Sunday E-dition: Poetry’s Dangerous Gift

By Tim Carl

Sep 07, 2025

NAPA VALLEY, Calif. — Poetry has always carried with it a kind of danger. Plato, writing in “The Republic,” called for poets to be banished because, as he put it, poetry “feeds and waters the passions instead of drying them up; she lets them rule, although they ought to be controlled.” Passions left unbridled, he feared, could lead citizens to sympathize where they were meant to obey, to question when they were meant to comply.

That suspicion is exactly what makes poetry indispensable. A society may survive without poetry, but it becomes thin, utilitarian, forgetful. Without poetry we risk losing the very threads that bind us — to each other, to nature, to history, to the universals of being human.

The Chorus of Time

Sappho, writing more than 2,500 years ago, left us fragments of longing — “someone, I tell you, will remember us” — that still spark across the centuries.

Emily Dickinson, with her spare dashes and elliptical lines, offered her feathered vision of endurance: “Hope is the thing with feathers — / That perches in the soul.”

Wilfred Owen dragged us through the trenches of World War I, watching a soldier choke on poison gas: “Dim, through the misty panes and thick green light, / As under a green sea, I saw him drowning.”

Percy Shelley imagined the arrogance of power crumbled to dust, a ruined statue in the desert declaring: “Look on my Works, ye Mighty, and despair!”

Billy Collins, in “The Lanyard,” admitted with humor and heartbreak the imbalance of devotion: “She gave me life and milk from her breasts, / and I gave her a lanyard.”

Mary Szybist braided historical voices with contemporary ones, collapsing sacred and ordinary in a single gesture: “Today I am pulling weeds, / and I find the Virgin’s face / staring up from the dirt.”

Jane Hirshfield invited us into silence where stones themselves seemed to speak — “Everything changes. Everything is connected. Pay attention.” And again, with quiet resilience: “The world asks of us only the strength we have and we give it. Then it asks more, and we give it.”

Rilke still whispers across time: “You must change your life.” And elsewhere, with equal tenderness: “Be patient toward all that is unsolved in your heart and try to love the questions themselves.”

Each poet, in their own way, insists on the same truth: You are not alone.

Stepping Into Other Lives

Poetry is not a mirror alone. It is a door.

A Joy Harjo poem rising with the cadence of a drumbeat.
A Langston Hughes blues poems rising from Harlem.
A Sappho fragment carried across oceans of time.
Ocean Vuong tracing the legacy of exile in a language not yet fully his own.

Each one is a window into another life. For a moment, we see as they see. And then we see ourselves differently.

Unlike social media of today, poetry does not cast blame but unveils connection.
It doesn’t provoke to control — it uncovers to illuminate.

That illumination is dangerous.

Because those who profit from fear, anger and division depend on our blindness. They want us distracted, scrolling endlessly, numbed by noise. Poetry interrupts. It demands attention. It insists on connection. And that is why poets have always been called dangerous.

Today’s Puzzle:

One of these crops never took root.
Napa Valley’s agricultural past includes some surprising harvests — from silk trees to beer ingredients. But one of these five has no local roots, not even as an experiment. Can you tell which?

Encounters

I learned this firsthand. Billy Collins once told me, while leading a workshop in southern Florida, “To write poetry, you must love poetry more than you love yourself.” It was not advice but a charge: Poetry demands a turning outward, a devotion larger than ego.

Mary Szybist, while teaching at a Napa Valley writers conference, showed me how the past never truly leaves us — how a poem can lift ancient voices into the present. Jane Hirshfield reminded me that pause itself can be a kind of poem, if we are willing to listen.

When I struggle — with loss, with fear, with uncertainty, with questions I cannot resolve — I turn to poetry. Not to escape, but to see more clearly.

Ralph Waldo Emerson wrote in “Woodnotes I”:

The moss upon the forest bark
Was pole-star when the night was dark.

The moss and the pole star — small details that help us find our bearings. Poetry is that compass.

Henry David Thoreau, writing in “Walden,” warned against gathering only for indulgence — food, drink, distraction:

Rather than love, than money, than fame, give me truth. I sat at a table where were rich food and wine in abundance, and obsequious attendance, but sincerity and truth were not; and I went away hungry from the inhospitable board.

He pressed for something deeper. Poetry presses too.

Local Threads

That chorus is not only global and historical. It is also local.

Here in Napa Valley, poetry is alive.

Today’s Poem of the Day highlights Benjamin Falk of Angwin, who writes of inner and outer landscapes with startling clarity. He is one of hundreds of local poets, proof that poetry is not just preserved in anthologies but practiced here and now.

