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5804. Ulgine Barrows - 9/17/2006 9:26:07 AM spirit in the night
luv ya
5805. Macnas - 9/18/2006 10:46:40 AM Thomas Kinsella
Scylla and Charybdis
Abstracted, sour, as he reaches across a dish
Of plaice, his hand on a tray of birds, O'Neill
Uplugs the weary fan: flat heaps of fish
Exhale. He watches Reynolds grope and pile
His window opposite with melons, fresh
Leather of cabbage, oranges . . . and smile.
Wiping his gamy hands he turns and thirsts
Abruptly for clay and fragrance, until it seems
The South in a sweet globe sinks to his lips and bursts.
And yet red-wristed Reynolds dreams and dreams
That he flies with the snipe in the sparse bracken, or thrusts
Cold muscle to the depths and dumbly screams.
I have slipped at evening through that ghostly quarrel,
Making a third, to round the simple moral.
5806. Seamus - 9/19/2006 7:55:11 PM Mac! Cén chaoi a bhfuil tú?
Kinsella and this sonnet in particular are on the short list for favourites from these quarters.
I've always loved how the voice has O'Neill (Scylla) and Reynolds (Charybdis) dream each other's lives through the windows of their shops in the quatrains and then interposes himself, Ulysses unbound, as the third of the "moral" in the couplet.
Kinsella, a master of description:
the weary fan
flat heaps of fish
fresh leather of cabbage
gamy hands
The South in a sweet globe
red-wristed
the sparce braken
cold muscle
And in terms of craft, "red-wristed Reynolds" is one of my favourite examples of top beat alliteration in a trio, without the overbearing repetition of the visual "r". Do you realise how very difficult that is to carry off? Put it this way, I've never come close.
I will note, in passing, that the man knows how to rime--until the couplet, root words all (and a name) and everywhere in one or two syllable end words. And the obvious comfort with the slant rime of "O'Neill" and "pile/smile"--that is called being sure of yourself. Why do so many think that a sonnet must be of Love, Thee and Thou, God and King, when in truth, the muck and blood and clay and cold muscle here would seem to fit in no other form. Of course, this is, in the end, a love and God sonnet anyway, but that's of no importance here.
Go raibh maith agat, Mac, for posting a favourite.
It's good to see old friends, this poem and you. NB: "old" in the second usage as in the length of friendship and not chronological age.
Seamus
5807. Macnas - 9/20/2006 8:48:00 AM Ta me go maith, agus don dan, ta failte romhat.
Even to the likes of me, Kinsella, the poets poet, has demanded my attention since I was directed to read and learn "Mirror in February" during my short stay in secondary school.
I've always liked his poetry for the simplest of reasons, the words and images resonate with me, and I find him more identifiably Irish than Heaney, even though Heaney is the current quintessential Irish poet.
The poem at hand, I think a delight to read, and it brings very vivid memories and images to mind. If you've ever wandered around Cork, and went to the English Market, on the south side, nearest Oliver Plunkett street, you would have found yourself among the fish stalls.
Traditionally, fishmongers would also have whatever game was in season, particularly waterfowl.
In my minds eye, I can see braces of mallard hanging over trays of black sole, plaice and monkfish. Snipe were never hung up, being such a small bird and were kept on a tray or dish.
When He says "leather of cabbage", you can feel the squeaky hide of the broad cabbage leaf in your hand. The opposites, the gamey smells of the fish stall against the earthy and sweet smells of the green grocers, and the intertwining of the two as the shopkeepers daydream, is a great hook that makes me come back to this poem time and again.
The meanings, the tale behind the tale, eludes me even when it's explained. I think, that I get caught up in the actual devices he uses, as I too, in my mind, have sped along the nap of the earth with the snipe, and I've watched the sea bass, in those rare moments where strong autumn sunshine shines through the dull green water, hunt among the inlets and troughs where the rock slopes down to the Atlantic on Howse strand, with them as they chase their prey through the drifting kelp and freezing water.
And in the end, I don't think it matters what gift you take from such a poem.
5808. alistairconnor - 9/20/2006 10:05:36 AM I enjoyed the poem the first time, but three times as much now...
Do another one! 5809. Seamus - 9/20/2006 4:10:15 PM Benbaun aubade
Busie olde foole, unruly Sunne;
Why dost thou thus,
Through windowes, and through curtaines call on us?
Must to thy motions lovers seasons run?
(from "The Sunne Rising" by John Donne)
Obsidian night,
unruly sun.
We spill off the dark
smoke wet wool
that burns
to swim in warm dew.
I am ploughman
of your feathered grasses
as sun-warmed sweat
rains over my back,
shines in your lips
and drips, drips down
where the urgent colder wet
connects us. Arching up,
I see fell runners.
The day's
first climbers
are coming
over the crags.
