Listen "If Hindsight Isn’t Twenty-Twenty"
Episode Synopsis
Episode Notes
This week's poem and episode dive into the common phrase “hindsight is twenty-twenty,” asking us to think about looking back with a bit more nuance.
For example, seeing an experience more clearly in retrospect shouldn’t diminish how it was felt at the time, particularly how these feelings are remembered in the body and soul (when our mind tends to intellectualize memory). The poem is written with a sonnet in mind, which usually follows fourteen lines (three stanzas of four and one of two), ten syllables per line, abab rhyme, and iambic pentameter (da-DUM, da-DUM).
Our poem includes fourteen lines with ten syllables each, but doesn’t rhyme or include a clear meter. Sonnets are often love poems about desire, but here, it’s about the desire to see that looking back at anything thoughtfully is messier than twenty-twenty, while no less meaningful.
Here's an excerpt of the poem (the full written & visually formatted versions can now be found & read at mikbrew.substack.com!):
Nearly always, we see things more clearly
after they’ve happened. But why do we see
best when looking behind us, each other?
Backward in time? Never ahead, forward?
Listen to this week's episode to hear the full poem! If you’d like to share your moment or memory on the podcast, please head to tinyurl.com/bravingthewaves.
This week's poem and episode dive into the common phrase “hindsight is twenty-twenty,” asking us to think about looking back with a bit more nuance.
For example, seeing an experience more clearly in retrospect shouldn’t diminish how it was felt at the time, particularly how these feelings are remembered in the body and soul (when our mind tends to intellectualize memory). The poem is written with a sonnet in mind, which usually follows fourteen lines (three stanzas of four and one of two), ten syllables per line, abab rhyme, and iambic pentameter (da-DUM, da-DUM).
Our poem includes fourteen lines with ten syllables each, but doesn’t rhyme or include a clear meter. Sonnets are often love poems about desire, but here, it’s about the desire to see that looking back at anything thoughtfully is messier than twenty-twenty, while no less meaningful.
Here's an excerpt of the poem (the full written & visually formatted versions can now be found & read at mikbrew.substack.com!):
Nearly always, we see things more clearly
after they’ve happened. But why do we see
best when looking behind us, each other?
Backward in time? Never ahead, forward?
Listen to this week's episode to hear the full poem! If you’d like to share your moment or memory on the podcast, please head to tinyurl.com/bravingthewaves.
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