Dear friends,
The other day I was in Dublin Airport, waiting for a flight. The flight was going to be slightly late, so the delayed crowd was doing what a delayed crowd does. Energy was rising to the surface; people were walking up to screens; checking their watches; making phone calls; worrying about destinations.
A woman and a toddler were walking up and down the aisle between some of the rows of seats. The toddler — confident, radiant, muscular — was picking up a small cup that the woman kept deliberately dropping. She’d drop it, the baby would pick it up; she’d drop it, the baby would pick it up. You know how it goes (on and on and on). At one point, the adult put the plastic cup behind her back. The child, without a blink, turned to me and grabbed the flask of tea I had in my hand. (Clever child; the flask’s lid was tightly closed).
Everyone around us burst out laughing: the woman, the man beside me, the couple next to me, the people on the other side of the row. The baby seemed delighted with the audience and engaged me in a pleasant tug of flaskwar (see muscular above) until new distractions came.
After that, the delay was different. I got chatting to the man beside me, Bruce. He was traveling to one place, I to another. Both of our flights were delayed a little. We spoke of poetry, and the world, of Ireland, the U.S., and other places. He told me about his work. He told me about his husband and his dog. It was a lovely way to pass half an hour. When I got up to board my flight, we hugged and parted company. Time had done something different; all thanks to a two-foot-high would-be tea-thief. All praise the moment and the interruption and the adult patiently playing with the child and the loveliness of chance encounters.
The latest season of Poetry Unbound finished last week (we’ll be back with season eight this winter). The poems for this season, the seventh, were often gathered around themes of encounter: with friends and history and DNA and illness; with violence, art, jealousy, comparison, risk, possibility, empire, nature, and kindness. It’s interesting how a word like counter (I’ll counter an offer) can be modified by the suffix “en.” “Human encounter is the essence of cure, in the deepest sense,” the Dutch psychotherapist Adrian van Kaam wrote in the 1970s. I read it and have never forgotten it. That idea was on my mind as I was choosing poems for this just-finished season.
One of the things a poem is is an attempt to encounter: language, time and its peculiar directions, presence and absence, imagery, energy, power, lament and longing. A poem is a piece of art, a package of both image and sound. It is filled with absence, too: whether the blank space on the page, or the inhalation of a breath at a pause, a break, a caesura. A poem — and this is why I do this work — is an invitation to attention, and as such, it is an experience of physics, too: time changes.
Someone came up to me after a Poetry Unbound event the other week. She told me that she’d been receiving some therapeutic care at an outpatient facility, and had shared some episodes of Poetry Unbound with others there. They began listening together; and then they began writing. Now they don’t listen to the episodes anymore, they write instead. It was an encounter upon encounter. She told me about her experience with the podcast; and about how she’d gathered community around her leadership; and how that community encountered poetry and each other and — oh glory — themselves; and the encounter of words after words on a page. I’ve told myself this story over and over since I heard it. I encountered myself when she told me, and have thanked her — repeating her name like a prayer of gratitude — since I met her.
For all of us at Poetry Unbound, we are moved to think that you bring yourself to poetry, and some small corners of your world, through the podcast. Thank you. This Substack will continue in the time between seasons (although there’ll be a small break for a few weeks; the next one will be out on August 27).
I loved your replies to the question last week! Thank you (my playlist expandeth).
For this week, I’d be interested to hear about a small encounter that did something to time.
Let them flow, friends. I’ll enjoy reading them next week.
Pádraig
PS: This Poetry Unbound season is over, but our Substack continues! There’ll be a few Poetry Unbound extras in your podcast feed to look for end of August: interviews from last year’s brilliant Dodge Poetry Festival. And On Being is back with a new season this autumn.
Poetry in the World
ONLINE:
I’ll be teaching a five-part online course this autumn — 5pm EST, on Sunday nights: October 8, 15, 22, 20, and November 5 — on literary readings of peculiar biblical texts. I approach the art of these stories in deep respect for the artistry of the — mostly anonymous — original writers. This will be an exploration of art, and it’s mostly for those who wish to enjoy a small safari through powerful literature (and come out alive). Registration and details here.
U.S.A.
Printers Row Literary Festival | Chicago, IL
I’ll be interviewing Charif Shanahan sometime on the 9th of September at the Printers Row Lit Fest in Chicago. The exact time will be posted on their website end of August, and we’ll share on Substack then as well. Save the date, and learn more about the festival in the meantime here.
Iowa State University | Ames, IA
On the 14th of September at 6pm CT, I’ll give a lecture about Poetry and Conflict Resolution at Iowa State University. Would love to meet you if you’re in the area. The event is free, and will be recorded. Find further details here.
Dominican University | River Forest, IL
In the evening of September 21st, I’ll be giving the Tenth Annual Caesar and Patricia Tabet Poetry Reading at Dominican University, in River Forest, near Chicago. Details and tickets here.
SCOTLAND
“Poetry, Spirit and Survival” | Island of Iona, Scotland
I’ll be leading a retreat March 18-23, 2024. While this is currently fully booked, you can join a waiting list for the retreat, or join an early mailing list for future annual Iona retreats by contacting the organizer here.
I was rummaging through baby clothes at a garage sale and picked up a yellow dress at the same time another woman picked up the same dress. We laughed and decided that whoever had the earliest due date would get the dress. Wouldn't you know our due dates were one day apart. So we compared notes and had so much in common that we forgot about the dress and made a date to have coffee. That was more than 33 years ago. Our daughters were born a day apart (in reverse order) and we have been friends all this time through play dates, losing our mothers, a divorce, several moves, and now retirement. Our daughters stay in touch, but Molly and I are friends to the core. And it all began with a tiny yellow dress.
Every night at 8pm, I lock the pool gate for my community. Swimming time is over. I grab Frodo and my walking stick so we can head up the road for our evening walk before bedtime. At the pool tonight a tribe of kids greets me and Frodo. Frodo gets pets and kisses, and he strums his tail and licks their eager hands. The kid chorus says, "We see you walking by our house with your stick." I am surprised. I never dreamed anyone might be watching, and somehow their excitement makes my heart happy. After many hugs and pats, Frodo and I take our leave.
As we walk up the road, we are passed by two cars and the youngest child waves through the window and I wave back. The sky is just starting to darken a bit, mellow dusk-time when the world is gray and enchanted. I hear kids voices from up the road, and I think someone must be in the rental cabin up the way. The voices grow louder, giggling, laughing, and from over the hill emerges a crooked line of kids, each one clinging to a hand-made wooden stick. Ragtag, clamoring, excited, happy, they hold up their sticks for me to admire. One complains his legs hurt, and I laugh and tell him to hang in there. It gets better. The lone woman shepherding the group in short skirt, cowboy boots, and gothic make-up laughs with me. And the band of fellow travellers moves past me to their home. And my heart is full, and I hear God saying, "See. You thought you were invisible."