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Published 2 December 2014. |
Poet Donald Hall somehow manages to write in a way that is both ornery and lyric.
For decades, Hall published acclaimed poetry. He even served for a year as the Poet Laureate. Then as he grew older, he found that poetry "abandoned" him.
Since writing is his way of being in the world, Hall began writing essays and publishing them in a variety of venues:
The American Scholar, Slice, Playboy, New Letters, and the New Yorker.
I found it delightful to imagine sitting with him in his farm house in New Hampshire.
Hall describes the life of a poet, the women he's loved, his enjoyment of food and smoking, his age-related challenges, and the nature that surrounds him.
And while I would never ask him about his wild, scraggly beard, he does offer a compelling narrative about this beard and two previous ones.
I invite you to "sit" with Hall by reading his essays. Here are the titles of the essays collected here and a couple of quotes from each: