Sometimes it seems to me that poets, especially American poets, got derailed by the confessional poems of Lowell and Plath, and there is just too much self-absorption. Of course, everything experienced is filtered through the lense of self, but a little perspective is the mark of a fine mind. Galway Kinnell gave a craft talk at Squaw Valley Community of Writers, in which he suggested taking the words “I” or “me” or the various forms of these out of your work. And Sharon Olds, who was also there, wrote a beautiful poem about how she loved the I-beam I, “Take the I Out.” But I did write for a year without an “I” poem. It was a good exercise. And it’s hard to beat this poem, with no I in it:
Saint Francis and the Sow
The bud
stands for all things,
even for those things that don’t flower,
for everything flowers, from within, of self-blessing; Continue reading “Too much I…”