LITR 5535: American Romanticism
 
Student Poetry Presentation 2006

Monday 20 November:

poetry: Simon J. Ortiz, “Earth and Rain, the Plants & Sun,” N 2814-2815

poetry reader / discussion leader: George Otis

Biography 

Simon Ortiz was born in 1941 at Albuquerque, New Mexico and raised in the Acoma village of McCarty, in an Acoma speaking family. He attended the University of Mexico and the University of Iowa 1962-1969. His family background influenced him a lot. For instance, his father who was a stonemason, carpenter and woodcarver, would talk and sing as he worked, and would say: “underneath / what looks like loose stone / there is stone woven together.” This sense of unity of nature permeates Simon’s poetry. As a child, there was also a relative with a humpback who would carry Simon and tell him stories. Simon confesses: “that contact must have contributed the language of myself.” That contact has certainly influenced Simon to be an indisputable cultural nationalist, and as well, an authentic Native American poet, with a mission of “continuance and preservation.”

His career includes the teaching of creative writing at the University of New Mexico, and a lieutenant governor of the Pueblo of Acoma.He is currently a faculty member of the University of Toronto, where he teaches native language and aboriginal studies, with a mission “to invoke an indigenous international perspective,” and to preach cultural assertiveness, rather than defensiveness.” He has written more than 30 books of poetry and prose. One of his most popular poetry collections is From Sand Creek which won the 1982 Pushcart prize.

Course objectives

Objective 1a. Romantic Spirit or ideology

-         To identify and criticize ideas and attitudes associated with desire and loss, rebellion, nostalgia, idealism, the gothic, the sublime, the individual in nature or separate from the masses.

Objective 1b.Romantic Period

- To speculate elements of realism and local color.

Objective 1c.Identify transcendental elements.

Objective 2: Cultural issues.

-         To speculate elements of rebellion, sentimental nature and equality in parallel.

“Earth and Rain, the Plants & Sun”

Once near san Ysidore

On the way to Colorado,

I stopped and looked.

The sound of a meadowlark

Through smell of fresh cut alfalfa.

Raho would say

“Look, dad.” A hawk

Sweeping

              Its wings

Clear through

             The blue

Of whole and pure

                The wind

                                the sky.

It is writhing

Overhead.

Hear. The Bringer.

                     The Thunderer.

Sunlight falls

Through cloud curtains

A straight bright shaft.

It falls,

          It falls,

       Down

      To earth,

A green plant.

Today, the Katzina come

Many times, the Katzina

The dancing prayers.

It shall not end,

Son it will no end,

this love.

Again and again,

The earth is new again.

They come, listen, listen.

Hold to your mother’s hand

They come

O great joy, they come.

The plants with bells.

The stones with voices.

Listen son, hold my hand.

DISCUSSION QUESTIONS.

1, Identify elements of romantic ideology in this poem with emphasis on:

        -desire and loss

        -rebellion

        -the sublime

       -the gothic

2, what elements of realism can one identify from Ortiz’s poem?

3, Simon Ortiz’s poem has some features of transcendence. Pick out some of these

features.

4, “I write down the experience of being an Indian in America.”- Simon Ortiz. How is this statement justified in the poem under discourse?

Southwest American Indian author, preview Katzina