Loureine A. Aber - My Littleness (1923)

Forgotten Poems #37

—: My Littleness :—

            Two pinholes in the curtain . . .
       My eyes;
            Two weeds flapping forlornly in a field of corn . . .
       My hands.

            And in the distance like a foghorn blowing  . . .
       My heart.

       I am no bigger than mountains,
       Or mightier than stars,
       The sphinx smells of me familiarly,
            Daisies touch lips with me . . .
       I shall be dust soon.

Loureine A. Aber (1893-1930)
P: Poetry (1921), The Double Dealer (1923), The Lariat (1924), Voices (1924); C: We, The Musk Chasers (1921); plays, etc.

Graduate of Oberlin College; friends with Lillian Blackwell Dial. Lived in Chicago, and worked in advertising.

Hey everyone. As I said in my last post, I ended up needing a longer break than expected, and haven’t done anything in a few months. I hope everyone enjoyed Haiku Thursday, the official return of the newsletter and a new weekly feature, focussing on translations and discussions around haiku, and haiku related forms. It’s something I’ve been passionate about for the last 20 years or so, and I’m really excited to be doing it.

The rest of the time, I will continue to post excerpts from my other main project, an every growing catalogue of obscure and forgotten English-language free-verse and ‘new verse’ poets (including rhymed and unrhymed) from the late-1800s and early-1900s (check out the full list of poets we’ve posted so far).

And sometimes, when everything is going just right, I’ll get that really special, good feeling, and find a few words of my own will arrive, in response to whatever poem I am about to post. Aber’s verse is a favourite of mine. She navigates the rush of imagery so smoothly, deconstructing herself—body and heart—into fields and foghorns and daisies, sights and sounds and textures, activating the full range of senses, as she returns to the earth: soon, we will all be dust. I can smell it too, just before the rain. Needless to say, it wasn’t hard to feel inspired after spending some time with Aber’s verse, which quickly lead to this;

  
       Excerpt from 'The Book of Spheres' . . .
                    For Loureine Aber
                             (by Dick Whyte)

       Riddles are for trees—
       At their feet
       Gather stones,
       Like songs

       Oh earth,
       Tell us of the future:
       How it will end
       And begin again—

       Ah well, let it!
       The dirt exhaled,
       Knowing it didn't need
       Permission.

       *         *         *         *

       Coda:

       Make something useful
       You said,
       And so we sang of trees
       And stones.

       And sometimes it was
       Enough.
 

Well, that’s it for this week. Hope everyone is having a lovely—I imagine—Sunday morning, wherever you are? As always, feel free to write your own poetic responses in the comments, or let us know what you thought of the poems. It’s late Sunday evening here in Aotearoa/New Zealand where I am typing away. I’ll see you on Thursday for another haiku translation, and am working on a few other new features for the newsletter too. Be well . . .

 
                           xoxo
                             dw
 

Forgotten Poets Presents:

Forgotten Poems, a living anthology of obscure and out-of-print poetry from the late-1800s and early-1900s. Explore the archives:

More poems about mountains . . .

More poems about stars . . .