Dear Friend,
Welcome back for SEASON SEVEN of the Contemplative Reading Project. It’s so nice to see you again!
In February and March, we were engaged in a special read-along project of Marcel Proust’s Swann’s Way. These discussions were led on Instagram and Zoom, both formally and informally, and I hope all involved enjoyed the experience. (I know some have expressed a desire to read through the rest of the saga, while others have decided this would be the first and last of Proust for them. Que sera, sera!)
As for me, I’m glad to be back here with you all and especially excited to be diving into National Poetry Month with the Pulitzer Prize-winning poet, Diane Seuss.
Our April 2025 Reading Selection
Diane Seuss is one of the most acclaimed American poets of our time, having won or been nominated for everything from the Juniper Prize to the National Book Award, and even a Pulitzer. While I’ve followed Seuss on social media for many years, I only recently read a full collection of her work, frank: sonnets, which might make anyone a fan of both Seuss and of poetry in general. (I can hear you non-poetry readers scoffing at me through your screens, but it’s true!)
I’m very much looking forward to experiencing another complete collection from this poet and to engage in some close reading and contemplation of poetry in this first full month of Spring, and during National Poetry Month itself. When would be a better time than this?
Publisher’s description: “Diane Seuss’s signature voice—audacious in its honesty, virtuosic in its artistry, outsider in its attitude—has become one of the most original in contemporary poetry. Her latest collection takes its title, Modern Poetry, from the first textbook Seuss encountered as a child and the first poetry course she took in college, as an enrapt but ill-equipped student, one who felt poetry was beyond her reach. Many of the poems make use of the forms and terms of musical and poetic craft—ballad, fugue, aria, refrain, coda—and contend with the works of writers overrepresented in textbooks and anthologies and those too often underrepresented. Seuss provides a moving account of her picaresque years and their uncertainties, and in the process, she enters the realm between Modernism and Romanticism, between romance and objectivity, with Keats as ghost, lover, and interlocutor.” (Gray Wolf Press)
About the editor: “Diane Seuss was born in Michigan City, Indiana, in 1956 and raised in Edwardsburg and Niles, Michigan. She studied at Kalamazoo College and Western Michigan University, where she received a master’s degree in social work.
“Seuss is the author of six books of poetry: Modern Poetry (Graywolf Press, 2024), a finalist for the National Book Award; frank: sonnets (Graywolf Press, 2021), winner of the 2022 PEN/Voelcker Award for Poetry, the 2021 Los Angeles Times Book Prize, the 2021 National Book Critics Circle Award for Poetry, and the 2022 Pulitzer Prize for Poetry; Still Life with Two Dead Peacocks and a Girl (Graywolf Press, 2018), a finalist for the National Book Critics Circle Award in Poetry and the Los Angeles Times Book Prize in Poetry; Four-Legged Girl (Graywolf Press, 2015), a finalist for the Pulitzer Prize; Wolf Lake, White Gown Blown Open (University of Massachusetts Press, 2010), a recipient of the Juniper Prize for Poetry; and It Blows You Hollow (New Issues Press, 1998).
“A Guggenheim Fellow, Seuss was writer in residence at Kalamazoo College for many years, and has been a visiting professor at Colorado College, the University of Michigan’s Helen Zell Writers’ Program, and Washington University in St. Louis. In 2021, she received the John Updike Award from the American Academy of Arts and Letters. In March 2023, Seuss served as the Guest Editor of the Poem-a-Day series. In January 2024, Seuss was elected a Chancellor of the Academy of American Poets. She lives in Michigan.” (Academy of American Poets)
Why Contemplative Reading?
Contemplative reading asks us not just what we’re learning about the book in our hands (or ears), but what we’re learning about ourselves through the experience of reading it. The aim is to create deeper awareness of ourselves and understanding of others. It is often described as “holistic,” but also as “heart-knowing.”
Heart-knowing. Doesn’t that sound nice?
The Plan
This book is divided into forty-one poems covering 109 pages. I’m going to aim to read about ten poems per week, in order to balance my reflections each Monday and to be able to speak to a few poems at a time. Here’s my posting schedule:
- April 07: “Little Fugue” through “Ballad from the Soundhole of an Unstrung Guitar”
- April 14: “Comma” through “Allegory”
- April 21: “Weeds” through “The Personal”
- April 28: “Untitled” through “Romantic Poet”
Reading & Responding
Each set of reading will guide my responses here on the blog and on social media. I will sometimes share the most provocative line or passage, and what it makes me think about. Other times, I’ll ask questions about the reading, things I’m wondering about or confused about. And still further, I might compare what I’m reading to what it reminds me of from other readings or experiences. I don’t want to give too much guidance about how to read, except to say, read attentively, read slowly, and listen to yourself. What thoughts and feelings arise as you’re reading? Write them down and give yourself some moments to reflect on why you’re thinking what you’re thinking, or why you’re feeling what you’re feeling.
I encourage you to join these conversations and leave your thoughts in the blog comments or on your socials. On social media, please use #theCRPblog.
Meditation
“This morning Poetry has conquered—I have relapsed into those abstractions which are my only life—I feel escaped from a new strange and threatening sorrow—And I am thankful for it—There is an awful warmth about my heart like a load of Immortality.” –John Keats
Love,
~Adam
Contemplative Reading Project 
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