On Shakespeare's 460th Birthday...

...A Reflection on His Enduring Poetic Genius

by Julia Buckley

This month we appreciate those poetic voices that gave words staying power, words that burrowed inside us and found our hearts and souls. But rhyme and rhythm, those two companions that helped to give the words their gloss, remain a crucial part of poetry, and William Shakespeare must be acknowledged today as a poet, a genius of iambic pentameter who gave us the Elizabethan (or Shakespearean) sonnet and a multitude of poetic phrasings to live by.

The simple format of the Bard’s sonnet style was ABAB  CDCD EFEF  GG. Thus, you had alternating rhyming lines, grouped in quatrains, until the final two lines (thirteen and fourteen) when you created a rhyming couplet, and this became the “mic drop” of your whole poem.

Among the many ways one can celebrate poetry and Shakespeare this month is to write a sonnet, or many sonnets, and read them aloud, revelling in the rhythm, rhyme, and intelligent wording of the poem.

For example, if I were to be asked to write a sonnet about National Poetry Month, I might begin—

What poems bring to ev’ry human heart
Cannot be measured with a mortal tool
But must be calibrated as an art

That elevates the thinking of a fool.

For those interested in sonnets, there’s a lovely video on this Shakespearean site, along with links to all of Shakespeare’s sonnets.

You can explore his beautiful sonnets and poems in the sites above, but I want to mention one more aspect of his poetic gift: the way he brought his poetry into his drama. Many of Shakespeare’s plays were written in iambic pentameter (or partially so), but that lovely regular line rhythm isn’t always apparent because he wrote in Blank Verse (unrhymed iambic pentameter). His diction, though, is unmistakably poetic, and I’ll support this contention with some of my favorite examples.

First, which love sonnet is superior to the words spoken by Romeo when he realizes that what he felt for Rosaline was infatuation, but what he feels for Juliet is love. As with the sonnets, Shakespeare seeks a sublime image to demonstrate the transformative power of Romeo’s love. What better than the metaphor of light? When Romeo lays eyes upon his young love, he concludes:

O, she doth teach the torches to burn bright!
It seems she hangs upon the cheek of night
Like a rich jewel in an Ethiope’s ear;
Beauty too rich for use, for earth too dear!
So shows a snowy dove trooping with crows,
As yonder lady o’er her fellows shows.
The measure done, I’ll watch her place of stand,
And, touching hers, make blessed my rude hand.
Did my heart love till now? forswear it, sight!

For I ne’er saw true beauty til this night.

--Romeo and Juliet, Act I, Scene 5

It amazes me each time I read it that Shakespeare had so much insight into every aspect of the human condition, including the overwhelming sensations of love. Romeo felt such love and such awe at her beauty that light itself could not compare to her. Shakespeare lifted the notion of love to the sublime, the eternal, and thus made it profound.

Emily Dickinson once explained the essence of poetry in a letter, saying,

“If I read a book and it makes my whole body so cold no fire can warm me, I know that is poetry. If I feel physically as if the top of my head were taken off, I know that is poetry. These are the only way I know it. Is there any other way?”                         ( L342a, 1870)

I like to use Dickinson’s method of determining what is poetic because it is the words that elicit a physical reaction that have already made it into our consciousness. Her “top of the head” feeling comes to me often when I read William Shakespeare, or the Romantic poets, or Emily Dickinson!  So all of my excerpts here are lines that moved me to a state of awe.

The poetry in Shakespeare’s plays gives them their staying power (401 years since his death), and there are so many other beautiful poetic moments:

Prospero the magician, in The Tempest, after giving up his power, and determining in an existential speech that “We are such stuff as dreams are made on.”

Or Macbeth, forced to sacrifice his selfish dream, his kingdom, and probably his life, concluding, “I ‘gin to be aweary of the sun.”

Or his wife, Lady Macbeth, plagued by horrible dreams and heavy guilt, murmuring “Hell is murky . . . “

Or Old King Lear, lamenting, “How sharper than a serpent’s tooth is a thankless child.”

Such powerful, poetic language cannot help but live on. Note the use of metaphor, simile, allusion, alliteration, personification, and other poetic devices in the quotes above that elevate the words to poetic status even without the use of rhyme.

