05-15-2013, 08:18 PM
I posted in "serious" a somewhat enigmatic piece. The devil was in me. Some of you may remember, for diverse reasons, Erthona (AKA Dale) who haunted these forums when quick and may do so yet when dead....which I fear, very sadly, is the case. A google will reveal all.
Dale and I argued often about the undeniably organic nature of the unfolding poetic masterpiece (lingua in maxillam) . I insisted that writing organically was a debatable device, deliberately adopted by the poet when required. Dale argued that by the very action of transferring thought to the written word in ANY contrived fashion, one was employing an organic technique.
To prove my case, I began to write a piece in free-fall. I decided to write a line and then see what popped into the fractal frame; continuing the process until enough became sufficient. The idea was to see if Dale (or anyone foolish enough to get involved
) could tell the difference between this "free-fall" verse and something deliberate and pensive.
In true erthona fashion, the cantankerous bugger went and died on me before I had built my petard.
So...the piece I am referring to, loftily and inconsequentially entitled "Patet exposita ad oculos" ( obvious when seen by the eye) is the "sufficiency" I referred to earlier.
Frankly, most are leaving it well alone but for me, it has some merit. I would say that, wouldn't I. No. I am not showing conceit. I really mean that the "technique" is empowering. We do not write anything through free will. Discuss.
In "Patet exposita ad oculos" the very first line is unchanged from how it was first composited. The piece had NO title, NO preconceived direction, NO point and NO purpose other than the exercising of the intellect. You may debate that, too.
The whole thing was written without reflection or with any thought of what had gone before and without any stimulants being involved. Then, as I am fond of telling others, I read it out loud. Utter rubbish.
So I punctuated it. I corrected misspellings. I lined it out. I tweaked and amplified whatever accidental nuances the piece of its own making possessed...and slowly, it developed a flavour.
Now you may well disagree, but quite quickly a thematic thread began to thicken...I was surprised that it became quickly but unmistakably "religious"...or more precisely, sacrilegious. As it was born, so it grew.
The title was stuck on to add to the catholicism of the piece but the glue was the Ecclesiastes quotation which is on a bridge close by, over the road on the banks of the Tees. It says all I wanted to say about belief. Billy got it with his "Fuck this for a Lark" comment on the piece. Everytime I go under that bloody bridge and read in copper-plate silvered letters that pathetically puerile line "All the rivers run into the sea; yet the sea is not full..." I hear myself scream "Idiot".
Why is this of import? Well, it fascinated me to observe how what was nothing more than a whole heap of organic manure could come to have SOME meaning, outside the writer's control, if only to indicate that the mental process continually strives for clarification. If I were to work more on the piece I could, and of this I am certain, make it in to a meaningfull bit of poetry....but I will not.
Organic verse?
Is it worth the extra?
Discuss. Erthona would.
Best, tectak
Dale and I argued often about the undeniably organic nature of the unfolding poetic masterpiece (lingua in maxillam) . I insisted that writing organically was a debatable device, deliberately adopted by the poet when required. Dale argued that by the very action of transferring thought to the written word in ANY contrived fashion, one was employing an organic technique.
To prove my case, I began to write a piece in free-fall. I decided to write a line and then see what popped into the fractal frame; continuing the process until enough became sufficient. The idea was to see if Dale (or anyone foolish enough to get involved
) could tell the difference between this "free-fall" verse and something deliberate and pensive. In true erthona fashion, the cantankerous bugger went and died on me before I had built my petard.
So...the piece I am referring to, loftily and inconsequentially entitled "Patet exposita ad oculos" ( obvious when seen by the eye) is the "sufficiency" I referred to earlier.
Frankly, most are leaving it well alone but for me, it has some merit. I would say that, wouldn't I. No. I am not showing conceit. I really mean that the "technique" is empowering. We do not write anything through free will. Discuss.
In "Patet exposita ad oculos" the very first line is unchanged from how it was first composited. The piece had NO title, NO preconceived direction, NO point and NO purpose other than the exercising of the intellect. You may debate that, too.
The whole thing was written without reflection or with any thought of what had gone before and without any stimulants being involved. Then, as I am fond of telling others, I read it out loud. Utter rubbish.
So I punctuated it. I corrected misspellings. I lined it out. I tweaked and amplified whatever accidental nuances the piece of its own making possessed...and slowly, it developed a flavour.
Now you may well disagree, but quite quickly a thematic thread began to thicken...I was surprised that it became quickly but unmistakably "religious"...or more precisely, sacrilegious. As it was born, so it grew.
The title was stuck on to add to the catholicism of the piece but the glue was the Ecclesiastes quotation which is on a bridge close by, over the road on the banks of the Tees. It says all I wanted to say about belief. Billy got it with his "Fuck this for a Lark" comment on the piece. Everytime I go under that bloody bridge and read in copper-plate silvered letters that pathetically puerile line "All the rivers run into the sea; yet the sea is not full..." I hear myself scream "Idiot".
Why is this of import? Well, it fascinated me to observe how what was nothing more than a whole heap of organic manure could come to have SOME meaning, outside the writer's control, if only to indicate that the mental process continually strives for clarification. If I were to work more on the piece I could, and of this I am certain, make it in to a meaningfull bit of poetry....but I will not.
Organic verse?
Is it worth the extra?
Discuss. Erthona would.
Best, tectak