“For a while there I read mostly poetry, which seemed to ratify or at least dignify my outsized feelings”.
Nam Le
Reflecting back on his teenage years here, it feels to me like a lovely description of what to do with outsized feelings! I even think its nice that he calls them outsized, rather than oversized feelings - it adds that sense of things just not fitting when you are younger and don't quite know what to do with them.
Anyhow, it is also a lovely way of saying how poetry can just fit. Oftentimes I think poetry is a place where you can find what you need, when you need it and sometimes without even knowing that you needed it.
Poetry is so vast and so various, and yet mostly it's available and easy to get into. You can flick through a book of poems and find out fairly quickly if they are for you or not.
Sometimes there will only be one or two which grab you - but my goodness do they grab. They speak right to you, personally, and they help makes sense of your world.
And just for that moment you can sit with them and feel heard.
Nam Le
Reflecting back on his teenage years here, it feels to me like a lovely description of what to do with outsized feelings! I even think its nice that he calls them outsized, rather than oversized feelings - it adds that sense of things just not fitting when you are younger and don't quite know what to do with them.
Anyhow, it is also a lovely way of saying how poetry can just fit. Oftentimes I think poetry is a place where you can find what you need, when you need it and sometimes without even knowing that you needed it.
Poetry is so vast and so various, and yet mostly it's available and easy to get into. You can flick through a book of poems and find out fairly quickly if they are for you or not.
Sometimes there will only be one or two which grab you - but my goodness do they grab. They speak right to you, personally, and they help makes sense of your world.
And just for that moment you can sit with them and feel heard.
love the poetry in your photographic response!
ReplyDeleteThanks Mo - I think it worked!
DeleteInteresting...I had just this response this morning listening to the poetry of Richard Blanco. I felt heard.
ReplyDeleteIs this a small view of your home in Sutherland? Whatever it is, those granite walls remind me so much of our holiday home in Aberdeenshire. They're very special places these solid old granite houses.
ReplyDeleteWould that it were Margaret! Our cottage is far more humble...this is an apartment we stay at in Edinburgh - we love that it has this atmospheric courtyard off the bedroom, and have sat drinking wine there on occasions...the solidity of that stone is marvellous. go well.
Delete