“How many things are there which we call miraculous or contrary to Nature? All men and nations do that according to the measure of their ignorance”–Montaigne
“Life, as you know, is but a burning, eating, breaking/down of organic matter into elementary bits/plus some details irrelevant to chemistry”–from the poem “Details” by Tomasz Rozycki
“It seemed we’d given time the slip, but when/you took a bit of apricot, there it was again.”–from the poem “The Garden” by Tomasz Rozycki
“You can define poetry as the power of the introvert”–Adam Zagajewski
“I wonder sometimes if there’s anyone there, when I’m reading. Does the speaker speak the poem? Or does the poem just speak?”–Elisa Gabbert
“…there’s nothing wrong with myths. Likely as not, the tendency to make up stories about the distant past as a way of reflecting on the nature of our species is itself, like art and poetry, one of those distinctly human trains that began to crystallize in deep prehistory.” From “The Dawn of Everything”, David Graebner and David Wengrow
“The red fence/takes the cold trail/north; no meat/on its ribs,/but neither has it/much to carry.” Snow Fence by Ted Kooser
Holland’s poem “Wrecks” (adapted for stage by Janice White Greenop) was selected as one of fifty playscreens from a submission field of seven hundred and was performed in NYC in the summer of 2022. The sponsoring organization is the International One Minute Theatre Festival.
As part of my speech at my daughter’s wedding in June of ’22, I recited this excerpt to my daughter, as if it were she speaking…the excerpt is from a Sharon Olds’ poem, appropriately titled: The Wedding Vow: “I had been working toward this hour/all my life. And then it was time/to speak–he was offering me, no matter/what, his life. That is all I had to/do, that evening, to accept the gift.”
The Poetic Endeavors and Mishaps of Ken Holland 