Entire books have been written about Shakespeare’s poetic genius, and I have only made a clumsy foray into his talent. I hope, though, that these examples will send you to his works to reclaim your own favorites by this great poet who remains a gift to literature and mankind.

 

Julia Buckley is a Chicago-area writer. 

She taught high school English at an all-girls school for more than thirty years, and she considered the teaching of Shakespeare’s works an honor and a true joy. 

She has published several mystery series, including the bestselling Writer’s Apprentice series. 

She lives in the suburbs with her husband, within driving distance of her two sons.
 

 

Today is Earth Day

Earth Day

by Jane Yolen

I am the Earth

And the Earth is me.

Each blade of grass,

Each honey tree,

Each bit of mud,

And stick and stone

Is blood and muscle,

Skin and bone.

And just as I

Need every bit

Of me to make

My body fit,

So Earth needs

Grass and stone and tree

And things that grow here

Naturally.

That’s why we

Celebrate this day.

That’s why across

The world we say: 

As long as life,

As dear, as free,

I am the Earth

And the Earth is me. 

From The Three Bears Holiday Rhyme Book. Copyright © 1995 by Jane Yolen.

Funny Friday - The O.G. Poet

 Foxtrot by Bill Amend

Originally published May 17, 2017

Thursday

Thursday

 

 And if I loved you Wednesday,

   Well, what is that to you?

I do not love you Thursday—

   So much is true.

And why you come complaining

   Is more than I can see.

I loved you Wednesday,—yes—but what

   Is that to me?

by Edna St. Vincent Millay

Jabberwocky By Lewis Carroll - Read by Benedict Cumberbatch

Almost every year, I share a video of Jabberwocky, which just happens to be one of my favorite poems.  

Here, for your enjoyment, is one of my favorite actors reading it.

Monday Morning

WriWritten and performed by Twin Poets Al Mills and  Nnamdi O. Chukwuocha.

Talking about poetry

A guest blog by Kaye Wilkinson Barley.

A few years back I came across a question a Facebook friend had posted pondering why weren't people writing poetry anymore?

Turns out this person had not read any poetry since their days in school when forced to memorize a poem from the book 101 Famous Poems compiled by Roy J. Cook (in print since 1916).

The answer to the question is, of course, yes there are, indeed, many more poets than the long honored Dickinson, Frost, Shakespeare, Poe, Whitman, Shelley, and Tennyson.

Modern poets being read and recognized more recently include the well-known Mary Oliver, Wendell Berry, Billy Collins, Elizabeth Bishop, Maya Angelou . . . the list is long.  Here's BookRiot.com's list of Best Modern Poets, which is short compared to the many poets who have work out there waiting for you to find.

Contemporary poets known for writing some fierce social commentary would include Kim Addonizio, Aja Monet, Louise Glück . . . again, the list is long and worth your research time.

And, then there are the poets writing today who may not be as well-known but might, some day in the future, be in a new version of 101 Famous Poems:  Leslé Honoré, Tara M. Stringfellow, Tarriona "Tank" Ball , along with this list of poetry books LitHub.com says you should be reading right now.

And finally, i apologize to those of you who are wondering how on earth I might have forgotten to include your own personal fave. It may be due to concerns of intruding into Marlyn's space. Or, I truly may have forgotten. OR, your fave may be someone I haven't discovered yet!

However, for several years, I have randomly posted poems that have somehow found their way to me at my blog. I dedicate the month of April to posting poetry. I hope you'll join me.

This might be the spot where I can tell you that a favorite place of mine to find new poets (along with writers, musicians, photographers, artists, etc.) is The Bitter Southerner, one of the best on-line magazines available today.

Thank you, Marlyn, for inviting me to write about a subject dear to my hear!

P. S.  -   

I recommend reading this essay by Courtney Emerson where she discusses elements of poetry which distinguish it from other forms of writing, and the importance it has played in society throughout history, i.e.,  .  . . ."with poets using their words to confront social and political issues."

Kaye lives with Don, her husband of 38 years, 

in the North Carolina mountains 

along with their Corgi, Annabelle. 

You can find Kaye's blog here.