I’ve spent the last two weeks getting serious about my dissertation. It’s been two years now since I successfully completed my prelim exams, and I have almost nothing to show for that time, dissertation-wise. It’s tremendously embarrassing, and even a little painful. By getting serious, I mean that I’ve been diving into the primary sources for my dissertation project, the poetry of a cluster of really wonderful poets (and people) frequently referred to as “The Objectivists”: Charles Reznikoff, Louis Zukofsky, George Oppen, Carl Rakosi, Basil Bunting, and Lorine Niedecker. William Carlos Williams was associated with the Objectivists for a time, and many scholars refer to a period of his poetry as “Objectivist,” but he is not always considered part of the core group by literary historians.

Reading their writing has energized me considerably, and motivated me to want to both write more of my own poetry and to get working on a dissertation that explores, elucidates, and even champions their impressive poetry. Over the next few weeks, I want to post little samples of the kind of poetry that each of the major Objectivists wrote, so that you too can grow to appreciate and love their work. If you love their poems, please buy the books that their work is contained in–all of the Objectivists except Carl Rakosi have beautiful editions of their collected work published in the past decade, so it is accessible, in print, and there for the enjoyment.

To start, here’s a small taste of Carl Rakosi, two poems about animals, and two other short lyrics:

“No One Talks About This”

They go in different ways.
One hog is stationed at the far end
of the pen to decoy the others,
the hammer knocks the cow
to his knees,
the sheep goes gentle
and unsuspecting.
Then the chain is locked
around the hind leg
and the floor descends
from under them.
Head down they hang.
The great drum turns
the helpless objects
and conveys them slowly
to the butcher waiting
at his station.
The sheep is stabbed
behind the ear.

Gentle sheep, I am powerless
to mitigate your sorrow.
Men no longer weep
by the rivers of Babylon
but I will speak for you.
If I forget you, may my eyes
lose their Jerusalem.

–from Ere-Voice (1967)

“Poem”

The ants came
to investigate
the dead
bull snake,
nibbled
at the viscera
and hurried off
with full mouths
waving wild
antennae.

Moths alighted,
beetles swarmed,
flies buzzed
in the stomach.

Three crows
tugged and tore
and flew off
to the oak tree
with the skin.

In every house
men, women and children
were chewing beef.

Who was it said
“The wonder of the world
is its comprehensibility”?

“Strictly Iowa”

They were married so long
they were worn down
to the same element,
two factual blue eyes
and an open freckled face
neither liberal nor conservative
like the Revolutionary farmer
and as sparing with an adjective
as a short-haired dog.

“Grace Note”

Since the world
has been my tuning fork
I must have struck
a note myself
from time to time
which pays my debt
with honest affection
undivided between
head and spring.