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In the early-career Wallace Stevens poem, ''Thirteen Ways of Looking at a Blackbird,'' the reader is presented with something seen from different perspectives. Perception is subjective, so these short stanzas shift and evolve but are not directly connected, other than by their subject. Each haiku-like stanza is its own way of looking at the blackbird.
Two selections from Jane Kenyon's poem "Three Songs at the End of Summer" illustrate how her poem also looks (in 12 small stanzas divided into 3 sections/songs) at something more abstract from different perspectives.
A white, indifferent morning sky,
and a crow, hectoring from its nest
high in the hemlock, a nest as big
as a laundry basket....
Crickets leap from the stubble,
parting before me like the Red Sea.
The garden sprawls and spoils.
Spruce, inadequate, and alien
I stood at the side of the road.
It was the only life I had.
Is Stevens' blackbird a symbol? Its color might suggest mystery. Its appearance in the poem shows a kind of interconnectedness as it separate from and also part of nature. If it is a symbol of the world itself, it can represent the complexity of our perception. Stevens gives us the bird in the natural world (a bird in the snow) to the psychological (a man mistaking a shadow for a blackbird).
What is the "correct" way to perceive the blackbird or reality? Of course, there isn't one way because our understanding of the world is shaped by our individual perspective.
In these poems, we asked poets to be attentive to the details of the subject and its surroundings. Present multiple interpretations without a need to select one as correct. You need not have 13 ways - though many 13 ways parodies and versions of Stevens' poem have been written. You could have as few as two ways of seeing. Your subject can be a thing (a river, a painting), a person (a lover, a baby), a scene (a baseball game, a thunderstorm) or something we can't literally see (terror, jealousy, the end of summer)
Wallace Stevens (October 2, 1879 – August 2, 1955) was an American modernist poet. He was born in Reading, Pennsylvania, educated at Harvard and then New York Law School, and spent most of his life working as an executive for an insurance company in Hartford, Connecticut.
He never learned how to drive and composed most of his poems while walking to work. In his long poem “Notes Toward a Supreme Fiction,” he wrote “Perhaps / The truth depends on a walk around a lake, // A composing as the body tires…”
Many of Stevens's poems, like "Anecdote of the Jar", "The Man with the Blue Guitar", "The Idea of Order at Key West", "Of Modern Poetry", and "Notes Towards a Supreme Fiction", deal with the making of art and poetry in particular. His Collected Poems (1954) won the Pulitzer Prize for Poetry in 1955.
13 WAYS OF LOOKING AT A BLACKBOARD
I
With apprehension as heavy as backpacks,
my students file in, whispering in every language
but English. The blackboard looms—a blank slate.
II
I am seven when my mother gives me a small
blackboard—slick and shiny as licorice—
with a box of pink chalk. I line up my dolls
and teach them the alphabet. We sing
a song of sixpence, a pocketful of rye.
III
Black board I enunciate to my student
Brack board he says, watching my mouth.
Eraser I say.
Elasher he replies, his mother tongue
insisting on its way.
IV
Dennis O’Malley forgets the steps of long division –
again. Sister Superior hisses at him…
Subtract and bring down the three!
Then smacks him into the blackboard.
He turns red with shame; I turn white with fear.
I hate math.
V
They chatter in Chinese as soon as I turn
to the blackboard. I want to tell them
they will never learn English this way,
but I continue to write the definition of “patience.”
VI
I don’t know the capital of Utah
when Sister Agnes calls on me. Fearing
the sting of her ruler, I twist sweaty hands
into the pleats of my uniform skirt
and send a silent plea to the cross above the blackboard;
but if Jesus knows the answer, He’s not telling.
VII
The irony of teaching the present perfect
to my homesick students is not lost on me.
I try pizazz - I put up charts, draw diagrams
in bright blue chalk but their eyes glaze over.
They look at the blackboard. Then at the clock.
Board. Clock. Bored.
VIII
A long, brittle stick of yellow chalk
snaps in two, then three and now
there are nubs so small that my nails
scratch the blackboard. A chorus
of Eeewwwwwwh unites us.
IX
I must not talk.
I must not talk.
I must not talk.
I must not talk.
I must not talk.
I must write this 95 more times
on the blackboard and it works--
my voice is gone.
