In The Joy of Poetry I often said there is no secret to understanding poetry. Because I delight in contradiction, I give you a poem about the secret meaning of a poem. I love the turn in the poem where she begins to talk about her poetry and what secrets it might or might not hold.
P.S. Glynn Young wrote a nice essay about Denise Levertov at Tweetspeak a while back.
The Secret
Two girls discover
the secret of life
in a sudden line of
poetry.
I who don’t know the
secret wrote
the line. They
told me
(through a third person)
they had found it
but not what it was
not even
what line it was. No doubt
by now, more than a week
later, they have forgotten
the secret,
the line, the name of
the poem. I love them
for finding what
I can’t find,
and for loving me
for the line I wrote,
and for forgetting it
so that
a thousand times, till death
finds them, they may
discover it again, in other
lines
in other
happenings. And for
wanting to know it,
for
assuming there is
such a secret, yes,
for that
most of all.
Denise Levertov
Your turn.
True confessions: I don’t know if I like it or don’t like it when someone “sees” in something I write a particular meaning that they are confident I intended. I DO like it when someone sees a connection between the words and something going on in their lives, and that it helped them or yielded an insight, especially when I could not have possibly known about their situation. I admit, though, I don’t care for it when they assume to know my mind or that I even had a particular meaning beyond what I’ve stated. At times I even feel defensive but say nothing. Suffice it to say, I still wrestle with how to respond, if at all.
I love what this poet has written, how she admits she has no idea what the secret is that those girls feel to have discovered, but that she loves their finding it and many others things.
I like this distinction you’re drawing, Marilyn. Maybe when people are sure they know our minds and meanings, we can just slip them this jewel by Denise Levertov.
Great idea, Megan!
I like it when people connect dots that have meaning for them–whether that’s what I meant or not. And I secretly like when people attribute deeper meaning that even I didn’t see–that they think I’m smarter than I am. 😉
Hahahaha. Yes! I like that as well, Sandra. 🙂