Once it was spring. Once, swings and whispers
were enough. But the cellar opened,
the notepad widened, and some ill-fated
woman in an ancient Greek dress
crept in. Murderess! The basket fell,
a pomegranate rolled, and the text
was filled with themes --
Adam and Eve, Adam and Eve, Adam and Eve.
(Always with the em dashes!
And that love of punctuation....)
Writing should not be a toil. Days pass
and he's made nothing. He begins to fear
the red-haired woman with the kindly eyes
would scold him for his lateness. Like a poem,
she should ask: "What kept you? What kept you?"
and, in bitter prose, he should deflate
to simple truth: "My Virtue failed."
So he changes his mind. "In the beginning,
God made the heavens and the earth: as his spirit
hovered over the face of the waters, he said
'Let there be light!' and there was light --
and all writing came from that great light
like scars, brands on experience."
(Always with the em dashes!
And that love of punctuation....)
He scatters lamps across the ocean in the hope
that she should follow. Should she follow?
Should she cross into his foggy land
and sacrifice her spirit world for flesh?
dye her hair, powder her skin, and wear
nails for bracelets, strips of leather
for a shirt? But his cross is burnt,
Calvary melted to a muddy flood,
and Joseph's tomb collapsed
to show the trick: carrion-eating bugs.
Moments pass. All his decisions, indecisions --
he considers them experiments. Ever the optimist,
he predicts that in another life....
(What a splendid skill! not to spill
a single drop of blood, not to evoke
the memory of speech, of prophecy.)
The Dead
The dead feast on my flesh,
and I have bared it for them.
Once it was spring. Once, swings and whispers
brought enjoyment. But the cellar
opened, the notepad widened, and some ill-fated
woman in an ancient Greek dress
creeped in. Murderess! The basket fell,
a pomegranate rolled, and the text
was filled with themes --
Adam and Eve, Adam and Eve, Adam and Eve.
(Always with the em dashes!
And that love of punctuation....)
Writing should not be a toil. Days pass
and he's made nothing. He begins to fear
the red-haired woman with a Fury's eyes
would scold him for his lateness. Like a poem,
she should ask: "What kept you? What kept you?"
and, in bitter prose, he should deflate
to simple truth: "My Virtue failed."
So he changes his mind. In the beginning,
God made the heavens and the earth: as his spirit
hovered over the face of the waters, he said,
"Let there be light", and there was light --
and all writing came from that great light
like scars, brands on experience.
(Always with the em dashes!
And that love of punctuation....)
He scatters lamps across the ocean, in the hope
that she should follow. Should she follow?
Should she cross into his foggy land
and sacrifice her spirit world for flesh?
dye her hair, powder her skin, and wear
nails for bracelets, strips of leather
for a shirt? But all his wood is burned!
his hill has melted to a muddy flood,
his tomb, collapsed to reveal
flesh and bone and cloth consuming scarabs.
Moments pass. All his decisions, indecisions --
he considers them experiments. Ever the optimist,
he predicts that in another life....
(What a splendid skill! not to spill
a single drop of blood, not to evoke
the memory of speech, of prophecy.)
I suppose this is yet another poem about 'my muse'. Poetry and its inspiration can end up being a sprawling psychodrama of a topic, and this work fits that general model. There's lots to like, but much more could be described as 'show off' poetry.
(12-14-2016, 02:49 PM)RiverNotch Wrote: The Dead
The dead feast on my flesh,
and I have bared it for them.
Once it was spring. Once, swings and whispers...............you seem to be saying that the Spring is a one off time when your pen flowed with a free hand, but growing stale is a path we choose to tread, and creative Spring returns when we drop the artificial cleverness of writing.
brought enjoyment. But the cellar
opened, the notepad widened, and some ill-fated..............I like the cellar and notebook images.
woman in an ancient Greek dress
creeped in. Murderess! The basket fell,
a pomegranate rolled, and the text........................okay she's Greek, now your rolling into the predictable.
was filled with themes --
Adam and Eve, Adam and Eve, Adam and Eve.................mystified by all this.
(Always with the em dashes!
And that love of punctuation....).........................self indulgent lines
Writing should not be a toil. Days pass
and he's made nothing. He begins to fear
the red-haired woman with a Fury's eyes
would scold him for his lateness. Like a poem,
she should ask: "What kept you? What kept you?"
and, in bitter prose, he should deflate
to simple truth: "My Virtue failed.".........................this is your strongest stanza
So he changes his mind. In the beginning,
God made the heavens and the earth: as his spirit
hovered over the face of the waters, he said,
"Let there be light", and there was light --
and all writing came from that great light
like scars, brands on experience.......................sprawling and over-reaching blah
(Always with the em dashes!
And that love of punctuation....)...............now the lines feel like a nervous tick.
He scatters lamps across the ocean, in the hope
that she should follow. Should she follow?
