Letter Poems: An Exercise
Kwyjibo
Posts: 662
Write a poem in which a particular speaker who refers to him or herself as "I" is addressing a particular "you." The poem does not need to be an actual letter (it doesn't have to start out with "Dear X"), but since the speaker will be addressing the "you," the receiver of the poem, readers will feel as though they are overhearing the words. Give some thought to whom you want to talk to in the poem. It might be a stranger or a fictinaly character. It might be someon who's dead. It might be someone you know very weel, although in the poem you are of course free to say anything, not just what you would ordinarily say to that person. (The "letter" might be unmailable!)
Example:
The River-Merchant's Wife: A Letter by Li Po (eighth century)
(translated from French to English by Ezra Pound)
While my hair was still cut straight across my forehead
I played about the front gate, pulling flowers.
You came by on bamboo stilts, playing horse,
You walked about my seat, playing with blue plums.
And we went on living in the village of Chokan:
Two small people, without dislike or suspicion.
At fourteen I married My Lord you.
I never laughed, being bashful.
Lowering my head, I looked at the wall.
Called to, a thousand times, I never looked back.
At fifteen I stopped scowling,
I desired my dust to be mingled with yours
Forever and forever and forever.
Why should I climb the lookout?
At sixteen you departed,
You went into far Ku-to-en, by the river of swirling eddies,
And you have been gone five months.
The monkeys make sorrowful noise overhead.
You dragged your feet when you went out.
By the gate now, the moss is grown, the different mosses,
Too deep to clear them away!
The leaves fall early this autumn, in wind.
The paired butterflies are already yellow with August
Over the grass in the West garden;
They hurt me. I grow older.
If you are coming down through the narrows of the river Kiang,
Please let me know beforehand,
And I will come out to meet you
...As far as Cho-fo-Sa.
Li Po was a male and writing this poem in the voice of a young female.
I'll put mine up a little later after I think o' somethin' good.
Example:
The River-Merchant's Wife: A Letter by Li Po (eighth century)
(translated from French to English by Ezra Pound)
While my hair was still cut straight across my forehead
I played about the front gate, pulling flowers.
You came by on bamboo stilts, playing horse,
You walked about my seat, playing with blue plums.
And we went on living in the village of Chokan:
Two small people, without dislike or suspicion.
At fourteen I married My Lord you.
I never laughed, being bashful.
Lowering my head, I looked at the wall.
Called to, a thousand times, I never looked back.
At fifteen I stopped scowling,
I desired my dust to be mingled with yours
Forever and forever and forever.
Why should I climb the lookout?
At sixteen you departed,
You went into far Ku-to-en, by the river of swirling eddies,
And you have been gone five months.
The monkeys make sorrowful noise overhead.
You dragged your feet when you went out.
By the gate now, the moss is grown, the different mosses,
Too deep to clear them away!
The leaves fall early this autumn, in wind.
The paired butterflies are already yellow with August
Over the grass in the West garden;
They hurt me. I grow older.
If you are coming down through the narrows of the river Kiang,
Please let me know beforehand,
And I will come out to meet you
...As far as Cho-fo-Sa.
Li Po was a male and writing this poem in the voice of a young female.
I'll put mine up a little later after I think o' somethin' good.
The most remarkable thing about you standing in the doorway, is that its you, and that you're standing in the doorway.
I write down good reasons to freeze to death in my spiral ring notebook. But in the long tresses of your hair--I am a babbling brook.
I write down good reasons to freeze to death in my spiral ring notebook. But in the long tresses of your hair--I am a babbling brook.
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you've won again, it seems,
the curtain calls for you to bow,
the spotlight fits you well,
i talked to you just yesterday,
you said this might just work,
but now i know the flection,
it's like such a putrid smell,
you fooled me and you schooled me,
at such an early age,
you shot an apple from my head,
the stories you could tell.
i'll never tell a soul 'bout you,
your name will never spill,
except upon the storied tales,
conscripted in my hell.
As she slams the door in his drunken face
And now he stands outside
And all the neighbours start to gossip and drool
He cries oh, girl you must be mad,
What happened to the sweet love you and me had?
Against the door he leans and starts a scene,
And his tears fall and burn the garden green
I write down good reasons to freeze to death in my spiral ring notebook. But in the long tresses of your hair--I am a babbling brook.
very special coming from Kwyjibo
As she slams the door in his drunken face
And now he stands outside
And all the neighbours start to gossip and drool
He cries oh, girl you must be mad,
What happened to the sweet love you and me had?
Against the door he leans and starts a scene,
And his tears fall and burn the garden green
we spent together late last fall,
with the cotton floating from the trees
twisting like a hurricane around your slim frame.
I remember that very first night,
with our faces side by side
on the cool, dusty tile floor.
I watched your chest heave
up and down, and felt your body
shivering, and then I knew I loved you.
