Poetry and the Power of Place
Walking by the waters,
down where an honest river
shakes hands with the sea,
a woman passed round me
an a slow, watchful circle,
as if I were as superstition;
or the worst dregs of her imagination,
so when she finally spoke
her words spliced into bars
of an old wheel. A segment of air.
Where do you come from?
‘Here,’ I said, ‘Here. These parts.’[1]
Region…Residence…Home. Call it what you will, the idea of one’s place holds meaning for each of us, regardless of where or how we live. For those who never stop moving, home is a rest stop between city limits. For those more sedentary, home can simply end where the rest of the world begins. Some of us are comfortable in our place, while others feel like plants struggling in the wrong soil. Our place affects how we are perceived by others (Yankees, Southerners, New Yorkers) and even how we perceive ourselves. I have found place to be of particular importance in the minds and hearts of Minnesotans. Duluth, Superior, Edina, and Red Wing all bring with them feelings and stereotypes stronger than any I knew in my native home of Nashville, TN. See, originally a southerner, I see Minnesota (my place of 14 years) from a more objective vantage point.
Nor is the power of place lost on poetry. Poets from all walks and generations have written their lines about the connection (or disconnection) to the ground they walk. From Blake’s London to Baudelaire’s Paris to Baca’s New Mexico, some places seem to inspire poetry with ease—even the desperate, winter vistas of Minnesota. The late Bill Holm was known to many as the voice of this land. He was an elemental of cold and frost and molded people and places from the very hoarfrost around him, barely outlined against their landscape as in his piece “Barbed-wire Winter.”
“–Boy!
When we got married–now, that was cold weather.
At least twenty-five below,
winter solstice, nineteen forty,
war and rinderpest.
Road to the church was blocked with barbed wire.
I remember we clambered over the rail fence of the parsonage.
–Hey, your dress is caught
–no, not there–over there.
We tramped the furrows of an ice-crusted
potato field, up to the minister
who was in his surplice and had
the Scriptures ready.
–Love is a path you must walk, he ways, Yes, we said.
But my lord what muddy feet we had!
When we got in bed that night
we cried a dab–both of us. God
knows why.
And then the long life began.”[2]
Reflecting on the power of place, I am reminded of a project taking place here at the Humanities Center—The Bdote Memory Map. Bdote refers to the confluence of two bodies of water for the local Dakota communities. In this instance it refers to the place where the Minnesota and Mississippi Rivers converge, for according to the origin stories of the Bdewakantunwan Dakota this place is the center of the earth. It is where Dakota people began. The Minnesota Humanities Center is working with local indigenous communities and American Indian-led media companies on this digital resource for acquiring and preserving stories and thoughts, across generations, on this area of deep meaning for the Dakota in Minnesota. The map is in development; its current iteration can be found here: http://web.mac.com/alliesms/Memory/MEMORY_MAP_.html. Content acquired here will be leveraged in a number of ways for our local educators to more effectively connect with their American Indian students and to educate their non-Indian peers on their rich cultural heritage. The Bdote Memory Map is but one tool the Humanities Center uses in its work with cultural competency and educational equity. For more information see the Humanities Center web site: http://minnesotahumanities.org/culturalcompetency.
I leave you with another look at place, by Heid Erdrich, local poet, editor, and member of the Turtle Mountain Band of Ojibwe.
“We were the land before we were a people,
earthdivers, her darling mudpuppies, so the stories go,
or emerging, fully forming from flesh of earth —
The land, not the least vaguely, realizing in all four directions,
still storied, art-filled, fully enhanced.
Such as she is, such as she wills us to become.”[3]
Special Note: Heid Erdrich will be the lead scholar for our American Indian Literature Series workshop for educators on June 11 and 12. Register now!
I encourage you to seek out the poetry of place, both locally and beyond. It cannot help but affect how you see your own place in the world.
What does ‘home’ mean to you? Tell us—we’d like to hear!
Until next week. Keep reading poetry.
[1] “In My Country” by Jackie Kay. Accessed April 15, 2009 from http://www.poetryarchive.org/poetryarchive/singlePoem.do?poemId=5685.
[2] Accessed on April 16, 2009 from http://www.northfieldlibraryfriends.org/bill_holm_poetry.html.
[3] Excerpt from “National Monuments” accessed on April 16, 2009 from http://www.swjournal.com/index.php?&story=13372&page=152&category=64.
