Poems are unpredictable. A good poem contains some discovery that takes us by surprise. But there’s a contradiction there, since you also have to have predictability in order to appreciate a surprise. (Otherwise, you have surprises exploding like war—or, in my case, like growing up with an alcoholic father.)
For a richly lived life—as well as for a poem—there has to be a basis of predictability punctuated by surprise...
My marriage crosshatches periods of illness and health. My husband is a 9-time cancer survivor. I’m the anchoring wife. Yet he’s the steady one—the thinker; I’m the flow—the feeler. (Just to massively over simplify!) When he is sick, I’m called upon to think and feel for both of us. It’s huge to have to take on both roles. At those times I’m so glad to have poetry.
The contradictions that serve our marriage are love and anger. That goes for periods of dramatic illness and for the badminton court. My husband is a super strong badminton player with a speedburst of a strategic, shallow serve, illness notwithstanding. I am a butterfly of a badminton player who depends on my intuition. He is stronger at the game than I am, and you would think he would win every time. But I play intuitively, and he cannot predict me. So I can win just with sheer footwork and body response. I baffle him. I surprise. Together we make a kind of poem that depends on predictability and surprise.
You cannot have the surprise without an underpinning constancy. Vine needs lattice. My husband has huge respect when I return a shot he never thought I’d get (his surprise causes him to miss), and I have huge respect for his steady strength and speed. We’re a match.
- Molly Peacock, in conversation with Susan Gillis over on her Concrete & River blog. You can read the whole thing here.
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