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Mon 19 Jul, 2004 12:22 am
TURNING TO GOLD
There is a kind of secrecy between the poet and his poems. Once this secrecy is violated the integrity of the poet is affected. Perhaps this is why, in my efforts to share my poetry, something is lost: meaning, a secret harmony, an appreciation of some personal and intimate beauty, my relationship with the recipient. The whole world is coloured, tarnished, sometimes disfigured. My wholeness, my sense of self, my integrity is affected. It’s like sharing one’s sexual intimacies. The preciousness, the secret, is lost. -Ron Price with thanks to Wallace Stevens in American Poetry: 1946-1965, R.P. Blackmuir, editor, Harold Bloom, Chelsea House Pub., NY, 1987, p. 145.
The poem below was written as I sat by my small pool in the garden. The pool has three goldfish and is situated in Belmont a suburb of Perth, Western Australia.
-Ron Price, 4pm., 30 March 1996.
They float so slowly,
a calm and silent demeanor,
golden through the dark green water
in this small garden pool.
Their mouths open up to the sky
as they nibble and return to the depths.
Can I, too, manifest this golden gentleness,
this grace and charm, this unquestioned beauty?
Can I, too, enjoy this apparent contentment
with a small space, a few rocks and the water of life?
Here on this dot, this point on a map,
this world of sand, where a city has been built,
can I learn to move with such precisioned alertness,
such concentrated attention, such instinctual release,
that my home, my place of movement, turns to gold
and I glide through space with such deep peace.
Ron Price
30 March 1996
Sharing poems
RonPrice wrote: There is a kind of secrecy between the poet and his poems. Once this secrecy is violated the integrity of the poet is affected. Perhaps this is why, in my efforts to share my poetry, something is lost: meaning, a secret harmony, an appreciation of some personal and intimate beauty, my relationship with the recipient.
Hi Ron:
My mother was a writer and a poet. She had a tenth grade education. Her spelling and grammar skills were minimal. Despite limited skills, she loved to write. She filled many spiral notebooks with her poems, ideas for novels, character sketches, and rough draft letters to editors poised between her grocery and chore lists.
One time she let me read a novel that she completed. I was only 19 or 20 years old and naive. I thought it was trashy (in a wannabe like Jacqueline Susann way). I humorously told my mom she should have lent it to me in a brown paper wrapper. She still let me read her other books. But, she kept her poetry to herself. She sheltered her poems like a baby she cradled in her arms and would not allow anyone else to hold. She often said her poetry was much too personal to share.
Your reluctance to share your poetry reminds me of my mother.
Dear Debra: What a Delight!
That's got to be one of the finest emails/postings I've ever read. I shall treasure it as I would my life. Your mother is a true friend.-Thanks.Ron
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