Poetry, Passion And Zen with Jane Hirshfield

Program Description

Poetry is a natural way to express what it means to be human, says Jane Hirshfield. Its depth and color are found in every culture and every age–in the writings not only of famous men but of equally gifted women who have been largely ignored. Hirshfield herself assembled a historical collection of women’s poetry that speaks to the beauty and wisdom of women’s spiritual experience. She reveals recurring themes in this poetry, such as the idea that the Divine is experienced through everyday actions and events, and that emotions belong in the enlightened life rather than detract from it. Hirshfield offers gentle wisdom about writing and appreciating poetry: “The poem is the speech of the inner heart, the inner mind,” she says. “If you can simply hear what it’s saying as if it were being whispered to you in the dark, you will understand good poems.”

She is the translator and author of several books of poetry including The October Palace (HarperCollins 1994), Women in Praise of the Sacred (HarperCollins 1994) and Nine Gates: Entering the Mind of Poetry (Perennial 1998).

Topics Explored in this Dialogue:

• Overcoming the “fear of poetry”
• Writing, hearing and understanding poetry
• Women’s poetry in the ancient Japanese imperial court
• What mystics of all traditions say about the Divine and the everyday
• How Zen practice relates to poetry
• Her extensive search for sacred writings by women
• Undiscovered women writers who exist “wherever you have men writers”
• The Beguine women’s spiritual communities of the 12th-14th centuries
• The modern rediscovery of Sophia, ancient goddess of wisdom
• Getting to wisdom by losing innocence and breaking the rules
• The “bodhisattva of emotions” who wants to liberate dark feelings

Program Number: 2486                  Host: Michael Toms               Interview Date: 9/13/1994