A Month of Poems: Day 1 - Sappho

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A Month of Poems Day 1 - Sappho From Bob Holman & Margery Snyder, your Guide to Poetry Welcome to A Month of Poems! We'll begin your 30-day sojourn around the world in poems with Sappho, the legendary lyric poet of ancient Greece. Her poems were so universally admired that she was called “the poetess” (as Homer was “the poet”), and Plato suggested she should be honored as one of the Muses, more than human, a goddess of poetry. "Hymn to Aphrodite" The “Hymn to Aphrodite,” also known as “Fragment One,” is the only one of Sappho’s poems that has survived to our day in its entirety—because it was quoted in full in the work of a later Roman admirer, the orator Dionysus. It is a prayer to the goddess of love, pleading for divine intervention to inspire passion in the heart of the poet’s unrequited love. For further reading: Profile of Sappho Her life, her legend, her poetry, and links to buy her books in English translation. This email is written by: Bob Holman & Margery Snyder Poetry Guide Email Me | My Blog | My Forum   Missing a lesson? Click here. About U. is our collection of free online courses designed to help you learn a new skill, solve a problem, get something done, or just learn more about your world. Sign up now, and we will email you lessons on a daily or weekly basis. You are receiving this email because you subscribed to the About.com 'A Month of Poems' email. If you wish to unsubscribe, please click here. About respects your privacy: Our Privacy Policy Contact Information: 249 West 17th Street New York, NY, 10011 © 2010 About.com   Advertisement

[Poetry Chaikhana] D. H. Lawrence - Song of a Man Who Has Come Through

Here's your Daily Poem from the Poetry Chaikhana --

 

Song of a Man Who Has Come Through By D. H. Lawrence (1885 - 1930)   Not I, not I, but the wind that blows through me! A fine wind is blowing the new direction of Time. If only I let it bear me, carry me, if only it carry me! If only I am sensitive, subtle, oh, delicate, a winged gift! If only, most lovely of all, I yield myself and am borrowed By the fine, fine, wind that takes its course through the chaos of the world Like a fine, an exquisite chisel, a wedge-blade inserted; If only I am keen and hard like the sheer tip of a wedge Driven by invisible blows, The rock will split, we shall come at the wonder, we shall find the Hesperides. Oh, for the wonder that bubbles into my soul, I would be a good fountain, a good well-head, Would blur no whisper, spoil no expression. What is the knocking? What is the knocking at the door in the night? It is somebody wants to do us harm. No, no, it is the three strange angels. Admit them, admit them.   -- from The Complete Poems of D. H. Lawrence, by D. H. Lawrence Amazon.com / Photo by AleBonvini /

============ Thought for the Day: Language is the first tool wielded and the last chain escaped. ============

Here's your Daily Music selection -- Tina Malia & Shimshai Jaya Bhagavan Listen - Purchase More Music Selections

 

Hi Omss -

I won't say much. It's a quiet Monday morning, a time for few words and just a taste of wonder...

Not I, not I, but the wind that blows through me!

I love this opening line. Have you ever noticed how wearying personal will is? Eventually everything feels like a dead effort. But when we learn the magician's trick of yielding, of letting the currents of life flow through us, delight pours through us with such surprising ease and actions form into unexpected success.

Oh, for the wonder that bubbles into my soul,
I would be a good fountain, a good well-head,
Would blur no whisper, spoil no expression.

And if you hear someone knocking, don't fear harm. Peep through the keyhole. It might just be three strangers in angel shape.

Admit them, admit them.

Carried by the course of the wind, we find we have come through...

Have a beautiful day!

Ivan


PS- Thank you for the several kind and concerned messages over the weekend. Sending much love to everyone!

 

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