Should she cross into his foggy land
and sacrifice her spirit world for flesh?...............I like the word made flesh theme
dye her hair, powder her skin, and wear
nails for bracelets, strips of leather
for a shirt? But all his wood is burned!
his hill has melted to a muddy flood,
his tomb, collapsed to reveal
flesh and bone and cloth consuming scarabs.........do scarab beetles eat cloth?
Moments pass. All his decisions, indecisions --
he considers them experiments. Ever the optimist,
he predicts that in another life...............................this displacement of inspiration to 'another life' .............is the usual cop-out.
(What a splendid skill! not to spill
a single drop of blood, not to evoke
the memory of speech, of prophecy.).................no blood = no life......a petulant whine to end this at last.
Thanks for the feedback! The siggy's the thing at the bottom, not the title. The title isn't under my control, but I do agree, it's quite apt ----- though I'm not sure if I should take that as a personal attack. Just because the speaker's flashy, doesn't mean I am (though I'm a little, when writing) ---- and just because what you've written isn't flashy, doesn't mean you are (though what you've so far presented is vivid, when it works). I'll offer a fuller response when I've got more feedback, but one thing I did forget is to remove "cloth" from the scarabs, as when they opened Jesus' tomb I think they found his bindings? Maybe I'll go with blood, or some other universal organ. Again, thanks!
It is worth noting that most readers won't care about the 'textual accuracy' of your references as long as the end result is musical. The strongest parts of this piece are the places where myths blend together, i.e.
(12-14-2016, 02:49 PM)RiverNotch Wrote: The basket fell,
a pomegranate rolled, and the text
was filled with themes --
Adam and Eve, Adam and Eve, Adam and Eve.
The other good parts of this poem are the clear images, which don't need to be referential in order to stand on their own. The lines about the cellar/notepad, "he scatters lamps across the ocean" and "dye her hair, powder her skin, and wear/ nails for bracelets, strips of leather/ for a shirt?" are the best examples of this sort of imagery.
However, you also have weak images in this poem, and places where the referentiality loses its music and veers into cliche. Saying that a woman has "a Fury's eyes" doesn't actually mean anything, even though the image of the furious red-haired woman is otherwise tangible. The stanza
(12-14-2016, 02:49 PM)RiverNotch Wrote: In the beginning,
God made the heavens and the earth: as his spirit
hovered over the face of the waters, he said,
"Let there be light", and there was light --
and all writing came from that great light
like scars, brands on experience.
says nothing new: How does god make the heavens and earth? What is water like without light? How does writing come from light? I like some of your ideas here--the "brand" line for me represents the way that language characterizes experience and thereby constrains it, but this idea (or whatever idea you were trying to express) is not expressed sufficiently within these lines to be a satisfying revelation.
Likewise, the tomb imagery is insubstantial and unclear. How much time did the degradation process take? The "muddy flood" seems to imply that the hill melted in a rainstorm, but that seems unrealistic (although I'm sure that there are powerful enough storms to cause that sort of environmental damage). How does the hill actually look, or the tomb? I kind of feel like it's not supposed to look like anything, and that the image is purely an example of intertextuality, but in this case it is still an uninteresting image. A reference alone is not musical. You need to transform the referenced text in a way that surprises the reader or reconciles something impossible.
A minor quibble: the introduction of the 3rd person in the 3.5th stanza is odd, considering the epigraph references an "I" and the lack of a 3rd person in the first major stanza.
Thanks for the feedback! I may have to revise the section on tomb -- it was supposed to be an extended Jesus reference, though with the usual feminine-flesh and masculine-Thought inverted, and the icons of the nails, the whips, the wooden cross, the skull-shaped hill, and the bare tomb subverted. As for the creation stanza, I'm not entirely sure about revising, particularly because it's the culmination of one of my drives for composing this piece, which is, as you noted, intertextuality. Not intertextuality with either the Bible or Greek myth, mind you, but with the stuff I've previously composed, with that whole bit being an indirect quote of the Bible, and a more direct quote of the linked. The greater drive of compiling a book is starting to really get to me....
As for your two other points, I do agree that "Fury's eyes" does nothing, and the shift to third person was semi-intentional: I was channeling the video game Braid, and I suppose at that point emotion bubbled over. Again, thanks for the feedback! The balance between intertextuality and musicality is one I've really been struggling with, especially with my latest stabs. I'm glad for your clarification on that, and welcome to the site!
Hello River! I feel like your last three poems or so (at least the ones that I've commented on) have so much beauty, but it's inaccessible.
An observation (not praise or criticism): it seems like the search for greatness and the supernatural has been seen in your work lately, and in this one in particular. Greek gods, Biblical gods, ideal women...it shows me something of the speaker's longing for something beyond, out of reach. And it feels so vague and out of reach for me too. I felt like your strongest pieces focused on what was in front of you, like McKinley Road. What I do like about it is that I get a sense of something of the speaker in that reaching and searching which is very quintessentially human, but that's subtext and should be subservient to a strong primary text.
A few thoughts below.
(12-14-2016, 02:49 PM)RiverNotch Wrote: The Dead
The dead feast on my flesh,
and I have bared it for them. -- I like a good bit of grump in my poetry; I'm a little maudlin myself, but it's bordering on 'woe is me.'