Why It Matters

Without poets, we lose our bearings.
Without poetry, we risk forgetting the universals of human existence — love, grief, wonder, loss, the fragile joy of being alive.
Without that remembering, we are diminished.

Poetry does not ask for perfection. It asks for presence.

You don’t need a degree.
You don’t need permission.
You don’t even need much time.

Imagine if each of us did just two things:

Read one poem a week. Really read it. Let it breathe inside you.
Spend 15 minutes writing one of your own.

That’s it. Little more than 15 minutes.

Do that, and the world shifts. Not because institutions change, but because we do. Because empathy deepens. Because we remember again that we are not alone. We never were.

Closing

Plato feared poetry because it could stir citizens to feel and question beyond reason, threatening the order of his ideal state. Centuries later, Octavio Paz turned that suspicion inside out, calling poetry “the antidote to ideology.” What Plato saw as dangerous, Paz saw as necessary — a force that resists control, resists simplification and expresses our full, sometimes fragile, often courageous, shared humanity.

Poetry is not ornament. It is a lifeline. It unsettles and consoles in equal measure. It opens, connects, reveals.

Plato distrusted poets because they could stir people to question, to feel, to see. We should welcome them for the same reason.

Read one poem this week. Write one of your own. Step into another’s shoes.
And see if the world does not look different when you do.

Sidebar: A Poetry Shelf for Every Reader

These are a few from my current stack of poems on the bedside bookshelf. It changes all the time, but these are ones I often go back to.

“The Essential Rumi” — translated by Coleman Barks
“All of Us” — Raymond Carver
“Questions About Angels” — Billy Collins
“Envelope Poems” — Emily Dickinson
“Native Voices: Indigenous American Poetry, Craft and Conversations” — edited by CMarie Fuhrman & Dean Rader
“The Beauty” — Jane Hirshfield
“Selected Poems” — Langston Hughes
“Good Poems” — edited by Garrison Keillor
“The Carrying” — Ada Limón
“Twenty Love Poems and a Song of Despair” — Pablo Neruda
“Citizen: An American Lyric” — Claudia Rankine
“Black Aperture” — Matt Rasmussen
“Letters to a Young Poet” — Rainer Maria Rilke
“Incarnadine” — Mary Szybist
“Selected Poems” — William Carlos Williams

Do you have a favorite poem or poet? Please add them in the comments so that others might learn about them too.

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Tim Carl is a Napa Valley-based photojournalist.

Today’s Polls:

Poem of the Day

“Odd Numbers”

By Benjamin Falk

Text within this block will maintain its original spacing when published


How can anyone like odd numbers?

Gustavo liked
odd numbers.

It amazed me.

But, since he is
dead now,
I hold a certain
cautious reverence
for odd numbers.

I hold a certain
cautious reverence
for Life
in general.

Kind of like
escargot.

A great father,
husband and son,
his smile
was a joy
at work.

I think his life
was good.
Until Lou Gehrig
got into the act.

I went to see him-
up on the ridgeline
of Spring Mountain.

The smile was there,
lighting up the mountainside.
The workers were there,
cheerful,
but
bowing their heads.
The vineyards were there,
respectfully invisible.

Trucks, tractors, discs.

And then.
He was gone.

About the author: Benjamin Falk moved to St. Helena in 1969 and joined a poetry reading group centered around W.W. Lyman. He was born in Buffalo, New York, and grew up in rural northern Illinois near the Wisconsin border. He remembers a high school English department that, in his words, “encouraged me to stick with football and forget about writing.” Football didn’t work out, so, as he likes to joke, writing is what he has left.

Falk studied international studies at Sonoma State University and spent much of his life in vineyards, managing operations for Cain in St. Helena and Safari Estate in El Dorado County, where he also served as president of the El Dorado Wine Grape Growers Association. He later worked as a senior viticulturist, and today he lives in Angwin. Earlier in his career, he was a copywriter on the E.&J. Gallo account at Young & Rubicam in Los Angeles and an associate editor for agricultural magazines in Fresno.

Before that, he carried cameras everywhere. Cartier-Bresson was his guide, and one of his prints sits in the di Rosa collection. He ran an art gallery in downtown Napa during its “ghost town” days, won an award at the Vision Gallery in San Francisco and then, as he puts it, “just stopped seeing things I wanted to take pictures of.”

Today he calls his poems “stills from the documentary of my life,” fragments that balance reverence with dry humor. Like his photography, they look closely at the overlooked — and, like any good poetry, they challenge, console and surprise. We’re glad he still feels compelled to write them.

