My moment of poetry fangirl heaven (with pic of autograph!)

[Lyric]

Yesterday my Poetry class was honored with a private reading by the poet James Harms, who is also a professor at my university. Jim has been gone this semester doing a guest teaching spot at another university, but came home long enough to do a reading and discussion hour with our class. In person, he is incredibly accessible and almost scary-smart. We had a terrific time. After class was over, I approached him and asked for an autograph, which he was delighted to give.



Jim signing my book in the classroom



The page he signed. If you can't decipher his handwriting, it reads:

"For Brandy, w/thanks for your careful reading of these poems. W/faith in words, Jim." and then a full-name autograph below his printed name, which simply reads "James Harms".

Here's one of Jim's poems for your reading pleasure. I absolutely love this one, by the way:

The Sanity of My Vessel from "Freeways and Aqueducts"

You're never here but here
you are, and you're smiling, a pair
of pink slippers hooked to your fingers.

If this were a dream
a small door would open in your body,
swallows would not be lost

in their migratory myths (they clatter
in the cold chimney as if
their blood remembers).

You are not a dream, a ghost,
an apparition, but you have risen
from the dust of a deep corner

because you are not here and here
is all I have. So I am readying the horses,
sewing a tear in my blue coat.

For it is nearly over,
the quiet of seaglass and sand,
a quiet that fills

instead of empties, the blown snow
finding the crack in the porch door.
The silence is slipping like a tongue

into sound, and I am almost to the gate,
almost ready to depart.
Repaired of dress and listening for how

the trees in reaching down to scratch
the bony rooftops recall your weary sigh,
my lighthouse, my siren (please wait),

I am very nearly on my way.

[xchrom]

1. that's very, very cool.

and damn if DU isn't just jammed with poetry lovers -- and how cool is that?

good on you for asking for his autograph.

edited to change povers to lovers

[miss_american_pie]

2. That poem is gorgeous

Lucky you. :hi:

[RetroLounge]

3. Very nice!

:hi:

RL