10-24-2013, 11:12 PM
Chris, thanks! I will give your suggestions some careful attention.
Ella, thanks as well. I appreciate the remarks, and will do likewise.
This poem, FYI, was written as an exercise for a creative writing class I took in 2006 or 2007. I had just come home, having completed graduate studies overseas, and was busy psychoanalyzing the repressiveness of my devout upbringing. Of course, none of this has to have any bearing on its significance as art, per se. But I am attached to some of the references, as well as some of the vaguely philosophical ideas presented, if simply because they tell a story that I had a deep need to speak out loud.
From my perspective, the effort was to contrast the paternal, authoritarian, overbright experience of a waking Christian life, with the dark world of dream, wish and fantasy that the former shoves under, ignores and disavows. That violence is a condition of the self-same sort of existence, for instance, is something that no one really cares to think about or admit. Thus is the gospel a foil, from the poem's perspective, for the very thing it covers over: its origins in violence. However, I feel like the poem slips into a sort of morbid fascination with the latter that doesn't sit too well with me, which is why I had the thought of making this a multi-part piece.
Anyways, thanks again for taking the time.
Ella, thanks as well. I appreciate the remarks, and will do likewise.
This poem, FYI, was written as an exercise for a creative writing class I took in 2006 or 2007. I had just come home, having completed graduate studies overseas, and was busy psychoanalyzing the repressiveness of my devout upbringing. Of course, none of this has to have any bearing on its significance as art, per se. But I am attached to some of the references, as well as some of the vaguely philosophical ideas presented, if simply because they tell a story that I had a deep need to speak out loud.
From my perspective, the effort was to contrast the paternal, authoritarian, overbright experience of a waking Christian life, with the dark world of dream, wish and fantasy that the former shoves under, ignores and disavows. That violence is a condition of the self-same sort of existence, for instance, is something that no one really cares to think about or admit. Thus is the gospel a foil, from the poem's perspective, for the very thing it covers over: its origins in violence. However, I feel like the poem slips into a sort of morbid fascination with the latter that doesn't sit too well with me, which is why I had the thought of making this a multi-part piece.
Anyways, thanks again for taking the time.