My heart rouses to bring you news, that concerns you and concerns many men. It is difficult to get the news from despised poems, yet men die miserably every day for lack of what is found there.
That’s Dr. William Carlos Williams, a poet and OB-GYN, and this is Professor Barbara Mossberg, welcoming you to the Poetry Slow Down, on KRXA 540AM, at the San Francisco airport; in the past two weeks I’ve been criss-crossing the country from blizzards to draughts, snows to warm desert sun, talking about the role of poetry in civic life, the power
of poetry to shape our life as inevitably and powerfully as glaciers—maybe it doesn’t look like things are happening–, when someone writes or reads a poem, but
over time, poetry rocks and moves and carves our civic landscape. Our weekly hour show here on KRXA waves a flag for poetry’s necessity: how William Carlos Williams says, in his poem To Asphodel, That Greeny Flower, my heart rouses to bring you news . . .that men die miserably without, that poetry is a different kind of news we need. Our show places poetry in between the headline news, the late-breaking, fast-breaking, heart-breaking news. In arguing the role of poetry in our lives, we see this week the Haiti earthquake. People all over the world are organizing relief efforts, and one thing
that strikes me is how we see the role of The Poet in society, because a disaster focuses attention on a culture’s values. Who do we send to help save the day in a crisis? What expertise do we consider essential? Do we send poets as well as engineers, story tellers as well as bridge builders? What does poetry matter? How has it ever mattered to civilization in constant crisis? How has it mattered to each of us in our daily struggles, and to larger society, the destiny of countries? Do we need the poet as well as the engineer, the fire fighter, the surgeon? With the story of Haiti’s earthquake I have been thinking about Tracy Kidder’s Pulitzer Prize winning book on Dr. Paul Farmer’s work in Haiti, Mountains Beyond Mountains: Dr. Farmer has a medical
degree and Ph.D. in anthropology, both from Harvard, in order to be useful in what is considered the most hopeless nation, certainly the poorest and most beset, in the Western Hemisphere, and takes up what are considered the most hopeless of diseases, HIV/AIDS virus and TB, as one single person tries to take them on . . . with hope and determination. Is he Don Quixote? Is he innocent of reality? What makes him believe he can and should make a difference in such overwhelming conditions of hopelessness? He describes his transforming moment when he is visiting Haiti, when he commits to his life work, literally, to set up clinics and raise money and get international aid. He is riding on a truck on steep rough mountain roads when before him
he sees a truck overturned and a lady with a basket of mangos strewn all over the road lying dead. Describing this moment’s momentousness to him as a philanthropist, historian, scholar, doctor, administrator—he writes a poem to express the meaning of what he sees and feels: it is in poetry that he finds a transformative image that enables him to define what he wants to do and be. We’re going to talk about the poem and the role of poetry in his life as an emissary of hope, in the context of the news today coming from Haiti, and we’ll take flight from poems and thoughts you send to me every week—today we’ll share with you some poetry of our listener Chuck Tripi, and Elaine Bolduc, we’ll go on wild goose chases from their
poems and writings to hear news of this “great happening illimitably earth,†we’ll be talking about magnetic fields and electromagnetic fields, yep, the science behind the earthquakes and Einstein, and how poetry leads us to the science of the earth . . . and stories of indomitable human courage and perseverance to inspire us . . . . So, first, from our headline news this week of Haiti’s earthquake, Dr. Paul Farmer is on the ground, his organization Partners in Health calling for the medical community to come help. He has been appointed by President Clinton, who is the UN Special Envoy for Haiti, as the Deputy UN Special Envoy for
Haiti. “Paul’s selfless commitment to building health systems in the poor Haitian communities over the last
20 years has given millions of people hope for a brighter future for Haiti,†President Clinton said. “His credibility both among the people of Haiti and in the international community will be a tremendous asset to our efforts as we work with the government and people of Haiti to improve health care, strengthen education, and create economic opportunity.â€
____________________
In his account of how he came to play this role, he was driving along National Highway 3, and on a dangerous curve saw an overturned tap-tap, baskets and mangos strewn everywhere, and a woman lying dead by the side of the road. He was silent, and then wrote a poem called The Mango Lady: here is the poem—and our program . . . I hope you enjoy, and thank you for listening, write me at bmossberg@csumb.edu, this is Professor Barbara Mossberg for the Poetry Slow Down…
© Barbara Mossberg 2012
