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Topic: GOODREADS NEWSLETTER CONTEST > PLEASE VOTE FOR DECEMBER'S GOODREADS' POEM - SIX FINALISTS
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VOTE IN THE POLL ON THE POETRY GROUP'S MAIN PAGE! (CLICK THIS LINK TO VOTE! --> JUST SELECT TITLE OF POEM YOU LIKE BEST!
Saga of Skins
I listen to the epic in your chest,
the measures of your storyteller heart.
Of all the drums you’ve played, this is the best.
Your bedtime tale uncurls me into rest,
like lullabies. I know it, every part
except the end, this epic in your chest.
At every home, the bard’s a welcome guest,
the one who acts out stories at the hearth.
Of all the hides you’ve drummed, I like this best,
the one I lie with, lie on, tightly pressed.
I hum its measure when we walk apart:
a great and classic epic in your chest,
the saga of your travels. Man at rest
still keeps the beat: the purest, artless art.
Of all the times you’ve kept, this moment’s best,
the song of now, a ballad of the west
on goatskin drums. I'm following your star;
I listen to the epic in your chest.
Of all the skins you’ve played, I like this best.
--Gwyn McVay
~~
Cervantes’s Blues
He asked her a question. She was only leaves blowing down the lane. And who was he? A farmer who had wondered too long over rabbits and wheat. A warrior retuned broken from war. Descartes’ double, the other inventor of the modern world. He was the jongleur of ‘what happens next’ and yet stood stunned stupid before the reticence of the Spanish countryside.
The first question was swept away by his need to ask another. So Cervantes tried again: the sea-clouds passing over head are yearning for these dried clots of dirt. Why do you wave them on?
This time Andalusia responded more seriously: when the source of all water dried into words, nothing became flowers and for the first time became possible. You see the sky had long ago hidden openness within the earth. He had found the seams of the world, forced her cracks, and slid his light into the loam, where, within the darkness of clay, he engendered the monsters of Theogony.
Cervantes could not imagine what any of this had to do with the drought—trying not to be annoyed he said: I’ve heard of some of them. The Titians, and a dog with a thousand eyes …
She cut him off: your people were brought here to eat the granadilla. Language was taught to them as if to children. To them music was given freely. But now your stories and songs have been released into these forests and chase the nightingale up and down god-inhabited streams as if consequence had died.
I tell you all will be cleared away—the grasses will rage and the fields once again will become a mosaic of fire and ash.
--Peter Atkinson
~~
Tom’s Quality of Light
Devolve again into the same mandala.
Sketch to focus. It’s your meditation.
The nurse brings your evening medication.
I see it’s hard to swallow.
Draw repetitive abstract flowers.
Cedric, the black nurse whom you say
is from pine country is with you today.
He charts minutes, swallows, urine, hours.
Think only of the years, months, weeks
you may or may not purchase like indulgences
with chemo. Make known your preferences
to go back home, among the other luminous antiques.
You and Debbie made a boho life:
thirty years of squalid joy and still inspired.
No judge or minister required
to make your one great love your wife.
Your ancient kitty, missing her Tom
now yowls in anguish to the empty studio.
She thinks your absence rude. You know
that emptiness and silence are not calm.
Instead, they swell to gales overnight
that swallow reason. Everywhere you turn
sail coffins like oaken ships. Eyes burn.
Worry chemo will obliterate your sight.
Can one calculate from fear and pain a quotient
quantifying life gained over quality thereof?
She wants, (your one and only love),
for you to die a person, not a patient.
That’s progress, I suppose, from refraining
even from the thought that you may one day die.
I want you both to look Death in the eye
so you can see your light as it is waning.
--Jan Steckel
~~
What has happened to the sylph of tears?
She has gone to gather silence
in a place
unvisited by waking eyes
Somwhere high in mountains dancing
with snow-spall and sky;
she is cleaning the largesse of sorrow
from the pattern in her bag
wings threadbare
thinly pinioned to a bright diminutive heart.
This is where she will remain
unknown even to herself,
the gentle hands withdrawn,
her satchel
hung
on a peg of ice.
--Seth Grube
~~
Before the Silos Collapsed
When cholera passed between us, father brought honey,
warm from the forest, and lime to keep snakes from our beds.
