Maurice Manning: Birds of America: Or, Tell Me a Story About Farming, Ceremony, and Poetry in Motion (January 2018)

“To make elements of a poem consciously formal is a ceremonial act,” says Maurice Manning, but adds that these formal elements are “vital and are therefore always in motion.” Through a meditation on the kinship of farming and his exploration of Robert Penn Warren’s Audubon: A Vision and Warren’s essay, “Democracy and Poetry,” Manning’s lecture seeks to articulate that “vibrant living thing below or above the poem.”