Good reads – Marge Piercy’s poetry & prose

Another good read (author I’m fond of) is Marge Piercy.

Like Ursula LeGuin, she also writes both poetry and prose. I came to her poetry, after enjoying her novels.  Most of her novels are set in the contemporary world when they were published, such as, Small Changes, but some in the historic past,  like Gone to Soldiers, and some are science fiction, like He, She, and It.

Here’s a poem she wrote that may help to inspire you: For the Young Who Want To, from her poetry collection, Circles on the Water (1982),. We have it  in the book collection (PS3566.I4 A6 1982).

It starts off:

“Talent is what they say
you have after the novel
is published and favorably
reviewed. Beforehand what
you have is a tedious
delusion, a hobby like knitting.”

This poem is encouraging young people (or beginners of any age)  to keep at it, despite the discouraging atmosphere for the arts (or the life of the mind in general. So, I think it can apply to science or any  creative endeavorl.

She has another great poem in that collection, called To be of Use, in which she described people who wholeheartedly enter into work, good work.  That poem ends with:

“The work of the world is common as mud.
Botched, it smears the hands, crumbles to dust.
But the thing worth doing well done
has a shape that satisfies, clean and evident.
Greek amphoras for wine or oil,
Hopi vases that held corn, are put in museums
but you know they were made to be used.
The pitcher cries for water to carry
and a person for work that is real.”

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