07-26-2013, 09:00 PM
Dear tectak,
I could not thank you enough for being the only person who has commented on my post. And no thanks to the moving, I like it right here (I have a mascohistic streak).
I embraced most of your suggestions (se the edited version below). On those points that I disagree with you I would like to clarify instead. Thanks again and looking forward to more suggestions from you and others.
AFRICA
I let my eyes wander fearlessly astray
from one star to the next in rapid pace,
getting lost and ending up far, far away
on the night sky of an austral place
And under its moon so round and bold
I see shadows labour though the sun has set. We are anthropomorphising the shadows. The shadows of people who work until late in the evening
Still their hands are empty and cold;
their foreheads dusty, bathing in sweat
I think about them, (The shadows still, is it unacceptably unclear?)who don’t own a pen Pen is a metaphore for possesions in general here...
– what do they do if they want to write? – ...and writing is a metaphore for self-realisation, whatever that might mean for a person.
those who lie sleepless in their humble den
awake with inspiration and without a light Yes, of course you can lie awake with a light as well... but if you had a light you could get all those thoughts down on paper and out of your head. At least that was the point I was trying to make. In the same way, if you had the financial means you could study, travel, or whatever self-fulfillment means to people.
And I wonder how they all ended up here; Here as in the privileged part of the world.
our papers, pencils, erasers, and books.
Some of them must have come from there I provided so many clues already (the title of the poem, a faraway place.. and one clue is yet to be given in the final line... stay tuned!
carved out of an old Adansonia’s crooks Adansonia is the Latin word for the baobab tree (hence the italic). The baobabs are endemic to Africa and often mentioned in African literature. It has been said that "whitout the baobabs there would be no life in Africa...". "An" refers to the tree, not to its crooks. And the word choice is not random, the baobab is characterised by its think trunk and its crooky branches.
Edit 2
AFRICA
I let my eyes wander fearlessly astray
from one star to the next in rapid pace,
getting lost and ending up far, far away
on the night sky of an austral place
And under its moon so round and bold
shadows labour though the sun has set.
Still their hands are empty and cold;
their foreheads dusty, bathing in sweat
I think about them, who don’t own a pen
– what do they do if they want to write? –
those who lie sleepless in their humble den
awake with inspiration and without a light
And I wonder how they all ended up here;
our papers, pencils, erasers, and books.
Some of them must have come from there
carved out of an old Adansonia’s crooks
I could not thank you enough for being the only person who has commented on my post. And no thanks to the moving, I like it right here (I have a mascohistic streak).
I embraced most of your suggestions (se the edited version below). On those points that I disagree with you I would like to clarify instead. Thanks again and looking forward to more suggestions from you and others.
AFRICA
I let my eyes wander fearlessly astray
from one star to the next in rapid pace,
getting lost and ending up far, far away
on the night sky of an austral place
And under its moon so round and bold
I see shadows labour though the sun has set. We are anthropomorphising the shadows. The shadows of people who work until late in the evening
Still their hands are empty and cold;
their foreheads dusty, bathing in sweat
I think about them, (The shadows still, is it unacceptably unclear?)who don’t own a pen Pen is a metaphore for possesions in general here...
– what do they do if they want to write? – ...and writing is a metaphore for self-realisation, whatever that might mean for a person.
those who lie sleepless in their humble den
awake with inspiration and without a light Yes, of course you can lie awake with a light as well... but if you had a light you could get all those thoughts down on paper and out of your head. At least that was the point I was trying to make. In the same way, if you had the financial means you could study, travel, or whatever self-fulfillment means to people.
And I wonder how they all ended up here; Here as in the privileged part of the world.
our papers, pencils, erasers, and books.
Some of them must have come from there I provided so many clues already (the title of the poem, a faraway place.. and one clue is yet to be given in the final line... stay tuned!
carved out of an old Adansonia’s crooks Adansonia is the Latin word for the baobab tree (hence the italic). The baobabs are endemic to Africa and often mentioned in African literature. It has been said that "whitout the baobabs there would be no life in Africa...". "An" refers to the tree, not to its crooks. And the word choice is not random, the baobab is characterised by its think trunk and its crooky branches.
Edit 2
AFRICA
I let my eyes wander fearlessly astray
from one star to the next in rapid pace,
getting lost and ending up far, far away
on the night sky of an austral place
And under its moon so round and bold
shadows labour though the sun has set.
Still their hands are empty and cold;
their foreheads dusty, bathing in sweat
I think about them, who don’t own a pen
– what do they do if they want to write? –
those who lie sleepless in their humble den
awake with inspiration and without a light
And I wonder how they all ended up here;
our papers, pencils, erasers, and books.
Some of them must have come from there
carved out of an old Adansonia’s crooks