28 Comments
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Beth Kephart's avatar

so many gifts, always, at Poetic Outlaws.

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Corie Feiner's avatar

So true!

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Ken Paul Rosenthal's avatar

I really needed this poem today.

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Tommy Swerdlow's avatar

I think that's called poetry.

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Joshua Bond's avatar

Since I'm a villanelle fan (eg: https://joshuabondpoetry.substack.com/p/gaza-stripped) Roethke's is one of my go-to poems to help keep me on track. Thanks for putting it out there.

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Corie Feiner's avatar

I feel like I am back in graduate school when I read, "I'm a villanelle fan!"

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Joshua Bond's avatar

Uh-oh ... :)

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Corie Feiner's avatar

I liked graduate school. No uh-ohs. Two years of geeking out on poems with some of the best writers of our time back in the 90's when we had fun... so much fun!

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Joshua Bond's avatar

Wish I'd done poetry and the arts, rather than engineering at university. My favourite villanelle is Ronald Wallace's "Nightline: An Interview with the General" (in his book "From People and Dog in the Sun (1987) - but I can't find it anywhere on the internet to read, with a link.

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Jane LeCroy's avatar

I love this villanelle so much, I turned it into a song- https://youtu.be/xSCNY3j5CzY?si=OTKP8mQ7S7prMSKc

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Corie Feiner's avatar

I thought at first this was a pantoum, but it is a villanelle. Besides being inspired by the softness spiritual sentiment of this poem, I love that it is in this form. I am now inspired to write a villanelle. Anyone else up for the challenge?

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Chassidy Lindsey's avatar

I really love this beautiful poem!! Love it!!! Thank you for sharing this poem with us!!🩷🩷🩷🩷🩷🩷❤️❤️❤️❤️🤗🤗🤗🤗🤗

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M L Martin's avatar

I knew it was a villanelle! It feels good to have confirmation, like I still remember some of my poetry class from community college 8 years ago!!

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Mary Roblyn's avatar

One of my favorite poems, by my favorite poet. My battered copy of “Collected Poems” always on my bedside table. Thank you for sharing this.

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Nancy Jainchill's avatar

One of my favorite poets. Thank You.

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Claire Gibb's avatar

I love this, thank you!

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Michael O’Keefe's avatar

Genius

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Kimpeccable's avatar

So very perfect for this particular moment in time. I love Roethke, that his work contains such sublime darkness and light.

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Joan Lauri Poole's avatar

Thank you!

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Hallelujah's avatar

Listen to Fuck the Jay Z, the bees, the and everything that didn’t remind you of me.wav by Hallelujah (GoDsMoVeMenT) on #SoundCloud

https://on.soundcloud.com/oiQSzWYUT3mGhbi39

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Annie Stenzel's avatar

it is a LOWLY worm, according to my Collected Roethke. (The worm may indeed also be lonely, but he wrote it as LOWLY.

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