Something happened in the course of the recent U. S. Open tournament. Lucille Clifton’s poem is about the “damn wonder” of renewal, and golf is catching a whiff of something fresh in the boy-faced Rory McIlroy.
Tag Archives: Lucille Clifton
Golf Suddenly Seems Green Again
The Green of Jesus Is Breaking the Ground
According to the church calendar, we are still in the Easter season,and the hope of the resurrection continues to be mirrored in beautiful May days. Lucille Clifton intermingles the spirituality of religion and the sensuality of life as well as any poet I know. Here’s a poem in her Jesus series. As far as she’s concerned, there’s no conflict between religious ecstasy and the sights and sounds of spring or the wonderful smells emanating from people’s kitchens and the music from their radios.
Answer the Door, Child–Truth is Knocking
We had our major awards ceremony this past Saturday. As is tradition, we began with a poem by Lucille Clifton that she allowed us to adapt slightly for the occasion.Our president then gave one of his patented speeches, this one centered on Plato’s Meno. It was exactly what I wanted our students to hear: a full-blown defense of the liberal arts.
Rising Again to Dance
Chidi Okoye (Nigeria) Spiritual Sunday I refute Berkeley thus, Samuel Johnson famously said. And kicked a rock. Bishop Berkeley was the 18th century idealist philosopher who asked how we know reality is really there if we are dependent upon our senses for perceiving it. Is the rock in existence when we turn our backs? Johnson’s […]
Jackie Robinson, Poetry in Motion
Jackie Robinson steals home Sports Saturday In the memorial service held at St. Mary’s College for Lucille Clifton two weeks ago, I learned that she had three special heroes: Martin Luther King, Muhammad Ali, and Jackie Robinson. Robinson, of course, was the African American player who broke the baseball color line in 1947, which he […]
Poems for Abuse Victims
Lucille Clifton Having attended a memorial ceremony for the recently departed poet Lucille Clifton this past Saturday (see yesterday’s post), today I commemorate her by putting some of her poems to good use. Catholic priest molestation has been in the news recently (less the molestation, which tragically occurs in all walks of life, than the […]