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5136. Macnas - 1/5/2004 4:18:20 PM Happy New Year Rick, hope you clobber that flu and are fighting fit for the year to come.
Prelude
Still south I went and west and south again,
Through Wicklow from the morning till the night,
And far from cities, and the sights of men,
Lived with the sunshine, and the moon's delight.
I knew the stars, the flowers, and the birds,
The grey and wintry sides of many glens,
And did but half remember human words,
In converse with the mountains, moors, and fens.
J.M.SYNGE 5137. angel-five - 1/6/2004 4:04:02 PM phoebus in december
Each winter night my ghosts come home,
to press against the windowpane
white shivered fingertips wide splayed,
their eyes borne inward toward my own,
their lips closed silent with my name.
The wind beyond the icy glass
drawn thin to whet across the rime
keens in the empty winter air
a drifting note too pure to bear
as it moves slow upon the land
deep streaming cold and turbulent,
between the clack of twig on bough
and over earth grown numb with sleep
a hymn which no born voice may sing
that whispers stark as graveyard stone
against a land gone white with time
and through the trees which crack with snow
arrayed like thornbrush in my mind.
I cannot breathe but for the pain.
The exhaled breath that spring drew in
now rattles through these frost struck bones
in thanatopic eulogy
handcrafted in a bloodshot eye
a warding sign against the night,
fain to crackle into light
illuminate and cease to be,
remembering the april rain
as one last kiss I never gave,
the goodbye which I could not pray
but for the words which rasp inside
hammered upon an empty page
this winter night
and words do not suffice to pay
the price their making parts from me.
For what is there that I can say?
Each winter all my loves stream by
my window, looking in at me,
their eyes gone cold with what I feel.
They're dead but I can't let them fade,
there's something wrong inside of me
And I look back through ink drawn fine
a failed attempt to exorcise
these thing that I can't let to be,
as branches fail beneath the snow
and air spins through eternity,
waiting to claw its way back out
of me again.
5138. RickNelson - 1/11/2004 1:09:51 AM This deserves a lot of praise angel-five. The contents theme and thought flows through, with spiral staircase symmetry. We know that from either direction the spiral may be infinite. That's the breadth of feeling I've read here, it draws upon experiences, knowledge and requisite of love. Then as a playback, we stroll into the cold, silence and loneliness an ended relationship brings.
There is nuance here, your ability to draw remembrance and clear emotion from allegorical natural elements is stirring at the low end and exciting to read at the high end. The excitement for me is the reaction to your train of thought via this expressive poem. It grows upon itself from the references to nature and a human condition. These elements evolve along the way, yet remain poignant to the established emotioal state. The end stating matter of fact that we shall revisit these emotions.
You've given an excellent example of the use of emotion and naturally ocurring conditions from the human realm of love. It's well thought out, finely executed and worthy of more than I can elucidate.
My current studies of poetry are centered around the metaphysical poets, as mentioned up thread. Criticisms of Donne are the feature of my study. The critics are showing a broad range and thus allowing me to view the study from multiple considerations. The overlap of these is growing my interest and your poem has the elemental feature of that overlap. That being experience and a strong theme, relayed via an expressive mood and compromised skillfully into a form of poetry.
This praise is warranted, and I would like more poetry. I would like to be so skillful, but grateful that I recognize it.
Best regards,
Rick 5139. RickNelson - 1/11/2004 11:22:37 PM Check out this Merwin poem I found posted on Slate's fray. It resounds truth and a clean connection with the environment. These culminate in a serene acceptance of age and ones mortality.
It's akin to the love found in angel-five's poem above. Angel-five's being familial or close loved one and Merwin's being of self vary only via these characteristics. The use of environment and emotion combine the lines into poetry. To borrow from Sir Herbert Grierson: "an echoing and re-echoing of similar sounds parallel to the fondness for resemblences"
{John Donne's Poetry, Authoritative Texts and Criticism, 1966; Selected and edited by A.L. Clements page 120."
This fits closer to angel-five's poem than merwins, but adjusted to the theme and listening to the alliteration of repeated consonant sounds, I include Merwin's poem.
" is W.S. Merwin's last poem. By W.S. Merwin
There once more the new moon in spring
above the roofs of the village
in the clear sky the cold twilight
under the evening star the thin
shell sinking so lightly it seems
not to be moving and no sound
from the village at this moment
nor from the valley below it
with its still river nor even
from any of the birds and I
have been standing here in this light
seeing this moon and its one star
while the cows went home with their bells
and the sheep were folded and gone
and the elders fell silent one
after another and loved souls
were no longer seen and my hair
turned white and I was looking up
out of a time of late blessings."
