“Hope” is the thing with feathers–
That perches in the soul–
And sings the tune without the words–
And never stops– at all–
And sweetest– in the Gale– is heard
And sore must be the storm–
That could abash the little Bird
That kept so many warm–
I’ve heard it in the chillest land–
And on the strangest Sea–
Yet, never, in Extremity,
It asked a crumb– of Me.
Thank you, Emily Dickinson.
This morning I began reading my Literary Criticism textbook in the section titled “Feminisms and Gender Studies”. It begins with an entertaining quote, so I thought I’d share:
“I myself have never been able to find out precisely what feminism is. I only know that other people call me a feminist whenever I express sentiments that differentiate me from a doormat or prostitute.” — Rebecca West
We had fall break this week, and I had the wonderful opportunity to travel to Pittsburgh and stay with a friends’ family. I was accompanied by many other friends, making this trip even more delightful. Besides enjoying superb hospitality and delicious food, we were able to spend a day in downtown Pittsburgh, which was awesome. The University of Pittsburgh has this incredible and incredibly huge building called the Cathedral of Learning. It is full of classrooms, but these are not your everyday college classrooms. Each room is designed for a different country so that you feel like you’re in Disney world every time you step into one– but a touch more realistic. It was an incredible building, which made me want to learn more just by being in it. It also caused an annoying little thought to be bouncing around my head called, “Why am I at Bethel?” I tried to stifle the classroom envy.
We also visited their huge library where they have an entire wall full of foreign films. Lovely. Their library also has big windows overlooking the natural history museum right next door. On one of the windows, we discovered a small blue post-it, which read, “All those children down there are so little and so young. I wonder if they will even remember visiting here.” That was enjoyable.
We finished up the evening by visiting all seven floors of the Andy Warhol museum, which I particularly enjoyed because I don’t think I’ve ever been to a full-fledged art museum before. We saw a large painting which had been covered in copper. Mr. Warhol then recruited five of his artist friends to pee on the copper so that it would oxidize and create some brilliant art. According to what was in their diets, the copper oxidized differently. It created a very interesting piece of art. I was immediately drawn to it from across the room, and upon reading the small sign beside it and discovering the above information, I had to laugh and enjoy it even more. There was also a magical room that made me feel like I was in the middle of a scene from Willy Wonka. Rectangular silver balloons filled this room and floated whimsically about it. A sign said, “You may play with the silver pillows,” which I most certainly did. They were filled with a mixture of helium and oxygen, causing them to float continual up and down and all around. It was a splendid time.
In 12 weeks and 3 days, I will be in a wonderful little place called Oxford. Not that I’m counting…
“Music can make us do what it wants”- Pythagoras
While Koch touched on the idea that poetic language is like creating music with words, he spends the following chapter explaining some of the ways to go about doing this. He talked about the use of repetition—both in sounds and in rhythms. Line division is an important part of giving rhythm to a poem because changing how the lines are divided will greatly affect the poem’s performance. Koch included a helpful discussing of meter, defining it as both the kind of stress pattern as well as the number of times this pattern is repeated in each line. Within a metrical line, there is imposed metrical rhythm as well as the natural rhythm of the words used, so when a poem is read, one can actually hear them both. So, constructing good metrical lines means understanding these rhythms and finding a balance between them. Koch also discussed the rise in popularity of non-metrical poetry within modern poetry. He gives O’Hara’s “Steps” as an example of this form of poetry.
oh god it’s wonderful
to get out of bed
and drink too much coffee
and smoke too many cigarettes
and love you so much
So, Koch defines meter as a poetic use of the order and rhythm of syllables. He next turns to rhyme, which he defines as a poetic use of the sound of words. He delineates between complete rhyme, partial rhyme, end rhyme, and alliteration. For example, Keats “The Eve of St. Agnes”:
Anon his heart revives: her vespers done,
Of all its wreathed pearls her hair she frees;
Unclasps her warmed jewels one by one;
Loosens her fragrant bodice; by degrees
Her rich attire creeps rustling to her knees:
Half-hidden, like a mermaid in sea-week,
Pensive awhile she dreams awake, and sees,
In Fancy, fair St. Agnes in her bed,
But dares not look behind, or all the charm is fled.
