Saturday, April 14, 2018

National Poetry Month: Poem #14

This is the longest poem I have chosen to quote--be glad it's not The Wasteland.
T. S Eliot is considered the eminent poet of the last century.
The metaphors are intoxicating.

1. The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock

by T. S. Eliot

	S’io credesse che mia risposta fosse
	A persona che mai tornasse al mondo,
	Questa fiamma staria senza piu scosse.
	Ma perciocche giammai di questo fondo
	Non torno vivo alcun, s’i’odo il vero,
	Senza tema d’infamia ti rispondo.


LET us go then, you and I,
When the evening is spread out against the sky
Like a patient etherized upon a table;
Let us go, through certain half-deserted streets,
The muttering retreats	5
Of restless nights in one-night cheap hotels
And sawdust restaurants with oyster-shells:
Streets that follow like a tedious argument
Of insidious intent
To lead you to an overwhelming question….	10
Oh, do not ask, “What is it?”
Let us go and make our visit.

In the room the women come and go
Talking of Michelangelo.

The yellow fog that rubs its back upon the window-panes,	15
The yellow smoke that rubs its muzzle on the window-panes
Licked its tongue into the corners of the evening,
Lingered upon the pools that stand in drains,
Let fall upon its back the soot that falls from chimneys,
Slipped by the terrace, made a sudden leap,	20
And seeing that it was a soft October night,
Curled once about the house, and fell asleep.

And indeed there will be time
For the yellow smoke that slides along the street,
Rubbing its back upon the window panes;	25
There will be time, there will be time
To prepare a face to meet the faces that you meet;
There will be time to murder and create,
And time for all the works and days of hands
That lift and drop a question on your plate;	30
Time for you and time for me,
And time yet for a hundred indecisions,
And for a hundred visions and revisions,
Before the taking of a toast and tea.

In the room the women come and go	35
Talking of Michelangelo.

And indeed there will be time
To wonder, “Do I dare?” and, “Do I dare?”
Time to turn back and descend the stair,
With a bald spot in the middle of my hair—	40
(They will say: “How his hair is growing thin!”)
My morning coat, my collar mounting firmly to the chin,
My necktie rich and modest, but asserted by a simple pin—
(They will say: “But how his arms and legs are thin!”)
Do I dare	45
Disturb the universe?
In a minute there is time
For decisions and revisions which a minute will reverse.

For I have known them all already, known them all:
Have known the evenings, mornings, afternoons,	50
I have measured out my life with coffee spoons;
I know the voices dying with a dying fall
Beneath the music from a farther room.
So how should I presume?

And I have known the eyes already, known them all—	55
The eyes that fix you in a formulated phrase,
And when I am formulated, sprawling on a pin,
When I am pinned and wriggling on the wall,
Then how should I begin
To spit out all the butt-ends of my days and ways?	60
And how should I presume?

And I have known the arms already, known them all—
Arms that are braceleted and white and bare
(But in the lamplight, downed with light brown hair!)
Is it perfume from a dress	65
That makes me so digress?
Arms that lie along a table, or wrap about a shawl.
And should I then presume?
And how should I begin? . . . . . . . .
Shall I say, I have gone at dusk through narrow streets	70
And watched the smoke that rises from the pipes
Of lonely men in shirt-sleeves, leaning out of windows?…

I should have been a pair of ragged claws
Scuttling across the floors of silent seas. . . . . . . . .
And the afternoon, the evening, sleeps so peacefully!	75
Smoothed by long fingers,
Asleep … tired … or it malingers,
Stretched on the floor, here beside you and me.
Should I, after tea and cakes and ices,
Have the strength to force the moment to its crisis?	80
But though I have wept and fasted, wept and prayed,
Though I have seen my head (grown slightly bald) brought in upon a platter,
I am no prophet—and here’s no great matter;
I have seen the moment of my greatness flicker,
And I have seen the eternal Footman hold my coat, and snicker,	85
And in short, I was afraid.

And would it have been worth it, after all,
After the cups, the marmalade, the tea,
Among the porcelain, among some talk of you and me,
Would it have been worth while,	90
To have bitten off the matter with a smile,
To have squeezed the universe into a ball
To roll it toward some overwhelming question,
To say: “I am Lazarus, come from the dead,
Come back to tell you all, I shall tell you all”—	95
If one, settling a pillow by her head,
Should say: “That is not what I meant at all;
That is not it, at all.”

And would it have been worth it, after all,
Would it have been worth while,	100
After the sunsets and the dooryards and the sprinkled streets,
After the novels, after the teacups, after the skirts that trail along the floor—
And this, and so much more?—
It is impossible to say just what I mean!
But as if a magic lantern threw the nerves in patterns on a screen:	105
Would it have been worth while
If one, settling a pillow or throwing off a shawl,
And turning toward the window, should say:
“That is not it at all,
That is not what I meant, at all.” . . . . . . . .	110
No! I am not Prince Hamlet, nor was meant to be;
Am an attendant lord, one that will do
To swell a progress, start a scene or two,
Advise the prince; no doubt, an easy tool,
Deferential, glad to be of use,	115
Politic, cautious, and meticulous;
Full of high sentence, but a bit obtuse;
At times, indeed, almost ridiculous—
Almost, at times, the Fool.