X
They begin to talk!
They write on the blackboard:
We very very like English with hearts
and stars and Korean characters beneath.
Our own Rosetta Stone! I want to do cartwheels.
XI
You’re on the path to perfection! proclaims
Sister Paul as I diagram sentences
on the blackboard and she gives me a star.
I help her clap erasers after school
and am covered in a cloud of fairy dust.
XII
They all ask to help erase the blackboard
after class. Is it to feel that felt block glide
over smooth slate?
Or to see their assignments disappear.
XII
With bucket and broom, the custodian
clatters in, dips the large gray sponge in water
and sloshes it on the board--
one long streak after another.
The blackboard glistens.
Barbara Whitehill
WHEN MEMORY IS BLUE
Salvador Dali, Persistence of Memory
He has lost his clock, his watches,
sees them warped on a table,
a branch, a sea monster
She is unsure whether to swim
in pool of infinity, or splash
in distant sea
He is not sure of time, the numbers
sometimes up, at times down,
intermingle of day and night
She wants to climb the bare tree,
plans to explore the far cliffs
needs to paddle in tidal pools
He cannot find that red time-piece
sees seed patch on a watch
winding likely forgotten
She is wavering about making footprints
in flat sand shadows
about resting by the cliff
He cannot decide which watch to straighten
doubtful he can unfold one
doubtful he can change time
She cannot tell him his treasures
hang time
warp memory
She decides on the infinity,
to dive into memory,
a buoyant swim.
Lavinia Kumar
IT'S ABOUT TIME
My grandson, at bedtime:
Argued for a little more time
“One more story … Please!”
Now older, he complains:
“How long before we get there?
I’m bored.”
My daughter laments:
“Between the kids and work
There’s never enough time.”
My wife suggests:
“I think it’s time for a haircut, dear.
You’re looking a little disheveled.”
The phlebotomist inquires:
“When is the last time you ate?
Fasting blood work requires 12 hours.”
My fishing guide coaches me:
Pay attention when you cast
Timing, he says, is everything
The article on investing notes:
Time is your biggest friend
Compound interest yields high returns
Chaucer once wrote:
“Time waits for no man”
Nor do tides - they’re beyond our control
Dylan’s strident voice declares:
“The times, they are a changing”
Kamala hopes for a reprise
Albert Einstein informed the world:
Physicists view time an an illusion
Past, present and future are relative
Zen Master Dogon taught:
Time is being ~ being is time
Time flows into itself
Sci-Fi writers tease us with:
Dr. Who, Marty McFly —
Characters who travel through time
Old men know nothing is more valuable:
Pray for a little more time
“One more story … Please!”
Frank Kelly
THE SPIDER
She hangs
suspended
like a puppet
dancing
to the tune
of the wind.
Blown this way,
blown that,
buffeted,
but only briefly.
Then she takes control
like a mistress puppeteer.
Knowing she is
powerful
and free.
Free to spin her silk
and weave her web
as she wills.
Or so she thinks.
But it’s an illusion.
She’s trapped.
Trapped
and wrapped
by her dna
as securely
as any fly.
Her patterns are
pre-ordained
pre-programmed
destined
to be repeated
millennia
after millennia
in her genes.
And there’s nothing
that she can do
to change it.
Lynn White
SEVEN PERSPECTIVES ON SPIDERS
“Don’t worry, little spiders,”
Said Kobayashi Issa in a haiku.
“I won’t sweep the corners.”
Conversely, Super Mom carries her arachnophobia
Like a jeweled crown, and since her favorite topic
Of conversation is herself, she spends quite a bit
Of time on this subject: “Oh, I’m so terrified!
All my life! I get physically ill just looking at one.
I can’t have any spiders in my house. They all
Have to be killed or I can’t sleep at night”
She doesn’t notice when the nanny rolls her eyes
And yawns, or hear her when Nanny mutters,
“Spiders are God’s creatures too, and they’re not
Afraid of you”
The Hopi include spiders in their art, like the angels
Surrounding the Madonna and Child in a Raphael painting.
In the Hopi world, these sweet little beings spin magical webs
That sparkle with dew at dawn and gleam in the red desert
Sunset. The spiders are the desert’s weaving teachers and
Creators of dreams.
