Poetry Friday: Inspired by Poet Laureate Arthur Sze

The Tree of Life

February's challenge was to write a poem inspired by/in conversation with a poem by the new Poet Laureate of the U.S., Arthur Sze.  I first found him via a podcast transcript, which featured Sze in an interview for Poetry Magazine's 110th anniversary. In it was this gem:

Sze introduces the ancient Sanskrit idea of Indra's net: Everything that happens in the cosmos is like a crystal. If you imagine the cosmos as an immense chandelier and shine light into it, each hanging jewel reflects and absorbs the light of every other. “That’s one of the things poetry does,” Sze says. “We’re not writing in competition—we’re all trying to create poems, and they’re all shining light on each other."

Wow. Each poem, shining a light on the other.  That's what the Poetry Sisters are all about. 

Next, I went in search of some of his poetry. I admit to not knowing much about his work, even though he's been around for decades, writing reams of poetry. So this article (Selections) was helpful in narrowing the field.  In it, I learned about Sze's translation of Chinese poetry, and his even wider interest in the struggle of every poet to "translate life to the page."  The poem given as an example of this struggle was  "Pe‘ahi Light," which I read, and fell hard for these lines:

Drizzle, rain, downpour—

I have no words for these kinds of rain;

I mark a conch shell doorstop, a dictionary

of etymology: rain, from Old English,

regn—a frond emerges out of the dark—

rain stops, water beads at the tips of ferns.

Words. Where they come from. What they say. What they can't say. I thought I could write a poem in response to that. 

No Words

ache, pain, sting—

I have no words for these kinds of pain

bite, gnaw, twist, rip—

words caught in teeth, as if we must feed

on this pain we have no words for

burn, spasm, catch—

words of unregulated jerking, as if our hearts

cannot steady this pain we have no words for—

but maybe no one does—

for in my dictionary, pain roots 

from the Latin poena:

penalty, cost, fine—

it is that which is taken,

like a pound of flesh

hence, the chart with grimacing faces 

or the numbers by which we rank

sensation, moving pain away 

from words, which are, at base, 

untranslatable from the body

which only knows how 

to bead and quiver

in the light that shines

on all the others,

giving words to

no words 

---Sara Lewis Holmes (all rights reserved) 

My poetry sisters all picked different poems by Sze to respond to. You can find them here:

Liz

Tricia

Laura

Mary Lee

Tanita

Poetry Friday is hosted today by Margaret Simon.