Ada Limón served as the 24th Poet Laureate of the United States. She’ll be in Eugene on Wednesday, April 8 for a talk at the Oregon Humanities Center at the University of Oregon. She spoke with KLCC’s Rachael McDonald.
Rachael McDonald: Your talk this week is called “The Unleaving: How Poetry Helps You to Not Miss Your Life.” What is it about poetry that can keep us present and aware and not miss our life?
Ada Limón: You know, poetry is really about noticing and paying attention, and I think many of the arts are like that, that it's about looking and deeply looking at the world. And when you do that, you are absorbing the moment. You are living in the present, and you're also recording it and I think there's something about that that gives us an appreciation even when we are experiencing really difficult times like right now. I think there is a moment where we have to recognize where we are. We have to know that we are in a moment of crisis. And, we also have to recognize the tools that help us deal with those moments of crisis that help us gather courage.
"So, poetry is that way of sometimes organizing what we see, making a container for everything that we are processing and going through, and it helps us recognize beauty and pain, but it also allows us to feel alive." - Ada Limón
McDonald: I definitely noticed that you have a lot of connections to the natural world and I saw on your website that you have trees that are important to you and kind of a list of those trees. I love that because that's something for me as well that, you know, there's certain trees that I kind of know of. What is it about nature and the natural world and, and having that connection that also helps with that sense of being present?
Limón: Yeah, you know, for me, nature is not something we go to, but it is us. And I think that we forget that and our relationship with the natural world is often so broken and so bifurcated, and we forget that we are part of this incredible, wondrous planet. And I think even little moments of breathing with a tree, recognizing that you are in exchange of breath with plants and really having that sit with you just for a moment can make you appreciate this wondrous moment of being alive. And I think it's very difficult to find those moments sometimes, you know, as we rush on to the next thing. As we're sort of overwhelmed by, you know, the crisis and chaos of the news cycle, but also a real loss of humanity and real planetary loss, and so I think that recognizing nature, looking at it, appreciating it, knowing it's an exchange, knowing that you're part of something larger makes you realize you're not going through this alone. It makes you realize that we are together, whether we like it or not, in this moment.
McDonald: Well, you have a poem to share with us. Would you like to introduce it?
Limón: Yeah, I'd be happy to. Thank you so much. And I'm very much looking forward to being in Oregon on Wednesday. It's been a while since I've been there and I'm very excited to be back. This is a poem that I think is about taking courage from the animal world and recognizing yourself in a really powerful, beautiful animal.
This is a poem called “How to Triumph Like a Girl.”
I like the lady horses best.
How they make it all look easy, like running 40 MPH is as fun as taking a nap or grass.
I like their lady horse swagger after winning. Ears up, girls, ears up.
But mainly, let's be honest, I like that they're ladies, as if this big dangerous animal is also a part of me. That somewhere inside the delicate skin of my body there pumps an 8-pound female horse heart giant with power, heavy with blood.
Don't you want to believe it?
Don't you want to lift my shirt and see the huge beating genius machine that thinks, no, it knows, it's going to come in first.
McDonald: Thank you so much.
Limón: Thank you.
Former Poet Laureate Ada Limón will give a talk Wednesday at 4 p.m. at the EMU Redwood Auditorium at the University of Oregon in Eugene. It’s also livestreaming. More info at the Oregon Humanities Center website.
Limón’s talk, part of this year’s “Attention” series, is sponsored by the Oregon Humanities Center’s Cressman Lectureship.
