tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9144957.post114071978590847916..comments2023-10-31T09:37:59.862-07:00Comments on Rocket Kid Writing: Jane Hirshfield at the Well, NEA & Contest questionsRachel Dacushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15754712503067644226noreply@blogger.comBlogger1125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9144957.post-1140781412833416932006-02-24T03:43:00.000-08:002006-02-24T03:43:00.000-08:00Rachel,thanks for the heads-up on the Hirshfield c...Rachel,<BR/>thanks for the heads-up on the Hirshfield conversation; (& good luck w/ the NEA).<BR/><BR/>The question about kindness etc. as subject in poetry seems perhaps problematical. Unless one is a teacher pontificating, most writers will not expound on or narrate their own acts of kindness, though generousities received / poems expressing gratitude can be written. In general, the occasional poem might be a tradition less common in Anglo-American poetry practice than in, say, East Asian cultural contexts. In Chinese antiquity (and into the present), the occasional poem -- e.g. a short poem written at a particular time to present to particular people -- has been perhaps a chief use for poetry per se, meseems; -- and hasn't been considered trivial, since the classical poets like Li Bai and Tu Fu and Wang Wei all practiced this extensively, as a part of daily life. But then, oftentimes, a sense of divinity-in-life, and gratitude for its forms and recognitions, may be imminent in poetry as essential subtext rather than topical subject, no?<BR/><BR/>cheers,<BR/>d.i.david raphael israelhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/16621521896693000470noreply@blogger.com