What does a comma do. I have refused them so often and left them out so much and did without them so continually that I have come finally to be indifferent to them. I do not now care whether you put them in or not but for a long time I felt very definitely about them and would have nothing to do with them.
As I say commas are servile and they have no life of their own, and their use is not a use, it is a way of replacing one’s own interest and I do decidedly like to like my own interest my own interest in what I am doing. A comma by helping you along holding your coat for you and putting on your shoes keeps you from living your life as actively as you should lead it and to me for many years and I still do feel that way about it only now I do not pay as much attention to them, the use of them was positively degrading. Let me tell you what I feel and what I mean and what I felt and what I meant.
No one has ever accused Gertrude Stein—her memory IS a blessing, dear reader—of having too few feelings when it comes to punctuation. I adore Stein’s remarks, rambles, thoughts, observations, and passionate recollections of her life lived with punctuation. Particularly the much-maligned comma. I always tell my writing students: “Gertrude Stein didn’t use commas because she said her readers knew when to breathe” (it’s true; see the block quote a little further down). But it’s probably more truthful to say that Stein enjoyed the adventure of the page and the sentence without direction, like not receiving a program for a theater or musical performance. Don’t spoil the arrangement for Stein: let her discover whatever is about to happen. But I also love how Stein describes the work of the comma, even while she is giving it a good bashing as being “servile”—after all, isn’t it nice, sometimes, to have someone or something be attentive to you? Someone to hold your coat? Bring you a cup of coffee? Put your shoes on? I think, in this hard life, we deserve a little ease. Especially in a college essay, or in a piece where clarity and organization are of utmost importance. As Rules for Writers gently suggests, “The comma was invented to help readers” (Diana Hacker, 266). All punctuation is about musical notation—how long we are pausing between our words, phrases, and sentences—and while the comma offers us a minor pause, it is a useful one. I wrote this about the comma:
Oh, the sweet comma. The pause. It sets apart phrases. It helps you list items, say names, dates, and places, and be clear and organized. It also lets your reader (and you) breathe. Read your work aloud, and notice your pauses. But don’t place a comma simply because you stopped typing.
Stein has more to say about the comma and, tellingly, she even indulges us with using a few commas as she does so. I think this is a lovely note to close on, because it opens the door to the pleasure of complicated sentences, and turns use away from use, and towards pleasure. After all, on the spectrum of use and pleasure, explicitly creative writing (essays, poetry, screenplays, short stories, novels, graphics) bends towards pleasure, and away from usefulness. So I will close this brief piece on the comma with Stein championing the complicated sentence, and the pleasures of forgoing the comma, even while using the comma, and showing that sometimes, you just need a sweet, minor pause:
A long complicated sentence should force itself upon you, make you know yourself knowing it and the comma, well at the most a comma is a poor period that lets you stop and take a breath but if you want to take a breath you ought to know yourself that you want to take a breath. It is not like stopping altogether has something to do with going on, but taking a breath well you are always taking a breath and why emphasize one breath rather than another breath. Anyway that is the way I felt about it and I felt that about it very very strongly. And so I almost never used a comma. The longer, the more complicated the sentence the greater the number of the same kinds of words I had following one after another, the more the very more I had of them the more I felt the passionate need of their taking care of themselves by themselves and not helping them, and thereby enfeebling them by putting in a comma.
Writing prompt: Write a prose poem/paragraph or lineated poem (written in lines) without commas. Observe what happens when you write without the comma. What other punctuation do you use? How do you replace the comma? Do your sentences shorten? Do they stay the same? If you choose to lineate your piece, do you use the poetic line/lineation as a comma replacement? Extra points for including a seasonal (it’s October) flower.
They look at each other across the glittering sea some keep a low profile
Some are cliffs The bathers think islands are separate like them
Poetry reminds me how connected we are—even in our loneliness, our quietness. Even as we read a poem by ourselves, we are connected by language to others (the writer, other readers). In Muriel Rukeyser’s poem “Islands,” the islands in the “glittering sea,” although they look physically separate, viewed distantly (objectively?) from above, are “connected / underneath.” The last couplet of the poem, “The bathers think / islands are separate like them” reveals a flaw in human looking and attention and analogy: that the bathers apply the same logic they apply to themselves, a logic of separateness and individuality, to the islands. The emphasis of the poem, an emphasis which is not a proof, returns us to connection and the deep feeling of the opening lines: “O for God’s sake / they are connected /underneath.”
