Julia Spicher Kasdorf at Goshen College

This weekend Julia Spicher Kasdorf visited Goshen College as the 41st S. A. Yoder Lecturer. Reading from her newly published book of poems, Poetry in America, Spicher Kasdorf read to a packed house in Rieth Recital Hall. Her audience was composed of three generations of readers--some of whom had been her professors when she was a student at Goshen, some who are her peers, and some who are the ages of her students. Laughter and thoughtful pauses punctuated the reading.

The poems evoked the characters of a rural Pennsylvania landscape, from the Cardio Kickboxing Instructor in Bellefonte to a legendary Amish grandmother killed in a buggy accident caused by a runaway horse. Kasdorf's poems are filled with a respect for the stories of others and the humanity of her subjects. The title poem of her new book evokes the solitary stranger who came to hear her read poems at a Barnes and Noble. In a gracious reversal of poet and listener, Barbara, who "had bangs and plastic glasses like Ramona the Pest," becomes the heroine of this poem. This is the generosity of Kasdorf's style--she draws the reader in and makes of her or him a poet.

Which poem drew you in?

Poetry Lovers are Everywhere -- Even in the End Zone

Peyton Manning, legendary quarterback of the Indianapolis Colts, has been know to quote poetry in the game's crucial final minutes. Read about it here.

Walt Whitman's legacy

Why begin a class on contemporary poetry with Walt Whitman? Because Whitman's poetry created innovations that today's poets still use.

In class we experimented with writing "Whitman imitations"--poems using the style of Whitman that contained our own imagery. Check out the student blogs to see some fun and creative responses in poetry. Any number of contemporary poets have paid homage to Whitman, including Ezra Pound, Hart Crane, and Charles Wright. Allen Ginsberg looks to Whitman as his poetic forbear in his famous poem Howl, and more playfully features Whitman and Whitman's style in "A Supermarket in California."

A Favorite Poem: Frost at Midnight by Samuel Taylor Coleridge

Ever since I read Frost at Midnight by Samuel Taylor Coleridge in Brit Lit as a first year student at Kenyon College, back in 1972-73, it has been one of my favorite poems--one I've returned to again and again.

Although it's written in a style that seems very old fashioned today, the images in the poem, and the way it opens up a moment into a chain of interlocking thoughts, feels both intimate and contemporary. Coleridge shares his thoughts on a winter evening, as he stares into the fire, focusing on a fluttering bit of ash, a "stranger," caught in the grate. This reminds him of when he was a lonely orphan at boarding school in London, and then he thinks of his own son lying close by in the cradle, hoping that he will grow up healthy in the countryside and have a better childhood.


What really grabs me in this poem, though, is the first line, "the frost performs its secret ministry." Coleridge suggests that the natural world has secrets to tell us, if only we will listen. But it's not just the idea here that captures me--it's the word "frost" on the tongue and how it catches on the "s" sound in each subsequent word--performs, its, secret, ministry. Hey, I just noticed that there's an "s" in every one of those words!

Richard Burton reads Frost at Midnight on YouTube

Part of Frost at Midnight dramatized in a clip from Pandaemonium (2000).

Frost at Midnight is one of Coleridge's "conversation" poems, in which he converses with, or explores his own thoughts, and draws the reader into the conversation. This method would become the foundation of the modern lyric poem, which includes much so-called "confessional" poetry. I was fortunate enough to meet the former Poet Laureate of the United States, Billy Collins, a few years ago in Ireland, and he told me of his fondness for the conversation poems, especially Coleridge's "This Lime-Tree Bower, My Prison." This surprised me for a few minutes, until I realized that Collins' own conversational poems draw the reader right into an intimacy with his own imagination in a similar way, but in a very contemporary style. See, for instance, is poem, Introduction to Poetry. You can read more of Collins' poems at the Academy of American Poets website.

Here's a photo of yours truly and Billy Collins taken at the John Hewitt Summer School in July 2008 in Armagh, Northern Ireland. The summer school is an annual event that features poetry readings, political discussions, concerts, and lots of good "craic."

Welcome to Intro to Lit: Poetry at Goshen College - Fall 2011

What is poetry?
How does it function?
Why is poetry important to us?
How is our understanding of poetry shaped by cultural context?
What work does poetry do in our world?
These are questions we'll be discussing and blogging about in Introduction to Literature: Poetry at Goshen College.