Audio of Moe's Reading/Poem for Lynne Knight/The Poetic Character

Second Reading At Moe's Books in Berkeley

I really enjoyed reading (my second here) with Lynne Knight at Moe's in Berkeley March 25th. Check out the following link at which you can listen to us read. Click on "listen to Ed Coletti" and you'll first hear Owen Hill introduce me. Then I'll begin, and, I recommend, in the interest of time that you pull the button about a third of the way through the reading to where I really begin picking up some steam. Here's the link with photos, bios, and audio.

Poem For Lynne Knight

I don't recall whether or not I've previously shared this here.

After a Reading About Her Mother

It’s not that I hear my conscience chiding.
I do.
It’s not about all those times
people didn’t approach me after a reading.
It is.

Not that her time spent with her dying
demented mother wasn’t moving.
Not that the child in me is too shy
or that in her vulnerability
I see my ego wanting more
than she or I or any audience can deliver.

Her poetry has rocked me speechless.
I’m not ashamed that I have no words to give her
except some day this poem.

And if tonight that’s only self-importance
then at my next reading
when no one tells me that I’ve moved them
I’ll remember Lynne Knight and how not speaking to her
freed me from my greediness for praise.

The Poetical Character

"John Keats wrote that the poetical character 'is not itself— it has no self— it is every thing and nothing— It has no character— it enjoys light and shade; it lives in gusto, be it foul or fair, high or low, rich or poor, mean or elevated.' And thus 'a Poet is the most unpoetical of any thing in existence; because he has no Identity— he is continually in {forming} and filling some other Body.' " (Peter Ackroyd in Shakespeare: The Biography)

...A cardinal
Passes like a flying tulip, alights and nails the green day
Down...

(Phillip Schuyler in Hymn to Life)

2008 Marin Poetry Festival - May 14-18 - including May 18th reading by Robert Bly, Eavan Boland, and Jane Hirshfield at Dominican College in San Rafael.

Comment Here on any of the above or below and read
the comments of others too. Log in under "Name" or
"Anonymous" if you like, but please be sure to sign
some facsimile of your name. Actual name is best, but use
what you like. If you have any difficulty, email me at
edcoletti@sbcglobal.net.

Mom Died/2 Poems/6-Word Memoir

My Mom
Anna Cavellini
June 23, 1914 -
February 26, 2008

Heaven?


This weird wonderful
weaving lattice of illusions
simultaneously held and disregarded.

My sister believes my dear
demented mother left
for heaven sometime ago.

Simply put, Mom has gone
somewhere farther away
even than New York is

from San Francisco, some
where our mother attempts to
explain from an infinitely interesting

tower of tongues as though she were
the Oracle of Delphi at the last moments
providing wisdom to her children straining

to comprehend what wandering meanings
she finds for where she’s been when back
to time she journeys home to us.


Mother

Switch thrown
dawn engulfs
mom and me.

We both toddle
in unfamiliar recognition.

My mother knows she loves,
not why this love,

Her smile beatific
looks into me,
to know
something of
her longing.

When I attempt
to remind her,

this fascination
shatters to bewilderment,

“You mean
you came
through me?!”

Comment Here on any of the above or below and read
the comments of others too. Log in under
"Name" or "Anonymous" if you like, but please
be sure to sign some facsimile of your name. Actual name
is best, but use what you like. If you have difficulty,
email me at edcoletti@sbcglobal.net.

Six-Word Poetry Memoir

I was tagged by Don Wentworth of the Lilliput Review to participate in the Six-Word Poetry Memoir forwarded by World Class Poetry Blog.

The game is an interesting twist on a challenge Earnest Hemingway was once offered. He bet $10 that he could sum up his life story in six words. He wrote: For Sale: baby shoes, never worn.

Evidently, this was discovered by Bookbabie who originated the current meme.

I'm tagging anybody who reads this and linking to a few folks below. So, if you're reading this, consider participating.

Here's my own 6-word memoir.


"Less frightened than engaged, he lived."

Here are the rules:

• Write your own six word memoir
• Post it on your blog and include a visual illustration if you’d like
• Link to the person that tagged you in your post and to this original post if possible so we can track it as it travels across the blogosphere
• Tag five more blogs with links
• 
  

Don Wentworth and Lilliput Review

Big Bridge and Michael Rothenberg

Jim Spitzer's Art Gallery