Writing prompt: write a piece (poem or paragraph that could begin a story, an essay) where a physical or environmental aspect offers a point of connection—a landbridge, a beach, a cup of something warm, a wind, a puddle of tadpoles at the park. Extra points for writing a three-stanza poem, like Rukeyser.
I’ve been reading Denise Levertov’s The Poet in the World (which features this essay), a book that was once an influential text in terms of teaching poetry in college and MFA programs. The other night, sleepy, just drifting off, I was reading the conclusion of a talk Levertov delivered in 1970 entitled “Great Possessions,” and I found myself waking up, because what she says in the following paragraphs is so true, so pertinent to now, and I feel like so few academics are brave enough to say what Levertov says, and how she says it.
The TL;DR: poetry is not at all about our safety or our comfort—but about our authentic living, our surviving as communities, about the quality of our life together on this fragile earth.
Even briefer TL;DR: you want to write good poetry? You have to risk (your time, your money, probably what you think of as your reputation).
Writing prompt: after reading the below excerpt from Levertov’s talks (I promise you, it is worth it—WORTH. IT. FOR. YOUR. SOUL!) write a poem where you RISK, where you SAY what you would not SAY to ANYONE ELSE. You are not SHOWING this POEM to ANYONE. You are WRITING IT. You are SAYING THE THING, WHATEVER IT IS. You are RISKING. You can burn the poem after, (safely!) in your sink or backyard firepit or something. You can keep it in your journal. You can put it under your pillow and sleep on it and let it seep into you and make you braver. But you will have risked and articulated and accomplished some incredibly important selfwork for you and your poetry. You need to ride that language edge out—you need to dare. If your nerve deny you, wrote Emily Dickinson, go above your nerve. Bonus points if you add a living flower or shrub or plant in your poem—name it. It will be your witness plant.
Happy National Poetry Month!
Since I believe there is a most intimate relationship between the quality of a person’s life, its abundance or sterility, his integrity, and the quality of his poetry, it is not irrelevant to say that, judging by some—not a few—I have met on my travels, the people who write banal poetry and, to almost the same extent, those who in desperation make up a fake surrealism, usually seem to be the same academics who talk a liberal line concerning education and politics (and often, as teachers, are genial and popular) but who, when it comes to some crucial issue, such as a student protest, will not commit themselves far enough to endanger their own security. Which comes first, the chicken or the egg? Is their poetry banal because their lives are banal, or vice versa? I think it works both ways. If these people committed themselves, took risks, and did not let themselves be dominated by the pursuit of “security,” their daily lives would be so changed, so infused with new experiences and with the new energy that often comes with them, that inevitably their poetry would change too (though obviously this would not ensure better poems unless they were gifted in the first place). But on the other hand, if they could manage to put themselves in a new, more dynamic, less suppressive relationship to their own inner lives and to the language, then they might discover their outer lives moving in a revolutionary way. So the process is dual, and can be approached from either direction.
And for myself—not without anguish, not without fear, not without the daily effort of rousing myself out of the inertia and energy—apping nostalgia that would cling to old ways, to that dying bird-in-hand that’s falsely supposed to be worth two free ones chirping in the bushes—I believe our survival demands revolution, both cultural and political.
If we are to survive the disasters that threaten, and survive our own struggle to make it new—a struggle I believe we have no choice but to commit ourselves to—we need tremendous transfusions of imaginative energy. If it is indeed revolution we are moving toward, we need life, and abundantly we need poems of the spirit, to inform us of the essential, to help us live the revolution. And if instead it be the Last Days—then we need to taste the dearest, freshest drops before we die-why bother with anything less than that, the essential?
Wallace Stevens wrote, “The poet feels abundantly the poetry of everything.” We must not go down into the pit we have dug ourselves by our inhumanity without some taste, however bitter, of that abundance. But if there is still hope of continued life on earth, of a new life, the experience of that abundance which poetry can bring us is a revolutionary stimulus. It can awaken us, from our sloth, even yet.
