Poetic Quotes

I will post a comment on how I, personally, feel about poetry a little later. For now, I would like to share these quotations on poetry with you. I enjoyed them because I felt that they were interesting and truthful about poetry.

"A poet's work is to name the unnameable, to point at frauds, to take sides, start arguments, shape the world, and stop it going to sleep."
- Salman Rushdie

"Even when poetry has a meaning, as it usually has, it may be inadvisable to draw it out... Perfect understanding will sometimes almost extinguish pleasure."
- A. E. Housman

 "Poetry is a deal of joy and pain and wonder, with a dash of the dictionary."

- Khalil Gibran 

"Poetry is ordinary language raised to the Nth power. Poetry is boned with ideas, nerved and blooded with emotions, all held together by the delicate, tough skin of words."
- Paul Engle

"Poetry is plucking at the heartstrings, and making music with them."
- Dennis Gabor 

"Poetry is thoughts that breathe, and words that burn."
- Thomas Gray

"Poetry is the rhythmical creation of beauty in words."
- Edgar Allan Poe

I also found a nice poem on poetry, but I am unable to post it. See the second link in the references to see it.

 References:

http://www.brainyquote.com/quotes/topics/topic_poetry.html#ixzz1IED9jmBG

http://www.poemhunter.com/poem/poetry-poetry-2/

Haiku

Here is a poem that I wrote, made up of four Haiku poems made into stanzas.

Since Haiku is a Japanese poem that is usually about nature, I thought about flowers. With the arrival of Spring, I thought that rain and flowers were good topics to start with. From there, the picture below gave me more inspiration, and this poem was formed.

Dreary, rainy day;

Black clouds, grey skies, heavy air,

Clingy wetness and cold.

Lightning streaks across

The sky, illuminating

The dark scene below.

Thunder soon follows,

An immense drum sounding its

Boom throughout the air.

A pink flower blooms,

A small beacon of beauty
In a dreary world.

- G.L. Schilbe

Sources:

http://www.mysoultosole.ca/assets/images/Purple_flower.jpg

Where I'm From

Here is the poem that I wrote from the "Where I'm From" poem template.


I am from hair clips,
From a fresh family meal at Pizza Hut and sticky homemade caramel popcorn.

I am from the immense cornfield, jumping between rows to avoid being caught in a game of hide-and-seek-tag.
I am from the fragrant lilacs, blooming fervently in spring, from the unkept bush that formed a magical kingdom of endless adventure.

I am from the pancake supper, exploring Uncle Rick's sugar maple bush and the shack where the maple syrup is freshly made in the spring.
I am from Grandma and Grandpaw's creek, the long trek down the trail to the stream of smiles and memories.

I am from the determined and the opinionated,
From "clean this up" and "don't be shy".

I am from "Jesus loves me, this I know" and from repentant prayers.
From singing songs, sleeping during sermons, and making colourful crafts in Sunday School.

I am from London, Ontario, one half from Poland and the other a mixture of German, Dutch, and various other ethnicities,
From crepes and schnitzel.

From the countless blackened fingernails my Father and Uncles received from hammers,
From the building of our house and the treacherous climb taken three stories above ground just to say hello,
From the flaming Jeep, my mother relieved to find my sister and I safely indoors.

I am from old family albums, stored away in a cupboard; some out of order, others never touched unless to reminisce.
I am from various files and dates taking up room in a monstrous desk drawer in the computer room.
These moments captured on paper and forgotten in another world separate of our own. Living in another world, yet in contact with our own on lonely Saturdays when fuzzy memories stored in the back of the mind are not enough to remember those moments that define our lives.

- G.L. Schilbe

Here is a picture of my mom and I in our backyard.



From the poem, and this picture, you can now see where I'm from.