This week: Vacationing Poetry Edited by: fyn  
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The real voyage of discovery consists not in seeking new landscapes, but in having new eyes.~~Marcel Proust
The travel writer seeks the world we have lost - the lost valleys of the imagination.~~Alexander Cockburn
The use of traveling is to regulate imagination by reality, and instead of thinking how things may be, to see them as they are.~~Samuel Johnson
It is not down in any map; true places never are.~~Herman Melville
It is good to have an end to journey towards; but it is the journey that matters, in the end.~~Ursula K. Le Guin
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Sometimes, people get so lost 'in' the vacation: running around, touring, seeing 'everything' that they miss out on opportunities to just see! Pictures are awesome to refer back to, but the more I travel, the more I've learned to take the time to write while I'm there--wherever the 'there' might be. The images, the import, the now-ness can get lost in the shuffle if you write about it later or, do not take notes. Writing down impressions or feelings of the moment at least helps keep that immediacy, that 'feel' of being there, even if the finished poem doesn't erupt until you are back home. Keeping track of initial impressions may lead to other thoughts that might require a bit more of an in-depth look which is far easier when you are still 'there' rather than relying on a search engine and what others thought after you are back home.
Travel poetry is fun because it gives your reader an insider's peek into what impacted you. When my hubby and I were first going to Hawaii three trips ago, I wasn't drawn to the island of Maui. We went to Oahu, Maui, and the Big Island. I included Maui because of a poem I'd read about that tweaked my curiosity in a way the travel sites simply had not. Maui, it turns out, was my favorite for a multitude of different reasons. Still is, three trips later.
Clearly, the timing of this newsletter has much to do, on my part, in the recent fires and devastation of Lahaina. The town is just gone. Well, the buildings are. Many people are. And yet, I know, clear through, that those remaining will bring back Lahaina because it is just who they are. The tree in the middle of town will come back and once again her leaves will shade the park in the middle of town. Once again it will be the place to find, catch up with, and talk story to under its spreading boughs.
And I find myself regretting that I never wrote that poem I was messing with in my head about the guy on the dock, or that old couple in that one store who beamed at each other or the children laughing under the banyan tree. Why didn't I take the time to write of the carver who, over several weeks freed the honu and the whale from the pieces of teak? Moments missed, uncaptured. And now would be colored by recent events. Yes, I wrote while there, should have written more.
Beyond mere memory, writing while off on vacation tends to make one look deeper into their surroundings, be more observant, and see more than the view through the camera's lens.
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|  | Northwoods Summer (E)
SLAM!ME Round 11 Entry - about a vacation cabin in the Northwoods of Wisconsin
#452627 by Sophy  |
| | | Ka Mua (E)
First...new beginning which can only invite seconds
#2115708 by fyn |
| | | Wa'a (E)
Early morning on a misty lake (In Hawaiian, "wa'a" is an outrigger canoe)
#2235717 by Emily  |
| | | kilauea (E)
Extraordinary once-in-a-lifetime adventure made better by thoughts of companionship.
#1000661 by BeHereBook  |
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Beholden   comments: I think it was CS Lewis who said that those who are trying to make a heaven on earth are making a hell of it. And the clue to the "importance" or otherwise of the poem is in your description of its content. The very fact that it's concerned with being politically correct makes me certain that it's not important (or probably worth classifying as poetry at all). But that's my opinion only and there may be huge numbers of people who disagree.
Which makes it clear that what really matters about poetry is always the "who" of it and not the "importance." What I consider great poetry might be scorned by others. So how are we to decide what is good poetry and what isn't? Democracy doesn't work in this case but time does. Ultimately, it's only time that decides what shall be remembered and what forgotten.
And that doesn't help at all in judging poetry produced in our own age - we can't wait a hundred years or so to see what survives. If we leave it at "we can all decide for ourselves," we still have no useful yardstick for deciding good and bad. Leave it up to the critics, those self-appointed "experts," and we have a situation like today where the good is ignored and the bad worshipped.
In the end, it comes down to effect. If a poem reaches into your heart and affects you, it's doing exactly what poetry is supposed to do. And, if the same is true for others who read it, the likelihood is that the poem has staying power and is therefore "good." Some may be completely unmoved by it but only time will tell which group is correct (if there is such a thing - but I believe there is). |
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Poetry: August 30, 2023 Issue [#12153]
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