I feel like a stranger to you now.
It's been far too long, so I'm coming
to Oregon again, sometime this spring.
I will understand if you don't love me,
but I need to see you.
I write down good reasons to freeze to death in my spiral ring notebook. But in the long tresses of your hair--I am a babbling brook.
a latch-key boy with my latch-key
I gave you everything I had of value
including myself
your departure was like an amputation
and I slowly fell apart again
I love you more than earth's green bliss
and more than heaven's spin
your wistful looks and laboured laugh
make light of all that's dark
you are the antidote to wrong
and wrongly you're not mine
I love you longer than a sigh
and deeper than a love's pine....
I know you now - we speak in games
and you are older yet
but your love's not getting
easier to get.....
The risk I took was calculated, but man, am I bad at math - The Mincing Mockingbird
I write down good reasons to freeze to death in my spiral ring notebook. But in the long tresses of your hair--I am a babbling brook.
Letter To Kizer From Seattle
Dear Condor: Much thanks for that telephonic support
from North Carolina when I suddenly went ape
in the Iowa tulips. Lord, but I'm ashamed.
I was afraid, it seemed, according to the doctor
of impending success, winning some poetry prizes
or getting a wet kiss. The more popular I got,
the softer the soft cry in my head: Don't believe them.
You were never good. Then I broke and proved it.
Ten successive days I alienated women
I liked best. I told a coed why her poems were bad
(they weren't) and didn't understand a word I said.
Really warped. The phrase "I'll be all right"
came out too many unsolicited times. I'm o.k. now.
I'm back at the primal source of poems: wind, sea
and rain, the market and the salmon. Speaking
of the market, they're having a vital election here.
Save the market? Tear it down? The forces of evil
maintain they're trying to save it too, obscuring,
of course, the issue. The forces of righteousness,
me and my friends, are praying for a storm, one
of those grim dark rolling southwest downpours
that will leave the electorate sane. I'm the last poet
to teach the Roethke chair under Heilman.
He's retiring after 23 years. Most of the old gang
is gone. Sol Katz is aging. Who isn't? It's close now
to the end of summer and would you believe it
I've ignored the Blue Moon. I did go to White Center,
you know, my home town, and the people there,
many are the same, but also aging, balking, remarkably
polite and calm. A man whose name escapes me
said he thinks he had known me, the boy who went alone
to Longfellow Creek and who laughed and cried
for no reason. The city is huge, maybe three quarters
of a million and lots of crime. They are indicting
the former chief of police. Sorry to be so rambling.
I eat lunch with J. Hillis Miller, brilliant and nice
as they come, in the faculty club, overlooking the lake,
much of it now filled in. And I tour old haunts,
been twice to Kapowsin. One trout. One perch. One poem.
Take care, oh wisest of condors. Love. Dick. Thanks again.
Richard Hugo
I write down good reasons to freeze to death in my spiral ring notebook. But in the long tresses of your hair--I am a babbling brook.
I have two big hands, and a heart pumping blood,
and a 1967 colt .45 with a busted safety catch.
The world shines as i cross the Macon County line--
going to Georgia
The most remarkable thing
about you standing in the doorway,
is that it's you, and that you're standing in the doorway.
And you smile as you ease the gun from my hand,
and i'm frozen with joy right where i stand.
The world throws its light underneath your hair--
Forty miles from Atlanta--this is nowhere.
Going to Georgia
The world shines as i cross the macon county line
going to Georgia.
I write down good reasons to freeze to death in my spiral ring notebook. But in the long tresses of your hair--I am a babbling brook.
Dear diary, it's been just like a dream.
Woke up late. Wasn't where I should have been.
For goodness sake what's happening to me.
Write lightly, yours truly, dear diary.
It was cold outside my door.
So many people by the score.
Rushing around so senselessly.
They don't notice there's people like me.
Write lightly, yours truly, dear diary.
They don't know what they're playing.
They've no way of knowing what the game is.
Still they carry on doing what they can.
Outside me, yours truly, dear diary.
It's over. Will tomorrow be the same?
I know that they're really not to blame.
If they wern't so blind then surely they'd see.
There's a much better way for them to be.
Inside me, yours truly, dear diary.
...
Somebody exploded an H-bomb today.
But it wasn't anyone I knew.
An old wistful song by The Moody Blues, but it has aged well and has a beautiful melody.. that was the strength of the MB, the melody.
As she slams the door in his drunken face
And now he stands outside
And all the neighbours start to gossip and drool
He cries oh, girl you must be mad,
What happened to the sweet love you and me had?
Against the door he leans and starts a scene,
And his tears fall and burn the garden green
Then four years later I was in an Imax watching this amazing film on caves and spelunking and I Know You're Out There Somewhere started playing; it was pretty much the entire soundtrack of the film. I laughed. Yes, it's obviously their worst!)