A song for your 'self'

“When you begin to write poems because you love language, because you love poetry. Something happens that makes you write poems. And the writing of poems is incredibly pleasurable and addictive.” – C. K. Williams (1939-2015)

A native of New Jersey, Williams came comparatively late to the writing of poetry, though he was encouraged by his father from an early age to read poems and learn them by heart. It was in penning a love poem at the age of 19 that Williams discovered a sense of vocation and from that moment on "knew that that was what I was going to do.”His poetic style involved long flexible lines and                       while he wrote on many topics, children, marriage and the ties of family were often his significant themes.   Among his many awards were the National Book Award for The Singing and a Pulitzer Prize for Repair. For Saturday’s Poem, here is Williams’ 
The Singing
I was walking home down a hill near our house    on a balmy afternoon under the blossoms Of the pear trees that go flamboyantly mad here    every spring with their burgeoning forth
When a young man  turned in from a corner singing   no it was more of a cadenced shouting Most of which I couldn't catch I thought because    the young man was black speaking black
t didn't matter I could tell he was making his    song up which pleased me he was nice-looking Husky dressed in some style of big pants obviously    full of himself hence his lyrical flowing over
We went along in the same direction then he noticed  me there almost beside him and "Big" He shouted-sang "Big" and I thought how droll    to have my height incorporated in his song
So I smiled but the face of the young man showed nothing    he looked in fact pointedly away And his song changed "I'm not a nice person"   he chanted "I'm not, I'm not a nice person"
No menace was meant I gathered no particular threat   but he did want to be certain I knew That if my smile implied I conceived of anything like concord between us I should forget it
That's all nothing else happened his song became    indecipherable to me again he arrived Where he was going a house where a girl in braids    waited for him on the porch that was all
No one saw no one heard all the unasked and    unanswered questions were left where they were It occurred to me  to sing back "I'm not a nice   person either" but I couldn't come up with a tune
Besides I wouldn't have meant it nor he have believed    it both of us knew just where we were In the duet we composed the equation we made    the conventions to which we were condemned
Sometimes it feels even when no one is there that    someone something is watching and listening Someone to rectify redo remake this time again though    no one saw nor heard no one was there











Share A Writer’s Moment with a friend by clicking the g+1 button below.