I’m not going to lie…Kendrick Lamar has art as protest on my mind. Art as subversion, as layered as a rose. Art as showing up, as voice-giving. Art as documentation of harm. Art as a shout, a stomp, a crip walk. And then I saw this image of a policeman at a protest, taken by mid-20th century photograph Dorothea Lange (1895-1965), and oh, I knew we should write about it:
Description: A uniformed policeman standing in front of a dense crowd of men holding protest signs in English and Japanese nearly fills the height of this vertical black and white photograph. The policeman either has a ruddy complexion or his face might be in shadow. He stands with his body facing us but he turns his head to our left in profile. His hands are crossed over his chest and one thumb is hooked into his jacket between two of the eight brass buttons down the front. A seven-pointed star reflects light on his chest and his flat-topped hat has a short, shiny brim angled down over his eyes. The jacket comes to his knees and his pants are lined with gold or other light material down the side. His feet are widely planted, and he wears dark shoes. The men in the crowd behind appear to be light skinned. Many wear button-down, collared shirts with ties tucked into long coats. Many also wear fedora hats and look off to our left, the same direction as the policeman. One man to our right wearing a floppy cap and glasses looks out at us with his hands in his jacket pockets. Some of the legible English words on the protest signs read “UNION,” “AMERICAN PRESS SLANDER against the,” and “JA.”
There is another photograph of a policeman, with even more posture in it, can you believe it:
Writing Prompt: Using the above photographs as your inspiration, write a poem or a story where you focus on power and its postures, its poses, its uniforms–even if you very gently fold this examination into, say, a schoolyard where children are playing during recess. Consider how power and gesture work, also how the lens of a camera works: what it looks at, who it looks at and considers, the angle of its gaze, whether it looks from above or below or at equal-height with its subject, or from behind, or before. Who is in the foreground? The background? What kind of sounds can you hear? What scents of the city can you smell, or in the scene in the story/poem you are writing? Let your imagination go.
How do you ready yourself to write? Some people need a certain pen, or to sit at a certain desk, or a certain place on their couch. I like to sit with my dog, Bug, and write–pictured below. Some people write on the bus as they ride to school or work, or at school or work (I used to write my poems in class, in my notebooks–don’t tell my professors, ha). It is good to have a sense of ritual–to figure out the rhythms of your days, to try and identify what they are. Every other week, on Thursday evenings, I drive one of my children to an appointment, and I sit in the car for an hour and wait for them–that is a guaranteed quiet hour. I usually take a book with me. Try to figure out when your quiet hours are, and write or read during them. Feed yourself, your mind. Your body is not the only part of yourself that is hungry. I talk more about Bug and squeezing in writing time here.
Your writing prompt this week is to locate a regular time to write–take a look at your planner, and identify a quiet time, an odd half hour that you usually spend scrolling on your phone (haha, I do that, too). Now set down your phone, and write about the things you had to do before you allowed yourself the time and space to write. Write down some images of things you noticed throughout the day. Anything you noticed outside? Sounds you can hear as you write? Colors? Light? Scents? Enjoy the grounding time of your own writing. I especially encourage you to write longhand, with paper and a pen or pencil.
Where do you feel most like you belong? Where do you feel at home?
I grew up on a farm, in rural Virginia. I grew up in a family where it was not safe to be a child–not from siblings, not from a parent. But the woods were safe, and quiet, and full of peace.
So your prompt over this long holiday week, should you decide to give yourself the gift of writing time, is to answer the question “Does the earth love you back?” And see if you can reach back to a place of safety & peace in your life as you write your answer. What was the sky like there? What were the sounds? (You might want to answer the question: who was not there?) What was the weather like? What were you wearing? What was your mind like in that space? And any other specific details you can think of–remember that there are many senses your writing can access (scent, touch, hearing, taste, sight).
It is a time of seasonal overwhelm–the light growing shorter and days chiller, the end of semester and final grades nearing, the holidays approaching–and we each balance and navigate our different caregiving responsibilities while trying to also, somehow, care for ourselves.
I think of the below, beautiful poem by the late poet Linda Gregg at times like these. Inspired by Gregg’s title, I would like to recommend that you try your hand at writing a small piece of writing this week, sometimes called micro, or flash, or simply a short form (or small poem). For a poem, keep it under ten lines, or several sentences if a prose poem. See what you can do inside a small space; see how you can manage most when you manage small; see how generous a space a small form can be.
