Our Lady The Opaque

[Magpie]

I kind of wished that I hadn't read all the comments on this page because they have definitely took me in certain directions, whether this is detrimental to my critique is yet to be seen. Hopefully not.

Our Lady The Opaque

I will not look at you
your eyes and your face and your hands -- I am also unsure of the repetition here. Also the choice seems very specific. By mentioning 'face' most would assume this included 'eyes', so I'm thinking there is a reason for mentioning three things... Trinity related perhaps??
I hold them in the blurred periphery -- I really like 'blurred periphery' here, although my first thought was also 'viewed through tears'
like the sun and the stars
you glow brighter when I look away -- This lines seems at odds with the first line

I will not see through you -- Again this line seems to contradict the very first line. In some ways it makes sense for you will not see through someone if you don't look at them, but I feel that this is not your intention
your face and the mind beyond it -- The use of face here seems odd unless you are implying that there is an inner face that is unseen
I halt my guessing at your feet -- Excellent line and possibly the key to the whole poem if my interpretation is somewhere near being correct
whatever fears or desires pulse therein -- This line is confusing... On first read it comes across as the 'fears and desires' are in her feet but then logic says that you must mean mind???
you do not need me to draw them from you

I will not touch you -- This line threw me at first. My first thought was 'physically touch' but I think your intention is more in the sense of 'affect/taint', although there could be a double meaning here that doesn't fit in with my interpretation (detailed below)... however I may be wrong.
your mind opaque and voice a mist -- 'your mind opaque' is already implied in the previous stanza
I know the venom in my hands
and the spines on my tongue
you are fading quick enough without my help

I do really like the poem and some of the images and it seems that in certain places you have chosen words very carefully for the sake of having the perfect word in the right place. However other parts of the poem don't seem to have had the same amount of attention to detail.

The title for me implies the Virgin Mary which is who 'Our Lady' refers to in Catholicism, but then you threw me by mentioning something about "Our Lady of the Flowers" in one comment. I take everything at face value and am easily tricked sometimes. Anyway sticking with the Catholic path, the book of Revelations has a passage singularly applicable to Mary.

"And a great sign appeared in heaven: A woman clothed with the sun, and the moon under her feet, and on her head a crown of twelve stars; and being with child, she cried travailing in birth",

and this would fit in with the sun and stars you mention in the first stanza. Also the Virgin Mary would account for the specific reference to "eyes, face and hands" as she is often depicted in iconography as having light radiating from these places which fits in with the last part of the first stanza which is all about light. I'm not sure how to take this stanza with the use of 'opaque' which apart from meaning impenetrable also means dull and not radiating light, I think it works but could be tweaked slightly to emphasise it. As regards the 'averted vision' debate, I didn't pick up on it when I first read it even though I am well aware of it. I agree with others that the first line contradicts any ideas of averted vision. Also my knowledge of averted vision in astronomy is that it is only used for faint objects such as nebulas, if you had mentioned nebulas I would have probably got it, if I had never studied astronomy I would never have got it. To convey this idea I think you would need to rewrite the first stanza (except the middle line, keep it, it is excellent). You can mention nebula in a certain way that keeps your star reference... Pleiades perhaps, which is mentioned in the bible three times (handy trinity reference), but also be careful not to confuse everything by involving Greek or other mythology.

Some statues and paintings of Mary depict her with a serpent or snake beneath her heel. She is also referred to as 'The New Eve' and is first prophesied in the very opening chapters of the Book of Genesis,
"I will put enmities between thee and the woman, and thy seed and her seed; she shall crush thy head, and thou shalt lie in wait for her heel.",

'Woman' being both Eve and Mary, and this is how I interpret your poem; as it seems to fit.

'I halt my guessing at your feet', which I think is an excellent line in the context of my interpretation. The serpent was crushed under the heel of Eve/Mary and also in this line is an example of you using the perfect word choice in 'halt', when it could have been so easy to use 'stop'. 'Halt' also meaning 'lame' in an archaic sense and it also seems to relate to 'heel'. Is this also possibly the reason for why you can't look directly at face, eyes and hands? Because you are under her heel.

Also, this is why I was confused by the first line of the third stanza, 'I will not touch you', because physically you are touching and also in the mental sense of touching as in 'affecting' this is also true... that is if it is Eve and the serpent that tempted her with the apple.

I've said way too much here for mild critique so I better wrap up quick because I'm bound to get a bollocking from Mod City. If my interpretation is anywhere close then perhaps you are on to something, but it certainly took me a hell of a lot of work to get there and I probably would have got nowhere near had I not been brought up Catholic for my sins; all original of course. If I'm wrong, then hey, it was a fun journey.

Cheers for the read,
Mark

Dear Mods, sorry for writing too much, I honestly thought it was in Serious 

It is a little wordy for mild, but I'm often guilty of the same thing. Solid critique. dale/mod