"Organic Bloom" by Stanley Kunitz

Subjects touched on in this episode include:

-Mid-century poet syndrome -Rhythmic vs. metrical variation -The poem as caesura salad -The Mind-Body problem, or, putting Descartes before the horse -Chaos and Cosmos -Is Hell artificial or organic? -Guilty sin vs. sinful guilt -More distinctions re: Romanticism -Insatiable desire and spiritual hollowness -A great Shakespeare quote from a just-ok Shakespeare play -Civilization as the macro-ubermensch -A short botanical digression -Finding existential hope in the way fruit works

Text of the poem:

Organic Bloom

The brain constructs its system to enclose The steady paradox of thought and sense; Momentously its tissued meaning grows To solve and integrate experience. But life escapes closed reason. We explain Our chaos into cosmos, cell by cell, Only to learn of some insidious pain Beyond the limits of our charted hell, A guilt not mentioned in our prayers, a sin Conceived against the self. So, vast and vaster The plasmic circles of gray discipline Spread outward to include each new disaster. Enormous floats the brain's organic bloom Till, bursting like a fruit, it scatters doom.

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Art by David Anthony Klug

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My favorite poetry podcasts for: Sharp thoughts and cutting truths (Matthew): Sleerickets Lovely introspection and sensitive reflection (Alice): Poetry Says The landscape of Ohioan poetry (Jeremy): Poetry Spotlight

Supported in part by The Ohio Poetry Association Art by David Anthony Klug

List of the most common metrical feet: Iamb: weak-STRONG (u /) Trochee: STRONG-weak (/ u) Anapest: weak-weak-STRONG (u u /) Amphibrach: weak-STRONG-weak (u / u) Dactyl: STRONG-weak-weak (/ u u) Cretic: STRONG-weak-STRONG (/ u /) Pyrrhic: weak-weak (u u) Spondee: STRONG-STRONG (/ /)