250 items to engage your reading pleasure for many years.
I’m Jim McKeown, welcome to Likely Stories, a weekly review of fiction, non-fiction, and poetry.
Books and Libraries Poems from the Everyman’s Library Pocket Poets is edited by Andrew D. Scrimgeour. The poetry is amusing, and I will scatter a handful from my copy of the book.
Wallace Stevens: “The house was quiet, and the world was calm. The reader became the book; and summer night. Was like the conscious being of the book. The house was quiet, and the world was calm. The words were spoken as if there was no book, Except that the reader leaned above the page, Wanted to lean, wanted much most to be The scholar to whom his book is true, to whom The summer night is like a perfect thought. The house was quiet because it had to be. The quite was part of the meaning, part of the mind: The access of perfection to the page. And the world was calm. The truth in a calm world, In which there is no other meaning, itself is calm, itself is summer and night, itself Is the reader leaning late and reading there” (19).
Emily Dickinson: There is no Frigate like a Book / To take us Lands away / Nor any Coursers like a page / Of prancing Poetry-- / This Traverse may the poorest take / Without oppress of Toil-- / How frugal is the Chariot / That bears the Human soul—” (24).
Maya Angelou: “I LOVE THE LOOK OF WORDS / Popcorn leaps, popping from the floor / of hot black skillet / and into my mouth. / Black words leap, snapping from the white page. / Rushing into my eyes. / Sliding into my brain which gobbles them the way my tongue and teeth chomp the buttered popcorn. / When I have stopped reading, ideas from the words stay stuck in my mind / like the sweet smell of butter perfuming my fingers long after the popcorn is finished. / I love the book and the look of words the weight of ideas that popped into my mind I love the tracks of the new thinking in my mind.” (29).
Hilaire Belloc: “ON HIS BOOKS. When I am dead, I hope it may be said: ‘His sins were scarlet, but his books were read.”
Laurie L. Patton: “ON LEARNING A SACRED LANGUAGE IN CHILDHOOD. What you remember: a verb, and how it collided with a crow alighting on a tree behind your mother’s head; / a noun, and how it spilled off the spoon falling from your brother’s mouth; / a sentence, and its chill like the chill of your teacher’s hand on your shoulder; / Now you keep the books near your body. They curl and cry and will not let you forget their embrace; their nouns and verbs break open your silence. / Their sentences nag like children wanting a drink. / You try to quiet them, but they refuse—the hopes and disturbances of your wizened sleep.” (94-95).
Alberto Ríos: “DON’T GO INTO THE LIBRARY.” The Library is dangerous—Don’t go in. If you do / You know what will happen. It’s like a pet store or a bakery—Every single time you’ll come out of there Holding something in your arms. / Those novels with their big eyes and wagging tails. Those no-nonsense, all-muscle Dobermans, / All non fiction and business, Cuddling when they’re young, / But then the first page is turned and no turning back. And those sleek, fast, beautiful greyhounds: poems. / The doughnut scent of it all, knowledge, The aromas of coffee being made / In all those books, something for everyone, The deli offerings of civilization itself. / The library is the book of books, Its concrete and wood and glass covers / Keeping with them the very big, Very long story of everything. / The library is dangerous, full of answers. If you go inside, You may not come out The same person who went in.” (125-126).
Books and Libraries: Poems offers over 250 items to engage you reading pleasure for many years.
Likely Stories is a production of KWBU. I’m Jim McKeown. Join me again next time for Likely Stories, and happy reading!