Here’s What Poetry Can Do

Here’s What Poetry Can Do 

…And if you’re not asleepby now, or bored beyond sense,the poem wants you to laugh. Laugh atyourself, laugh at this poem, at all poetry.Come on:
Good. Now here’s what poetry can do.

Stephen Dunn : Poem for People That Are Understandably too Busy to Read Poetry

A period of confinement like the one we’re going through right now makes people creative. Among other things, I have immerged myself in reading poetry and re-launched the habit of learning favourite poems by heart.

Even if memorising isn’t your thing, reading poems can do a lot for you. When poets write about confinement during other periods of history, we can see that concentrating on all the little miracles of everyday life is a good way to deal with it. Poetry relativizes our problems. Poetry sharpens our perceptions and makes us feel more keenly and, last but not least, poetry simply beautifies our world…

PS The complete poem by Stephen Dunn can be found here.