Category Archives: Poetry

Poem of the Week: Be faithful Go

Posted on March 31, 2007 by cicada

Life is more complicated, more mysterious and more convoluted than the party, the army, the police. Let us detach ourselves a little from this truly horrible everyday reality and try to write about doubt, anxiety and despair. -Zbigniew Herbert My … Continue reading →

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Poem of the Week: In the Night Orchard

Posted on March 21, 2007 by cicada

Much has been made of Shenandoah editor R.T. Smith’s “Southern” voice and perspective. Margaret Gibson says of his 2004 collection, Brightwood: Vernacular, down-home, these are poems given to remembering, and they make a faithful account. They find healing in a … Continue reading →

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Poem of the Week: Mnemonic

Posted on March 16, 2007 by cicada

Apparently you can selectively wipe out a single memory in rats. If you believe that our memories make us who we are, the implications are disturbing. I joke about wanting to block out portions of my life – usually chunks … Continue reading →

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Poems of the week: rediscovered Plath; Keats’ worst poem ever

Posted on March 2, 2007 by cicada

Anna Journey, a VCU graduate student, recently discovered a previously unpublished poem by Sylvia Plath. That venerable arbiter of literary taste, Jane Magazine, calls it “a gorgeous sonnet about feeling blah”. If you’ve read AS Byatt’s Possession (or seen its … Continue reading →

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Poem of the Week: WH Auden

Posted on February 24, 2007 by cicada

In honor of Auden’s centenary, York cabbies will be reciting his verse to their passengers. I expect most of the passengers will at least know who Auden is; if New York cabbies did the same, maybe not! Take this quiz … Continue reading →

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Poem of the Week: let’s hear it for descent with variations

Posted on February 16, 2007 by cicada

Let’s be honest: biologists sometimes get a little intoxicated by the beauty of the natural world. My friends know I will break off mid-conversation to crawl into the brush, mesmerized by a snake or a liverwort. My good china is … Continue reading →

Posted in Biology, Books, Poetry, Science, Wonder Cabinets | 3 Comments

A little reading is a dangerous thing

Posted on February 13, 2007 by cicada

I’ve been reading more than posting for the past week, and have a collection of odds, ends and lint to pass on. I have a love/hate relationship with the New Yorker. It’s just too much reading for me to keep … Continue reading →

Posted in Biology, Frivolity, Poetry, Science, Science in culture & policy | 1 Comment

Poem of the Week: For all this, nature is never spent

Posted on February 9, 2007 by cicada

Poor Gerard Manley Hopkins. He’s frequently anthologized, yet I get the feeling people read his poems and go “Wha. . . .?” So he was a manic-depressive repressed Jesuit who invented his own words, rhythm and poetic theory. So his … Continue reading →

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Poem of the Week: Magnitudes

Posted on February 2, 2007 by cicada

In honor of a resounding consensus on global warming which is finally drowning out the anti-science, wishful-thinking faction: a poem which appeared eighteen years ago but is even more relevant today. I still have my original copy of this poem … Continue reading →

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Poem of the Week: We must risk delight

Posted on January 26, 2007 by cicada

My favorite poem of 2005. A Brief for the Defense Jack Gilbert, Refusing Heaven Sorrow everywhere. Slaughter everywhere. If babies are not starving someplace, they are starving somewhere else. With flies in their nostrils. But we enjoy our lives because … Continue reading →

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