I grow old … I grow old …	120
I shall wear the bottoms of my trousers rolled.

Shall I part my hair behind? Do I dare to eat a peach?
I shall wear white flannel trousers, and walk upon the beach.
I have heard the mermaids singing, each to each.

I do not think that they will sing to me.	125

I have seen them riding seaward on the waves
Combing the white hair of the waves blown back
When the wind blows the water white and black.

We have lingered in the chambers of the sea
By sea-girls wreathed with seaweed red and brown	130
Till human voices wake us, and we drown.

After reading this poem in 1970 in college, I deliberately chose not to 'measure out my life with coffee spoons.'
The Italian passage at the beginning is from Dante's Inferno:

If I believed that my answer would be
To someone who would ever return to earth,
This flame would move no more,
But because no one from this gulf
Has ever returned alive, if what I hear is true,

I can reply with no fear of infamy.

Was Eliot a British poet or an American poet? He immigrated to the U.K. But he didn't say he measured 'I measured out my life in teaspoons but coffee spoons.' He was, afterall, born in St. Louis Missouri.

T. S. Eliot

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/T._S._Eliot

April is National Poetry Month--Here Are Some Good Resources

1. National Poetry Month Is Here Again!

http://www.poetryfoundation.org/harriet/2013/04/national-poetry-month-is-here-again/

2. Celebrate National Poetry Month with FREE POETRY!

http://www.poetryfoundation.org/npm

3. Integrating Daily Poetry in the Classroom: 5 Tools to Support Your Efforts

http://www.edutopia.org/blog/integrating-daily-poetry-5-tools-brett-vogelsinger

My pocket, my favorite poem.

3. Poem In Your Pocket

http://mzteachuh.blogspot.com/2012/04/poem-in-your-pocket.html

4. Poems at Home

http://www.readingrockets.org/article/36693/?utm_source=Twitter&utm_medium=Hootsuite&utm_campaign=RRSocialMedia

5. National Poetry Month

http://www.poets.org/page.php/prmID/41

6. The Poem Farm

https://www.facebook.com/pages/The-Poem-Farm/123265697709968?group_id=0

7. BRING POETS INTO YOUR CLASSROOM

http://teacher.scholastic.com/poetry/

8. Grand Slam: Performance Poetry Engages Students

http://www.edutopia.org/poetry-literacy-live-technology-performance-video

9. Getting to Know Your Students Through Poetry

http://www.edutopia.org/blog/poetry-lesson-plan-I-am-from-elena-aguilar

10. National Poetry Month: Useful Resources for Teachers and Students

http://www.edutopia.org/blog/national-poetry-month-teacher-resources-matt-davis

Here are my poetic posts up to 4/13 (will bring this current soon):

11. MzTeachuh's Poetry Corner

http://mzteachuh.blogspot.com/2013/04/mzteachuhs-poetry-corner.html

Poet of Poets

Educational Links 4/15/18

10 Staggering Statistics About Struggling Readers and Reading Growth

https://schoolleadersnow.weareteachers.com/staggering-statistics-about-struggling-readers-and-reading-growth/

Nation’s Report Card Shows Students With Disabilities Lagging

https://www.disabilityscoop.com/2018/04/13/nations-report-card-disabilities/24973/

STEM Is Far More Than the Lone Genius

https://blogs.scientificamerican.com/budding-scientist/stem-is-far-more-than-the-lone-genius/

10 Tips For Getting Started With Mindfulness In The Classroom

https://www.teachthought.com/pedagogy/7-tips-getting-started-mindfulness-classroom/

Social Media Posts as Exemplars

https://www.edutopia.org/blog/social-media-posts-exemplars-marissa-king?utm_source=facebook&utm_medium=socialflow

The ADHD Homework System We Swear By

https://www.additudemag.com/slideshows/less-homework-stress/?utm_source=facebook&utm_medium=social&utm_campaign=parent

Why Teachers Should Help Students Learn Effective Study Strategies

https://www.kqed.org/mindshift/48139

Some of the best learning strategies aren’t often used by teachers or students largely because of time pressures in the classroom. Frequent low-stakes quizzes that force students to recall information from their memories, combined with spaced out practice show some of the clearest results.

National Poetry Month: Poem #13

“We Real Cool,”

by Gwendolyn Brooks

THE POOL PLAYERS.
SEVEN AT THE GOLDEN SHOVEL.
We real cool. We
Left school. We
Lurk late. We
Strike straight. We
Sing sin. We
Thin gin. We
Jazz June. We
Die soon.