Once it was spring. Once, swings and whispers
brought enjoyment. But the cellar -- show enjoyment, don't state it! Falls flat.
opened, the notepad widened, and some ill-fated
woman in an ancient Greek dress
creeped in. Murderess! The basket fell, -- women are always to blame, eh?
a pomegranate rolled, and the text
was filled with themes -- Adam and Eve is one theme....what are the others? Themes is a weak word.
Adam and Eve, Adam and Eve, Adam and Eve.
(Always with the em dashes!
And that love of punctuation....) -- and yet you're not using em dashes -- signals to me a longing to escape strictures. Maybe push that a little bit and play with other ways to break the rules.
Writing should not be a toil. Days pass
and he's made nothing. He begins to fear
the red-haired woman with a Fury's eyes -- is this the same red haired woman from 'Making of a Straight Man?' You wouldn't be recycling images would you....? That's ok, just make me love and hate her, though. If she's going to be a recurring character...
would scold him for his lateness. Like a poem,
she should ask: "What kept you? What kept you?"
and, in bitter prose, he should deflate
to simple truth: "My Virtue failed." -- this is the best stanza because the speaker becomes human and approachable. This is where connection to the reader is possible.
So he changes his mind. In the beginning,
God made the heavens and the earth: as his spirit -- I dig the Biblical reference because this is a beautiful passage.
hovered over the face of the waters, he said,
"Let there be light", and there was light --
and all writing came from that great light
like scars, brands on experience. -- writing is a scar? Why would the speaker mourn that something that scars the universe is lost? I think you're referencing 'in the beginning was the Word' and I dig, but the word needs to become FLESH, eh? Bring the imagery down to earth.
(Always with the em dashes!
And that love of punctuation....) -- I love me the em dashes. Hater.
He scatters lamps across the ocean, in the hope -- lamps across the ocean is lovely. Good tie in with the light from preceding stanzas.
that she should follow. Should she follow?
Should she cross into his foggy land
and sacrifice her spirit world for flesh?
dye her hair, powder her skin, and wear
nails for bracelets, strips of leather
for a shirt? But all his wood is burned!
his hill has melted to a muddy flood,
his tomb, collapsed to reveal
flesh and bone and cloth consuming scarabs. -- Huh??? I love scarab beetles, and I dig the slightly kinky wardrobe you've chosen for her, but these details are personal to the point of being non-transferable to your audience (unless your audience is yourself....)
Moments pass. All his decisions, indecisions --
he considers them experiments. Ever the optimist,
he predicts that in another life....
(What a splendid skill! not to spill
a single drop of blood, not to evoke
the memory of speech, of prophecy.) Huh???
thanks for the feedback! some touches -- so far i feel that more radical change would dilute whatever it is that's in there. specifics:
gutted starting quote. the second statement read irrelevant and kinda stupid.
turned "enjoyment" to an even blander form, because that scene was not the point i wanted to make.
on adam and eve: the joke being that there are no other themes.
hmm....this is weird. oddly enough, this is a piece that neither really uses em dashes, nor really abuses them, and same goes, i think, for punctuation. however, that second voice is necessary, since it divides the sections naturally, and sets up the question mark of a conclusion, so i'm conflicted....
changed "Fury's eyes" to the equally referential, but much more ironic and, to me, hilarious, "kindly eyes".
on failed virtue: i do like that part, too. it is i think the part most influenced by how i experienced Braid, which is a video game i heartily recommend.
on the Biblical passage: this is the second time i've alluded to that, in a piece i've posted here. i'm not sure how i used allusion here fits with how you think allusion should be used, amaril. of course, it might be because i am not an experienced allusionist (lol), but i very rarely allude to add to the original piece; rather, i abduct, metaphorically stealing the passage to state something that would, if stated otherwise, not nearly be as clear, beautiful, powerful. i mean, sure, a writer's job is to make something new, but at the same time you've got the shoulders of giants, and ultimately the point here is more....well, the interplay of themes that i hope are clearer in this new edit, rather than an elaboration on the concept of (Biblical) creation.
on "scars, brands on experience": for brands, i just thought it was a good image (plus i think i've used a brand in writings before? at least in a much more vicious fashion ----); but it's scars i think that's more important, as i hope this new edit should show.
edited the tomb part. it reads less musical for me, but at least it should be clearer what sort of contrast i was going for.
i love the scene of Odysseus having to feed the dead with blood to hear them speak. something like that -- i can understand why it does seem out of the blue, but somehow i do like the disjointed nature of it, especially since it is sort of tied not just to Eucharist, but to my current (mild) obsession with reincarnation. so that is another baffling part to be kept.
i hope to receive bits on the changes. thanks again for the feedback!
I felt like your strongest pieces focused on what was in front of you, like McKinley Road. What I do like about it is that I get a sense of something of the speaker in that reaching and searching which is very quintessentially human, but that's subtext and should be subservient to a strong primary text.