Here and Now: Poems
Contents:
Is there any other way? Her definition is functional and empirical, passionate and subjective: How poetry creates the poetic state of mind in a reader is the central question of this book. It happens through the form of the poem, which guides the mind of a reader. It happens through leaps of association. And it happens as the poem explores and activates and plays with the nature of language itself. Poems exist to create a space for the possibilities of language as material.
That is what distinguishes them from all other forms of writing. Poems allow language its inherent provisionality, uncertainty, and slippages. They also give space for its physicality—the way it sounds, looks, feels in the mouth—to itself make meaning. And poems also remind us of something we almost always take for granted: The elusive, quick-silver, provisional nature of language is by necessity suppressed in ordinary conversation, as well as in most other writing.
What makes a poem different from any other use of language is that it remains the sole place designed expressly to make available those connections that are hidden when language is being used for another purpose. Language waits to be released in poetry. Poetry enacts the possibilities and powers that lie dormant in the nature of language itself. Poems are where contradictions and possibilities of the material of this meaning-making system are deliberately brought forth and celebrated, ultimately undistracted by any other overriding purpose. Unlike other forms of writing, poetry takes as its primary task to insist and depend upon and celebrate the troubled relation of the word to what it represents.
Poetry takes this inherent limitation of the material of language—that words are imprecise in their relation to whatever it is they all-too-imperfectly denote—and turns it into a place of communion.
Here’s To Right Now ~ Wedding Poem
Remarkably, impossibly, miraculously, we somehow manage to communicate and mean despite the imperfect instrument of language. In this way, the provisional, tenuous, exciting, fragile, imperfect, yet intensely pleasurable relationship of a poem to language, and to meaning, could be said to be a kind of metaphor for our own relation to language, the world, and each other.
There can be both sadness and joy in this recognition of the human condition. It could be said the relationship of poems to what we intuit but can never fully say makes them like prayer, that unending effort to bring someone closer to the divine, without pretending the divine could ever be fully known or understood. Electricity may start things, but if they're to last I've come to understand a steady, low-voltage hum of affection must be arrived at.
How else to offset the occasional slide into neglect and ill temper? I learned, in time, to let heaven go its mythy way, to never again be a supplicant of any single idea.
For you and me it's here and now from here on in. Nothing can save us, nor do we wish to be saved.
Let night come with its austere grandeur, ancient superstitions and fears. The title poem is the standout piece, but the opening poem, as well as several in the book's last section, resonate loudly soft like a force loosed with a small hesitation by an accomplished artist still a puzzle unto himself. Nov 06, Tyler Jones rated it it was amazing Shelves: Stephen Dunn never fails to impress me. His voice is so recognizably Stephen Dunn , and yet he has a real wide range.
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It's all in here and it's all unmistakably Stephen Dunn and I never get tired of it. On the contrary, I find each of his books better than the last. Then again, I'm probably his target audience; aging liberal male with a growing ball of indignation inside me. Mar 29, Micah McCarty rated it liked it. I am a super fan of Stephen Dunn's poetry.
He is the guy who got me into poetry in the first place he and Billy Collins anyway. My first two reads were collections of his best stuff, maybe that's why I found this book a bit lacking. There were some obvious gems. But as a whole I found it barely above average.
Here and Now: Poems by Stephen Dunn
I probably should have waited ten years for the gems to be picked out and put into a best of collection. Still good stuff, just not as good as I have come to expect from him. Apr 17, Ryan rated it liked it. I thought this one was good: Connubial Because with alarming accuracy she'd been identifying patterns I was unaware of--this tic, that tendency, like the way I've mastered the language of intimacy in order to conceal how I felt-- I knew I was in danger of being terribly misunderstood. Mar 21, Patricia rated it really liked it.
Stark, poignant poetry about relationships, love, loss, longing, unspoken thoughts and feelings, and the marginalized in society. Dec 16, Samantha rated it really liked it. Far better than Everything Else in the World. Dunn's language in these poems is simplistic and well-crafted. Some of the personas coming through are less than appealing, but the work itself is strong. Oct 05, Angelica rated it really liked it.
Here And Now - Poem by Stephen Dunn
Highlights of the collection for me: I can return to him again and again and again. Jul 16, James rated it really liked it Shelves: I am a huge fan of Stephen Dunn's poetry and this book is further evidence of his power with words.
While not as strong as his Pulitzer Prize-winning Different Hours, this is the voice of a strong, confident poet writing about life in all its beauty and mystery. Jun 14, Siel Ju rated it liked it. Lyric poems -- Themes include love esp. A solid collection, though it has some weaker sections.
Apr 19, Claire rated it really liked it Shelves: Jan 17, M.
Book Excerpt: 'Why Poetry'
Paul rated it liked it. Mar 06, Suzie rated it it was ok. Hmm, maybe I didn't choose the right Dunn collection with which to start.