Comments on: What’s more important

By: Suzanne

Suzanne — Thu, 14 Jun 2007 02:39:02 +0000

That’s a beautiful poem.

You and AT are doing some kind of high-brow, low-brow experiment on us, aren’t you?

By: WCGPop

WCGPop — Thu, 14 Jun 2007 04:25:47 +0000

Ditto on the poem.

Not so sure about the roots of the article, however there appear to be some interesting ideas lurking in there.

By: The Bosphorus

The Bosphorus — Thu, 14 Jun 2007 11:15:38 +0000

Mary Oliver has some amazing poems. She has this very keen eye for watching nature that I really like.

I haven’t read the book the article reviewed. It’s been 2 years since both were published. I’d be interested to find out how the books argument has stood up during that time.

By: girlfriend

girlfriend — Thu, 14 Jun 2007 14:46:16 +0000

In a society where the future of our teens is so vulnerable due to the war they need to cling to something. During the cold war many teenagers clung to religion. I am not saying it is right or wrong but it is a survival technique. If this great number of teens truly believed we would have fewer drug problems or alcohol problems among teens.

By: Suzanne

Suzanne — Thu, 14 Jun 2007 20:55:15 +0000

This also makes me think of how neatly prosperity theology fits into our growing consumerism.

By: The Bosphorus

The Bosphorus — Thu, 14 Jun 2007 23:57:26 +0000

You know I hadn’t realized how the poem and the article speak to each other.

The poem presents a very stark, but not pessimistic, realism. The article points to a spirituality that works to avoid that very same realism, namely death.

The big difference between the two is that death is the very end of the spirituality of comfort and pleasure fulfillment. Death gives way to life and more life in Oliver’s poem and especially her other poems.