On absence, on ghosts, by W.S. Merwin:
Your absence has gone through me
Like thread through a needle.
Everything I do is stitched with its color.
On being mistaken for a ghost in Alaska last winter: click here for an updated version of this piece.
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4 comments:
I love short poems like this. There is nothing more to say, there is no need for illusion or any more layers. "Like a thread through a needle" "stitched with it's color" I feel it, I see it, I have lived it too.
Great selection.
The updated version is fantastic too. I admire your work ethic.
B.G.
hi, bruce, yes the poem i first saw on the bus as part of the 'poetry in motion' series. that's what i call civilization; reasonable buses with on-board poetry!
cheers
cameron
p.s. bruce, i think the instrumental linked below has the same characteristics if many of my favorite poems; as you say, 'no need for illusiopn or any more layers':
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IyM7SNn4SCg
cheers
cameron
on your ghost story: I don't know if you watch much tv, like Ghost Whisperer and such, but I found it really refreshing to read a ghost story where they're going "No, no, DON'T go toward the light!". A real life ghost story, for a change.
I also was really struck by the ghost not being a generic ghost - being a particular ghost and having a name. Imagine living in a place you know so well that you see what appears to be a ghost and think "oh that must be so-and-so's ghost", instead of "what's that crazy white guy doing out there?". Imagine living where the ghost seems the more likely explanation.
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