Poetry

Poetry has been on my mind lately because a group of my friends recently had a poetry night. For more than twenty years we have met regularly to talk about books, art, other subjects of interest. We call ourselves the "Inspiritice Society" because we inspire each other.

Every one brought a poem to read. . .ranging from classics to children's poems to contemporary strangeness. I brought my favorite collection, "Good Poems Selected and Introduced by Garrison Keillor"; others had tattered old editions from grade school or belonging to their parents. We kept thinking of fragments of this and that from the past, looking up snippets on our smart phones and finding the sum total and reading it aloud. Our hostess dressed all in black with a beret on her head - - a true beatnik!

Poetry connects with a different level of consciousness. Last summer I read about a man who always takes a book of poetry on his vacation and reads one a day in the late afternoon. He calls it his "cocktail hour."