Ted Kooser Winter Morning Walks

 

The full title of this collection is "Winter Morning Walks: 100 Postcards to Jim Harrison."

Each poem is titled with a date.  Each poem starts with a short reference to the weather, like a diary entry.  Each poem is created from the raw material of a morning walk (often pre-dawn or just as dawn begins or in his home just after the walk).  In this way it's like all of the "art projects" that I like -- 100 days, create a poem postcard from what I see and think on a morning walk.

It always starts with a specific description of nature.  And the kernel of the poem grows organically from that closely observed nature.  This one, for instance, includes specific observation followed by a single sentence of reflection.

It feels like haiku in spirit.  There's specific seasonality to it.  And it works under the impression that everyday there is a poem waiting for us to write.  The poem is not inside your brain, waiting to be birthed, but is a reaction to closely observed nature.  The idea is that you go for a walk, observe, be open, describe things.  Then make something of it.  Make something of the day.  This is not too different than when I wrote my 10 haikus in 10 days following 10 observations.

Jazz composer Maria Schneider turned 25 of the poems in this collection into a song cycle, written for the opera singer Dawn Upshaw.  

Here's his website that I'd like to dig into.