Adventures Of Isabel

....
Isabel met a hideous giant,
Isabel continued self reliant.
The giant was hairy, the giant was horrid,
He had one eye in the middle of his forhead.
....

Ogden Nash should really be read aloud to fully appreciate his rhyming genius; dancing rhythm and word play that bring a deceptively light touch to what those inclined might call a feminist poem. The fairy tales that force girls into the role of victim are turned upside down; even the modern monster of a doctor attempting to psychologically infect our heroine with hypochondria is "calmly" dealt with. Poems with meaning don't have to be serious.

A Broken Appointment

You did not come,
And marching Time drew on, and wore me numb.
Yet less for loss of your dear presence there
Than that I thus found lacking in your make
....

We've all been there, waiting on someone who never showed. These days it wouldn't be the lack of presence so much as the lack of an explanatory text that would have our minds making presumptions, reading into and over-analysing past interactions, concluding they clearly have no feelings at all rather than considering the mundane options of no credit, dead battery, phone lost, stolen or simply left at home. Thomas Hardy was without such technology to consider but his plight, and his resulting judgement of a woman not present to defend herself, has not changed in two hundred years.

The Road Not Taken

....
I shall be telling this with a sigh
Somewhere ages and ages hence:
Two roads diverged in a wood, and I—
I took the one less traveled by,
....

I can rarely think of Bob Frost, or Walt Whitman, without recalling Roberto Benigni's character in Down By Law. Having been fortunate enough to have hiked around Robert Frost country, this poem has both a literal and metaphorical resonance for me. It can be read as a glass-half-empty or glass-half-full poem (is the sigh of regret or contentment?) but either way it is the road not taken that gets the title spot.

Young Me, Now Me

Find an old family photograph, dust it off and just imagine what you’d all look like were you to repeat the shot. My brother was well known for dropping his trousers whenever a camera pointed in his direction; his older self – retired professional, father of four with letters after his name – would be unlikely to even smile if I reminded him of his former cheeky escapades captured on camera all those years ago. He’d probably be arrested were he to repeat his earlier actions on the front lawn before horrified relatives, now aged, with less of a sense of humour than they had way back when.

Ze Frank posted an old pic of himself online with a second version taken years later and started a craze that ended up as this hilarious book, Young Me, Now Me. Featured are many original snapshots alongside a modern replica recreated as closely and faithfully as humanly possible. What was two cute kids licking lollipops is now two adults looking slightly ridiculous in the same pose. A ponytailed girl celebrated her birthday, grimacing, two fingers pulling her mouth apart, a silly hat on her wobbly head; fast forward twenty-five years to find that same person complete with party hat and oddly ugly grin, mouth held apart by older fingers. It’s an age thing: what is endearing in a person who only comes up to your knees becomes peculiar and very slightly strange in someone older, but obviously no wiser. It’s genius!

His Stillness

....
"There are things we can do which might give you time,
but we cannot cure you." My father said,
"Thank you." And he sat, motionless, alone,
with the dignity of a foreign leader.
....

This is one of the many poems Sharon Olds wrote about her father being diagnosed, treated for, and eventually dying from cancer. Though really what she is often writing about is seeing her father, and their relationship, with fresh eyes. Because he did not react as she expected him to - possibly wanted him to? - her paradigm shifts, her understanding of the past alters, her respect grows. As he is given notice of the imminent end to his mortality, so she is given the grace of his immortality within herself.

Early in the Morning

....
My mother combs,
pulls her hair back
tight, rolls it
around two fingers, pins it
....

I discovered Li-Young Lee through hearing an interview with him and being captivated by his voice and careful way of speaking. He struck me as someone who does not underestimate words. From an extraordinary life, rich with experience, he pulls quiet, observational poems, as with this one where the simple daily act of his mother tying back her hair in the morning is the pebble dropping into the still pool.

This Life

....
did he imagine that she would grieve
all her young life away tell everyone
this boy I kind of lived with last year
he died on account of me
....

A Grace Paley poem contemplating the suicide of a young man. How easy it is to have clear perspective from the outside and how hard from the centre of a maelstrom. We value so dearly that which we have to fight for, and resent those who devalue the same thing by throwing it away.