:: Poetry ::

:: Thursday, October 30, 2003 ::

OK, here's a new one--no explication and only a brief apology for the obsessive English theme.
Rob

PARALLAX

Astronomy--an apparent change in an object, caused by a change in observational position that provides a new line of sight.

The English dawn trembles behind the poplars
And drowns the stars, one by one, in milklight
As I walk out across the heath, scattering
Rabbits and one startled lapwing, which dopplers

From left to right and back again in fear.
The pond beside the house is still, reflects
A sky as grey and soft as wool, and only
Venus—that bright, cold chip of ice—appears

Upon the surface. Four thousand miles away,
You sleep, and when you wake in that silk night
Of Midwest heat and see a smattering
Of stars, they’ll look the same, but in array
They’re slightly changed. You too—your eyes, your neck,
More lovely with distance and lonely skies.

:: Rob 10/30/2003 09:03:00 AM [+] ::
...

Paul,
I really like the tone of this poem--if it were music, it would be one of those songs played mainly in minor chords that sound so mournful yet so beautiful. I feel kind of guilty, but my comments are mainly small technical ones since it seems like most of this poem is working the way you want it to; but here goes, for what it's worth:

Great title and some great lines--my fave's: "crispy dresses," "garments are gone, / bees are done," "belt of buds," "as its replacement wets its lips," "still shuddering / on their stems like eyes / shut hard," "Before they shrivel...weight of their petals," and "choirs of dust."

As for your concerns about "spiked green cages," I'm with you--it's problematic. Without your explication, I'm not sure I would have figured that one out, and obviously you can't include an explanation with the finished piece. I think you really only have two options here. One, you could simply forego the violence idea and describe the leaves more clearly (not a great option, granted); or, two, you could tack on some sort of technical or clinical detail that helps to clarify. For example, "among the spiked green cages of their X's." Now, I have no idea what those thingamabobs are called, but I imagine that they've got some sort of botanical name, right?

I'd also change "it's" in line 7 to "but" to help confirm the rhetorical shift there. But I'm not sure what "side access" is in that same line. I'm imagining something like a carnival tent where kids can look into the peepshow by pulling up a side of the tent, but I don't really know if that's what you're going for. I'm also not sure about the language of "pimps" in the third stanza. It kind of goes with the figurative language of "peepshow" (though not completely as those things would not mix & match in the real world), but it doesn't really work with the carrying away of the wax--I keep asking myself why pimps would carry wax away, or (figuratively) what is it they're supposed to be carrying away? Likewise, the phrase "behind the door" in stanza 2 seems to hint at the peepshow again, but it's not quite clear and actually may detract from "wets its lips."

I might also change the line break in stanza 3 to read, "still shuddering / on their stems like eyes shut hard /" In stanza 4, I think you can safely remove "though" from the first line--it's not adding much. Finally, the tense in line four of the final stanza should probably read "will cling," and I would take out "looking up" altogether. Grammatically, it makes it seem as if the elms are looking up instead of the cicadas. Of course, if you take that out, you'll have to rework the final line so that "bronze and hollow and sightless" doesn't refer back to elms either, though I think that's a fantastic last line for this poem.

Rob
:: Rob 10/25/2003 08:46:00 AM [+] ::
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Paul, sorry I've been so remiss. I'll get to you poem soon. Perhaps today?
:: Sean 10/24/2003 04:09:00 AM [+] ::
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Rob, why don't you put a poem up, and maybe Paul can join us later. I'm back from Crete and windburned, but happy.
:: Sean 10/13/2003 03:53:00 AM [+] ::
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|More later, Rob. I'm in Crete or Santorini. Talk to you at length soon.
:: Sean 10/11/2003 01:18:00 AM [+] ::
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Echo echo echo....
:: Rob 10/06/2003 10:30:00 AM [+] ::
...