Eclipse Poetry, April 8

Paul Grondahl, Dan Wilcox, Natalya Sukhonos

What would a solar eclipse be like without poetry? Actually, I guess it would be like any other astronomical event — another reason to look up at the sky. But the visionary Opalka Endowed Director of the New York State Writers Institute, Paul Grondahl, thought that at least at a university setting, poets should be be there to provide, if not commentary, at least a literary perspective, so he invited me & poet Natalya Sukhonos to provide that perspective while hundreds of students stared into Space (with the necessary Eclipse glasses).

The day was a bit overcast & in Albany, NY we were not in the path of totality, & I had given my glasses away to a student, but the ambient light did darken somewhat, as if the Sun were turning the rheostat down briefly.

Natalya’s eclipse poem was titled “The Journey of Eclipse,” written specifically for this occasion, mixing together images of the characters from Waiting for Godot & of the Cheshire cat, invoking silence. She also read 2 other poems that pondered the stars, one inspired by Rilke, “Lost Souls,” the other an ekphrastic piece from a painting, “Night Sky #16 by Vija Celmins.” 

I too had 3 poems, the word play on the term “Physics” (both as the type of science & the old-fashioned term for “laxative”), a poem inspired by “The Transit of Venus;” my eclipse poem was based on watching TV news coverage of the 2017 Great American Eclipse, & is titled “Spathe is the Plathe,” which one can find on my Blog here.

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