[Benbaun (Binn Bhán) is one of the Twelve Bens (Na Beanna Beola), a series of twelve quite modest peaks in Connemara of coastal west Ireland, where I am from. Fell running is an athletic event somewhat like cross-country, except that the course includes topping any number of mountain peaks--in the case of the Bens, all twelve.]
(Given what real poetry looks like in Mac's contribution, perhaps the epigraph for this should be changed to "You sir are no Kinsella".)
Seamus
5810. alistairconnor - 9/20/2006 6:19:29 PM I can't read that without moving my lips. And feeling vertigo too. Benbaun aubade. C'est pas de la daube. Works for me.
I was down Dingle way (not in May, but in July) and I climbed Brandon, hand in hand with my girls, a little way.
5811. seamus - 9/21/2006 5:41:13 AM Why, thanks, alistair.
If not a stew, then maybe a cold porridge.
Hold onto the Brandon memory. It sounds a good one.
Seamus 5812. Macnas - 9/21/2006 9:38:36 AM "You sir are no Kinsella"
Why should you be, sure aren't you already Seamus, nach bhuil? 5813. alistairconnor - 9/21/2006 1:46:11 PM ... he means he wouldn't sell his own kin. 5814. Macnas - 9/21/2006 2:45:30 PM A dhia dhilis, ta sin millteanach. 5815. Seamus - 9/21/2006 5:04:20 PM Which pun do you mean, Mac, alistair's or mine or perhaps both? 5816. RickNelson - 9/21/2006 6:36:53 PM "feathered grasses"
Perfect!
nuf said. 5817. Ulgine Barrows - 9/23/2006 6:14:30 AM Heartache Number One was when you left me
I never knew that I could hurt this way
Heartache Number Two was when you came back again
You came back and never meant to stay
Chorus:
Now I've got heartaches by the number
Troubles by the score
Every day you love me less
Each day I love you more
Now I've got heartaches by the number
A love that I can't win
But the day that I stop counting
That's the day my world will end
Heartache Number Three was when you called me
And told me you was coming home to stay
With hoping heart I waited for your knock on the door
I waited but you must have lost your way
Chorus:
Now I've got heartaches by the number
Troubles by the score
Every day you love me less
Each day I love you more
Now I've got heartaches by the number
A love that I can't win
But the day that I stop counting
That's the day my world will end
Ah, the day that I stop counting
That's the day my world will end
~Dwight Yoaku=am 5818. Ulgine Barrows - 9/23/2006 6:17:22 AM Gotta watch out for that heartache
Bonnie Tyler: It's A Heartache
Hear more from Bonnie Tyler:
The real lyrics were:
It's a heartache, nothing but a heartache...
But I misheard them as:
It's a hard egg, nothing but a hard egg... 5819. Ulgine Barrows - 9/23/2006 6:23:47 AM She said I’ll give you an intentional heartache
That’ll hurt a lot worse than the one that you left in me
And tell your little tramp to step back so your new ex-wife can get started
And you won’t have to look twice to see
~!more Dwight Yoakam 5820. Ulgine Barrows - 9/23/2006 7:46:09 AM A nose so pretty
but not a perfect sight
and a good morning's a little to the right
Two drops of happy, one pinch of pain
I'll call her
Little Miss Sunshine (Little Miss Rain)
A mouth full of honey
so the bees won't sting
her hair is golden
as an angel's ring
Two drops of happy, one pinch of pain
I'll call her
Little Miss Sunshine (Little Miss Rain)
A Little Miss Sunshine (Little Miss Rain)
~Lee Hazlewood 5821. NuPlanetOne - 9/24/2006 5:09:25 PM x-box warrior
How can he fight an enemy?
He has not suffered
Sure, he has vanquished virtual
Buffered pixels, rendered
Approximate visages of foes
And he goes about it
With animus as if these games
Were real. As if he could feel
Their pain. And he blames
A religion, the reign of terror
That he watches on tv
Cookies and milk in hand
And is ready to stand up
And take a pledge. This boy
Who ran away behind a hedge
Twenty yards from home
To go fight a boy who watched
As Mujahideen decapitated
His father, every day had seen
Atrocity and hunger
This boy, my boy, his mom
Pulling on her courage
Pleading, demanding he stay
That boy, remanding to Allah
His mom, pulling on a belt
Of bombs, commanding he fight on
How can he fight such an enemy
Without cheat codes, or cheerios
Without a pause control
With out weapon modes
Or a troll to re-up his life force
Of course, he will pray
Bless mommy and daddy and sis
And all we can do is kiss
Him goodbye.
5822. Seamus - 9/24/2006 10:18:29 PM Stunning, Nu. That is absolutely stunning.
Evocative and haunting--the juxtapositioning is so true, so sharp, it actually becomes painful to see it.
Gentlefolk of Mote Poetry, I say you NuPlanetOne.
5823. NuPlanetOne - 9/26/2006 12:35:40 AM Seamus
Thank you my friend. It is nice to hit the chord you intended to pluck. Makes all this scribbling worthwhile.
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