Some poems by Carver:
I found some poems by Carver, which seem to be really relevant to the stories we have read.
Drinking While Driving by Raymond Carver
It's August and I have not
Read a book in six months except something called The Retreat from Moscow
by Caulaincourt
Nevertheless, I am happy
Riding in a car with my brother
and drinking from a pint of Old Crow.
We do not have any place in mind to go,
we are just driving.
If I closed my eyes for a minute
I would be lost, yet
I could gladly lie down and sleep forever
beside this road
My brother nudges me.
Any minute now, something will happen.
The Current by Raymond Carver
These fish have no eyes
these silver fish that come to me in dreams,
scattering their roe and milt
in the pockets of my brain.
But there's one that comes--
heavy, scarred, silent like the rest,
that simply holds against the current,
closing its dark mouth against
the current, closing and opening
as it holds to the current.
Photograph of My Father in His Twenty-Second Year by Raymond Carver
October. Here in this dank, unfamiliar kitchen
I study my father's embarrassed young man's face.
Sheepish grin, he holds in one hand a string
of spiny yellow perch, in the other
a bottle of Carlsbad Beer.
In jeans and denim shirt, he leans
against the front fender of a 1934 Ford.
He would like to pose bluff and hearty for his posterity,
Wear his old hat cocked over his ear.
All his life my father wanted to be bold.
But the eyes give him away, and the hands
that limply offer the string of dead perch
and the bottle of beer. Father, I love you,
yet how can I say thank you, I who can't hold my liquor either,
and don't even know the places to fish?
2 comments:
Something just popped into my head - I think it would be a good idea to have students read a poem by Carver before a short story. Perhaps they would be able to identify that there is more to what they are reading than they initially thought.
I think students are conditioned to find more meaning in poetry because they have to investigate the meaning, but when they are reading prose they often just take it as it is.
Any thoughts?
Ooh, I do like that idea Shannon. This is of course, assuming you've convinced your students that there really is depth in poetry. (There are always some reluctant students in that regard.)
But this does sound like a really good way to introduce the idea of minimalism, and how powerful it can be.
I was also thinking that one of the activities in the NCTE book was to use a photograph as an inspiration for a poem, especially one of a family member. I think that could really get some interesting results, especially if students choose a picture of someone important to themselves.
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