This is Episode 71 of Poems for the Speed of Life.

Today's poem is "Because" by James McAuley.

James McAuley was a 20th century Australian poet, essayist and academic. He took poetry’s art and craft so seriously that he was behind one of history’s most elaborate (and successful) literary hoaxes, ridiculing modernist verse by creating a fictional modernist poet and manufacturing his entire body of work in one day. The creation, Ern Malley, was heralded as a genius by the Australian modernist poets whose work he despised as lacking depth and meaning and artfulness.

This poem, “Because”, is less about art and more about life. It's about parenting and being parented and the deep and lasting impact that relationship has on the full spectrum of one’s life.

There is a depth of feeling here, and a perceptiveness about truly complex matters, that is profound.

As a man, one of the things I’m most interested in is the relationships between fathers and sons, and this poem has so much to say on that that it would be unfair to say any more. I’ll let the poem speak.

You can read the poem here.

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Music Credit:

Once Upon a Time by Alex-Productions | ⁠⁠https://onsound.eu/⁠⁠  | Music promoted by https://www.free-stock-music.com