Are you a poet, or do you have a favorite piece of verse you'd like to share? Napa Valley Features invites you to submit your poems for consideration in this series. Email your submissions to napavalleyfeatures@gmail.com with the subject line: "Poem of the Day Submission." Selected poets will receive a one-year paid subscription to Napa Valley Features (a $60 value). We can’t wait to hear from you.

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Today’s Caption Contest

Pick your favorite caption or add your own in the comments below.

Possible Captions:

“Zillow called it ‘cozy.’”
“It’s not just a shell. It’s a lifestyle.”
“Form is function.”
“It practically carries me.”
“And how was your trip to Europe?”

Last week’s contest results

In “Sunday E-dition: From Vineyards to the Sea — A Highway 128 Drive,” the winning caption was “Freedom, as it turns out, is mostly optics,” with 54% of the votes.

"Day 46: My influencer experiment has failed."
"Never trust the cloud with your dreams."
"Some mornings, the water just seems heavier."
"Time isn’t linear. It’s a bowl."
"Freedom, as it turns out, is mostly optics."

Last Week

Georgeanne Brennan recounted a scenic journey in “From Vineyards to the Sea — A Highway 128 Drive,” weaving together personal anecdotes and travel recommendations. Her route included stops at Champagne lunches in Napa, wine tastings in St. Helena and Alexander Valley and meals at restaurants like Diavola in Geyserville and the Boonville Hotel. She highlighted local favorites, from bakery stops to eclectic shops, before arriving at the MacCallum House Inn in Mendocino for a fine dining experience and overnight stay. Along the way, Brennan described changing landscapes — from vineyards to redwood forests — offering readers a detailed snapshot of Highway 128’s culinary and natural appeal.
In “Under the Hood: Why Napa’s Demographics Point to Contraction, Not Growth,” Tim Carl examined Napa County’s shifting demographics and shrinking economic base. Census data revealed an aging population structure shaped less like a pyramid and more like a matchstick, with older residents far outnumbering younger ones. Carl outlined why reversing this trend is mathematically implausible and emphasized the economic implications, noting that Napa’s reliance on the wine-tourism sector — which makes up roughly 75% of the county’s GDP — is increasingly unsustainable. Despite growth in housing, wineries and resorts since 2019, jobs and wages have declined, undermining assumptions that development will drive prosperity. The article concluded that Napa must plan for its aging population and contracting economy rather than hoping for expansion that data do not support.
“Rupert” by Kathleen Scavone
Kathleen Scavone reflected on seasonal transitions in “The Magical Intricacies of Napa Valley in Fall,” blending observations of nature with scientific detail. She described early autumn scenes along a local trail, from stargazing and wildlife encounters to the changing colors of grapevines and bay laurels. Scavone detailed the biology behind spiderweb construction and leaf pigmentation, explaining how chlorophyll, carotenoids and anthocyanins contribute to fall’s vibrant palette. The piece wove sensory detail with natural science to highlight the subtle shifts marking Napa’s fall landscape. She encouraged readers to seek wonder in these everyday intricacies, including vineyard views as part of the season’s display.
Dan Berger continued his examination of wine trends in the “Wine Chronicle: What Happened to Cabernet?” in focusing on how modern cabernet sauvignon production caters to immediate consumption rather than long-term aging. He argued that stylistic changes — higher alcohol, lower acidity and added sweeteners like Mega Purple — have dulled cabernet’s complexity and aging potential. Berger also criticized the decline in wine education and appreciation, noting cultural shifts away from traditional wine rituals such as swirling and sniffing. He warned that these changes reflect a broader industry retreat from craftsmanship and authenticity, especially in response to market and regulatory pressures.
David Shubin explored the origins, genetics and year-round appeal of lemons in “Be Grateful When Life Gives Us Lemons.” He traced their development from ancient hybrids in India to today’s cultivated varieties like the Meyer lemon, which he noted is genetically closer to mandarins than true lemons. Shubin explained that lemons differ from most citrus by producing fruit nearly all year in climates like Napa’s, a trait tied to their tropical ancestry. He emphasized that lemons are not a default misfortune, as the cliché suggests, but a result of centuries of human effort in cultivation and trade. The piece concluded with upcoming events hosted by UC Master Gardeners of Napa County.

Answer + Explanation

Flax.
Flax was not part of Napa’s crop rotation — neither as an experimental nor commercial crop at any point in recorded history.

Historical Timeline & Additional Facts:

Wheat: Grown since the Rancho Period (1830s–1840s); Napa ranked second in the state by 1889
Mulberries: Briefly cultivated in the mid-1800s for silk production experiments
Hops: Grown for beer production in the 19th century
Walnuts: Commercial orchards since the late 1800s; the Hartley walnut was developed locally
Flax: No documentation or evidence shows flax was ever grown in Napa Valley — not even experimentally.

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