Monday, April 27, 2009

I believe

I believe in true love.
I believe that no matter how hard someone tries, people cannot completely change. 
I believe we should follow our true calling. 

Wednesday, April 22, 2009

A Poem for the Soul

Vacation 
by Rita Dove
I love the hour before takeoff,
that stretch of no time, 
no home but the gray vinyl seats linked like unfolding paper dolls. 
Soon we shall be summoned to the gate,
soon enough there’ll be the clumsy procedure of row numbers 
and perforated stubs—but for now I can look at these ragtag nuclear families
with their cooing and bickering 
or the heeled bachelorette trying to ignore a baby’s wail
and the baby’s exhausted mother waiting to be called up early while the athlete,
one monstrous hand asleep on his duffel bag, listens,
perched like a seal trained for the plunge. 
Even the lone executive
who has wandered this far into summer 
with his lasered itinerary, briefcase
knocking his knees—even he 
has worked for the pleasure of bearing 
no more than a scrap of himself 
into this hall. He’ll dine out, she’ll sleep late, 
they’ll let the sun burn them happy all morning 
—a little hope, a little whimsy 
before the loudspeaker blurts 
and we leap up to become 
Flight 828, now boarding at Gate 17.


Both witty and truthful, this poem is one for the aware. I love it because when I am at an airport, I too think of the people; where they are going and what they act like always runs through my mind. It's a lot of fun, almost like playing a game with myself. Ms. Dove captures the essence of the human mind during a usually mundane situation. Vacation reminds us of the waiting before we can go and have fun and reminds us that everyone has somewhere to go and something to accomplish.

Tuesday, April 21, 2009

"It is difficult to get the news from poetry, yet men die miserably every day for lack of what is found there." - William Carlos Williams

In poetry, we know that the author is trying to show us something. However, we cannot find what that "something" is directly. We must search for what there is to find and in some cases one man can get different "news" than the other. 
Some people try so hard to find what is in poetry that they sometimes lose sight of the simple message. The harder they look into things, the less and less the message means. When searching,  a lesson can mean less and less but when man happens to come across it, it holds a whole new significance. It is like having an epiphany; one cannot search for it, but must let it come to him.