At work tonight, I waited on a sweet lady named Ilene. She sat out on the patio in the beautiful 70 something degree weather, ate a caesar salad, and drank a glass of Hahn Meritage. She asked my name and invited me to sit. Since I didn’t have any other tables at the moment, I gladly obliged. We had a great conversation about fall and seasons changing and her favorite wines. Apparently she loves Malbec, which she wondered if I had ever tried. I shared with her that I actually just turned 21 last Wednesday. To which she responded that I should try Malbec sometime if I get the chance. Then she decided that she would like desert, so I brought her chocolate ganache cake per Wally’s recommendation. When I brought the cake, she asked for another piece of cake to go, as well as a bottle of Malbec. I brought them both out to her and tried to open the bottle of wine, which I failed miserably at. It was the first time I had tried to open a bottle of wine at an actual table. I’ve practiced on some empty bottles. I just struggle to get the cork out, but I’ll get there. She was very gracious about it. So, I went to enlist Joe’s help, and he finished. By this time I had a couple more tables, so I attended to them. I eventually noticed that Ilene hadn’t been at her table for a while, but she had left the bottle of wine and the cake to-go. I went inside and asked Joe if he’d seen her anywhere. He told me to go check my book. So, I walked to the table and inside the book I found a note. It read, “Happy 21st Birthday, Melisa”.
How beautiful is that? I was astounded by this woman’s generosity and kindness. I felt so incredibly loved by this woman I’d know for ten minutes– She totally made my day.
In case you’re wondering, I gave the Malbec to a friend at work who will be able to enjoy it, and the half of the chocolate cake I haven’t eaten yet is sitting in my fridge, waiting with anticipation for tomorrow.
In his book Making Your Own Days, Kenneth Koch begins his discussion of poetry by identifying poetic language as its own language within whichever language it’s written. He regards poetry as a mysterious being, as no one has quite been able to explain where poetry comes from. The ancient Greeks called the Muse the source of poetry, which others have said it comes from some residually creative place in the unconscious. To Koch, in order to write poetry, the writer must understand this poetic language– the kind of words and phrases used, the rhythms, the importance of the words.
Because the sound of a word is just as important as the meaning of a word, poets must be well acquainted with the vocabulary of poetic language, and choose their words wisely in order to make good poetry. Koch refers to the sound of poetry as “making music out of words”. He claims that poetry has the power to make convincing whatever it says, in part because it is communicated in such a beautiful manner. Understanding poetry as a musical language, one must also realize that this language is not hard and fast, nor is any language. Rather, the techniques used by one poet may become adopted to the language and used by many poets afterward.
Another aspect of poetic language is its natural bent toward using literary devices, such as personification, apostrophe, hyperbole, and the like. So, the formation of poetry is very much like playing with your words. Things that may be nonsensical in our conventional use of English, suddenly become somehow understandable in the language of poetry. One poet Koch cites as capturing the musical quality of poetry is Shakespeare.
Sonnet 116
Let me not to the marriage of true minds
Admit impediments. Love is not love
Which alters when it alteration finds,
Or bends with the remover to remove:
O no! it is an ever-fixed mark
That looks on tempests and is never shaken…
I blew my own mind today when I logged into my blog, only to find that I haven’t posted in exactly 2 months. Incredible how quickly that times goes by. To have a quick life update, after my previous post I:
-Spent one more week in West Virginia.
-Drove home to Indiana, getting lost at least once in every state, classic move for me.
-Spent two days getting caught up on sleep and people.
-Had four wisdom teeth removed, and laid on my back for five days on lots of drugs.
-Packed for college.
-Moved back in.
-Started classes.
-Got three jobs, one I already had, two are new.
-Memorized a long menu and learned a lot about cocktails.
-Started learning Greek and Hebrew.
-Living life with six awesome girls in a house on the edge of campus.
-Our house has a mouse.
-Learning, learning, learning, tired, excited, exhausted, full of joy…In need of so much grace.
Aside from the above mundane details about my life, I have decided to embark on a new project this semester. In considering my English major, I realized that I know pretty much nothing about poetry. I don’t know how to write it, read it, understand it. I have read very little poetry, am unfamiliar with any poets really, and don’t know how poetry works. So,I decided to begin learning. I have a book about poetry, written by a modern poet named Kenneth Koch. I’m not sure if he’s any good or not. I know nothing about poetry. But, I will be reading through his book and summarizing what I learn from each chapter on my blog. I will also be sharing poems from his anthology that I find particular interesting, boring, surprising, terrible, beautiful– you get the idea. I’m also going to be practicing what I’m learning by writing my own poems. This is quite a scary endeavor. I may have written three poems before in my life, and I’m fairly sure all were required by some class. Anyhow, if I get brave enough, or stupid enough, I may post some of those as well.
