Friday, October 14, 2011

WHAT STAYS WITH YOU LATEST AND DEEPEST?

This week I read UNBROKEN by Laura Hillenbrand.


It's an excellent book, and as is often the case with excellent books, I found poetry in those pages -- starting with the epigraph that opens the book, which is taken from an actual poem:

What stays with you latest and deepest? of curious panics,
Of hard-fought engagements or sieges tremendous what deepest remains?

- Walt Whitman, “The Wound-Dresser”

(complete poem here)

It's a great question, isn't it?

I think every poem we write should answer that question.


For more poetic thoughts and verse, visit Poetry Friday Roundup with David at FOMOGRAMS.

3 comments:

  1. Ah. The thorny unanswered queries about that which is deep, tremendous - those 'hard-fought engagements' - I suddenly missed Whitman. I should look for 'leaves of grass' in my disorganized bookshelves.

    This has made me pensive this evening. :)

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  2. Wow - I'd forgotten about that poem, Irene - it's a real heart-breaker. I assume it's from when he tended soldiers during the Civil War...?

    Well, I'm with you - this is a good question to ask, even if we can't always put our fingers on the answer.

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  3. I wish I could banish forever some of my "curious panics" and "sieges tremendous" that haunt me and come back to undermine my confidence. But I suppose that they are part of what makes me ME and I should embrace, rather than banish them. Still...

    (thanks for making me think and wonder!)

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