{"id":2948,"date":"2019-03-08T00:00:16","date_gmt":"2019-03-08T05:00:16","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/sites.udmercy.edu\/mission-and-identity\/?p=2948"},"modified":"2019-09-18T16:44:54","modified_gmt":"2019-09-18T20:44:54","slug":"march-8-san-francisco-as-an-improbable-poem-naomi-shihab-nye","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/sites.udmercy.edu\/poetry\/2019\/03\/08\/march-8-san-francisco-as-an-improbable-poem-naomi-shihab-nye\/","title":{"rendered":"March 8 San Francisco as an improbable poem – – Naomi Shihab Nye"},"content":{"rendered":"

Friday, March 8, 2019 \u00a0\u201cYou can\u2019t order a poem like you order a taco.\u201d<\/strong><\/p>\n

\u201cpoems hide. In the bottoms of our shoes,
\nthey are sleeping.\u201d<\/p>\n

Last night (March 8, 2016), I sent a friend who lives in San Francisco a NYT piece\u00a0\u201cIn San Francisco and Rooting for a Tech Comeuppance\u201d and asked how it read to her. \u00a0{n.b., that friend just returned to her home from my city after 3 days of coaching people learning to live with Michigan\u2019s resent anti-gerrymandering law (n.b., \u201cjust returned\u201d = March 6, 2019). \u00a0She told me Detroit was damn cold laced with vitality and real people.<\/p>\n

She responded:<\/p>\n

\u201cSF is ground zero for the clash between young, affluent techies and San Francisco\u2019s famously diverse communities. The Airbnb controversy epitomized the conflict as rental properties are taken off the market in favor of higher-priced, short-term Airbnb rentals\u2026which only serves to further exacerbate the lack of affordability. The article has a lot of truth to it.\u201d<\/p>\n

I wrote back: \u00a0\u201cI only know SF as it has evolved from what I read (with one exception). \u00a02 Decembers ago The American Experience producers of \u201cThomas Edison\u201d flew me to SF for a couple hours on camera as a talking head. \u00a0 I stayed in boutique hotel a couple miles due east of USF. \u00a0I was confused by the neighborhood. \u00a0It felt as if it had been a neighborhood with close to the ground long rooted people. \u00a0Didn\u2019t feel much that way now. \u00a0I looked for a place to eat with plain earthy people and waitstaff and food. \u00a0Took two days to find one. \u00a0That said, your few lines confirm my take. \u00a0SF has long been shaped by its fixed, relatively small, perimeter which, like a piston\u2019s cylinder cycle, generates power by compression. \u00a0 Feels, though, like it\u2019s gotten out of hand.\u201d<\/p>\n

The metaphor of San Francisco as like an engine\u2019s piston, \u00a0whose fixed cylinder wall and the tight fit with its cylinder, makes high compression possible. \u00a0The compression generates the power that makes the engine do its work. \u00a0But what happens when the pressure overloads the strength of the cylinder wall? \u00a0Boom!, like the 19th century river steam boats whose high pressure engine drivers sometimes raced each other down or up the river by hammering a shim into the pressure release valve to build more compression and greater speed. \u00a0Quite a few of those high pressure boilers blew up as did the famous Mozelle a few\u00a0hundred yards out from\u00a0Cincinnati\u2019s wharf (c. 1838) and spewed tiny body parts all over Cincinnati\u2019s harbor streets and out over the river. \u00a0[for a short historical account see: \u00a0https:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Moselle_(riverboat)<\/a>]\u00a0 All this led me to ruminate about the power of anger in the wake of the 2018 mid-term blue wave sweep. \u00a0And that led me to look for a good poem about anger for today.<\/p>\n

But while looking for an anger poem, I found this previously-unread masterpiece. \u00a0It was love at first site. \u00a0For you too, I hope. \u00a0In an angry time, gracefully crafted tenderness and wit can be like fresh clean air in the lungs.<\/p>\n

Have a blest weekend.<\/p>\n

john sj<\/p>\n

p.s. \u00a0Brilliant sun in my town today. \u00a0Daylight Savings time is just around the corner. \u00a0Left-over piles of snow here and there to whet our appetites for daffodils and crocuses.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Today\u2019s Post\u00a0<\/strong>\u00a0\u201cValentine for Ernest Mann\u201d<\/strong>
\n<\/strong>Naomi Shihab Nye<\/p>\n

You can\u2019t order a poem like you order a taco.
\nWalk up to the counter, say, \u201cI\u2019ll take two\u201d
\nand expect it to be handed back to you
\non a shiny plate.<\/p>\n

Still, I like your spirit.
\nAnyone who says, \u201cHere\u2019s my address,
\nwrite me a poem,\u201d deserves something in reply.
\nSo I\u2019ll tell you a secret instead:
\npoems hide. In the bottoms of our shoes,
\nthey are sleeping. They are the shadows
\ndrifting across our ceilings the moment
\nbefore we wake up. What we have to do
\nis live in a way that lets us find them.<\/p>\n

Once I knew a man who gave his wife
\ntwo skunks for a valentine.
\nHe couldn\u2019t understand why she was crying.
\n\u201cI thought they had such beautiful eyes.\u201d
\nAnd he was serious. He was a serious man
\nwho lived in a serious way. Nothing was ugly
\njust because the world said so. He really
\nliked those skunks. So, he re-invented them
\nas valentines and they became beautiful.
\nAt least, to him. And the poems that had been hiding
\nin the eyes of skunks for centuries
\ncrawled out and curled up at his feet.<\/p>\n

Maybe if we re-invent whatever our lives give us
\nwe find poems. Check your garage, the odd sock
\nin your drawer, the person you almost like, but not quite.
\nAnd let me know.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

Naomi Shihab Nye
\nb. March 12, 1952\u00a0(age\u00a066)<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Friday, March 8, 2019 \u00a0\u201cYou can\u2019t order a poem like you order a taco.\u201d \u201cpoems hide. In the bottoms of our shoes, they are sleeping.\u201d Last night (March 8, 2016), I sent a friend who lives in San Francisco a … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":139,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[11641],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/sites.udmercy.edu\/poetry\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2948"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/sites.udmercy.edu\/poetry\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/sites.udmercy.edu\/poetry\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sites.udmercy.edu\/poetry\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/139"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sites.udmercy.edu\/poetry\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2948"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/sites.udmercy.edu\/poetry\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2948\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2950,"href":"https:\/\/sites.udmercy.edu\/poetry\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2948\/revisions\/2950"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/sites.udmercy.edu\/poetry\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2948"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sites.udmercy.edu\/poetry\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2948"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sites.udmercy.edu\/poetry\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2948"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}