Gardeners love them too, the ladies in the Lake Country
Following Beatrix Potter’s lead, tend to their carrots and peas
And cherish their herbs. The spiders are eager assistants,
Eliminating the pests who would devour the tender leaves.
The plantation workers in old Hawaii sang songs about the
Cane Spiders on their ukuleles in the twilight when the hot day’s
Work was done. They learned soon after they got off the boat
From the Philippines or the Azores to respect the Cane Spider’s
Space and save their machetes for the stalks.
In the Ozarks, the Black Widows hide in the dank, dark storm
Cellars near the coal shuttle, keeping the orange hourglass
On their undersides hidden. Every family can tell a tale about
An inebriated uncle or a hapless third cousin who died of a Black
Widow spider bite. Are the folks back there afraid of spiders?
No. The Black Widows are there to teach the humans
To pay attention.
Rose Anna Higashi
SUNSET WITH ARGOS
We are sitting on the dock with our drinks waiting for the Sun to set again.
I have my bourbon. He has his water and a bone.
His dichromatic vision sees shades of blue and yellow,
while reds, greens, and oranges are beyond his spectrum.
He sees a very different sunset. Perhaps it is like a Van Gogh painting.
The water is more gray or white -
a faded photograph of the ocean we once sailed together.
He has a superior ability to see motion -
that ripple that means a fish, a turtle, an insect landing on the surface.
While my vision narrows with age,
his is still wider.
The scene may have been blurry in the noon bright light
but he can see better in dim light.
The mirror-like membrane behind his retina reflects light
allowing him better sight as darkness comes on.
We walk to the house and his that retina glow may be anatomical
but that I always see as his inner light.
Good boy. Home at last.
Charles Michaels
TEN WAYS TO CONSIDER MY UTERUS AFTER HYSTERECTOMY
I.
hidden, a closed fist––
I don't know you
exist
until first blood,
the first hurt
II.
slim hips, head high
sweet fulcrum of sway
drive me to the next adventure
glide me to another destiny
III.
tiny cauldron of secrets––
my soul stirs
IV.
where spirit
hovers before flesh,
I can't imagine
the breadth
you expand
from dark hollow
to fierce shelter
V.
Daughter
I feel everystretch
your heel against my rib
head pressed low
in my pelvis as you grow
beyond containment
the searing breach
as I release you
to every day, grow
beyond containment, still
VI.
foundation of my power,
gentle mountain
VII.
cauldron of secrets
festers, collects
I know you now
by the blaze
of your pain
VIII.
in butterfly-sit, I welcome
my breath to your depth,
surrender
imagine you clean
after the d & c
IX.
malignancy
more surgery
who will I be without you
X.
life-giving alchemy
letting you go
has set me free
Michelle Ortega
THE STAR-SPANGLED BANNER
Yankee stadium rises en masse
as Robert Merrill strides
toward home plate.
It’s Opening Day.
Merrill wanders alone
in the dark outside his home.
The anthem surrounds him like fog.
Outside the room where his son
and friends gather, one muffles
the Stratocaster aping Hendrix’s
Woodstock national anthem.
Bob gazes at four bongs
reeking on a shelf.
The boys are too stoned
to rise to the anthem.
His silence menaces.
Old Yankees fans beam when
they hear the national anthem
and see, behind their eyes,
Robert Merrill in pinstripes.
Rob Friedman
SEVEN WAYS OF LOOKING AT A HAWK
Behind the deserted house
hawk lifted from her nest staring us down.
Hawk, the brazen hero of her diary
locked tight with a tiny key.
Even hawk is mortal, his bones,
his feathers to rise again.
It costs so many
songbirds to feed hawk’s fuzzy babe.
Hawk is the scream in my ears
seen without seeing.
Black ink circles intricacies of sky
as hawk scribes your day.
Hawk as totem on our gatepost –
will she let us in?
Taylor Graham
STOODLEY PIKE
(Stoodley Pike is a hill in West Yorkshire, England.
It features a famous Napoleonic War Monument.)
Two figures are cresting the distant hill,
Edging, ant-like, to the top of the Pike,
Leading a long line of intrepid ants,
In a futile climb to a pointless summit,
Yearning, striving -that's what ants are like!
Without doubt they will glance down to the right,
Viewing my own house with a wan, wry smile!
