7/28/12 Poet of the Day - John Donne

Donne, John (1572-1631), English poet, prose writer, and clergyman, considered the greatest of the metaphysical poets and one of the greatest writers of love poetry.

Although he was known for love poems and devotional poems, this brief one of his struck me recently as a succinct definition of futility almost flippant in its simplicity:

A Burnt Ship

Out of a fired ship, which by no way
But drowning could be rescued from the flame,
Some men leap'd forth, and ever as they came
Near the foes' ships, did by their shot decay;
So all were lost, which in the ship were found,
They in the sea being burnt, they in the burnt ship drown'd.

o_O

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A place too dirty, damp and dank...

Here is a poem I wrote a few years back to memorialize a very poorly managed and seedy local laundromat I was forced to frequent:

A place too dirty damp and dank
For people of high moral rank

A place like a dirty restroom stall,
A place where moths and roaches crawl,

A place lit by fluorescent light-
A place that prompts instinctive flight

It’s filth belies its purpose fair:
To keep unspotted what you wear

The shiny neon lights don’t hide
The fact that they have little pride, who

Own this pit, this den, this cave
Which would disgrace the foulest knave

Who dared to set his feet beyond
The door, of this slough of despond

Alas I must now end this rhyme
To complete it would take too much time

But before I depart I beg of thee
That someone would destroy the key

That opens the door to this cursed place
This blight upon the human race

This shack which does disgrace the name
Of Laundromat- and brings it shame

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7/26/2012 Poet of the day: William Cowper

Cowper, William (1731-1800), Was an English poet, who wrote about simple pleasures of country life and expressed a deep concern with human cruelty and suffering. He suffered periods of acute depression. He spent time in an asylum but composing poetry helped him to recover. 

He is perhaps best known for his poem "The Castaway" using a man washed overboard in a storm as a metaphor for his own depression:

 OBSCUREST night involv'd the sky,
     Th' Atlantic billows roar'd,
When such a destin'd wretch as I,
     Wash'd headlong from on board,
Of friends, of hope, of all bereft,
His floating home for ever left. 
 
 He makes it clear what he means in the final verse:

No voice divine the storm allay'd,
     No light propitious shone;
When, snatch'd from all effectual aid,
     We perish'd, each alone:
But I beneath a rougher sea,
And whelm'd in deeper gulphs than he.

The often quoted line "Variety is the spice of life" was written by Cowper as part of a large 6 book poetic series entitled "The Task."

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