My poetry in motion poem, “My Words to You” by Jean Valentine was found on the six train. I didn’t really have an initial reaction to the poem even though I came across it numerous of times on my way home. With that being said, this assignment allowed me to analyze what the meaning was. “My words to you are the stitches in a scarf / I don’t want to finish” (Line 1-2). The stitches in the scarf is what keeps the fabric together. The stitches are symbolizing the strength in the bond you and your partner has created. “Maybe it will come to be a blanket / to hold you here” (Line 3-4) represents how you didn’t expect your relationship to get so far but yet it did, so the scarf is no longer just a scarf, you’ve turned the scarf into a blanket. The more time you spend with your partner, the more you grow, the more comfortable you get and you begin to feel at home. “Love not gone anywhere” (Line 5) is basically saying that you made your love go from something small (the stitches in a scarf) to something big (the blanket). You can make it as big as you want but at the end of it all, it will stay with you.

The title of the poem, “My Words to You” brings this feeling of comfort along with the background of the poem. The background gives you this warm fuzzy feeling when you look at it followed by the poem itself. This poem explores the nature of love and what it feels like. As simplistic as it was it was very thorough with the message it wanted to give.

My initial reaction reading the poem for the first time was, why did the author abbreviate some of the words?, but at the same time I thought the idea was brilliant. The poem talks about what you should feel while reading a poem and how that poem should make you feel while reading it. In the poem the speaker sounds like he is kind of trying to direct you in the way of where the poem should make you feel something and where the poem should take you. For example, ” a poem shd happen to you like a cold water or a kiss” (Line 8-10), the speaker is saying that a poem should either shock you,make you feel good, feel bad, bother you or soothe you, all of which happen to you when you drink water or kiss someone or something.

In the poem there is a big visual piece of art that looks like the moon or earth accompanied by the rest of the other planets, i.e (Mars, Jupiter, Saturn, Neptune). Those are the planets that the visual art looks like most and they are circle shaped and colored blue, yellow and orange. This poem was chosen for subway riders to read because on your way home or to work or wherever you’re going the poem is not something that is too emotional but its a quick read especially if you are on the train with nothing to do.

Reading poems one time in your life can help you relax, refresh your mind and sometimes can give you memories along with a motivation throughout your life. In Merwin’s “Remembering Summer” found in Poetry Society America, first reading the title of the poem gives a little throwback about summer and the amusing times. As we know summer we feel the warm of the summer heat, the ice cream, the beach and so on. But there’s always the time where it comes to the end, the winter. The speaker tells the reader of the summer and “remember the winter how cold it got” by saying that the speaker couldn’t enjoyed the summer heat and it got cold really fast out of the sudden. In addition, the speaker has only remembered how the summer was warm and “only the long days the breathing of the trees” where the pleasant moment. We can say that this poem can tell us that there are somethings that has the end of the enjoyment. But knowing that waiting can take time to feel the same excitement so the speaker have said,  “I can sit here now still listening to it”. Basically, the speaker feels the cold has arrived and trying to find the ways of getting warm by just flash backing the summer.

 Poetry In Motion                                 

The title of the poem I have chosen is “My Words To You” by Jean Valentine, I found this poem on the 6 line. I have seen this Poem many times before, every time I would see it I would read it and try to understand it. This Blog Post gives me the opportunity to go more in depth and really get a better understanding of this poem. My initial reaction to reading this poem, was the speaker holding on to a loved one and spending more time with them. In line 1 to 3 “My words to you are the stitches in a scarf “/ I don’t want to finish/ maybe it will come to be a blanket”. I think that the speaker wants more time with their loved one, because comparing a scarf to a blanket, a scarf is smaller and takes less time to make. Stitching that blanket together symbolizes the speaker wanting time to say more and spend more time with their loved one.
The two themes I can take from this poem are love and time, Time because the speaker wants to spend more time with their loved ones, they don’t want the words to finish because then time is up. Love because they want to hold there love one and not lose them. I do think this poem is accessible for general readers because there are many different ways to decode this poem because it is short and straight to the point. The image next to the poem is a design of many different flowers within each other, it is very abstract. What does this image represent ? Why do the words have to end?, those are two questions that have been picking my mind.

P.S. Last Line:  I can sit here now still listening to it

The title of this poem is “Remembering Summer” and the author is W.S. Merwin. I found this poem on the R train(line).  My initial reaction to reading this poem is that it gives off a very refreshing vibe. When I read anything, I often visualize in my mind, so when I was visualizing this poem, the scenery and the things the speaker describes puts me in a very happy and relaxed mood. Also, when I saw the author’s name, it seemed very familiar to me because it is written by the same author of the poem, “The Lonely Child.” The visual art that accompanies the house is a white lily and a tree branch. I think this particular poem was chosen for subway riders to read because it has a very refreshing feel to it. Many subway riders are really busy, either heading to work, school, etc., but when they read the poem, they will feel calm.  I think the speaker is a woman and the subject of the poem is the delights of summer. The theme that the poem explores is that summer is the best season because, to the speaker, summer is a very relaxing and peaceful time. For example, the poem states, “and the light getting longer in the valley/the sound of a bell from down there somewhere/I can sit here now still listening to it” (Lines 10-12). This shows that the speaker is very relaxed or calm sitting in a valley and listening to the sounds of bells while watching “the light getting longer.” Some questions I have about the poem is why the speaker could never get warm during the winter and who the old lady in the beginning of the poem was.

The poem “Dew” by Kay Ryan was generously given to me by Professor Bannett as I was unable to find any poems on the trains I use to get to school. My initial reaction to reading the poem was “While this poem is nice, it’s meaning seems very general”. The art is very simple, it’s a green stem with green leaves. Green is usually synonymous with life, so I thought I think the leaves represent individual people. I believe that this poem was chosen for train riders, because it represents every day life. The speaker appears to an outside point of view, this poem has no first person or third. The speaker is more invested in the scene before him, probably watching people walking around in front of him.

The subject is plants which I believe to be analogy for humans. “But unattached and subject to their weight”, this could mean that all people have different goals in life even when they are working together. The theme is life. People come and go in your life every day, some contribute to your day and others are just random strangers. Yes, I think that “Dew” is accessible for general readers since it’s meaning can be interpreted in many ways. Some questions I have would be: Where was Kay Ryan when she was writing this poem ? What inspired her ? Why is she being so cryptic ?