Skip to main content

CB in IN

Poets from Indiana, Catherine Bowman


Wait, you say, again with a poet not born in Indiana! Yep, Catherine Bowman was born in El Paso, Texas, and she received her MFA from Columbia University in New York, but she's been teaching and living in Bloomington for a long time at this point, and if there's one thing this blog shows, it's that some of Indiana's greatest writers are transplants. Catherine Bowman is one of those. And really, one of her books is titled 1--800-HOT-RIBS*. The title alone of this book hints a little at her range and sensibilities as a poet. Some of her other books are titled The Plath Cabinet and Can I Finish Please? One of my favorite of her poems, "Story of a Tree," has the following lines:

tree of memory, tree of ghosts, tree of rain—

under birdsong whispers
you cradled me in your canopy.
When I was a baby, I stroked
the soft hair on your leaves.

You were my first true church,
and when rains came
our whole bodies shook
and shimmered with God’s words.


The entire poem can be found on the Poetry Foundation page, though the richness of her connection with nature and with a childhood memory is clear from this excerpt alone. Having such memories myself, I feel like it is very easy to connect to this poem and sink into its language. 


*Yes, I know you think I made this up. Perhaps you think I made up Cathy too, but oh, dear reader, Google for yourself. Never trust me, the unworthy narrator. 

Labels:

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

JM in IN

Poets from Indiana, John Matthias Wait, that's John Matthias. I know, you're probably like, why wasn't he the first poet on the list for Indiana? After all, he studied under John Berryman and Yvor Winters. He rubbed elbow patches with Robert Hass and Robert Pinsky. He was at Notre Dame when the MFA started, edited The Notre Dame   Review , and joked around with other amazing writers like Steve Tomasula and Joyelle McSweeney (I suppose, though I haven't heard any stories). And, finally, he's the poet that Robert Archambeau is always talking about, so you know his work is amazing .  He grew up in Ohio and went to The Ohio State U and Stanford, but he's been in South Bend long enough to be claimed as someone with "deep Indiana roots." I'm sure that some of his many books were written along the banks of the St. Joseph River.  One of my favorites is "After Quevedo." Quevedo himself writes insightfully about death, and Matthias' poem picks ...
Post a Comment
Read more

RUJ in IN

 Poets from Indiana, Robert Underwood Johnson I know, you're like, wait, that guy looks old. Yep, Robert Underwood Johnson died in 1937. He lived through the Civil War, served as an ambassador to Italy, went camping with John Muir (yes, that one), argued for copyright laws, argued for land conservation and women's rights. He hung out with Teddy Roosevelt, Augustus Saint-Gaudens, Ulysses S. Grant, Henry James, and many others. And yes, he grew up in Indiana and graduated from Earlham College in Richmond at the age of 14. Still, even more importantly, he was a poet with many books to his name. I first came across his work in Eletha Mae Taylor's Indiana Poetry  compilation. It contains this poem, "Titian's Two Loves, in the Borghese."               One forgets not the first dead he sorrowed over;                One forgets not the first kiss of the first lover.         ...
Post a Comment
Read more

ES in IN

Poets from Indiana, Evaleen Stein So, I'm going way back for this one, but Evaleen Stein is one of most Indiana poets featured yet. She lived and died in Lafayette. And what's more, she's pretty amazing. She's probably best known for writing novels for children, but she wrote hundreds of poems. Many of them are aimed at children, but many are observations of local nature. In addition, she translated poems from Italian and Japanese, no small feat. Just consider this excerpt from "Showery Time" (you can find the whole poem here ): In countless fluted creases The little elm-leaves show, While white as carded fleeces The dogwood blossoms blow. A rosy robe is wrapping The early red-bud trees; But still the haws are napping, Nor heed the honey-bees. And still in lazy sleeping The apple-buds are bound, But tulip-tips are peeping From out the garden ground.  This is a peaceful little poem with natural images that still scream Indiana, and it's really ju...
Post a Comment
Read more