OOC: Poetry Recommendations?

[watch_is_me]

So, oddly, since I've gotten into Who and started writing fic, I've also found myself reading poetry. I've always looked at poetry and gone "Pfft. Poetry. It's like, what you do if you can't write fiction." Of course, now I'm reading poetry and going "Well, hell, no, it's not the same thing at all. This is what you write to say the things you *can't* say in narrative prose." And it's lovely for providing hooks and inspiration for ideas and fiction, so far, or seems like it will/could be.

Anyway, so I've been on a Shakespeare and Walt Whitman kick recently, and have Dickinson and "The Waste Land" lying about my room, and mean to get to Wilfred Owen and Dylan Thomas, but I was wondering, for those more poetically well-read than I, any good recommendations? Any poems or poets that specifically make you think of the Doctor or of your muse? Or that are just, you know, really good?

Links to poems would be awesome!

Comments

[brigadiertardis.livejournal.com]

This is my absolute favourite Dylan Thomas poem ever in the history of ever. It's so hauntingly beautiful and just ousbogusg I love it so.

And for all things Dylan Thomas, there's always here and here.

I'm a huge fan of John Donne and Robert Frost, both of whom I believe you are familiar, but there's also William Cullen Bryant whose "Thanatopsis" is always a good inspiration, and e.e. cummings has some good stuff, too.

There are so many more I can talk about but I shall leave you with these. Oh, and Alfred Tennyson~.

[watch-is-me.livejournal.com]

"Unicorn evils." That's a very nice turn of phrase, there. It's amazing how nice death is, for literary work. It makes for beautiful songs, too. So many good folksongs about the dead, especially war dead and criminal dead.

I need to read more Frost. I'm guessing I'd like him, but I've just picked up the usual osmosis ones--ye old paths less-traveled by and woods stopped by, etc. Bryant, I don't know. Shall look into to! And cummings, I know, but haven't read. Heh, same with Tennyson!

It's such a funny thing, wandering into a field I don't usually play in. I realize I know all the *names,* but I don't know what they stand for. Whereas, in genre fiction, you know, if someone said "Butler" to me, or "Philip K. Dick" or "William Gibson," I immediately know what that name *means.* Not just that they're an author, but what that name describes. Always strange, being a newbie.

[didnt-blink.livejournal.com]

The Waste Land is as good as any place to start with Eliot, though I would recommend The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock and The Hippopotamus.

Robert Browning is a great character poet. Look for his dramatic monologues, particularly
The Bishop Orders His Tomb at Saint Praxed's Church, My Last Duchess and Porphyria's Lover.

I'd also recommend looking out for Sylvia Plath, particularly Morning Song and Lady Lazarus; Philip Larkin's High Windows and Friday Night in the Royal Station Hotel; I'd even suggest you hunt out a collection of Nick Cave's lyrics.

[watch-is-me.livejournal.com]

Huh, I like "The Love Song." Yeah, I picked up "The Waste Land" because it seems to be his most-referenced work, in other literature/plays/etc., and I was starting to feel Culturally Ignorant. .-.

Plath, I know I need to look into. They didn't have her at my used bookstore; silly used bookstore >:| Oh, the Larkin looks interesting--a bit snarky and dark. That can be a good combination, done right.

And Nick Cave! I just started listening to some of his music. I've enjoyed it so far.

[didnt-blink.livejournal.com]

It's sort of his Ulysses, yeah.

Welp, look out for Ariel, but make sure it's not the version edited by her daughter. Apparently no one told her the merits of drafting your work before publication.

I think snarky and dark is one of Larkin's more favourable reviews! But then, he spent the majority of his life as a librarian in Hull. Comes with the territory.

Red Right Hand, which I think is on the Bad Seeds album Let Love In really reminds me of the Doctor, particularly his darker side.

[watch-is-me.livejournal.com]

OMG, I LOVE THOSE LYRICS!1!1!!!1 *glomps* That's so spot on. ...I must listen to the actual song now. *appropriate lyrics glee*

Why, yes, I am easily enthused .-.

[didnt-blink.livejournal.com]

It's Nick Cave, enthusing is a moral obligation! If you like that song, some Tom Waits albums wouldn't go amiss!

God, I'm such a culture whore. I'll run out of recommendations one day!

[watch-is-me.livejournal.com]

I hopped to Cave from Waits. I haven't heard a lot of either, but, yeah, they're dark and rough and narrative, and I like that. It's not like much else I've listened to!

