Buddhist Catholic Contemplative Evangelical General Christian Hindu Jewish Latter-day Saint Muslim New Visions Progressive Christian

Beliefs

Topics

Columnists

Resource Library

Research Tools

Video

Podcasts

Thought Readers

Faith In Media Tracker

Newsletters

Ad-Free & Subscriber Log-In Subscription Support

Follow Patheos

Good Letters

Home
Catholic
James Tate: Finding the Ultimate in the Ordinary

James Tate: Finding the Ultimate in the Ordinary

Last updated on: April 6, 2016 at 1:00 am by Morgan Meis

James Tate: Finding the Ultimate in the Ordinary 2016-03-31T12:54:52-07:00 Morgan Meis

LOGO Patheos Explore the world's faith through different perspectives on religion and spirituality! Patheos has the views of the prevalent religions and spiritualities of the world.

james-tate The poet James Tate died last year. It happened in July. He was seventy-one years old. This, then, is the first Lent and Easter season we’ve been without him. Pity, that.

Back some years ago, The Paris Review published a lovely conversation between Charles Simic and James Tate. Simic opens up the conversation by noting that Tate, in a poem called “South End,” defined the challenge of poetry as the following:

“The challenge is always to find the ultimate in the ordinary horseshit.”

Simic asks Tate to explain what he means by “the ordinary” and “the horseshit.” Tate responds by saying that he means “the ultimate horseshit,” which can be found, he elaborates, “anywhere.” Not, admittedly, the most helpful of elaborations.

Simic then notes that Tate’s line about the ultimate and the horseshit can be boiled down to the well-known idea that the job of poetry is to “find the extraordinary in the midst of the ordinary.” Tate responds that he’s well aware he’s mouthing a platitude. But, Tate says, he added the word “horseshit” to “make it a bit more distinctive.”

The conversation between Tate and Simic proceeds more or less along these lines. Tragedy is discussed. Comedy is discussed. Family is discussed. Death makes an appearance.

It should be said that James Tate was an American poet. There is no special methodology for being an American poet. Except that all good American poets tend to do something like what Tate describes in the following comment:

“Sure, you can just walk by somebody downtown and overhear one phrase and it’s a cliché and suddenly you go, Wow, actually that’s very beautiful when it’s taken out of its normal meaning. It’s very stimulating and it gives you a lot to think about. Wow.”

That, to my mind, is the American poetic methodology in its essence. You go downtown. You hear things. You write them down in a different context. Poetry.

I’m not being flip or cynical here. It is a brilliant and beautiful methodology. And not at all easy to do. It is something Wallace Stevens did that one time when he said “the only emperor is the emperor of ice-cream.” Or Williams Carlos Williams when he wrote:

I have eaten
the plums
that were in
the icebox

Empty, otherwise-dumb thoughts and fragments of conversation lifted up by the poet’s ear are made to quiver in the pure ether, the queer spaceless space of language decontextualized and then recontextualized as poetic line. That is what American poets do. The American thing is to go for the ultimate in the horseshit.

All of this is preface to the fact that James Tate once wrote a very good Jesus poem. One of the best, to my mind. I also think of it as a Lenten poem and an Easter poem. Here’s how it goes:

Jesus got up one day a little later than usual. He had been dreaming so
deep there was nothing left in his head. What was it? A nightmare, dead
bodies walking all around him, eyes rolled back, skin falling off. But he
wasn’t afraid of that. It was a beautiful day. How ’bout some coffee? Don’t
mind if I do. Take a little ride on my donkey, I love that donkey. Hell, I love
everybody.

Now, I’m not going to go crazy analyzing this poem, mostly because it doesn’t need it. Instead, let’s just point out a few things. First off, the idea that Jesus was dreaming so deep there was nothing left in his head. That is good.

And the idea that Jesus was having a nightmare. Excellent. Yes, a nightmare. Why not?

But the nightmare goes away, as nightmares do. The nightmare dissolves into a beautiful day. Then Jesus has a cheeky morning dialogue with himself. He offers himself some coffee. He accepts.

He decides to take a little ride on his donkey. Brilliant. He likes his donkey. More than that, he loves his donkey.

Then the thought occurs to Jesus, he doesn’t just love his donkey. He loves everybody. The donkey—and everybody else.

God, a Gospel writer once opined, is love. Sure. What does it mean, though? What would such a thing look like?

That’s very hard to say. Hard to put your finger on until a sense of it washes over you one day, if only for the most fleeting of fleeting moments. Such a fleeting moment is captured in Tate’s poem.

The first three lines set it up. The final three lines carry it home. “Wake up!” the poem says. Wake up from the nightmare and have some coffee and take a ride on the donkey.

If you won’t wake up, that’s too bad. There’s another task for you, then. We let the dead bury the dead. The nightmare will continue.

Morgan Meis is the critic-at-large for The Smart Set (thesmartset.com). He has a PhD in Philosophy and has written for n+1, The Believer, Harper’s Magazine, and The Virginia Quarterly Review. He won the Whiting Award in 2013. Morgan is also an editor at 3 Quarks Daily, and a winner of a Creative Capital | Warhol Foundation Arts Writers grant. A book of Morgan’s selected essays can be found here. He can be reached at [email protected].

Previous Post

April 5, 2016

A Dancing Christ

Next Post

April 7, 2016 Imitating the Saints

Browse Our Archives

Select a Category A. G. Harmon Alissa Wilkinson Allison Backous Art Authors Brad Fruhauff Bradford Winters Bryan Bliss Caroline Langston Chad Thomas Johnston Chris Hoke Christiana N. Peterson Culture D.G. Myers D.L. Mayfield Daniel Bowman Jr. David Griffith Elizabeth Duffy Faith Film Greg Wolfe Guest Contributor Interview Jan Vallone Jeffrey Overstreet Jessica Eddings-Roeser Jessica Mesman Griffith Kelly Foster Lindsey Crittenden Morgan Meis music Natalie Vestin Nick Olson Peggy Rosenthal Personal Reflection Poetry Friday Reflection Relationships Review Richard Chess Richard Cole Sara Zarr Shannon Huffman Polson Sonya Bilocerkowycz Tania Runyan Tony Woodlief Topical Categories Uncategorized Vic Sizemore Writing

Select a Month October 2018 September 2018 August 2018 July 2018 June 2018 May 2018 April 2018 March 2018 February 2018 January 2018 December 2017 November 2017 October 2017 September 2017 August 2017 July 2017 June 2017 May 2017 April 2017 March 2017 February 2017 January 2017 December 2016 November 2016 October 2016 September 2016 August 2016 July 2016 June 2016 May 2016 April 2016 March 2016 February 2016 January 2016 December 2015 November 2015 October 2015 September 2015 August 2015 July 2015 June 2015 May 2015 April 2015 March 2015 February 2015 January 2015 December 2014 November 2014 October 2014 September 2014 August 2014 July 2014 June 2014 May 2014 April 2014 March 2014 February 2014 January 2014 December 2013 November 2013 October 2013 September 2013 August 2013 July 2013 June 2013 May 2013 April 2013 March 2013 February 2013 January 2013 December 2012 November 2012 October 2012 September 2012 August 2012 July 2012 June 2012 May 2012 February 2008

TAKE THE

Religious Wisdom Quiz

Who was Deborah's military commander?

Select your answer to see how you score.

Barak Gideon Jephthah Samson