Thursday, June 29

Poetry Thursday: Leonard Cohen, W.S.Merwin & Linda McCarriston

Poetry Thursday ... today, Thursday, has been so busy for me with work that I haven't had time to really sit down and make a proper poetry post. Instead I am linking to my sunday post (with an awesome poem by Linda McCarriston) and to my photoblog, where I posted another wonderful poem by W.S.Merwin that I love) ... so please click the link to Sunday's post, Healing the Mare or my photoblog post at Land of Little Rain, for my Poetry Thursday contributions.



Ah, and as an extra bonus, I also wanted to tell you about a wonderful interview of another master of song, lyric and poetry, Leonard Cohen.

A friend sent me a note telling me about the PBS News broadcast tonight -- Leonard Cohen was being interviewed. He has been in my , oh, top three singer/songwriter/poets/lyricists forever ... as long as I can remember. so of course, I wanted to watch the interview. We missed it on tv (not being tuned into tv the way I am) but I am listening to the interview online. Here's the link


I have been thinking off and on, about the Poetry Thursday prompt a couple of weeks ago, to read a poem aloud, or consider the spoken word when writing a poem and how that might or might not change how we understand a poem, or write.... and when I heard Leonard Cohen talking about how a poem's mood can be entirely different depending on who is reading it aloud, and how that person is feeling just before reading, or during the reading .... I thought I'd like to share what he said with the other Poetry thursday contributors.

When asked, "What's the difference between writing a poem and a song?" Cohen replied:

A poem has a different time. For instance, a poem is a very private experience and it doesn't have a driving tempo - in other words, you can go back and forward, you can come back, you can linger. it's a completely different time reference. Whereas a song, you've got a tempo - you've got something that is moving swiftly, you can't stop it. And it's designed to move swiftly from mouth to mouth, heart to heart where a poem really speaks to something that has not itme, and that is a completely different perception.

He also said, "The tempo of a poem "migrates" depending on the mood of the reader."


I wrote this blog post for Poetry Thursday. Check out other poetry posts for this week by clicking this button:

1 Comment:

Unknown said...

Hi-just found your pages. I've especially loved Merwin's work, including short stories, autobiography, for some time.

Your photos also quite wonderful! (I like drawing, graphics, and my brother used to teach photography to adults in the summers, though I'm only a snapshot taker myself.)

- Jenell