{"id":139808,"date":"2019-09-26T13:08:36","date_gmt":"2019-09-26T17:08:36","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/?p=139808"},"modified":"2019-09-26T13:08:36","modified_gmt":"2019-09-26T17:08:36","slug":"poetry-rx-the-fucking-reticence","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/2019\/09\/26\/poetry-rx-the-fucking-reticence\/","title":{"rendered":"Poetry Rx: The Fucking\u00a0Reticence"},"content":{"rendered":"

In our column Poetry Rx, readers\u00a0write in<\/a> with a specific emotion, and our resident poets\u2014Sarah Kay, Kaveh Akbar, and Claire Schwartz\u2014take turns prescribing the perfect poems to match. This month, Kaveh Akbar is on the line.<\/i><\/em><\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>

\u00a9 Ellis Rosen<\/p><\/div>\n

Dear Poets,<\/em><\/p>\n

I am at a point in my life where I have very little structure, where every day is full of small decisions and every move feels like a long shot. I am in the process of beating an addiction (I hope), but this means that I am fully sober, grounded, and often a very raw kind of awake for every long minute of the day, however brilliant, brutal, or just plain boring it is. Do you have a poem that could quiet my mind or offer me clarity?<\/em><\/p>\n

Thanks,<\/em><\/p>\n

Actively Awake<\/em><\/p>\n

Dear AA,<\/p>\n

I remember so clearly the early days of sobriety. I\u2019d stare at my watch willing the time to pass faster, only to see, like in those old high school movies, the second hand seemingly move backward. When your whole life is predicated on feeding your addiction, and then you remove that addiction entirely, you\u2019re suddenly faced with a lot of life. A lot of hours, minutes, seconds. It\u2019s one of the reasons I got so into poetry; it was literally just a place to put myself. I could read a book of poems and not worry about what to do with my body or my mind for an hour, two hours. I could write <\/em>a poem and somehow make four or six or eight hours just fly by. <\/p>\n

For you, I prescribe one of my very favorite poems, Jean Valentine\u2019s \u201cI Came to You<\/a>.\u201d<\/p>\n

I came to you
\nLord, because of
\nthe fucking\u00a0reticence<\/em>
\nof this world
\nno, not the\u00a0world,<\/em> not\u00a0reticence<\/em><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

It\u2019s a bizarre poem, one with very few words (and most of those words are repeated). Its first sentence is a sentence I have repeated to myself like a protection spell throughout my years of sobriety: \u201cI came to you \/ Lord, because of \/ the fucking reticence<\/em> \/ of this world.\u201d<\/p>\n

I\u2019m just as confused as anyone as to what I mean when I say words like \u201cLord,\u201d and I have even less of an idea of what Jean Valentine means, but my sense is that here, it means something like \u201cthat which is bigger than my own ego,\u201d possibly even something like \u201csurrender.\u201d I came to surrender because of the fucking reticence of the world. That makes sense to me. If the whole world loved what I loved (in my case, alcohol and various choice narcotics) as much as I did, there\u2019d be no need for surrender. My behavior would be totally understood by all. But the world\u2019s reticence, its \u201cfucking reticence<\/em>\u201d brought me to my knees.<\/p>\n

But then Jean goes into hyperdrive\u2014\u201cno, not the world<\/em>, not reticence<\/em>, oh.\u201d And that \u201coh\u201d! The volumes I could write around that \u201coh\u201d! I feel in those two letters the futility of language, the frustration of trying to meaningfully convey any real experience of suffering or grace with these sounds, these barbaric black letters on a page. And then she ends the poem with the only thing she seems to know for certain, the only thing that is absolutely within her purview to state without qualification: \u201cWe were sad on the ground.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u2014KA<\/p>\n

*<\/p>\n

Dear Poets,<\/em><\/p>\n

I\u2019ve recently endured a crisis of faith that resulted in my leaving the only spiritual home and community I\u2019ve ever known. I feel small and lost, yet strangely alive. Even brave? Still, my entire worldview has shattered, and I am in a disorienting free fall. I\u2019m hoping you can help me create a soft place to land with poetry about change.<\/em><\/p>\n

\u2014Falling, yet Free<\/em><\/p>\n

Dear Falling,<\/p>\n

I love the way your letter frames the leaving as an opportunity for bravery, for creation and change. For you, I prescribe another favorite, Ben Purkert\u2019s \u201cNatural Intelligence<\/a>.\u201d It begins:<\/p>\n

The plural of anything is bound to be sharper:
\ncountless birds spelling\u00a0V<\/em>\u00a0above my head.
\nWhere they land, a field must slightly compress,
\nhardening under their cool weight.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

