Monthly Archives: July 2020

Living Where Peace Comes Dropping Slow

By Robin Bates | Published: July 20, 2020

Tuesday We’ve put up a birdfeeder outside our screened-in back porch and are now being visited by a non-stop stream of goldfinches, titmice, and chickadees. One additional benefit is that, for the first time in my life, I fully appreciate a Yeats image that has always eluded me. It makes sense that “The Lake Isle […]

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On John Lewis’s Love of “Invictus”

By Robin Bates | Published: July 19, 2020

The late John Lewis’s favorite poem was apparently “Invictus,” a problematic lyric but one can see how Lewis used it in the cause of social justice.

Posted in Uncategorized | Tagged "Invictus", Civil Rights Movement, John Lewis, William Ernest Henley | Comments closed

Scraping One’s Knees on Jacob’s Ladder

By Robin Bates | Published: July 18, 2020

Denise Levertov draws on the Jacob’s dream about a stairway to heaven to capture poetry’s transcendent qualities.

Posted in Uncategorized | Tagged "Altar", "Circus Animals Desertion", "Jacob's Ladder", 9-11 poems, Denise Levertov, George Herbert, Lucille Clifton, sacred spaces, Transcendence, William Butler Yeats | Comments closed

An Early Advocate of Native Lives Matter

By Robin Bates | Published: July 16, 2020

A recent SCOTUS ruling in favor of Indian rights brings to mind a Scott Bates poem about Christian Priber, an early fighter for Indian autonomy.

Posted in Uncategorized | Tagged "P Is for Pribers Paradise", Christian G. Priber, Colonialism, Indian rights, McGirt v Oklahoma, Scott Bates | Comments closed

Young People and Covid Spread

By Robin Bates | Published: July 15, 2020

Dr. Birx has blamed the Covid-19 explosion in part on irresponsible young people. Reading the carpe diem poets would have helped her understand them better.

Posted in Uncategorized | Tagged "To the Virgins to Make Much of Time", Andrew Marvell, carpe diem, coronavirus response, COVID-19, Robert Herrick | Comments closed

We Are Waiting Rooms at Bus Stations

By Robin Bates | Published: July 14, 2020

As poet Marge Piercy sees it, we are bus station waiting rooms through which people pass, each leaving an imprint.

Posted in Uncategorized | Tagged "Visible and the In-", identity, Marge Piercy, personal encounters, Relationships | Comments closed

Mary Trump, Smiley on Nightmare Families

By Robin Bates | Published: July 13, 2020

To see another family as dysfunctional as the one Mary Trump describes in her recent book, look to Jane Smiley’s “Thousand Acres.”

Posted in Uncategorized | Tagged Donald Trump, family dysfunction, Jane Smiley, King Lear, Mary Trump, Thousand Acres, Too Much and Never Enough, Trump family, William Shakespeare | Comments closed

Covid Costs Us Loved Ones’ Final Words

By Robin Bates | Published: July 12, 2020

Among the many tragedies related to Covid is how family and friends are missing out on final words. Many literary works touch on the importance of this last encounter.

Posted in Uncategorized | Tagged Aeschylus, Agamemnon, COVID-19, death and dying, death bed words, Henry Fielding, Richard II, Song of Solomon, Tom Jones, Toni Morrison, William Shakespeare | Comments closed

Hearts Upright & Sound Receive the Seed

By Robin Bates | Published: July 11, 2020

In a series of parables, 18th century poet Christopher Smart sought to make Jesus’s parables accessible to the expanding middle class.

Posted in Uncategorized | Tagged "Sower and the Seed", Allen Ginsberg, Christopher Smart, evangelical movements, Jesus parables | Comments closed