Eulogy

[matsunosuperfan]

Eulogy

Crimson-red brocade seethes,     difficult opening for me; I instinctively pull away from what I recognize as poemy syntax and diction
whispering conspiracies through twisted limbs     flowery and nonspecific
Callously churning contortion of nature      more of the same, you've lost me by now - so much roaming, melodramatic abstraction
 
In gaseous boughs, rising thick
Heavy and violent arsine clouds,      better IMO, I can visualize something, though still p vague. "arsine clouds" feels good in the mouth
most warm and rapacious miasma     dislike "most" as poemy / affected, "rapacious" is close to facing the same accusation
 
Breath falters as it pierces through tissue,     I really don't vibe with this syntax, can't see any justification for its use
Childish cries smothered by folds of linen
as it penetrates the body and paralyses it      what is "it" - the breath? confusing
 
Rigor mortis, posthumous stillness
Vines form a funerary wreath
Vegetation thrives                  feels like a relatively flat, summative ending which I also resist

I'm afraid I don't know where I am, what is happening, what to imagine, or why I'm meant to feel anything about any of it

Poem kind of feels like an assortment of language that is supposed to sound poetic, there's a very loose sense of subject guided heavily by the title and more directly evocative word choices like "funerary" and "cries smothered" but mostly the reader is left to imagine more or less whatever. If we rewrite the poem in plain speech and take away the "this is a poem" register of language, what do we have? Too little specificity, I fear, for even an abstract impressionist type sketch of the specific occasion or subject.