It

[NobodyNothing]

I had

[billy]

if it gives a good memory it can't be that bad.

[NobodyNothing]

if it gives a good memory it can be that bad.

I'm the most unlikely godfather...but three times over...a very forgiving and enabling circle of friends...

[Erthona]

NN,

I like the concept as a new vine being a metaphor for some new to the spiritual process. however Had you not included the note, I doubt I would have ever gotten that.

Dale

[ellajam]

I love the beginning and the idea, babes are like that, the vine tendril is perfect. I think for the occasion I would have preferred statements instead of questions, or at least more present tense. What occasion is less in the past?

What does it know to wake
from a dream it resembles
to an uncertain fate?

But in your own form, of course.

I enjoyed the read, thanks for posting it.

[NobodyNothing]

Thanks Dale and ellajam for the thoughtful comments. Actually, I don't why I posted this one. It was really just a targeted poem for a very specific real life circumstance. It hung framed above little Bronwyn's crib years ago.

That's funny about you not knowing it was referring to a new born child with the tendril metaphor. You might be right without the background, or foreknowledge. One of those so obvious to my own mind, but not so a more anonymous reader.

And I do "questions" in poems sometimes. When you brought that up 'e' I noticed that I probably do that more than I should. It honestly just never came to me to do it any other way at the time I was doing it.

Anyway...I should do some more thoughtful commenting again soon on other's poems. Been a little neglectful in that way.

[Joshua]

I like the concept

[NobodyNothing]

I was always obsessed with the "moment", that great intersect where everything converged, the past and the future, eternal recurrence and something distinctly new, open-eyed knowledge and forgetful innocence, the creation and the fall. etc, etc...

I always felt the ancient Gnostics and the 13th century Kabbalahists were the greatest depth psychologists of such a moment. I studied them till my eyes went bleary, the greats like Valentinius, Moses Cordero, and especially Isaac Luria, one of the great mystics ever. Gershom Sholem was a great writer of the Kabbalhists, read his two great works on the subjects till the spines of the books exploded and rendered their pages unbounded.

I tried to write a four sonnet sequence about this moment, but have some heavy editing to do on the last three yet. The first, however, was like the 4th or 5th poem I ever wrote, and, for the life of me, can't get myself to change it. It was hard to write because it takes place before/after corporeality of any kind.

It sucks, of course, that's a given. lol


OUR FATHER

I

Time's evoking memory…once…there at last,
the substance and the movement of a dream
born of forlorn space, ensuing to contrast
one sentimental moment to redeem

of a father…enthralled in ecstasy
beholding but the beauty of the gift,
itself…only distinct in recognition
of this relation: responding harmonies.

Free…beyond the obscuring condition,
unending image, wherewithal of myth,
nature…awe inspiring composition,
aesthetically unerring labyrinth...

this…the sweetest sorrow…could never belie
the creation in the remembrance of why.

[NobodyNothing]

Is this how it ends?
Is this where love
and passion recede?
Is this the soul drowning
the self with its call?

How do we live with you?
How do we make
of this world your home?
How do we account
for all of your needs?

The harms we do cause
to such things that we love
from what only might be
some need of the self to say:
"My how I've changed!"

---

---

pearls were once but grains of sand,
each spring a winter's night,
the caterpillars humble steps
herald beauty in its flight...

Lol...words are so fun...

[Erthona]

NobodyNothing wrote:"And I do "questions" in poems sometimes. When you brought that up 'e' I noticed that I probably do that more than I should. It honestly just never came to me to do it any other way at the time I was doing it"

Using questions is more a rhetorical trope than a poetic one. You can use it in speeches to get the crowd fired up. In poetry it generally comes across as disingenuous because the reader cannot respond, and the answer is already known. I generally weed them out as I would any typo. A lot of times the line that contains the question can be dropped entirely, or at least turned into a statement. It is similar to using an inversion, as people often do in sonnets because of lack of skill. If it used to a purpose, with skill, it can be used, if used because the writer isn't skillful enough to stay with the meter except by using it, than no. In prose poetry, it can often be used if the speaker is talking to himself like.

"After my visit to the planetarium (sounds like sanitarium) I asked myself, why is space so black, and why do they not have a McDonald's on the moon? Such deep thoughts made my brain hurt, and then I heard them say, "It'll have to come out".

Dale

Dale