FIRST THINGS Poetry Reading

The FIRST THINGS Annual Poetry Reading, which was initiated in 2015, provides an opportunity for editors and readers of the magazine to come together for a pleasant evening of poetry and conversation. The 2021 Poetry Reading featured Paul Mariani and was held at the FIRST THINGS offices. Mariani has published several poetry collections, as well as numerous books of prose. After more than a year of cancelled events and uncertainty, this evening was a wonderful reminder that there can never be too much poetry in one’s life, for it refreshes timeless truths and brings even the seemingly mundane to vibrant life.

Snow Moon Over Singer Island

Black velvet darkness, tufts of clouds heading slowly up the beach, the February snow moon like the host the priest raises shining now along the solemn coast, transfiguring the Atlantic waters down below.

I sat there transfixed, as if for once at peace with what I had the sense this time around to see, the things that all my life have ground me down at last drifting off to the east northeast.

But what words can net what one feels in these too-brief moments? Grasshopper transcendence, the poet called it, those translucent wings whirring up into the Sunday light before the shouts of strangers force their entry like some thief.

Show us a sign, we say, show us what we think we want to see. Though do we even know what such a sign would be? Or is the blessèd thing already there before us, you and me, and all we really need to see it are the eyes to see?

— Paul Mariani