And now for Linda Gregg:
We Manage Most When We Manage Small
What things are steadfast? Not the birds. Not the bride and groom who hurry in their brevity to reach one another. The stars do not blow away as we do. The heavenly things ignite and freeze. But not as my hair falls before you. Fragile and momentary, we continue. Fearing madness in all things huge and their requiring. Managing as thin light on water. Managing only greetings and farewells. We love a little, as the mice huddle, as the goat leans against my hand. As the lovers quickening, riding time. Making safety in the moment. This touching home goes far. This fishing in the air.
Writing inspiration is all around us–the weather, our mood, something someone said to us on a train or at school, a line from a television show. Writers often find themselves responding to headlines in real-time, because, if you haven’t noticed, people are so, so interesting. Life is brimming with wildness, with beauty, with ODDITY. I remember when I was younger, and the “Human Interest” section of the newspaper was my favorite section, but the older you become you see that the whole newspaper is the human interest section. There’s nothing more delightful than something being interesting, after all, which is a central element of Cleopatra’s beauty and attraction in Shakespeare’s play Antony and Cleopatra, her “infinite variety” remarked upon with wonder.
So here, then, are some interesting headlines I’ve pulled for you to use as inspiration for your own poem or story or essay:
Whether you love the crisp, falling leaves, the pumpkin spiced lattes and sweater weather, or whether fall fills you with some deep melancholy you can’t quite name, most people find that fall gives them feelings of some kind. The good news is that writing, like all art, is a place where feelings are a natural part of the context in which we make our art. I will even go so far to say that no writer or artist makes good art by denying, dismissing or minimizing their feelings.
Here is a poem by the 19th century poet Gerard Manley Hopkins that is all about feeling some VERY big feelings in autumn. In fact, it is about an adult watching a child who is crying over the falling leaves. It is such a richly beautiful poem in terms of sonics or sound: “Nor mouth had, no nor mind, expressed / What heart heard of, ghost guessed”–what incredible lines for the day after Halloween! Though “ghost” really means “spirit” here, like the holy ghost, or the holy spirit. But when I was running through our park yesterday, and the gold poplar leaves were crunching underfoot, I thought of Hopkins’ “though worlds of wanwood leafmeal lie”–like WHAT an incredible line that somehow describes the feeling of all the leaves dropping at once and also such a feeling of human desolation, it’s almost a SciFi scene.
Today’s prompt, then: write your fall feelings by first writing a list of ten images or details you’ve noticed about the changing season. And then write your heart out!
Spring and Fall by Gerard Manley Hopkins
Márgarét, áre you gríeving Over Goldengrove unleaving? Leáves like the things of man, you With your fresh thoughts care for, can you? Ah! ás the heart grows older It will come to such sights colder By and by, nor spare a sigh Though worlds of wanwood leafmeal lie; And yet you wíll weep and know why. Now no matter, child, the name: Sórrow’s spríngs áre the same. Nor mouth had, no nor mind, expressed What heart heard of, ghost guessed: It ís the blight man was born for, It is Margaret you mourn for.
It has been a rainy, flood, hurricane-filled time these past few weeks, so while your workshop leader is travelling to Youngstown LitFest this week and we won’t be having workshop this Friday (10/18), I will be leaving you with the warm recommendation to read Lorine Niedecker’s incredible poem “Paean to Place” which includes the lines:
O my floating life Do not save love for things Throw things to the flood
ruined by the flood
And of course, a few writing prompt suggestions to start your own writing flowing:
Write your own paean (a song of praise) to place, to where you grew up, to your history with water? maybe a specific memory of water?
Write two columns: in one, a list of things you have lost. In the other: a list of things you have recovered or found or saved. Use the two lists to generate a new piece of writing, poem or prose.
Write a piece that contains a vocative “O” as in “O my floating life” or “O Pioneers” or “O Brother Where Art Thou.”
Write a piece where something is ruined. Or where you think something is ruined. What happens?
Write your own flood story, or write about a time of past disaster. Write about what came after.
See you next week, writers!
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The Line Break 