DATE=05/08/02

TYPE=BACKGROUND REPORT

NUMBER=5-51582

TITLE=N-Y-C POETRY/9-11

BYLINE=MONA GHUNEIM

DATELINE=NEW YORK

VOICED AT:

INTRO: Poetry readings have been a fixture of the New York City café and bar scene for decades. But since the September 11th attacks on the World Trade Center, New Yorkers are turning to poetry for comfort, compassion, courage and even companionship. Mona Ghuneim reports an increase in readings, workshops and poetry-related events suggests a new appreciation of poetry is on the rise in the city.

TEXT:

/// POET FRANK RUBINO ACTUALITY ///

This poem is called "Ted" and some of you may recognize that it is about a poet named Ted Barrigan who was sort of a great (sort of) center of gravity here in New York poetry. "Ted":

I got to visit him when he was alive

once in their apartment on St. Mark's Place.

Alice Nutley was there fixing supper

which he ate flat on his back in bed…

A reading at the Cornelia Street Café in Manhattan one night brought together three diverse poets, friends, relatives and a group of New Yorkers on a poetry outing. Open up the listings of daily events in any New York City paper or magazine and you are sure to find a poetry reading going on that day if not two or three or possibly more. Whether it be the poetry of an acclaimed poet or one just emerging on the scene, a writer reading poems by his or her favorite poet, or a theme-night of Turkish, Russian or Polish poetry, the city has more to offer these days.

And Alice Quinn, Director of the Poetry Society of America, says the programming in New York has become "delicious." Ms. Quinn says it is an amazing moment for poetry. But, she says, there is method to the poetry madness.

/// QUINN ACTUALITY ///

Every single evening there is a conflict for anyone who loves poetry because the programming is fantastic. It is very much a feeling of civic responsibility, especially now I think, because people want to go to readings, they want to gather together, and they want to hear something that is going to be spiritually nourishing and help them at this point.

/// END ACTUALITY ///

Another way Ms. Quinn hopes poetry is helping New Yorkers is within the public transportation system. The Poetry Society of America and the Metro Transit Authority select poems to be displayed on New York City buses and subways for the program "Poetry in Motion." The program has been in existence 10 years in New York, and in other cities such as Chicago, Los Angeles and Houston. But Ms. Quinn says selecting the poems for New York for 2002 was particularly sensitive.

/// QUINN ACTUALITY ///

We had chosen the 12 poems, and we were still in favor of the 12 poems that we chose, but we had to reshuffle them because the three poems that we wanted to put up immediately after September 11th (had) definitely had to have a certain gravity.

/// END ACTUALITY ///

The three poems that went up first were Gerard Manly Hopkins' "Pied Beauty," William Wordsworth's "Intonation Ode" and W.H. Auden's "The More Loving One." Ms. Quinn, who is also the Poetry Editor for the New Yorker magazine, says the poems are significant at a time when the nation is striving to survive a crisis through strength. She cites Auden's "The More Loving One," in particular.

/// QUINN ACTUALITY ///

I think that those lines about "but on earth indifference is the least we have to dread from man or beast" were really sort of sobering after September 11th. And then the poem takes that wonderful turn of "if equal affection cannot be, let the more loving one be me."

/// END ACTUALITY ///

The subjects of poems being read, listened to and discussed around the city are not all related to tragedy. But there is a subdued tone since September 11th. At a recent reading at Poets House, poet and translator Rika Lesser read from her poem "Translation," which was reminiscent of a type of loss.

/// LESSER ACTUALITY ///

Lost: the Original, its Reason and its Rhyme,

Words whose meanings do not change through time,

"The soul in paraphrase," the heart in prose,

Strictures or structures, meter, les mots justes;

"The owlet umlaut" when the text was German,

Two hours of sleep each night, hapax legomenon,

A sense of self, fidelity, one's honor,

Authorized versions from a living donor.

/// END ACTUALITY ///

Ms. Quinn says poetry is helpful in difficult times. She believes the poem chosen for the New Yorker magazine's September 11th issue was especially appropriate.

Polish poet Adam Zagajewski's "Try to Praise the Mutilated World" appears on the back cover of that issue. Ms. Quinn calls the poem a blessing and a recommendation to the world.

/// QUINN ACTUALITY ///

The response to it was palpable. People carried it around, put it up on their bulletin boards, talked about it and it prompted this wonderful reading down at Cooper Union a reading of the same title.

/// END ACTUALITY ///

With its references to nature, fond memories, appreciating what we have and allowing for the passage of time to heal all wounds, this poem could even be the signature poem for New York City.

"Try to praise the mutilated world.

Remember June's long days,

and wild strawberries, drops of wine, the dew.

The nettles that methodically overgrow

the abandoned homesteads of exiles.

You must praise the mutilated world." (Signed)

NEB/NY/MG/BJS/SAB