My childhood and then later youth has been unconsciously influenced by poems . Earlier,the only poems i could understand and appreciate were the ones in English class.
The ones which have stuck to my memory even though i completely lost track of poems after school are
Daffodils by William Wordsworth, The Charge of the Light Brigade by Lord Tennyson,
The Rime of the Ancient Mariner by Samuel Coleridge ,
Abou Ben Adam by Leigh Hunt
In XI and XII i came across Emily Dickinson and Nissim Ezekiel- not during coursework .Since i was science student in college,appreciating poem,plays and stories in college class was considered useless by my class mates .Except me and other 5-6 students nobody attended English lectures in XI and XIIth.
I came across
Emily Dickinson and
Solitude by Ella Wheeler Willcox in a book of poems.
During my graduation years, i came across 2 lines of
Elizabeth Barrett Browning's poem in a Mills and Boon [the only one i ever read]:
'I love thee to the level of every day's most quiet need'
By sun and candlelight'
Internet had made inroads in India and i remember i searched for the poem.Those lines belong to 'How do I love thee?'.
Since I was in flush of my youth,full of romance this poem awakened my passionate side.This poem made me realize what a hopeless romantic and passionate and extreme person I'm.I knew it then if i ever fall in love- real love i'll know it and will not be able to deny it or rationalize it.
Emily Dickinson has been a part of my life ever since too. Her poems are sad, hopeful, full of pathos and a weird sensibility and i understood them.Her poems are a hallmark of a sad,real,passionate and sensitive -suffering woman.
Since then i have read Poems by American poets both 19th and 20th century.Except for few sonnets of Shakespeare, I find I cannot hold attention to 17th and 18th century poets.Most recently I have appreciated
Pablo Nerudo's poems.And I'm still open to all kinds of poetry.I try and read Indian poetry however most of them are translated works.
My attempt at writing poetry is only to express certain things in verse instead of essays. I'm envious of poeple who write poems that rhyme because i haven't been able to do that successfully.
