Will and Representation

[RiverNotch]

Will and Representation



Isolate -- turn of the century
prostrate to past and present -- tears
rolling down windless slopes -- loins
hacked off the immortal

I AM -- desiring no malice
seated, flying, fallen -- peacock eyes
filled with hateful flame -- with rueful power!
and skin glowing copper
turned tarnished tin --

Though my skin is earth
and Venus is my favored planet,
Saturn cannot conquer. There is
only Love within this fire,
misplaced, cracked, consuming,

yet nevertheless Hallowed,
for I AM nothing -- a child
still, enjoying -- sunset flowers
in the shattered forms of dusk --

Really not sure if I did this ekphrasis thing right, especially with how referential everything is. First picture is "The Demon Seated", next is "The Demon Prostrate".

WILL AND REPRESENTATION: An ekphrasis on Mikhail Vrubel's "The Demon Seated" and "The Demon Prostrate"

Isolate -- turn of the century
prostrate to past and present -- tears
rolling down windless slopes -- wings, loins
hacked, scattered -- off the immortal

I AM -- desiring no malice
seated, flying, fallen -- peacock eyes
filled with hateful flame -- with rueful power!
and skin glowing copper
turned tarnished tin --

Though my skin is earth
and Venus is my favored planet,
Saturn cannot conquer. There is
only Love within this fire,
misplaced, cracked, consuming,

yet nevertheless Hallowed,
for I AM nothing -- a child
still, enjoying -- sunset flowers
in the shattered forms of dusk --

[Lizzie]

Hi River! There's some good description here. I can't say if you're "doing it right" -- I don't think you're doing it wrong.

Really not sure if I did this ekphrasis thing right, especially with how referential everything is. First picture is "The Demon Seated", next is "The Demon Prostrate".

WILL AND REPRESENTATION: An ekphrasis on Mikhail Vrubel's "The Demon Seated" and "The Demon Prostrate"

Isolate -- turn of the century
prostrate to past and present -- tears
rolling down windless slopes -- wings, loins
hacked, scattered -- off the immortal

I AM -- desiring no malice -- I like how I AM relates to 'desiring no malice,' even though it combines with 'off the immortal.' It makes for a smooth transition between stanzas.
seated, flying, fallen -- peacock eyes
filled with hateful flame -- with rueful power!
and skin glowing copper
turned tarnished tin -- I like this line and the one above

Though my skin is earth
and Venus is my favored planet,
Saturn cannot conquer. There is
only Love within this fire,
misplaced, cracked, consuming, -- yes, they don't demonize the demon

yet nevertheless Hallowed,
for I AM nothing -- a child -- I see an adolescent-ishness to the top picture as well
still, enjoying -- sunset flowers
in the shattered forms of dusk --

I don't think it needs to be so choppy with all the dashes.

Also, there's a lot of descriptor words (seated, flying, fallen, wings, loins, etc) that are floating about a bit loose. I think you'd do well to introduce more of a scene and work these words in naturally, maybe into some kind of a plot.

Cheers!

Lizzie

[RiverNotch]

thanks for the feedback! here's an edit posted: pictures rearranged in an attempt to better structure the narrative, plus a slight cleaning up of "wings, loins". "seated, flying, fallen" was the one straightforward reference to the narrative behind both the poem and the Vrubel paintings (which themselves were based on the narrative of the long poem by some French or Russian romantic poet I forget entitled [I think] "the demon"), but i agree that they may need a bit of sprucing up; and for the choppy rhythm, that was my attempt at capturing Vrubel's rather choppy style of composing images, and maybe it worked, maybe it didn't.