5140. ScreamingSin - 1/13/2004 3:32:11 PM justears, I really like your 5120 "High View"
Especially the timing, I suppose; in a new year, the better self (adamantine) that could be, lords it over the lower self that is (rubble and slime).
The dichotomy, fissure is great this time of year in our society.
Well done. 5141. NuPlanetOne - 1/14/2004 6:50:14 AM
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Greeting all…..
There are some nice things posted here…….. angel-five…*phoebus in december* is just marvelous. Powerful. Damn good ready for publication poetry. Very nice.
Anyway…..hope to get in here more often and post and read. So nice to see some of you still at it…..rick…..good read on angel’s poem…….and justears……….just wonderful! I’m reading back to see what else I have missed. I think I have been associated with this forum in it’s various guises now for at least 8 yrs……wow! Spanning 2 centuries……….ha! Ciao for now.
5142. justears - 1/18/2004 11:22:36 AM Thanks for the notes of appreciation Nu, Rick and Sin. W.S.Merwin is a favorite of mine. A5 your poems are exceptionally honest and evocative. 5143. justears - 1/20/2004 11:28:47 PM The Beaver and the Flyfisherman
It’s a standoff
And the Beaver is Pissed off.
The Flyfisherman sees
a likely deep pool
behind the lodge but
The Beaver sees
an Intruder.
The war begins with a sudden
loud splash behind
the Flyfisherman
which makes him think
a Savage on shore must
be throwing big rocks.
Spooked but undeterred, he
fishes on while the Beaver
tries to make himself even clearer,
patrolling the full extent of his domain
up and down the river.
Downwind, he treads water and
histrionically sniffs the air
as if to say—“Who is this obtuse asshole in my pool?”
Back and forth, back and forth
not ten feet from the Fisherman.
And now come Four Gorgeous Ducks
who cruise in peacefully
but intent upon
their business,
they won’t choose sides.
At last
the Flyfisherman,
unlucky in his original mission,
switches to plan two.
5144. uzmakk - 1/21/2004 12:27:27 AM justears:
I just posted your poem elsewhere. Your moniker is attached. I hope you don't mind if it travels a little. 5145. uzmakk - 1/21/2004 12:29:08 AM The chap I sent it to is an avid flyfisherman. 5146. justears - 1/21/2004 2:35:40 AM UZ, Glad you thought well enough of it to pass it on. 5147. wonkers2 - 1/21/2004 2:44:25 AM Nice poem. JE. Did you catch any? 5148. justears - 1/26/2004 10:55:29 PM Six cock and two hen pheasants
block the gravel road
like Robin Hood’s highwaymen,
they are a proud band
unintimidated by the grumbling
metal monster which grinds up
demanding passage.
All in good time,
All in good time,
we will let you pass
when our due in dignity
has been paid.
Our feathers are beautiful,
well groomed and ready,
our eyes are keen,
our posture alert.
But, just now, we prefer
to walk, our road, thank you.
5149. wonkers2 - 1/27/2004 1:20:32 AM Nice pome! 5150. justears - 1/27/2004 2:40:51 AM Thanks Wonk, Here's another written about the same time:
Fishing with streamers down the Boneyard,
I notice a tree just felled by a beaver,
its pencil-sharpened trunk points to the river.
Approaching it seems a Christmas tree
bedizened with red globes
Hoping perhaps for cherries
Instead I find only crabapples
But the wet fall air is redolent
Of dark, red perfume.
5151. wonkers2 - 1/27/2004 8:11:28 AM Another vivid moment captured in poetry. 5152. HCaulfield - 2/4/2004 5:33:56 PM Sheesh, remind me to not pass through y'all's biosphere w/o some kind of defensive weapon.
I remember when I was a kid, and a bat got in the house.
Pa whacked it with a handy tennis racket.
15-love. 5153. alistairConnor - 2/4/2004 6:13:55 PM hc, welcome. 5154. alistairConnor - 2/4/2004 6:15:15 PM A porcelain woman with a secret smile
Do you embrace the day or only
Remember yesterday's joys
A flower's perfume a blue sky 5155. RickNelson - 2/5/2004 12:34:16 PM hmmmm....
yup.
The day, for sure the day.
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