Two weeks ago we had a pretty rough Kids Club…I’m not going to sugar coat it. It was awkward from the beginning because two teams wanted to do Kids Club, so one team did Monday and Tuesday, while the other team did Wednesday and Thursday. This is a very terrible idea in case any of you are planning on leading mission trips in the future. Because it was set up this way, each team spent at most 5 hours with the kids. It’s hard enough for the kids to warm up to a new team every week, why would we make them do it twice in the same week? One interesting thing I’ve observed being on this side of mission trips is how easy it is to be unintentionally selfish and inconsiderate of the community we’re trying to serve. We see that two teams have a heart to come and love on kids in the name of Jesus and we think ‘awesome’. We love that they have hearts to serve, and we want to use people where they are passionate, so we just split up the week and let each team do a few days. Makes sense…kind of.
But the reason that we’re here, or the reason that I’m here at least, is for the kids. It’s not to make teams happy– yes that would be great if both happened, and most of the time it does. However, I deeply believe that our first priority should be serving the kids, meeting their needs in any way we can. That being said, I went into this past week with much prayer. I sent this request to the faithful people praying for me this summer:
Please pray that the Lord would give us endurance to persevere in loving these kids, and for supernatural wisdom concerning how to discipline them, love them, and point them to Jesus. Also, please pray for maturity on the part of the team that’s coming in– we need some people passionate about kids!
And that is exactly what the Lord graciously sent this week. I got a front row seat to watch the Lord do more than I could ever ask or imagine, and I am so grateful because the kids here know the Lover more richly as a result.
The team that came in to do Kids Club came with a passion to love on the kids. Beautiful. They prayed for the kids every day before we went to pick them up. They were focused on the kids from the moment they walked in the door. I hadn’t yet experienced a group of high schoolers this selfless, and they blew me away at how loud their love for Jesus was. And the Lord blessed their willing hearts.
Muscles and Dakotta hanging out with the boys.
One of the leaders was able to have an incredible conversation with a seven-year-old girl named Toshaliqua. This girl is so precious, but I have never experienced a child so defiant and manipulative. But the Lord sent Whitney who was able to show the love of Christ to Tosha in a way that I have not been able. Tosha asked Whitney to pray for her and crawled into her lap in order for her to do so. I watched Tosha’s behavior completely turn around this week, and it was because love was communicated to her in a way that she heard, felt, and understood. That is an incredible victory for the Kingdom of Heaven.
Whitney and Tosha
The team led several worship songs for the kids, and I have never seen the kids engage as much as they did this week. We sang Marvelous Light with some sweet motions. An adorable six-year-old named Cedaysia loved to scream “Sin has lost its power!” Amen, sister. I love how worship creatively communicates truth about Jesus in a way that will stick in the minds and hopefully in the hearts of the kids. We also learned a song in Swahili this week and the kids were great at it!
Cedaysia and her googly eyes
We tried something new this week– we broke into groups of 3-4 to discuss the message, to work on the memory verse (1 Corinthians 13), and to pray together. This proved to be a sweet time, especially as I got to see how God is planting seeds through the memorizing of that chapter of the Bible. Some of the kids are really close to having it memorized, which is incredible in a community of kids who have heard very little from the Bible at all. God gave me a front row seat to watch the kids being prayed for by older kids from an entirely different community and an entirely different life. It is so beautiful to watch God moving in lives from all angles.
Toward end the week, we had a very sweet glitter, bubbles dance party. Does life get sweeter? Today I am incredibly humbled that God entrusted me with these sweet, beautiful, precious hearts this summer. Lord, may you be lifted high in their lives.
For a class I’m taking this summer, I’ve been reading through an anthology about the usefulness of literature called The Christian Imagination. I stumbled upon this poem and was intrigued by it, so I thought I’d share.
The Foolishness of God
Perform impossibilities
or perish. Thrus out now
the unseasonal ripe figs
among your leaves. Expect
mountains to be moved.
Hate parents, friends, and all
materiality. Love every enemy.
Forgive more times than seventy-
seven. Camel-like, squeeze by
into the kingdom through
the needle’s eye. All fear quell.
Hack off your hand, or else,
unblodied, go to hell.
Thus the divine unreason.
Despairing you may cry,
with earthy logic– How?
And I, your God, reply:
Leap from your weedy shallows.
Dive into the moving water.
Eye-less, learn to see
truly. Find in my folly your
true sanity. Then, Spirit-drivven,
run on my narrow way, sure
as a child. Probe, hold
my unhealed hand, and
bloody, enter heaven.
