.
This is also true for myself. I can be sent into a world of Utopia, or a dungeon of sorrow by reading poetry. It is an intense experience to feel the poem's power to effect you in such an intimate way.
An example of a classic poet who has made me feel sensational, Lawrence Lawrence is D. H. Lawrence. His poem "What would you fight for?" had me hooked from the first line. Lawrence writes:.
What would you fight for?.
I am not sure I would always fight for my life.
Life might not be worth fighting for.
I am not sure I would always fight for my wife.
A wife isn't always worth fighting for.
Nor my children, nor my country, nor my fellow-man.
It all depends whether I found them worth fighting for.
The only thing men invariably fight for.
is their money. But I doubt if I'd for mine, anyhow not to .
shed a lot of blood over it.
Yet one thing I do fight for, tooth and nail, all the time.
And that is my bit of inward peace , where I am at one with .
myself.
And often I am worsted.
Sometimes, although more often in the past I have experienced times when I too have felt this. The poem then goes on to explain how his wife, country and "fellow-men" might not be worth the fight either. Lawrence is making the reader weigh the importance of these commonly significant things. Perhaps he is saying what is truly significant and important is ones own developed mind and its overall tranquility, not these luxuries of freedom, riches and companionship. Because even without those things, one can always rely on their "inward peace." By saying he is "often worsted" Lawrence is admitting to being defeated, but still sticks strongly behind his belief. .
"Late Air" by Elizabeth Bishop is another poem which has personal touched me. With her choice of words and musical tone, I felt a slight sense of ecstasy after I finished the last stanza. .
Late Air.
From a magician's midnight sleeve.
the radio singers.
distribute all their love-songs.
over the dew-wet lawns.
