Reading poems

I'm not sure how this got started, but I notice that a lot of poets when they read deliver their lines with an upward lift at the end of the line.

deliver their LINES
with an upward LIFT
at the END
of the LINE.

It's a fairly unnatural method of reading or speaking and can often distract from the substance of a very good poem. I remember attending poetry readings when I was an undergrad, and no one ever read that way. It seems to have arisen with the ascent of the workshop culture wherein most of the students (now the instructors) are mostly familiar with the works of their contemporaries or the contemporaries of their teachers. I'm not saying I want to hear someone declaiming like Wallace Stevens or chanting like Pound or Yeats, but a good delivery that doesn't lose the prose sense of what's being said would be nice.

No-bama (4)

Ok, he gives another one of his "inspiring" speeches, this time on racial issues. To which I say, finally. Why didn't he give this speech as soon race became an issue? Say, during the South Carolina primary. Begin to deal with it when it first appears. That way it doesn't give off the stink of a political cover-up. During the speech he dismissed the idea that he chose this time to give the speech because of the problems with Rev. Wright. Sorry, guy--that's a no-sell. It would've just faded into the woodwork, he said. Nope. Wrong again. This one's got legs. He had to have known what this guy was saying from the pulpit. He married Obama and Michelle; he christened his children. "How could I have know?" doesn't cut it. This was a classic cya speech, cut and dried.

The real question is why this man, who has had political goals almost from the moment he dropped out of the womb, was stupid enough to stay in this particular church. Did he think no one would ever bother checking up? That he's still in the race is testament to how easily the press covers this guy. Imagine if it turned out that John McCain's pastor delivered Aryan Nation rant as part and parcel of his sermons. McCain could write-off the nomination no matter how many delegates he's banked.

Politics. That's the bottom line. This guy is looking to maintain his political positioning. Hope? At this point I think we all need to hope that there isn't another one this bad waiting in the wings.

Sing

Minister. O Lord, open thou our lips.
Answer. And our mouth shall show forth thy praise.
—The Book of Common Prayer


Sing, sings the titmouse.
Sing, sings the bullfrog.
Sing, sings the cricket.
Sing, sings the robin, its twilight note
piercing the air, the heart, moving
me to open my lips, not to the Lord above
but to the fallen shards of heaven
sprung to life, giving voice through all these
pied and dappled creatures for joy and praise
that life flows, that the trees flower, that all
life blossoms and burgeons, that we rise
each morning to watch the sun’s aureole
brighten the tips of the farthest trees, or rain
drip from the eaves, snow drop in its delicate,
intricate glory. Light, dark—the interplay
life’s Gloria that we, by speaking, by
singing, bring to our own, wholly undivided note.