More than one way (Scribble #123)
Affine Nest
pray, wake spirit
and dream down the long green limbs
sung before dawn, before
crow’s black wizened cry, before
heron’s still blue passion. why
ask for lentic gospel when wild hearts
lead the wayward home?
ask fire, ask sun, ask
new moon glad tidings –
driftwood thrown upon white sands,
trail of yearning, seam of
ignescent truth. fool’s fire?
nay, libran, doff scales, doff blind –
affiance body to body, river to sea, blood’s blood.
Ask
in hearts, bright hearts –
none gathers brightness more –
ask sun, ask moon, ask
kestrel perched on
ashen wire in grey sky not gray.
reason spoils the joy
a simple boy knows well,
gainful simplicity,
unruly as chestnut
loosed in blue.
i did not look twice
and will no longer: love
nays but the wary: me she kissed.
incense that you blew ‘cross bare arms: thus
need is identified, never to be
announced as parting: disclosure
kissed by all the bodies I bring you. I
am – I was – heart-severed, a green lunatic
returning to portion sustained
and echoed not. You were called and
guessed the simplicity lurking, not here, but
underneath the white stone rosary. It
lay to us to read the signs, though for you
inclinations are signs in and of themselves.
ask me, my love, if the darkness of your eyes
nears mine own echo and, in the trailing, answers.
in the offing, coastal flutter,
native as one called by simple source,
arsis, fleet of feet:
keep heart, my love, keep
all that ‘riches, naming
red first in that trove,
as red in parting, as red in
green, as red in ambit.
umbered, if you will, i
lose all fear, lose death itself:
impuissant am i to your call
and so remain. ask me if
night has whispers, if night has flesh.
imprint dawns. her name
neither stills nor lengthens, it quickens,
as hand to fin, hand to mirth,
kalends to an idle heart.
april burrows –
ravenous – as night
asks here? now? why
give back that which
utters peace? as
linden i am sent, leaves
imbosomed, gathered, no
accident of birth, but starred, sent,
nevus upon the nick of time.
posted by murat11 at 9:08 PM
11 Comments:
Ooh! I loved this Paschal! Just the opening line got to me, "pray, wake spirit." The imagery of the crow seems to imply his cry announces the dawn. When I got to "the joys a simple boy knows well" I decided you'd let your inner child ask some of the wondering questions that seem to be posed here. My dad might identify with that simple boy.
So many wonderful images, too many to list them all, but briefly, "ashen wire in a grey sky not gray", "when wild hearts lead the wayward home", and "impuissant am I to your call, ask me if night has whispers, if night has flesh". Wow!
Brought up the Merriam-Webster software today. Lots of usage. Where did you get this astonishingly huge vocabulary? I've always been proud of mine but you outdo the dictionaries and probably some of the thesaurus's. Awesome!
Delightfully fascinated!
Joy!
Feeling poetic today? I must be completely honest and say that this kind of poetry is really difficult for me to read because it's full of words I never saw before, if poetry wasn't complex enough in one's own language.
But I tried and some parts were beautiful, others I couldn't quite grasp. ;)
Lee: Thanks for your good words: I'm glad you liked and got the feel of these poems.
Words just seem to stick to me, though I don't get too hung up on meanings: sound and energy always take precedence for me over meaning.
DM: These were all sonnets I wrote for Tina a few years ago, but I remembered they were full of the word "ask," so I unearthed them out of the files.
I struggle plenty about poetic meaning (often shunning meaning altogether), but one of the best things any of us can do with poetry is read it aloud. Whether meaning "arrives," the energy and sense of things always will.
whew!!! - i feel illiterate when i read some of your stuff, so i just listen to it and let the imagery please me and capture what i can of some of the meaning --- you are very talented!!!
You're right, poetry is supposed to be a feast of the senses, reading it outloud may just do the trick, but it still won't tell me what wizened, doff or affiance are, for example ;) Still some words are just what their sound produces.
these are beautiful...
Thank you for posting these three poems which simply sing. I love the nature images in the first poem. I could hear the poet's voice saying those words that heal, when the rest of us think in cliches. "Ask fire, ask sun, ask new moon . . . " What a moving and powerful set of poems.
danni: Thank you for your words: your description of reading them is similar at times to my writing them, as if I am surfing strong impressions and words that tumble out, sometimes evoking sense and sometimes simply a wash of images, connected or disconnected by sense.
DM: I like your notion of "still some words are just what their sound produces." Surrealists, following an associative stream of language, can end up with just such effects. I just re-read "Affine Nest" and, to my mind, you lose very little "sense" by simply cropping the three words you mention. "Doff" (to take off) is perhaps most necessary for sense, but again, "sense" is seldom my primary goal.
Thank you, jsd.
Thank you for reading of the poems, Beth. It was fun to work with the modern sonnet structure, as they tumbled out.
A feast of "new moon glad tidings," Paschal. At first I typed "feat." Hey, that works too. At first I typed "that words." That works too. At first I typed "that woks." That works less well, although it does revert back to "feast." You're cooking, man! Or should I say "green lunatic." Or "simple boy." Either/or works/words/woks.
The asking, "loosed in blue," makes for a "coastal flutter" of dreaming wisdom, distilled as a sonnet. Or five.
"Unruly," "no reason to spoil the joy." Is there an echo in here?
San: I liek lal yoru "accdinetal" sepllinsg. Teyh all wrok dindeed, echoes abounding.
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