Such small, ant-people seem to live down there,
Tiny, tedious, scarcely worth our care.
They don't even climb!
They haven't even gone the extra mile!
Distance lends us perspective,
But takes away our empathy.
Ants are not people, like you and me!
It is a test of kindness
Which humanity fails.
Troubles assessed from far away
Are weighed upon diminishing scales!
John Botterill
VIGNETTES OF FIVE-YEAR-OLDS' BASKETBALL GAME
for Jaxon
I.
A single referee—
A whistle and smile
His only accoutrements
II.
Twelve little ones on the run
Up and down the court—
Dribbling or not here they come
III.
Swallowed by their jerseys,
They break out in dance—
When coach hurls atta boys
IV.
Comedians with imperfect timing—
Distinguished by velcroed sneakers
Neon-colored headbands, and zip
V.
Sidelined on bench at halftime,
The team looks left, right, all around—
For trouble.
VI.
Coach calls out, Hands up—
Little stretch toys plant one foot
In box and reach for the ball
VII.
The big guy in black and white
Admonishing the pint-sized roughhouser—
You can’t hug him like that.
VIII.
The tiniest team member
Excoriates his opponent—
Stay out of my box
IX.
Without aim, dwarfish baller lunges
Sphere towards hoop—swoosh
A one-in-a-million shot
X.
The ref in stripes and grins
Warns spectator papas—
It’s about to go down.
XI.
Around and around on rim—
In for two points. Who is
prouder, five-year-old or Mom?
XII.
Little action shots
You can’t get back—
Pick-me-ups for tomorrow
Jo Taylor
SNAIL MAIL
When you move at a snail’s pace,
Snail mail’s the way to communicate.
Slowpoke, I scrawl a slimy
Trail across the page:
Read me against the wintry
Whiteness of old age.
To Christians I represent
The deadly sin of Sloth;
To Greeks the time to harvest;
But the Aztec moon god
Carries my shell on his back.
Think of the armor you lack!
Tyrian Purple I secrete,
Prized by the Phonecian brigades,
Sign of royalty and wealth,
Gracing the sails of their fleet,
Embodying good health—
For it’s slow to bleed or fade.
In a Javanese folk tale
Keong Emas is my name:
Princess magically confined
In a snail shell’s golden frame.
That’s a story children should mind,
For it teaches them to be kind.
In France you can eat me:
I can’t escape, I’m too slow.
But just before you say grace,
Take a look at your escargot:
Can you confidently state
You won’t end up on a plate?
Brothers and sisters, take heed:
No matter how fast you speed,
This old world is still a globe.
What goes around comes around,
All before you can make a sound.
Easy and slow: that’s the way to go.
Lee Evans
VARIATIONS AND SUBTLE CHANGES
I.
waiting for change
awaiting colours to fill the sky
II.
on the feathery wings of a bird of peace
the enunciation of silence
so pleasing
III.
so pleasing to see
change delivered
on the eloquent wings of silence
Lee Burke González
ROOTS III
They say that roots don't tunnel alone,
as we once thought, but are entangled
in a greedy, nourishing, cooperative, complex
mesh of mycelium, other roots, and more
mycelium. Every mighty oak, every wood
anemone, a node in the wood-wide web.
They say that the root system of an oak—
say, the 900-year-old beauty down on the banks
of the North Tyne river—
mirrors the tree we see towering over us;
as above, so below.
They say that ginger is a healer—
a medicine plant, if you will—
yet it has also made itself quite comfortable
in a box of chocolates proffered
on that not-so-special occasion.
They say there are several thousand distinct types
of potato in the world.
That you can name six, seven at most, is indicative
of yet another way in which we have
impoverished ourselves
in our rush to feel ever richer.
Witches say that a mandrake will scream
as he's wrenched out and uprooted from the
rich, dark Earth; and if any human
should hear such a scream without adequate protection
then they will immediately die.
They say that Korean ginseng
is 'good for men's health' (by which they mean
it makes men hard and virile). Ginseng grown
elsewhere in the world is just not as potent.
The soil is not the same.
They say that if you take the time to listen,
in the right season, you can hear rhubarb grow;
the crackling of the stems growing upwards,
the tearing sound of the roots
growing from their tips
beneath your feet.
Robert Best