poetry hut

Poem of the Week, by Gunter Grass

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If you’re interested in taking one of my one-day creative writing workshops this fall, you can check them out here.

It’s busy here at poetry hut central. Poems are disappearing at a rapid clip and we have to keep up, printing, scrolling and rubber banding new ones while bingeing shows. When I’m on the porch, which is most of the time, I love to see passersby stop and choose a poem, read it, put it in their pocket.

A few fun facts about operating a poetry hut:

1) People greatly prefer poems printed on neon paper. Violent pink and intense teal are always the first to go.

2) People do not like yellow poems. Yellow poems are always the last to go.

3) Some people read their poem, then carefully scroll it up, replace the rubber band, and put it back in the hut. For some reason this goes straight to my heart.

4) Over the years, a wood engraver has left limited edition prints of their gorgeous, intricate, otherworldly work as gifts. Maybe an art-to-art exchange? We save every one and my daughter framed several. One of these days I’ll spot the artist in the act, but no luck yet.

5) Some passersby leave poems of their own making, written on the scrap paper we leave in the hut. Others write down their own favorite poems, ones they must have memorized, like the beautiful poem below that I found a few minutes ago when I returned from a run (okay fine, slow jog).

The world feels so lonely sometimes, but not always.

Happiness, by Günter Grass

An empty bus
hurtles through the starry night.
Perhaps the driver is singing
and is happy because he sings.

For more information about Günter Grass, please click here.
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Poem of the Week, by Edgar Allen Poe

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Poetry hut Poe fanI found this note in my poetry hut the other day (the poetry public is more demanding than you’d think), went straight to my computer, dug out my favorite Poe poem, printed it out, and stuck it in the poetry hut with a note that read “For the Poe fan!”

Next day, it was gone.

 

 

A Dream Within a Dream
– Edgar Allan Poe

Take this kiss upon the brow!
And, in parting from you now,
Thus much let me avow:
You are not wrong who deem
That my days have been a dream;
Yet if hope has flown away
In a night, or in a day,
In a vision, or in none,
Is it therefore the less gone?
All that we see or seem
Is but a dream within a dream.

I stand amid the roar
Of a surf-tormented shore,
And I hold within my hand
Grains of the golden sand–
How few! yet how they creep
Through my fingers to the deep,
While I weep–while I weep!
O God! can I not grasp
Them with a tighter clasp?
O God! can I not save
One from the pitiless wave?
Is all that we see or seem
But a dream within a dream?

 

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For more about Edgar Allan Poe, click here.

Poem of the Week, by Galway Kinnell

Posted on by alisonmcghee

The other day in my poetry hut, where people sometimes leave little poems as well as taking them away, I found this tiny poem penned out on a piece of scrap paper. Galway Kinnell, who died last year, was one of my favorite poets; I always sort of had a crush on him, based solely on his photo and a few of his poems. The poem below fits my definition of a prayer. Also, how often do you get to say the word “is” three times in a row?

Prayer

Whatever happens. Whatever
what is is is what
I want. Only that. But that.

—
For more information on Galway Kinnell, please click here: here.
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The Poetry Hut

Posted on by alisonmcghee

How to Make a Poetry Hut

First, read through some of the thousands of poems you’ve copied down over the years. Do not be surprised when you end up spending the entire morning doing this.

Find this one, by Hafiz:

With that Moon Language

Admit something:
Everyone you see, you say to them, “Love me.”
Of course you do not do this out loud,
otherwise someone would call the cops.
Still, though, think about this, this great pull in us to connect.

Why not become the one who lives with a full moon in each eye
that is always saying,
with that sweet moon language,
what every other eye in this world
is dying to hear?

Think about it, that great pull to connect. Think about how the longer you live, the more your life winnows itself down to wanting only that. Only connection. How it happens more intensely now, maybe because when you feel that pull toward someone, you don’t try to hide it. You talk, you listen, you touch. You don’t hold back.

Decide then and there to build a poetry hut. Ask your handyman friend Doug to build one for you. Laugh when he says, “I would consider it a public service, Alison.”

Paint the poetry hut when Doug delivers it. Dig a hole in your front yard with a spade, and when the hole gets too deep to lift the dirt out, kneel down and dig it out with your hands. Dig it as deep as your arms are long. Be glad that you manage to avoid utility wires and pipes.

Nail the hut to a 4×4 post. Heave the whole thing, hut and post, into the hole. Tilt it this way and that until it’s straight. Or straight enough.

Go buy some Quik-crete. Pour it into the red pail in the basement. Add some water. Stir it up immediately  with a spoon. As soon as it’s mixed, scrape it into the post hole and mound it around the post.

Go to Hunt ‘n Gather and wander around the clutter of rooms until you find enough old children’s blocks to spell out P O E M S. Go to Bryant Hardware and buy some blue putty, the kind used to stick posters to walls. Stick a blob of blue putty on the back of each letter block and then press the puttied blocks onto the front of the poetry hut.

Go back to your labyrinth of poetry, found everywhere in your house: in books, on scraps of paper, in your computer, in your heart.

Choose a few of your favorites and jigsaw-puzzle them into a columned file labeled Poetry Hut Poems. Print them out on colored paper. Scissor them apart.

Roll them up like tiny scrolls, offerings to the gods, and tie them with scraps of ribbon. Put them in a basket. Make a sign that says “Help yourself to a poem” and put the basket and the sign in the poetry hut.

Peer into the hut every day or so. Realize that 10-15 poems are disappearing per day. Replenish the basket when the supply dwindles. Be surprised and happy when small notes start appearing in the poetry hut, thank-you’s and smiley faces and even a “Haiku 4 U.”

Watch unseen from your porch as a woman with long burnished hair walks by with her dog, stops, opens the poetry hut door, selects a poem, unscrolls it, reads it, shakes her head and smiles, puts the poem in her back pocket.

Keep thinking about it, this great pull in us, to connect.