[watch-is-me.livejournal.com]

Okay, this goes right on my Watch!Ten playlist. I love this. Black coat and blood on his hands XD And that bouncy little background rhythm.

[goodathart.livejournal.com]

I'll admit, I like newer poetry, and don't really focus on particular writers very much. When I look for a poem, I want it very dynamic, something that's gripping when read aloud. Most of my poetry books are anthologies. So I'll recommend my favorites of those first, then get specific!

Poetry International 7/8 is a great book of poetry, all originally written in English so there's not anything lost in translation. Lots of different subject material; definitely plenty to choose from. Unfortunately, I can't seem to find most of the poems online. But it's only like six bucks, used, on Amazon. New, when I bought it, I paid $12. Really, it's worth it.

The Beat Book is also a good one, full of poems that are very adamant about meaning something. Lots of fun with formatting, again with the multitude of subjects as diverse as the writers, etc. Diane di Prima and Allen Ginsberg are my favorites, of those represented there.

Poets Against the War is fairly obvious in what it contains, but some of it, like Suicide Note are worth it, even if you're not into that sort of thing. The site with the poem is also the book's website, and has several other poems from its contents featured.

Listen Up! is spoken word poetry. All very new, very fun. Best read aloud to yourself, I tend to think.

Red Sky at Night is British Socialist poetry. Very the Doctor, I think.

Fable (top poem in the link) is great, heart-breaking. It can be found in Holocaust Poetry, along with a lot of other very inspirational work that could be very relatable to the Doctor.

As for recommending writers, I can only do so with one not previously mentioned; Stephen Berg. I have his New and Selected Poems, which is mostly just about life. Very good.

[watch-is-me.livejournal.com]

Long and eclectic list! Awesome! Thanks! \o/ It's humbling to have stumbled into poetry-land; it's like when I was first starting out with my theatre major and people were like "Brecht! Chekhov! McDonagh! Stoppard!" And I was like, "...Yes? Are we taking role? .-. "

Oh, "Fable" *is* good. Funny how you can tell a work's translated; most translation gives things this precise formality. I don't think there's any way to translate poetry, really, quite; like drama, it's so based on sound and language-play.

People write some of the most beautiful pieces about war. It's like it makes people look at everything harder.

[tingle-of-life.livejournal.com]

I love this book to pieces.

The writer also goes by Jaida Jones, and she currently has a book of Fantasy fiction out called Havemercy, along with her co-author Dani Bennett. They are magnificent. I haven't had a chance to read the book yet, but Jaida is one-half of the duo that writes the Shoebox Project and Dani is a delightful person.

BUT YES the poetry book is love.

One of my favorites: Advances in Technology (From the section 'About Love')

[tingle-of-life.livejournal.com]

Website
not responding--

404

(SOS)

the page you have requested
cannot be found.

Playing hard to get,
the html, its coy tag-language,
and I with my hammering hands
just cannot communicate correctly.

ESC. ESC. ESC.

CTRL-ALT-DELETE.

Deeply drunk on the
androgynous anonymity of
the intoxicating intricacies of
the indelible internet of
the twentieth century

we bare our ankles
to the web browsers
because it requires
no courage
to do so.

CTRL-F.

Searching for you
I did not imagine I would
find you here, wearing
color code rings on your fingers,
and jewels of javascript
in the naked nest
of your neck;
three div layers of
marqueed text
encircling serpentine
your hips.

CTRL-S.

Do not think I will
let you be lost, even
in the clutter of
desktop folders
and spyware

CTRL-Q

I don't stop dreaming of your
instant messages, your
e-cards and your emails
your weblog pictures of old cathedrals
and old toothbrushes
your witty image manipulations
your domain name

even when I succumb to nighttime or
perhaps the blue screen of death
(I can only afford this OS;
do not deny my name, do not
judge me by my Windows 2E)
I know that you are

emailed multiple times to myself
burned onto CDs
saved in the slim slide of cold metal
(locked or unlocked)
on black & gray diskettes

mine forever and always

before

RESTART

Re: One of my favorites: Advances in Technology (From the section 'About Love')

[watch-is-me.livejournal.com]

we bare our ankles
to the web browsers
because it requires
no courage
to do so. <---*like this in particular*

I may have to check this poet out. ...Also, hee, no one wants to get me going on the weirdness/fascination of online relationships/persona presentation. It's so interesting and complicated! OH. The comic miniseries "USER," have you read it? It is the best thing I've read on the subject. *and now cannot for the life of her remember the author/artist*