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Thursday, May 25, 2017

Jane Hirshfield's On the Fifth Day powm getting international attention

One of the major German newspapers, Frankfurter Allgemeine, just published a piece about Jane's "On the Fifth Day" poem, which she read at the April 22nd March for Science (which should have been held earlier so that it could be the March March for science) In this article there's a framing of it as Buddhist,. It's of course in German but Google Translate seems to do a fairly reasonable job..That's Jane reading at the March. Here she is on Youtube at the DC March speaking and reading the poem.
The Washington Post's digital version of the poem is here:


There was a good bit of U.S. attention as well --first the poem was run rather prominently in the Washington Post, then the NY Times ran a front page article which opened by describing my #PoetsForScience project for the D.C.March and this about poetry and resistance and then this a week later. Brainpickings did a piece on the poem. Jane says that eading it in D.C. to some good percentage of the 100,000 people who came to the main March was an experience she's unlikely to have again and that the Poets For Science Tent in the Teach In area was always thronged. The poem was also read at the close of the Irish March for Science by Mary Robinson (former president of Ireland) and in translation at the Paris and Marseilles Marches in France.

The poetry banners she had made were shipped to an event in NYC and then some came to John Muir's house in Martinez California where she read in a small eco-poetics festival recently. The banners have been on display in the local high school. The banners are made with help from the Wick Poetry Center at Kent State in Ohio, who are keeping a website home for the project.