There\u2019s so much to love in this poem, but I especially love the way it is attentive to change and stasis: the weight of a flock of birds causes a field to \u201cslightly compress,\u201d but the birds themselves remain what they are, something people call a kind of \u201cintelligence.\u201d You say your \u201centire worldview has shattered,\u201d but you are also feeling \u201cstrangely alive.\u201d What flux! Having left your spiritual community you are no longer among<\/em> as you had been, and that can be painful. But remember, Purkert teaches us that \u201cthe plural of anything is bound to be sharper.\u201d What luck, then\u2014you\u2019re looking for \u201ca soft place to land,\u201d and your sharpness has worn away as you\u2019ve moved into aloneness. You\u2019ve already become your own soft place.<\/p>\n

\u2014KA<\/p>\n

*<\/p>\n

Dear Poets,<\/em><\/p>\n

My girlfriend is about to enter her final year of medical school before she enters the wonderful but terrifying world of the National Health Service. She is utterly brilliant and caring to her core, but I can tell she\u2019s scared. She\u2019s going to be faced with some desperately sad situations (along with some triumphant and remarkable ones) and I think she\u2019s wondering whether she has the strength to handle it and also is petrified of the mistakes she\u2019ll make. Please can you help me to reassure and comfort her?<\/em><\/p>\n

Yours,<\/em>
\nWanting to Soothe<\/em><\/p>\n

Dear WtS,<\/p>\n

For a long time I thought I was going to be a medical doctor. I was moving through the motions, trying to be a good Iranian boy, taking all the biology classes and doing hard science extracurriculars, imagining myself going to medical school at Johns Hopkins and then working at the Mayo Clinic. My parents were thrilled. Then, I discovered poetry and everything went to hell. To this day, my parents joke (at least I think they\u2019re joking) that they should have taken me out of school the day my English teacher first sent me home with a stack of poetry books.<\/p>\n

This to say, I have such profound respect to your girlfriend for doing an incredibly difficult, thankless thing, and for being willing to carry the burden of doing that incredibly difficult thankless thing for, presumably, her whole life. Your desire to support and celebrate her through this makes me love you both, and reading your letter I immediately thought of this poem by Rafael Campo<\/a>.<\/p>\n

\n
what I would like to offer them is this,<\/div>\n
not reassurance that their lungs sound fine,<\/div>\n
or that the mole they\u2019ve noticed change is not<\/div>\n
a melanoma, but instead of fear<\/div>\n
transfigured by some doctorly advice<\/div>\n
I\u2019d like to give them my astonishment<\/div>\n
at sudden rainfall like the whole world weeping,<\/div>\n
and how ridiculously gently it<\/div>\n
slicked down my hair<\/div>\n<\/blockquote>\n

Campo is a practicing physician himself\u2014which, sidebar, is totally nuts. I have thrown my entire life into learning how to write poems and still feel like an apprentice. Imagine being able to write as well as Campo and also <\/em>be a whole entire medical doctor as a career. The mind boggles.<\/p>\n

Anyway, your letter made me think of Campo\u2019s poem because it sounds to me like your girlfriend isn\u2019t so much concerned about remembering the right \u201cdoctorly advice,\u201d but instead about managing the inevitable losses and griefs inherent to her profession. Her heightened sensitivity to the humanity of her role is an essential calibration, one that I expect will make her uniquely capable of doling out what the doctor in the poem hopes to give. Astonishment, yes. And that most elusive thing to find in a doctor\u2019s office: comfort.<\/p>\n

\u2014KA<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Want more? Read earlier\u00a0installments of\u00a0Poetry Rx<\/a>.\u00a0<\/i>Need a poem?\u00a0Write to us<\/a>! In the next installment, Sarah Kay will be answering questions.\u00a0<\/em><\/p>\n

Our poets, brilliant though they may be, would like to remind you that they are only poets. If you or someone you love requires professional help, please consider\u00a0the resources listed here<\/a>.\u00a0<\/em><\/p>\n

Kaveh Akbar\u2019s poems have appeared recently in\u00a0<\/em>The\u00a0New<\/span>\u00a0Yorker<\/span>,<\/em>\u00a0Poetry,<\/em>\u00a0t<\/em>he<\/em>\u00a0New<\/span>\u00a0York Times,<\/em>\u00a0the\u00a0<\/em>Nation,\u00a0and elsewhere. His first book is\u00a0<\/em>Calling a Wolf a Wolf. Born in Tehran, Iran, he teaches at\u00a0Purdue<\/span>\u00a0University and in the low-residency M.F.A. programs at Randolph College and Warren Wilson College.<\/em><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

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