All the "classics" have been listed already, so I'll mention someone more modern who I think programmers would enjoy: Christian Bök. Check out Crystallography and Eunoia.
Ask HN: Who are your favorite poets?
221–230 of 369 posts
Re: Ask HN: Who are your favorite poets?
#222Earlier quoted context omitted.
"I want to do to you , what the spring does to the cherry trees." I've never seen that in english, so I looked it up ( http://albalearning.com/audiolibros/neruda/poema14-sp-en.htm... ) I guess it goes without saying, but english really doesn't do him justice, rhyming trees with kisses is pretty poor compared to cerizos and besos which is perfect rhyme. But I suppose poetry is about the most difficult thing to transla…
> rhyming trees with kisses is pretty poor compared to cerizos and besos which is perfect rhyme I read the spanish version from the link you posted and, although I don't speak spanish, it doesn't look like there is any other rhyme at all in the whole poem. Am I right? Do you think that this was intentional - does it mean something in spanish/latin american poetry?
No there's rhyming all over the place in this one, just not always on the end of the line. But first and second stanzas, in the 4th just take for example:
"Pasan huyendo los pájaros. El viento. El viento"
huyendo rhymes with viento, pasan alliterates with pajaros, and the "l" en los and "o" in pajaros fits very nicely with the "l" and "o" in the repition of "el viento".
In english you see the translator trying to get it somewhat with birds and by :
"The birds go by, fleeing. The wind. The wind."
Re: Ask HN: Who are your favorite poets?
#223So many. To name a few:
Marge Piercy (see below)
Robert Frost (if you read him carefully)
Philip Larkin
William Stafford
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To be of use – by Marge Piercy
http://writersalmanac.publicradio.org/index.php?date=2006/09....
The people I love the best
jump into work head first
without dallying in the shallows
and swim off with sure strokes almost out of sight.
They seem to become natives of that element,
the black sleek heads of seals
bouncing like half-submerged balls.
I love people who harness themselves, an ox to a heavy cart,
who pull like water buffalo, with massive patience,
who strain in the mud and the muck to move things forward,
who do what has to be done, again and again.
I want to be with people who submerge
in the task, who go into the fields to harvest
and work in a row and pass the bags along,
who are not parlor generals and field deserters
but move in a common rhythm
when the food must come in or the fire be put out.
The work of the world is common as mud.
Botched, it smears the hands, crumbles to dust.
But the thing worth doing well done
has a shape that satisfies, clean and evident.
Greek amphoras for wine or oil,
Hopi vases that held corn, are put in museums
but you know they were made to be used.
The pitcher cries for water to carry
and a person for work that is real.Re: Ask HN: Who are your favorite poets?
#224My favourite poet is K. P. Cavafy and my favorite poem is Ithaca: As you set out for Ithaka hope the voyage is a long one, full of adventure, full of discovery. Laistrygonians and Cyclops, angry Poseidon—don’t be afraid of them: you’ll never find things like that on your way as long as you keep your thoughts raised high, as long as a rare excitement stirs your spirit and your body. Laistrygonians and Cyclops, wild Po…
As this is my favourite poem as well and you beat me to sharing it, I may as well add some context to it for the people not familiar with names and situations:
Ithaca[1] is where Odysseus[2], one of the greek heroes in the Trojan War, came from. After the war was over he set, along with his crew, to return home but this took him ten whole years and Homer wrote about his adventures and misfortunes in the epic that is known as Odyssey[3].
Now, as this consists of dangerous situations, very bad luck, betrayal and a couple of other bad things, the word "odyssey" has become one with which modern greeks describe a long and difficult period until something (a goal, a destination, etc) is reached. However, Kavafis (greek for Cavafy) turned this around and is describing all the great things that one can benefit from during such journeys: new harbours, Phoenician goods, Egyptian cities - all these pictures are used to demonstrate how rich one will be after an "odyssey" even if he/she has to face Laistrygonians, Cyclops and angry Poseidons.
In the end, Kavafis tells us about what Ithaca really is about: not reaching your destination but experiencing the journey.
[1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ithaca [2] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Odysseus [3] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Odyssey
Re: Ask HN: Who are your favorite poets?
#225I love many poets and poetry.Two that I would like to share with HN commuity at this time would be - Rumi and Gulzar Rumi said things like Forget safety. Live where you fear to live. Destroy your reputation. Be notorious. Rumi: Meet you there Out beyond ideas of wrongdoing and rightdoing, there is a field.I 'll meet you there. Rumi: Silence There is a way between voice and presence where information flows. In discipl…
"Out beyond ideas of wrongdoing and rightdoing, there is a field. I'll meet you there."
This is one of my favorite quotes - first came across it while reading "And the Mountains Echoed". I'll definitely have to check out more of Rumi's works.
Re: Ask HN: Who are your favorite poets?
#226HW Longfellow : Psalm of life
Rudyard kipling; If
Re: Ask HN: Who are your favorite poets?
#227Pushkin, Lermontov, Nekrasov... Yeah, I'm Russian :-p Among English poems, I rather like this one by Laurie Lee: A golden fish like a pint of wine Rolls the sea undergreen, Glassily balanced on the tide Only the skin between. Fish and water lean together, Separate and one, Till a fatal flash of the instant sun Lazily corkscrews down. Did fish and water drink each other? The reed leans there alone; As we, who once dra…
I'm not Russian and I like Lermontov :)
Same, but I'm more partial to Pushkin :)
Re: Ask HN: Who are your favorite poets?
#228Earlier quoted context omitted.
Isn't it strange to call that Beaudelaire's? Edna St. Vincent Millay put these words on paper, Beaudelaire wrote only in French...
I don't find it strange to claim that this is Baudelaire's work. Of course the style and the rhymes makes it very different compared to the original version. I also think that translation has altered the poem's beauty but the message is still here, the story is the same and it leaves me with the same humbled feelings.
Story? There's no story in poetry!
But yes, this is still Baudelaire's poem, I would have recognized it (I know well the French version).
Re: Ask HN: Who are your favorite poets?
#229Galway Kinnell
Re: Ask HN: Who are your favorite poets?
#230Just had to add my favorite, William Carlos Williams:
so much depends
upon
a red wheel
barrow
glazed with rain
water
beside the white
chickens.