Poetry Project

I'm doing a project in one of my classes (The Preacher and the Poet, how wonderful of a class it is indeed) on love poetry. I picked love poetry because all the other topics were depressing (especially the topic of depression) and I had to believe that some poetry comes from a place within us that is experiencing some kind of joy. Even if it is a deep longing for someone we can't have, love is some form of good thing. I haven't quite figured out what good comes of it but when I do I'll let you know. I picked 10 poems, all of them wonderful and all of them I could gush about for days and then I have to come up with a theory of preaching from them.

Here is what I've found: all the love poems in some way compare love to or relate love to nature. I have had this theory for a while that love is instinctive, its something within us that we cannot control, it just happens to us. It is buried deep within our being which makes it a natural occurrence. I think preaching is similar. It's natural. It's instinctive. It's in your gut. One of my favorite characters on my favorite show (that will remain unnamed because those of you who know me best know what it is and the rest of the world can just remain in the dark) said "Love isn't brains it's blood." We can think about it, we can't rationalize it, it just moves within us.

During class we have to share one of the poems from our collection (only one I know it tortures me). I chose this excerpt from a poem by Anne Sexton:

Watch out for love
(unless it is true,
and every part of you says yes including the toes),
it will wrap you up like a mummy,
and your scream won't be heard
and none of your running will end.

Love? Be it man. Be it woman.
It must be a wave you want to glide in on,
give your body to it, give your laugh to it,
give, when the gravelly sand takes you,
your tears to the land. To love another is something
like prayer and can't be planned, you just fall
into its arms because your belief undoes your disbelief.

I wish I could express to you how much this poem stirs me. Anne, in all her depression, at the end of her life, expresses to someone (the poem is titled "Admonitions to a Special Person) how love compares to nature and finally religion. These are two themes I found over and over again in my research. There is something about faith that compares to love. There is something about being blind to what we believe that compares to being blind to how loves works within us. But there is also something about a choice that we make to accept love into our lives that makes it different from anything else. It must be a wave you want to glide in on.

I can't even begin to express the difference this project has made in my life. There is something about spending your entire Saturday, from the second you wake up to the second you go to bed, sitting on your couch reading poetry that changes your life. Now that will preach.