TOP91-DES88
This Old Poem #91:
Naomi Shihab Nye’s Blood
Copyright © by Dan Schneider, 5/15/04
Naomi Shihab
Nye is about as Arab as I am, which nowadays could be dangerous- but given the
blood I have means that both she & I are relatively safe. In truth NSN is 1
of the premier hausfrau poets of our times. Along with the deadly dull Carolyn
Forché she is 1 of the leading lights of the hausfrau brigade. So alike are the
duo that in the late 1990s they both came to read at the repellant Hungry Mind
bookstore, only to both rip bad poetry, yet refuse to name names, claiming that
the offenders are known, but they won’t name’em.
Despite her
lack of poetic talent & her terminal PC Elitism I can honestly say that as a
poet NSN has a nice ass, especially for a woman pushing 50. That along with the
long braided ponytail she wears that sways near her ass is enough for me to,
well, take it a little easier on NSN than I would were she bloated beyond
recognition like, oh, a certain other poetastress in the hausfrau brigade.
Here’s the ubiquitous online bio-cum-blurb:
Naomi Shihab Nye was born in St. Louis, Missouri, in 1952, to a Palestinian father and an American mother. She received her B.A. from Trinity University in San Antonio, Texas, where she still resides with her family. She is the author of numerous books of poems, including 19 Varieties of Gazelle: Poems of the Middle East (Greenwillow Books, 2002), Fuel (1998), Red Suitcase (1994), and Hugging the Jukebox (1982). She has twice traveled to the Middle East and Asia for the United States Information Agency promoting international goodwill through the arts. Nye has received awards from the Texas Institute of Letters, the Carity Randall prize, and the International Poetry Forum. Her poems and short stories have appeared in various journals and reviews throughout North America, Europe, and the Middle and Far East. Nye has also written books for children, and has edited several anthologies of prose.
Those of you calling out for euthanasia- be stilled! You know the bad that’s coming, so you are prepared. Here goes:
Blood
"A
true Arab knows how to catch a fly in his hands,"
In the spring our palms peeled like snakes.
Years before, a girl knocked,
Today the headlines clot in my blood.
I call my father, we talk around the news.
The
1st 3 stanzas all belong to separate poems because they do not
connect & they do not relate to the titles, despite an earnest attempt to wedge
them in. NSN hopes that by tossing up those stanzas it will distract the reader
from her real intention, which is to whine about the Israeli-Palestinian
nonsense. In the rewrite I cut to the chase; even though it’s the weakest part
of the poem it’s the only 1 the title relates to & the non sequiturs?
Well, they’ll have to be reused elsewhere.
Blood
A
little Palestinian dangles a truck on the front page.
I call my father, we talk around the news.
No
music, no real imagery of power, & no real ‘poetry’ of any sort. The
original lays like a silent fart & the rewrite is more focused, but lacks
the earlier possibilities. That could well describe NSN’s poetry career.
Here’s
some snippets from an online interview published at http://www.pifmagazine.com/vol27/i_bare.shtml.
I will provide translation:
RB:
How did you first get published? I'm curious about the "nuts and
bolts" of becoming published for you.
NSN:
"Nuts and bolts of becoming published" – well, I have this theory.
You start anywhere you can, anyplace that seems inviting or possible to you. For
me, it was magazines for kids, since I read them at the library and subscribed
to a few. They often had pages that invited their readers to send work. So, I
sent it. I had no delusion that everything I wrote would or should get
published. This has served me well. There was never any great
"mystique" about publishing to me, since I started when I was 7.
As a teenager I
published in places like Seventeen. As a college student, I started
reading literary journals, publishing in places like Modern Poetry Studies
and Ironwood. One little thing always led to another. No way around that.
All of my books since have been invited by various publishers or editors. I
never have had an agent to this day. To publish, one needs to read widely, and
find what's out there, then send one's own work to places you feel particular
links with – that is my philosophy of publishing.
Of course NSN neglects to
mention her careerist tendencies, starting with college & worming her way
through Academia. Publishing is easy when you’ve played the game as long as
NSN!
RB:
How do teaching and writing intersect for you? Are they separate activities,
or are they connected?
NSN:
Teaching and writing are separate, but serve/feed one another in so many ways.
Writing travels the road inward, teaching, the road out – helping OTHERS move
inward – it is an honor to be with others in the spirit of writing and
encouragement. I never wanted to be a full-time teacher for a minute, though,
only an itinerant visitor. It's that nomad in my blood.
Question- if anyone
but an Arab claimed that being an Arab was ‘that nomad in my blood’ would
they not be assailed as a racist?
RB:
Do you think of yourself/your poetry as political?
NSN:
Yes, I do think of myself as political, alas, because politics is about people,
and I am interested in the personal ramifications of everything, for everybody.
How can we get away from it?
Of course, this is a moot
point, since at the Hungry Mind reading NSN aped the familiar & false canard
that ‘all poetry is political’. Thus her qualification of her status as a
political poet has about as much heft as her radical assertion that she’s a
human poet! & I seriously doubt that NSN would like to get away from her
fetid brand of political poetry, lest she would have no reason to write, or be.
RB: Who are your
favorite poets to read? Are there books you return to again and again, and if
so, what are they?
NSN: William Stafford
will always be my favorite poet. I read LOTS of poets, constantly. Recently read
& loved Hettie Jones & Koon Woon, always read W.S. Merwin, Molly
Peacock, Jane Hirshfield, Jane Kenyon, Lucille Clifton, on and on and on. I
never stop reading. I’m reading manuscripts for a contest now. Very exciting.
Is it me or do they just
not make interviewers the way they used to? These questions are as off-the-rack
as NSN’s answers are. Where would NSN be if she actually had to think &
answer a query she had not hear 10,000 times before?
RB:
What is your advice to writers, especially young writers who are just
starting out?
NSN:
Number one: Read, Read, and then Read some more. Always Read. Find the voices
that speak most to YOU. This is your pleasure and blessing, as well as
responsibility!
It is crucial to
make one's own writing circle – friends, either close or far, with whom you
trade work and discuss it – as a kind of support system, place-of-conversation
and energy. Find those people, even a few, with whom you can share and discuss
your works – then do it. Keep the papers flowing among you. Work does not get
into the world by itself. We must help it. Share the names of books that have
nourished you. I love Writing Toward Home by Georgia Heard, for example.
William Stafford's three books of essays on the subject of writing – Crossing
Unmarked Snow is the most recent – all from the Poets on Poetry series of
the University of Michigan Press, Ann Arbor – are invaluable. I love so many
of these new anthologies that keep popping up. Let that circle be sustenance.
There is so much
goodness happening in the world of writing today. And there is plenty of ROOM
and appetite for new writers. I think there always was. Don't let anybody tell
you otherwise. Attend all the readings you can, and get involved in giving some,
if you like to do that. Be part of your own writing community. Often the first
step in doing this is simply to let yourself become identified as One Who Cares
About Writing!
My motto early on
was "Rest and be kind, you don't have to prove anything" – Jack
Kerouac's advice about writing – I still think it's true. But working always
felt like resting to me.
Again, off
the rack. Then, again, NSN’s rack is pretty nice too! Would that she put as
much effort into her poetry as she does that. Pilates can work wonders, eh?
Final Score: (1-100):
Naomi Shihab Nye’s Blood: 45
TOP’s Blood: 50
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