I’m not really sure how obscure my choice is, but I know I never heard of Sidney Lanier until long after I left school. His most famous work is probably “The Marshes of Glynn”, but “Sunrise” and “The Song of the Chattahoochee” are my favorites. Since his works are in the public domain, I can quote at will. Here is the best of the best of Poems of Sidney Lanier
Now that’s what I call poetry!
Anne Sexton
Obscure because not too many people seem to recognize the name or the works, not so obscure because she did win a Pulitzer Prize for her poetry.
example:
Ahh…nothing quite like the poetry of the mentally ill!
Well, I do not know how obscure he is. Vadim Andreyev
A DEEP SCAR ENGRAVED…
A deep scar engraved in the bark’s dark silver;
the lovely circle of your inital letter,
distinct in spite of the years.
Along the bark’s sharp grooves runs
the large-headed ant, unaware in its haste
that the circle is endless.
Osip
Toss-up: Dana Gioia, or Thomas Lynch. Neither is exactly unknown, but both are more or less outside the “poetry industry”, earning a living outside of writing or teaching, and it shows in their work.
A.E. Houseman
Careful, biblio…a couple months ago I started a “Who’s your favorite obscure composer/What’s your favorite obscure classical work” thread, lookin’ for some new sounds to throw on the box, and I got called a show-off and an elitist snob.
I hope it doesn’t happen to you, because these sorts of threads are the main reason I spend so much time checking in here.
I’m extremely fond of the California poets George Sterling and Robinson Jeffers…
THE NIGHT OF GODS (Sterling)
Their mouths have drunken Death’s eternal wine –
The draught that Baal in oblivion sips.
Unseen about their courts the adder slips,
Unheard the sucklings of the leopard whine;
The toad has found a resting-place divine,
And bloats in stupor between Ammon’s lips.
O Carthage and the unreturning ships,
The fallen pinnacle, the shifting Sign!
Lo! when I hear from voiceless court and fane
Time’s adoration of Eternity –
The cry of kingdoms past and gods undone –
i stand as one whose feet at noontide gain
A lonely shore; who feels his soul set free,
And hears the blind sea chanting to the sun.
THE BED BY THE WINDOW (Jeffers)
I chose the bed downstairs by the sea-window for a good death-bed
When we built the house; it is ready waiting,
Unused unless by some guest in a twelvemonth, who hardly suspects
Its latter purpose. I often regard it,
With neither dislike nor desire; rather with both, so equalled
That they kill each other and a crystalline interest
Remains alone. We are safe to finish what we have to finish;
And then it will sound rather like music
When the patient daemon behind the screen of sea-rock and sky
Thumps with his staff, and calls thrice: “Come, Jeffers.”
Nice idea.
Slapping a hand on the broad bottom of ‘obscure’ is more problematical than usual given that I’m not familiar with who from here is not known there. I’m middling with Philip Larkin on the ground that he is very well known here, probably is (in the US) to poetry buffs and is worth looking at if you’re a more casual reader. The second choice (below) is short and sweet.
Church Going
Once I am sure there’s nothing going on
I step inside, letting the door thud shut.
Another church: matting, seats, and stone,
And little books; sprawlings of flowers, cut
For Sunday, brownish now; some brass and stuff
Up at the holy end; the small neat organ;
And a tense, musty, unignorable silence,
Brewed God knows how long. Hatless, I take off
My cycle-clips in awkward reverence,
Move forward, run my hand around the font.
From where I stand, the roof looks almost new-
Cleaned or restored? Someone would know: I don’t.
Mounting the lectern, I peruse a few
Hectoring large-scale verses, and pronounce
“Here endeth” much more loudly than I’d meant.
The echoes snigger briefly. Back at the door
I sign the book, donate an Irish sixpence,
Reflect the place was not worth stopping for.
Yet stop I did: in fact I often do,
And always end much at a loss like this,
Wondering what to look for; wondering, too,
When churches fall completely out of use
What we shall turn them into, if we shall keep
A few cathedrals chronically on show,
Their parchment, plate, and pyx in locked cases,
And let the rest rent-free to rain and sheep.
Shall we avoid them as unlucky places?
Or, after dark, will dubious women come
To make their children touch a particular stone;
Pick simples for a cancer; or on some
Advised night see walking a dead one?
Power of some sort or other will go on
In games, in riddles, seemingly at random;
But superstition, like belief, must die,
And what remains when disbelief has gone?
Grass, weedy pavement, brambles, buttress, sky,
A shape less recognizable each week,
A purpose more obscure. I wonder who
Will be the last, the very last, to seek
This place for what it was; one of the crew
That tap and jot and know what rood-lofts were?
Some ruin-bibber, randy for antique,
Or Christmas-addict, counting on a whiff
Of gown-and-bands and organ-pipes and myrrh?
Or will he be my representative,
Bored, uninformed, knowing the ghostly silt
Dispersed, yet tending to this cross of ground
Through suburb scrub because it held unspilt
So long and equably what since is found
Only in separation - marriage, and birth,
And death, and thoughts of these - for whom was built
This special shell? For, though I’ve no idea
What this accoutred frowsty barn is worth,
It pleases me to stand in silence here;
A serious house on serious earth it is,
In whose blent air all our compulsions meet,
Are recognised, and robed as destinies.
