Committing to Memory

“Always keep something beautiful in your heart.”

Dear friends,

Months ago, I typed out a long poem that I love. I typed it out so that I could memorise it. 

I grew up in a time when memorisation of poetry was taken for granted. We’d be given some dense text — in English and Irish — and were expected to have it learnt off by heart by the week’s end. Memorisation has gone in and out of educational fashion over the decades since I was seven, and I don’t have straightforward feelings about it: it benefited me, but my assumption is that it didn’t benefit everyone. However, at a gig a few years ago, where some folksy rock stars were belting out tunes, I looked around and saw hundreds of people singing words as if their lives depended on it. Texts have a way of becoming part of us, and a memorised text — a favourite song, a favourite poem, a favourite passage of a story — feels like it speaks us back as we speak it out. 

So, I typed out that long poem, and have been carrying it with me for months. 

When I say months, I think I probably mean about twenty months. Maybe closer to thirty. 

But this week I decided I’d start. I’ve not made much progress. Just a page and a bit. My seven year old self would be aghast at how slow my progress is made. I’m 47, I’d say to him, I’m busy, give me a break. He wouldn’t give me a break. He’d look at me in judgment and then ask questions about what it’s like to be old. 

The poem I’m learning is the first part of a book-length poem by Mary Oliver, The Leaf and the Cloud; a dense, demanding, complicated piece she wrote in response to a statement about art by John Rushkin. It was published in 2001 by De Capo Press. I have read it many times over the years. And already, this week, in the lines I’ve learnt, I’ve found myself thinking about it in new ways. To learn off by heart is to somehow have the lines inside you, rather than on a page. I’m chewing on words like “recall” and “into the earth” and “flaring” and “Catalpa”. Also, words like “comforting” and “silly” and “poem”.

When I recite it to myself, I most often close my eyes, so there’s a different kind of reading happening, a gaze that’s turning in a different way. My eyes are on something else. There’s the slight thrill of achievement when I’ve managed to add an extra line to memory (only one extra line? the 7-year-old me says). Mostly I keep the text of the poem by the place I make tea or coffee, so that every time I go to replenish a cup (which is many), I see it, and cast my eyes over it for half a minute. That’s it; I don’t have much time, but those little pockets help.

Photo by sean Kong on Unsplash

Pascal said, “In times of difficulty, always keep something beautiful in your heart.” I think I turn to memorised poems because it provides a text with which to be in conversation. The text might not be beautiful; and I might not be in a time of difficulty. Or it might and I might too. Either way, I like the exchange with the lines. It’s some company across time and interpretation. 

I am curious what texts you try to keep in memory. And why. And when have you recalled it. It might be a poem, or a line from a book, it might be imperfectly recalled, but nonetheless permanently in you… What is it? And why?

I read Where Angels Fear to Tread by E.M. Forster years ago, and there’s a line I’ve always recalled: “We all radiate something curiously intimate when we believe ourselves to be alone.” That line was a permission for me. And radiate — what a verb: to shine, to emit. 

I’ll meet you in the comments, friends. 

Pádraig 

PS: Apropos of nothing but the broad topic of memory, I recommend Maria Stepanova’s book In Memory of Memory (translated magnificently by Sasha Dugdale) to you. It was up for the Booker a few years ago. It’s a dense 500-page essay about mediocrity, memory, reliability, truth, and family. Utterly compelling. 

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Poetry in the World

Wick Poetry Center

I’ll be in Kent, Ohio this Tuesday, February 21, spending the day at Kent State University. If you’re in the area, you’re most welcome to come for a poetry reading I’m holding that evening at 7pm ET. Some details on the location:

Michael Schwartz Center
Room 177 
800 E. Summit Street
Kent, OH 44242 
Parking is available in the Kent State Student Center parking lot (1075 Risman Drive)

The Craft of Translation

On Sunday, March 5, I’ll be back in New York City, joining the magnificent Patricio Ferrari for a multilingual poetry reading (English, Irish, Italian, Spanish) and a lively discussion on the craft of translation.

You can register here, with a suggested donation of $10 in support of Tender Buttons Press. Hosted by Torn Page, starts at 5pm ET. Would love to see you there — do come up and say hello.