Today I found a wonderful story in the NY Times about folks with cancer who are writing poetry as a way to deal with it. There are some great comments about some of my favorite poets, Donald Hall, Jane Kenyon, and I added a comment about Tory Dent -- who's poem Black Milk I posted to my Laundry Songs blog yesterday. I have a friend who's just been diagnosed with breast cancer, a best friend, and I feel so dissoriented by the news. I don't have a place in my life for this information --yet. Writing -- I should give it a try.
Since Kyle's poem talks about growing a prickly pear cactus, I offer two photos. If you read the NY Times article, you'll find links to the Journal of the American Medical Association (JAMA) and to another article in the Times about a study showing that newly diagnosed patients who write expressively about their feelings have improved quality of life. There is a beautiful photo of a person reading a journal at the top of that article, which I'd love to post here -- but I don't know the rules about posting other publications photos -- so, you'll have to go to the NYTimes to see for yourself.
One patient wrote: “Don’t get me wrong, cancer isn’t a gift, it just showed me what the gifts in my life are.”
3 comments:
TO DREAM OF SKATING ON ICE
“To dream of skating on ice means satisfaction with a current project.”
--Dictionary of Dreams
Amidst white groves
Inside a lilac tree
I gaze at airy flights across a frozen lake.
Like soaring birds
We are all of us, skating on ice.
Spanning circuits
Dense, ring-shaped,
Effortless,
Dazzling as a diamond dream
Before the break.
Beneath the brightness, I see a shadow
And the semblance watches me.
A shrill remembrance,
The impervious stare of quartz:
A trade-off between tomorrow and the past.
The break below faces a ruptured skyline.
Its path
Squalls out for meaning.
The meaning is the sea.
I seize the mirror and the likeness mirrors me.
Beneath the brightness, a shadow floats
Under a pond of ice.
Freezing up in time and space
I drift inside the memory of a winter’s whorl,
Headed to where I came from.
Thanks for your poem, I really like the quote --
Thanks for your comment.
My purpose for posting was (obviously) to get comments from people who are in some sense in touch with poetry. I am not a professional poet (if there is such a thing). I am pretty satisfied overall with the feedback I've been getting so far.
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