by Richard Subber | Dec 28, 2023 | Language, Poetry, Reviews of other poets
Poetry alive!
As I write my kind of poetry, it happens often that a creative way is to imbue the inanimate things with human attributes, to hear the stones weeping, to believe that the owl called to me…
I find vivid elements in otherwise tolerable poems by other poets, including many whose names you and I know, and including others whose obscurity may not be fully deserved.
By chance I read “Hermes of the Ways” by Hilda “H. D.” Doolittle (1886-1961). In pre-WWI London, she joined Ezra Pound and Richard Aldington to form the original Imagist trio of poets. I am not visibly quivering to read more of her work but I offer here brief praise for her formulation, thus:
“…Apples on the small trees
Are hard,
Too small,
Too late ripened
By a desperate sun…”
Her casual introduction of an unsuccessful sun invites the reader to take a bite, nevertheless, and chew on the douleur of that big yellow thing in the sky…
“Hermes of the Ways” by Hilda Doolittle, published in Vol. 1, No. 5, of Des Imagistes, February 1914, as posted online on November 13, 2016, at Poets.org
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Book review. Copyright © Richard Carl Subber 2023 All rights reserved.
Home Team: Poems About Baseball (book review)
Edwin Romond hits another homer…
Above all: Poems of dawn and more with 73 free verse poems,
and the rest of my poetry books are for sale on Amazon (paperback and Kindle)
and free in Kindle Unlimited, search Amazon for “Richard Carl Subber”
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by Richard Subber | Dec 26, 2023 | Human Nature, My poetry, Poetry
…Becky and the baby are waiting…
A man’s job
I won’t sell my trees.
The balsams would go quickly
at “cut your own” prices,
but I tell my neighbors, again this year,
there will be no cutting
on this old slope that spills down
to my little barn.
Day is darkening,
and I move among my trees.
This one, bent and broken
in last winter’s snows,
has grown,
the birds of spring may nest
in its green spaces…
and now, from below,
the boy climbs to me, his head down,
his father’s axe in hand,
he has changed since his father died,
he tries to do a man’s work,
he will have little time
for baseball with the other boys.
“I told Momma I would find a tree,
to make a Christmas for Becky and the baby.”
So.
He holds his axe in both hands,
and he stands straight in my field.
I extend my arm.
“Go find a good one,
I can help you carry it home.”
December 1, 2018
My poem “A man’s job” was published in my third collection of 64 poems, In other words: Poems for your eyes and ears. You can buy it on Amazon (paperback and Kindle), or get it free in Kindle Unlimited, click here
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My poetry. Copyright © Richard Carl Subber 2023 All rights reserved.
Book review: Shakespeare’s Wife
Germaine Greer went overboard a bit…
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My first name was rain: A dreamery of poems with 53 free verse and haiku poems,
and the rest of my poetry books are for sale on Amazon (paperback and Kindle)
and free in Kindle Unlimited, search Amazon for “Richard Carl Subber”
Your comments are welcome—tell me what you’re thinking.
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by Richard Subber | Dec 25, 2023 | My poetry, Poetry
wrapping in the dark hours…
Santa’s helpers
Bows and ribbons all around,
we’re on the floor
wrapping in the dark hours,
and we unwrap our hearts
and share great gifts,
again and again.
December 25, 2022
Inspired by “Every Christmas Eve” by Rosemerry Wahtola Trommer, December 25, 2022, on her website, www.ahundredfallingveils.com
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My poetry. Copyright © Richard Carl Subber 2024 All rights reserved.
Book review: Tales from Shakespeare
summaries by Charles and Mary Lamb…
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Above all: Poems of dawn and more with 73 free verse poems,
and the rest of my poetry books are for sale on Amazon (paperback and Kindle)
and free in Kindle Unlimited, search Amazon for “Richard Carl Subber”
Your comments are welcome—tell me what you’re thinking.
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by Richard Subber | Dec 24, 2023 | American history, Book reviews, Books, History
strange men are shooting…
Book review:
The Diary of a Lady of Gettysburg, Pennsylvania
From June 15 to July 15, 1863
by Pennsylvania Lady of Gettysburg
Ithaca, NY: The Cornell University Library Digital Collections, 2023
29 pages
There is not much fireworks in The Diary of a Lady of Gettysburg, Pennsylvania.
Rather, this largely muted account of a civilian lady in Gettysburg during the famous battle is a compelling tribute to the civilians and combatants who unhappily endured the terrible fighting and killing that could have effectively ended the American Civil War, but didn’t.
A devastating insight into the civilians’ stress and suffering is this: during most of the battle, they really didn’t know very much about what was going on. The civilians who stayed in the town (most of them) repeatedly hunkered down in their cellars and waited until the artillery bombardments ceased. The civilians repeatedly talked with both Union and Confederate soldiers who were in or moving through the town. The civilians, in the main, tried to care for the wounded men of both sides who happened to be nearby.
The battle of Gettysburg was terrifying for the civilian residents of the town, and, luckily for them, it didn’t last too long.
Try to imagine hiding in your house for four or five days, desperately wondering what’s going on, while strange men are walking and running through the streets, shooting at everything, and cannon balls are hitting buildings every so often.
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Book review. Copyright © Richard Carl Subber 2023 All rights reserved.
Book review: The Sea Runners
…it informs, it does not soar…
by Ivan Doig
Above all: Poems of dawn and more with 73 free verse poems,
and the rest of my poetry books are for sale on Amazon (paperback and Kindle)
and free in Kindle Unlimited, search Amazon for “Richard Carl Subber”
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by Richard Subber | Dec 21, 2023 | Human Nature, Tidbits
folly and stuff…
“Answer not a fool according to his folly”
Proverbs 26:4, King James Version
Don’t always say what you’re thinking…
…think about what you’re saying.
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Copyright © Richard Carl Subber 2023 All rights reserved.
Book review: The Proud Tower
…a lot more than a history book…
by Barbara Tuchman
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Writing Rainbows: Poems for Grown-Ups with 59 free verse and haiku poems,
and the rest of my poetry books are for sale on Amazon (paperback and Kindle)
and free in Kindle Unlimited, search Amazon for “Richard Carl Subber”
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