Post by elisabethne116 on May 30, 2013 22:35:00 GMT -5
Li-Young Lee was born to Chinese political exiles in Indonesia at a time when anti-Chinese sentiment was fomenting there. Due to the hostile environment that surrounded them, Lee and his family left Indonesia upon his father’s release from a political prison and came to the United States in 1964. In spite of his physical departure from Asia, it is clear from his poetry that Lee never abandoned his cultural roots; the influences of classical Chinese poets, such as Li Bo and Tu Fu, along with those of his ancestors are evident in his poems.
Lee did not seriously begin writing poetry, however, until he attended the University of Pittsburgh at which point his father inspired him to find his passion. While it is not uncommon for college students to experiment in the search for their identities, the poetry that sprang from Lee’s search for self is anything but ordinary, and it quickly catapulted him into the much acclaimed poet that he is today.
A distinctive characteristic of Lee’s poetry is its tendency to relate narrative or “the weight of memory” to launch its investigations of the universe. While this prompts some readers to believe his poetry to be strictly lyric, a further examination reveals the complexity and universality of his prose, which, haunted by a “thousand voices of China and Japan” “flourish beneath” the seemingly superficiality of his simplistic language.
While such prose are as pleasing as “the music of comb against hair,” as one closely reads his poetry and “the tangles are undone,” it transforms from “a syncopated code I long to know” into the universal concept sure to evoke sentimentality in all participants in the human experience.
Lee’s poems take the reader on a journey through “the thousand mile sadness, the rocking ship, and the melancholy of trains” by reminding the reader that we are “opening to fullness and toward death.” Such a realization causes the reader to ponder the endless “vastness of the world,” but at the same time to cherish the “days we live as if death were nowhere in the background.” Thus, the reader is called to realize the significance of “moments measured by a kiss or a tear, a pass of the hand along a loved one’s face” over the course of a lifetime.
As the poet Gerald Stern points out, “what characterizes Lee’s poetry is a certain humility, a love of plain speech, and a search for wisdom and understanding.”
After familiarizing oneself with Lee’s poems, it is not uncommon to find oneself “in absolute silence and full of love” for such talent.
Not immune to the stunning beauty of his work, Lee believes that each of his poems is a “descendent of God.” Even flawed poems, he maintains, “are failures of perception, failures of understanding, but those flaws become a part of the poem’s integrity.” And his poems do, indeed, possess integrity. For that reason, I am honored to welcome Li-Young Lee on this occasion and express my sincere gratitude for his willingness to share his poetry with us tonight.
Lee did not seriously begin writing poetry, however, until he attended the University of Pittsburgh at which point his father inspired him to find his passion. While it is not uncommon for college students to experiment in the search for their identities, the poetry that sprang from Lee’s search for self is anything but ordinary, and it quickly catapulted him into the much acclaimed poet that he is today.
A distinctive characteristic of Lee’s poetry is its tendency to relate narrative or “the weight of memory” to launch its investigations of the universe. While this prompts some readers to believe his poetry to be strictly lyric, a further examination reveals the complexity and universality of his prose, which, haunted by a “thousand voices of China and Japan” “flourish beneath” the seemingly superficiality of his simplistic language.
While such prose are as pleasing as “the music of comb against hair,” as one closely reads his poetry and “the tangles are undone,” it transforms from “a syncopated code I long to know” into the universal concept sure to evoke sentimentality in all participants in the human experience.
Lee’s poems take the reader on a journey through “the thousand mile sadness, the rocking ship, and the melancholy of trains” by reminding the reader that we are “opening to fullness and toward death.” Such a realization causes the reader to ponder the endless “vastness of the world,” but at the same time to cherish the “days we live as if death were nowhere in the background.” Thus, the reader is called to realize the significance of “moments measured by a kiss or a tear, a pass of the hand along a loved one’s face” over the course of a lifetime.
As the poet Gerald Stern points out, “what characterizes Lee’s poetry is a certain humility, a love of plain speech, and a search for wisdom and understanding.”
After familiarizing oneself with Lee’s poems, it is not uncommon to find oneself “in absolute silence and full of love” for such talent.
Not immune to the stunning beauty of his work, Lee believes that each of his poems is a “descendent of God.” Even flawed poems, he maintains, “are failures of perception, failures of understanding, but those flaws become a part of the poem’s integrity.” And his poems do, indeed, possess integrity. For that reason, I am honored to welcome Li-Young Lee on this occasion and express my sincere gratitude for his willingness to share his poetry with us tonight.