Poetry Sunday: Calling Things What They Are by Ada Limon
It is important to call things what they are. The poet Ada Limon agrees.
Calling Things What They Are
by Ada Limon
I pass the feeder and yell, Grackle party! And then an hour later I yell, Mourning dove afterparty! (I call the feeder the party and the seed on the ground the afterparty.) I am getting so good at watching that I’ve even dug out the binoculars an old poet gave me back when I was young and heading to the Cape with so much future ahead of me it was like my own ocean. Tufted titmouse! I yell, and Lucas laughs and says, Thought so. But he is humoring me; he didn’t think so at all. My father does this same thing. Shouts out at the feeder announcing the party attendees. He throws out a whole peanut or two to the Stellar’s jay who visits on a low oak branch in the morning. To think there was a time I thought birds were kind of boring. Brown bird. Gray bird. Black bird. Blah blah blah bird. Then, I started to learn their names by the ocean, and the person I was dating said, That’s the problem with you, Limón, you’re all fauna and no flora. And I began to learn the names of trees. I like to call things as they are. Before, the only thing I was interested in was love, how it grips you, how it terrifies you, how it annihilates and resuscitates you. I didn’t know then that it wasn’t even love that I was interested in, but my own suffering. I thought suffering kept things interesting. How funny that I called it love and the whole time it was pain.
Let me go through this one a few times. It speaks to me in many ways. Thanks for introducing me to it, Dorothy.
ReplyDeleteI thought you might like this one!
DeleteI haven't seen a tufted titmouse around here for a couple of years now. Where have all the birds gone?
ReplyDeleteWell, they are around. I see them regularly at my feeders, but at this time of year, many birds tend to be less obvious as they go through their molt and get ready for winter. It's almost as if they are embarrassed by their shaggy appearance and don't wish to be seen.
DeleteAt my house, the Eastern chipmunks love to join the afterparty. But it's a lot more than just about birds. This is one of those poems that you have to stop and think about.
ReplyDeleteSame with the squirrels in my yard. The feeder posts have squirrel baffles so they can't get to the feeders but they clean up every seed that falls to the ground.
DeleteWhat this! All her birding comments totally made me smile while the ending made me a little sad.
ReplyDeleteIndeed. The poem has an interesting arc, doesn't it?
DeleteI felt so fortunate to get to hear Limón read and speak when she came to Houston some time back. What a great poet she is. Thank you for sharing this poem---it is new to me.
ReplyDeleteI don't think I have ever read a poem of hers that didn't move me or that I didn't enjoy on some level. She well deserves her post as Poet Laureate.
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