Library Hotel, The Best American Poetry, and TS Poetry are teaming up to ask you to pick a poem for the Library Hotel’s beautiful Poetry Garden.
If your poem recommendation is chosen, you will receive a gift.* And you’ll know that it was your pick that will grace the setting of many a hotel-staying book lover in the future.
The poem should express a spirit of travel, literature love, or the Library Hotel itself.
What? You haven’t stayed at the Library Hotel?
A limited number of rooms are still available during National Poetry Month, if you want to book your very first stay now. Of course, we want you to do that and make it fall on April 22nd and 23rd, so you can also join us for our Ruby Garden Dreams meet up—complete with poetry workshop in the Library Hotel Poetry Garden, sightseeing, and an evening of readings and live music at International Arts Movement. Make your room reservation soon if you want to secure a space at the Library Hotel!
If you join us at the Library Hotel and would like to get a signed copy of our brand new poetry collection, Love, Etc., of course we would be happy to oblige. Just bring it along or plan to pick one up at the event.
But before you find a little love, pick a poem for the Poetry Garden. And bring some love of poetry into the lives of travelers, who can make Poetry their home away from home.
Photo by Claire Burge, author of Spin: Taking Your Creativity to the Nth Degree.
*Please nominate a new poem, if you see that your favorite has already been chosen. Only the first entrant for any particular poem will be considered eligible to receive a gift.
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Richard Maxson says
I cannot be there, because of other commitments, but here is a poem suggestion by Juan Ramon Jimenez
The Definitive Journey
…and I will leave. But the birds will stay, singing:
and my garden will stay, with its green tree,
with its water well.
Many afternoons the skies will be blue and placid,
and the bells in the belfry will chime,
as they are chiming this very afternoon.
The people who have loved me will pass away,
and the town will burst anew every year.
But my spirit will always wander nostalgic
in the same recondite corner of my flowery garden.
L.L. Barkat says
Ooooo, nice.
Is there a translator?
Richard Maxson says
I remembered this from the 70s reading Journey To Ixtlan by Carlos Castaneda, who was credited with the translation.
There is also a translation by a South African poet, Uys Krige. Personally I don’t like this one as well as Castaneda’s.
The Final Journey
… and I will go away.
And the birds will stay, singing
And my garden will stay
With its green tree
And white water well.
And every afternoon the sky will be blue and peaceful
And the pealing of bells will be like this afternoon’s
Peal of the bell of the high campanile.
They will die, all those who loved me
And every year the town will be revived, again
And in my circle of green white-limed flowering garden
My spirit will dwell nostalgic from tree to well.
And I will go away
And I will be lonely without my home
And without my tree with its green foliage
Without my white water well
Without the blue peaceful sky
And the birds will stay
Singing
Robert Bly has translated Jiminez (and I love his translations of many poets including Rilke), but I couldn’t find a translation of this poem by him.
Donna says
Richard, I like that one. 🙂
My favorite poem in all the world…. Rumi’s “The Guest House”. And, a guest house receives travelers, yes? 🙂
THE GUEST HOUSE
This being human is a guest house.
Every morning a new arrival.
A joy, a depression, a meanness,
some momentary awareness comes
as an unexpected visitor.
Welcome and entertain them all!
Even if they are a crowd of sorrows,
who violently sweep your house
empty of its furniture,
still, treat each guest honorably.
He may be clearing you out
for some new delight.
The dark thought, the shame, the malice.
meet them at the door laughing and invite them in.
Be grateful for whatever comes.
because each has been sent
as a guide from beyond.
— Jelaluddin Rumi,
translation by Coleman Barks
Richard Maxson says
I like this also, Donna.
Sandra Heska King says
The Journey by Mary Oliver (from Dream Work)
One day you finally knew
what you had to do, and began,
though the voices around you
kept shouting
their bad advice—
though the whole house
began to tremble
and you felt the old tug
at your ankles.
“Mend my life!”
each voice cried.
But you didn’t stop.
You knew what you had to do,
though the wind pried
with its stiff fingers
at the very foundations,
though their melancholy
was terrible.
It was already late
enough, and a wild night,
and the road full of fallen
branches and stones.
But little by little,
as you left their voices behind,
the stars began to burn
through the sheets of clouds,
and there was a new voice
which you slowly
recognized as your own,
that kept you company
as you strode deeper and deeper
into the world
determined to do
the only thing you could do—
determined to save
the only life you could save.
Richard Maxson says
My wife gave me Dream Works for Christmas and this was one of my favorites in that collection. As with so many of her poems it is a profound truth.
Sandra Heska King says
It’s probably much longer than they want, but I love it.
Donna says
Oh, Sandra. Kind of amazing but this speaks exactly to what I am working on, at this very moment. It’s wonderful.
Sandra Heska King says
Well, that kind of gives me chills, Donna.
Nessa says
The Round
by Stanley Kunitz
Light splashed this morning
on the shell-pink anemones
swaying on their tall stems;
down blue-spiked veronica
light flowed in rivulets
over the humps of the honeybees;
this morning I saw light kiss
the silk of the roses
in their second flowering,
my late bloomers
flushed with their brandy.
A curious gladness shook me.
So I have shut the doors of my house,
so I have trudged downstairs to my cell,
so I am sitting in semi-dark
hunched over my desk
with nothing for a view
to tempt me
but a bloated compost heap,
steamy old stinkpile,
under my window;
and I pick my notebook up
and I start to read aloud
the still-wet words I scribbled
on the blotted page:
”Light splashed . . .”
I can scarcely wait till tomorrow
when a new life begins for me,
as it does each day,
as it does each day.
from Passing Through: The Later Poems, New and Selected, by Stanley Kunitz, (W. W. Norton, 1995)
Kevin says
My nomination is Emily Dickinson’s “There is no frigate like a book.”
Ivana Bolf says
Thank you all for your amazing suggestions! We’re so excited to announce that the poem we have selected is “Notes on the Art of Poetry” by Dylan Thomas, which was suggested by our Poet-in-Residence, Karen Clark. It wasn’t easy to choose just one poem because we had a very close runner-up! Kevin, we loved your nomination, Emily Dickinson’s “This is no frigate like a book” so congratulations on being our first runner-up! Kevin, we would love to send you 2 anthologies of poems to thank you for participating and nominating such a beautiful poem. Please email me at ivana@libraryhotel.com with your contact information and I’d be delighted to send you the books! Thank you everyone once again!
Best,
Ivana
Director of Sales
Library Hotel
(212)204-5417
Kevin Stotts says
Thank you for the notice. I rarely go to NY, but will definitely visit the garden at the Library Hotel upon my next visit.
My contact information:
Kevin Stotts
39 West Stafford Avenue
Worthington, OH 43085
Ivana Bolf says
Thank you so much Kevin! The books will be on their way to your shortly. We plan on announcing the winning poem and the runner-up on Facebook and Twitter so keep an eye out for that. Congratulations again!
Best,
Ivana Bolf
Director of Sales
Library Hotel
(212)204-5417