Prize-winning poet evokes emotions

As the sun set through the windows of the Solarium in the Indiana Memorial Union, Pulitzer Prize-winning poet W.S. Merwin brought members of his audience not only to their feet, but also to tears when he spoke Monday night.\nHe spoke warmly and simply, rhythmically as only a poet could, while he read from a selection of his poems and expressed his thoughts on the environment, as well as memory, solitude, pacifism and peace. \nThe event consisted of two sections. In the first, Merwin was prompted with questions from Andrea Ciccarelli, director of the IU College of Arts and Humanities Institute.\nCiccarelli said he was impressed with Merwin's most recent writing. \n"After 50 years, he still has something to say," Ciccarelli said.\nMerwin has a career in poetry that spans five decades. His books include "The Drunk in the Furnace," "The Vixen" and "The Folding Cliffs." He is also known for his poetry translations, his environmental activism and his ability to use language to convey his thoughts in a way that touches the hearts of his readers.\nThe room where he spoke was overflowing with guests, the majority of whom were Bloomington residents, holding pen and paper in hand, waiting for the wisdom they were sure would drip from Merwin's words.\nThough Merwin is a strong promoter of peace, he said he understands the perspectives that prompt war.\n"I've never called myself a pacifist; other people have done that," Merwin said. "I could always imagine circumstances in which violence is the only possible way of dealing with a situation. It's a deplorable last resort that may arise instantly." Merwin told the audience how he enlisted in the Navy at age 17, and with a chuckle, said that he had high hopes of impressing a girl with his uniform. He was soon released from the Navy after refusing to take orders. \n"What I had come to feel was that I was being trained to accept orders from people whom I don't know that involve the lives and deaths of people I don't know and my own life and death," Merwin said. "I said I'd rather go to the brig than go on training to do something I don't believe in."\nMerwin answered Ciccarelli's questions about his writings on solitude and called society's idea that environment is separate from nature dangerous and destructive. \n"The human population is expected to reach 11, 12, 13 billion in the not very distant future," Merwin said. "In the mean time, every other species of life has become endangered. I don't think these are things we should shy away from."\nDuring the second half of his time at the Union, Merwin read a selection of poems from his book "Migration." He stepped up to the microphone, peered over his glasses and began with the poem "Odysseus," and continued with "Noah's Raven" and "When the War is Over."\nHis audience listened intently with eager eyes. Their awe and respect was palpable from the sighs they let out at the end of each poem.\n"It was amazing. I'm not sure that I can put words to it," said Bloomington resident Anne Haines. "It was one of the best poetry readings I've ever heard." \nWhile the crowd gave Merwin a standing ovation when he was finished, Haines had tears in her eyes.\n"Terror reassurance an old/ old sadness it would seem we knew/ enough always about parting," he read from his poem "Waves in August." "But we have to go on learning/ As long as there is anything"