Restful New Hampshire

On a recent visit to the Laconia Public Library I noticed a collection of Donald Hall’s books on the counter. He was a poet and in June 2006 appointed the 14th Poet Laureate of the United States. His work primarily focused around the bucolic life he could enjoy residing in New Hampshire.
Since 1975, and until his death on June 23, 2018, Donald Hall lived on a farm in Wilton that had been in his family for generations. Jane Kenyon, his wife for 23 years until her death in 1995, was also a poet. He reflected on their relationship in two books, Without (Houghton Mufflin Harcourt, 1998) and The Painted Bed (Houghton Mufflin Harcourt, 2002).
In addition to his poetry, Donald Hall wrote and published essays, textbooks, literary criticism and children’s books. I pulled from the collection at the Laconia Library Essays after Eighty (Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, 2014), a book that was published when he was 86 years old. The essays are insightful and amusing as he confronts the indignities, the loneliness and his view of the world through the lens on a man in the fourth quarter of his life.
A few days later, and with Hall’s book of essays in my satchel, I was in Franconia and had an opportunity to attend a poetry reading at Frost Place. Robert Frost owned a farm overlooking the White Mountains from 1915 to 1917 after he returned from London and as World War I was starting. Now the home is open to the public and there are a number of poetry programs and events throughout July and August.
When I visit Frost Place I always recall Robert Frost struggling the read the poem he composed for the inauguration of President John F. Kennedy, the first poet ever to have been invited to read on this occasion. He typed the poem he composed and titled “Dedication” on his typewriter and the text was a light gray. The glare from the January sun made it difficult for him to see so he recited from memory “The Gift Outright.”
“The land was ours before we were the land’s.
She was our land more than a hundred years
Before we were her people. …”.

From “The Gift Outright,” Complete Poems of Robert Frost
(Holt, Rinehart and Winston, 1964)

The evening I was at Frost Place the Conference on Poetry was in session (July 8 – 14) and there were reading by three poets, Vievee Francis, Eduardo Martinez-Leyva and Martha Rhodes.
As I listened to the poems being read on this warm, July night I began to think about the number of poets and writers inspired by our beloved New Hampshire. The dramatic changing of the seasons, the wind whistling through a stand of trees, the sound of birds in conversation or singing to greet the dawn, the ripple of the waves as the water reaches the shore of our many lakes and ponds.

We are connected to global epicenters, yet we have the space and quiet for reflection and contemplation. Sitting with a group of poets and poetry enthusiasts on the side of a hill in Franconia, looking back at the mountains as the sky shifts to black and tall torches light the lawn, one can understand why this place was a refuge for Robert Frost.
I have recently learned the Boston Red Sox have a poet in residence. Many of you who attend games at Fenway Park must know the voice of Dick Flavin? Donald Hall was a Red Sox fan and wrote Fathers Playing Catch with Sons: Essays on Sports (Mostly Baseball) (Houglin Mufflin, 1985).
Of course, it isn’t just writers who are inspired by the lakes,
bogs, the fields, and the forgotten back roads and trails that surround us. Musicians, visual artist, stone masons, weavers can be found tucked away across our State. It’s our style.

“…It’s restful to arrive at a decision.
And restful just to think about New Hampshire.”

From New Hampshire, Complete Poems of Robert Frost
(Holt, Rinehart and Winston, 1964)