And that much never can be obsolete,
Since someone will forever be surprising
A hunger in himself to be more serious,
And gravitating with it to this ground,
Which, he once heard, was proper to grow wise in,
If only that so many dead lie round.
And, of course, the inevitable:
This Be The Verse
They fuck you up, your mum and dad.
They may not mean to, but they do.
They fill you with the faults they had
And add some extra, just for you.
But they were fucked up in their turn
By fools in old-style hats and coats,
Who half the time were soppy-stern
And half at one another’s throats.
Man hands on misery to man.
It deepens like a coastal shelf.
Get out as early as you can,
And don’t have any kids yourself.
Like Anne Sexton, Sara Teasdale (1884-1933) won a Pulitzer Prize for Poetry (in fact, I believe she won the very first such prize in that field) but has since faded into semi-obscurity, aided by the fact that she tried to arrange to have her personal effects and poems destroyed after her suicide. Regardless…
A Prayer
When I am dying, let me know
That I loved the blowing snow
Although it stung like whips;
That I loved all lovely things
And I tried to take their stings
With gay unembittered lips;
That I loved with all my strength,
To my soul’s full depth and length,
Careless if my heart should break,
That I sang as children sing
Fitting tunes to everything,
Loving life for its own sake.
The Answer
When I go back to earth
And all my joyous body
Puts off the red and white
That once had been so proud,
If men should pass above
With false and feeble pity,
My dust will find a voice
To answer them aloud:
“Be still, I am content,
Take back your poor compassion,
Joy was a flame in me
Too steady to destroy;
Lithe as a bending reed
Loving the storm that sways her—
I found more joy in sorrow
Than you could find in joy.”
One day last October
When I was far from sober,
Returning with my load
With manly pride
My feet begin to stutter
So I lay down in the gutter
And a pig came up
And laid down by my side.
A woman passing by was heard to say,
"Hmmmph! You can tell a man who boozes
By the company he chooses. sniff
And the pig got up and slowly walked away…
-Anonymous
THE WAIT
It seemed
like years
before
I picked
a bouquet
of kisses
off her mouth
and put them
into a dawn-colored vase
in
my
heart.
But
the wait
was worth it.
Because
I
was
in love.
BOO, FOREVER
Spinning like a ghost
on the bottom of a
top,
I’m haunted by all
the space that I
will live without
you.
I dunno how obscure these people are, but I love CK Williams (recently won a Pulitzer Prize, but he’s still not known), Mark Halliday, and Adrienne Rich (okay, she’s really not that obscure, but a lot of people don’t know who she is).
Well, I’m fond of James Elroy Flecker, a 19th century English poet oft quoted by Horace Rumpole.
I also like Stevie Smith, not quite as obscure, but not too many ordinary folks have heard of her.
I posted in a hurry, and since both poets’ works are still very much under copyright, I’d hoped to find examples online to link to, but didn’t turn up any right away. So, to rectify the omission, here’s what I’ve found:
Thomas Lynch, "Grimalkin". Alas, I’ve not been able to get my hands on this volume, but I’m very fond of both Skating with Heather Grace and Still Life in Milford. The latter is the only one of Lynch’s three volumes of poetry still in print in the U.S., though his wonderful book of essays The Undertaking : Life Studies from the Dismal Trade, about his work as an undertaker, is still available, and his newest (in the same vein) Bodies in Motion and at Rest: On Metaphor and Mortality was just published this summer; haven’t had a chance to pick it up yet. The Undertaking enjoyed a fair amount of success, endangering Lynch’s status as an “obscure” poet, but then I doubt many of the people who’ve bought and enjoyed the essays have actually bought and read the poems.
Dana Gioia and more here. Like Lynch, Gioia is perhaps better known for his prose than his poetry. His 1992 volume Can Poetry Matter? : Essays on Poetry and American Culture, especially the title essay (originally published in the Atlantic Monthly and available online) caused quite a stir when first published. Dopers who’ve recently completed an intro to lit or intro to poetry course may recognize him as the most recent co-editor (with X.J. Kennedy) of the venerable survey anthologies Literature: An Introduction to to Fiction, Poetry, and Drama and An Introduction to Poetry.
…or read in a LONG time! The poet: Philip Freneau (the “poet of the American Revolution”). I’m sure he is LONG forgotten. Anyway, the reason I remember this long-dead, long-obscure American poet: when I was in JHS, I had to take printing - don’t laugh, we actually set type by hand and printed books. As a class project, we set up a book of poetry and printed copies for outr parents (who promptly tossed them in the wastebasket). Anyway, I remember some verses from a poem commemorating the battle of Lake Champlain (War of 1812)!
…" from Isle La Motte to saranac, with sulphurous clouds the heavens were black…
…we saw advance the “CONFIANCE”, shall blod and honor stain her track…
…to gain dominion on the lake"
I have NO idea why this obscure poem stays locked in my memory! The mind works in strange ways!
I am a huge fan of Byron Herbert Reese, who lived and wrote poetry in the mountains of North Georgia until he died by his own hand in 1958. More biographical info can be found here:
http://canes.gsw.peachnet.edu/~world/reece.html
Reese was a supremely talented poet who did not get the respect he deserved largely because he clung to old forms (sonnets, lyrical poetry, etc.) and was thus perceived by critics of his own generation as “old-fashioned”. His poems, particularly his meditations on nature and country life, are heart-rendingly beautiful. I’ll try to post a couple of samples tomorrow.