Oh, yeah, and to me! There’s a poet whose loss I was planning to write about, but then I remembered that I share a birthday with Mary Oliver today. And so instead of thinking about aging and death, I decided that first, it would be a good idea to spend a little time in the studio with some of Mary’s poems today.
Yesterday on Twitter, poet Chen Chen, author of When I Grow Up I Want To Be a List of Further Possibilities, tweeted that he enjoyed actually writing out or typing other people’s poems. What a cool idea! And so I tweeted back, well, this:
And while I think writing the poems of others would be an equally interesting and enlightening exercise, it’s probably not that much fun for you to watch or listen to me doing it. So for now, I’ve resorted to my old practice of recording poems that I love, partly just because I love them and partly as a way to more fully live within, and come to know them. As Chen Chen says, “rhythmic inhabiting”
For this September 10th, on which both Mary Oliver and I were born (Honestly, it really was my idea, and she didn’t seem to mind), I pulled her collection Evidence off my shelf and went into my studio; some might call it a bedroom. And here are a few poems of hers that I enjoyed vocalizing. I hope you enjoy them.
And here are a few poems of hers that I enjoyed vocalizing. I hope you enjoy them.
If you liked these poems, as my friend Neil Silberblatt says, please go to your local independent bookstore and they can get you a copy of the book so you can enjoy all of them. If you don’t have a local independent bookstore, stop by your local library.
And, though I am no Mary Oliver, my first chapbook has some similar themes and settings. I suppose I was influenced by her more than I realized. It’s called Moons, Roads, and Rivers, and it is available now for pre-order from Finishing Line Press. You’ll be able to get it from your local bookseller after November 17th, but if you’d like to have a copy anyway, ordering from the publisher by September 22nd helps me out by increasing the final press run and making us best friends. Hey, maybe you could even order a copy for your local library! Just a thought. Thanks for your help, whatever you can do.
To order my chapbook (THANK YOU!) click here. To read more about it and link to a few sample poems, go here. Thanks for making it a happy birthday. I’ll tell Mary you said hello.
David J. Bauman 
I doubt I would know how to write a poem if I had not read Ms. Mary.
“House of Light” was the first of her collections I read, and it still enraptures me. I think I learned more from that book and the “Poetry Handbook” than I did from my college writing classes.
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Agreed! When I worked for the Priestley Library we did a workshop working through her Poetry Handbook. I love that she says the way to learn to write good poetry is to read lots of good poetry. There was more to the book than that, of course, but it was a joy.
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Happy birthday, David! And to Mary too. Thank you for the gift of poetry you share with us. And congrats on your chap book!
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Haha! Thank you for all of what you said. When the pre-sale is over I won’t have to include such shameless plugs! 😉
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