1. Doris Salcedo
This installation, produced for the
8th International Istanbul Biennial,
contained approximately 1,550
wooden chairs stacked between
two buildings to address the
history of migration and
displacement in Istanbul.

3. Welcome
to
Session 6

4. A
Writer’s
Reference
And Life

5. English Only …

6. POETRY

7. Poetry
For the sake of a single poem, you must see many
cities, many people and things, you must
understand animals, must feel how birds fly, and
know the gesture which small flowers make when
they open in the morning.
-Rainer Maria Rilke

8. What is a poem?

Robert Frost said “Poetry is the kind of thing a
Poet writes.”

Poems are written with the feelings and the
emotions, with the intuition and the instincts, that
make each of us who we are.

Difficult to define – there is so much of it

It is the oldest of language arts

Psalms

9. Psalm 46
– 1 God is our refuge and strength,
– an ever-present help in trouble.
– 2 Therefore we will not fear, though the earth give way
– and the mountains fall into the heart of the sea,
– 3 though its waters roar and foam
– and the mountains quake with their surging.[c]
– 4 There is a river whose streams make glad the city of God,
– the holy place where the Most High dwells.
– 5 God is within her, she will not fall;
– God will help her at break of day.
– 6 Nations are in uproar, kingdoms fall;
– he lifts his voice, the earth melts.
– 7 The Lord Almighty is with us;
– the God of Jacob is our fortress.
– 8 Come and see what the Lord has done,
– the desolations he has brought on the earth.
– 9 He makes wars cease
– to the ends of the earth.
– He breaks the bow and shatters the spear;
– he burns the shields[d] with fire.
– 10 He says, “Be still, and know that I am God;
– I will be exalted among the nations,
– I will be exalted in the earth.”
– 11 The Lord Almighty is with us;
– the God of Jacob is our fortress.

10. Poetry & Language Arts

Sticks of clay/painted on walls of tombs

Drama – 200/300 years later – emerging from
Poetry performance

Novel – only 300/400 years old

Short Stories – less than 200 years old

Storytelling – part of human experience

“A poem should not mean/but be.” - MacLeish, p. 671.

11. Dictionary Definition

Webster's New Collegiate Dictionary
A composition in verse, characterized by
imagination and poetic diction.
Any composition marked by qualities ascribed
to poetry, as elevation or beauty.
1949 edition said, “The art or work of poets;
the embodiment in appropriate language of
beautiful or high thought, imagination, or
emotion, he language being rhythmical,
usually metrical, and adapted to arouse the
feelings and imagination…”

12. Modernization

“It no longer expresses what we expect from poetry
today [the 1949 definition]. Visions of beauty expressed
in rhythmical language are not what most poets have
written in the last decades, since our expectations for
the future have become more wary. Poetry does,
however, continually present a conscious shaping of
language and an awareness of form to set it apart from
its sister prose.” p. 673.

13. Mr. Keating's Definition of Poetry

14. Grab Bag of Language

Two parts to see in Poetry
1. Theme – what is the poet telling you?
2. Means – how? Structure? Form? Rhythm?
Sounds of words, allusions, music art, … grab
bag of language, expression and thoughts =
elements of Poetry.

15. Where Do Themes Come From?

Within the writers themselves ...
I Sound My Barbaric Yawp

16. Being here
–All my poems are suggested by real life and
therein have a firm foundation …. No one can
imitate when you write of the particular, because
no others have experienced exactly the same thing. -
Goethe

17. Look closely at
something you see
all the time. Write
as if you've never
seen this before.
Use “It looks like” as
a tool. Describe
exactly what you
see.

18. Why do we write Poetry?
The powerful plays goes on ... and you may

19. I am not crazy!

The daily routine of our lives can be good
and even wonderful, but there is still a
hunger in us for the mystery of the deep
waters, and poetry can fulfill that hunger. It
speaks to that place in us that seems
incomplete. And it can assure us that we
are not crazy or alone, and that is a tall
order. p. 680

20. –Poem Crazy
– “We have to start with ourselves
before we can reach beyond
ourselves. And whatever our
intention, the way we see and
write about the world always
reveals who we are.”

21. What Poem did YOU
choose? & Why?
Dramatic Readings

22. Movie
Time
Get a Snack,
a Beverage.
Dead Poet’s Society
Fill out Worksheet/Canvas
Quiz as Movie Plays

23. Mid-Term Review