Transcript

I’m Major Jackson and this is The Slowdown.

O Captain! my Captain! our fearful trip is done, begins Walt Whitman’s famous poem. I enjoy what are called apostrophes, poems that are spoken to a specific person. They are so dramatic, so performative. They make us feel as if we are eavesdropping or suddenly in a theater of the mind. If you’ve ever accidentally received an email meant for someone else or read a postcard not addressed to you, poems of address play on conditions you’re familiar with.

Many poems presume an audience of imagined readers, that is, you and me, who overhear the speaker emoting and thinking. Yet, if a poem is addressed specifically to a “you,” it breaks the fourth wall in acknowledging our presence. When that happens, I look over my shoulder, then back at the page, and ask, “You talking to me?”

Poetry is full of speeches to a specific someone. But that’s not enough: the poet must find the language and music to engage readers in the drama of what is shared. I learned that the hard way. I’ve written many failed love poems and discovered, surprisingly, people are, best case, mildly interested in hearing someone else’s romantic words. Unless the poem contains such a fire of expression that it becomes difficult not to be swept up in a blaze of swooning. And thus, I am a poor man’s Pablo Neruda.

Through my many years of reading poetry, I feel as though I’ve absorbed other people’s stories and feelings. I strongly believe this has fortified me with a spirit of kindness, poetry as a daily pill of compassion. This is a grounding tenet in my belief in poetry as a communal and righteous good. We get to see through each other’s eyes and feel through each other’s hearts.

Today’s poem, an address from a parent to a child, is an intimate one-way conversation. The poem’s internal music compels us to listen even closer, to feel a passionate parental love—or to recall the love we have received—and the curiosity and wonder that breeds from such affirming grounds.

And Everywhere Offering Human Sound
by Joan Houlihan

Come here. Let me finger your hair.
I like the way you imitate weather:
a white breath, here and there,
the rush and sting of pinkened air,
a coven of crows talking briefly of home
and then the pelted tree.
By these shall I know ye,
bless yer little round mug.

Oh, my semi-precious, so much slow time
so much crawling and browsing
so much fascination with harmful insects
and corrosive sublimate.
As if you have as many eyes
as many eyes as the common fly,
and every one stuck open wide
to the wonderful, wonderful world.

So, I get up at 4 AM, finally, to put on some tea—
a soothing explanation for steam.
Children grow into themselves, then away.
We mustn’t worry when they’re gone—
or worse, not-quite-gone-yet.
The roots of things connect
where we can’t see.

When I was born, my mother began counting
to herself. Something in the middle 
must have gone missing.
Fortunately, I have all my faculties.
In fact, I still remember to turn 
every small thing until it gleams:
like your favorite airplane pin

there, riding on its own cotton wad. 
Now come here so I can see
through your eyes to the sky within.

You are my only animal—
my animal of air.

“And Everywhere Offering Human Sound” by Joan Houlihan from THE MENDING WORM © 2021 Joan Houlihan. Used by permission of New Issues Poetry and Prose.