This is before the war, when
all the rivers flowed from the western highland,
when there was hope, when sugar could be placed
on the tongue and the eyes kept closed in its sweetness.
This is before the village starved,
before the silos collapsed,
their walls weakened by bombardments,
the people crushed under rice and dust.
This is before bodies stopped in the tall river grass,
some in plastic bags, some bloated in the sun,
before the river filled with mud and debris,
and sickness emptied the land.
This is our father, brushing heavy lotus leaves
from the boat’s edge and saying:
Drop a few grains of rice into the river
and it will bring up hundreds of fish.
When there isn’t rice, simply spit in the water
and all the colors will still come rushing.
--Eric Anderson
~~
The Parrot-Ox
The parrot-ox
is clearly confused,
as evidently
so were his parents.
Being both heavy and light,
he can neither
fly nor root,
which makes his life
a kind of hovering
between two things
that cross each other out.
All play is work,
all drudgery is sport,
and so he spends his days
busily doing nothing,
circling square
fields of thought
like a practical idealist.
At night he holds forth
in a neighborhood bar
in his undertaker’s suit
and Indian headdress.
He drinks to sober up
and tell again
the sad joke
of how we die at birth
into opposites.
And then he laughs
till he cries and cries
till he laughs,
sorrow and joy
mixing it up in his blood.
--Jane Ellen Glasser
~~
Thanks to finalists' judges, Wendy Babiak, Andrew Haley, and Ruth Bavetta, for their time and careful consideration! Next month, we will be posting Honorable Mentions.
~~
The Parrot-Ox was absolutely brilliant and definitely gets my vote. I love the way Jane explains the "paradox" and at the same time uses the metaphor within the poem, of the parrot and the ox ("he can neither / fly nor root") and how that itself describes the paradox, too. Quite humorous, in that it was so spot on.
Oh, I choose the Parrot-Ox as well! I love the humor. Second place for me is probably "What has happened to the sylph of tears?".
ooooh... so hard to choose. I love the Parrot-Ox -- linguistic pleasure probing deeper concerns. It immediately sparked me. The others were good, but this stood out immediately.
I helped choose two of them and I'm still having trouble deciding. I've been back to this thread a few times, and each time I feel differently. Empirical proof, I guess, about the subjectivity of taste!
my vote goes to Cervante's Blues, a difficult choice since all the poems here possess a powerful voice.
There were so many good ones this time. Really hard to choose. So many good ones had to be left behind That's why we've decided to have Honorable Mentions.
While I like most of the poem, the sixth stanza of Parrot-Ox bothers me greatly. I must be overly sensitive since no one else seems to notice it or find it troublesome. Perhaps I am only feeling more aware of how we handle the "other" after reading "Poetry and Ethics:Writing About Others" in Writer's Chronicle this month which I actually thought was a bit harsh. I know my own work is definitely not above reproach and I don't agree with all of Saje's examples. Perhaps Jane was trying to deal with the paradox of how we view Native Americans, but I still see it as a problematic stanza.
Sandra wrote: "While I like most of the poem, the sixth stanza of Parrot-Ox bothers me greatly. I must be overly sensitive since no one else seems to notice it or find it troublesome. Perhaps I am only feeling mo..."
I do not see it. I do not think it has anything to do with insulting Native Americans. Based on the same premise, you can make an argument that the author is insulting undertakers; after all, the hero gets drunk wearing "his undertaker’s suit and Indian headdress."
Brilliant poem, by the way, but I still liked Cervantes’s Blues better.
I can appreciate that, I wouldn't have said anything except that I think its an important issue. I don't think that stanza is the sum total of the poem either, just a choice of image that I disagree with. I certainly didn't mean to upset anyone, just to open up a discussion.
Sandra,
For the sake of discussion could you clarify what you mean by problematic? Do you see it as problematic for you as reader or problematic in the sense that writers should never write anything that might offend someone else's sense of political correctness? They are two different issues. Every writer has personal issues he or she deals with and, while I haven't read Natasha's article, I've known her for several years. This particular issue of whether or not poets have any ethical responsibility toward the "other" is a favorite theme of hers. Whether or not it should be for every writer may be a good discussion topic.
To me, it seemed fairly obvious that the "Indian headdress" in that stanza could be only notionally Indian, or fake-Indian, the way some in the US still dress their kids as stereotypes of indigenous people for Columbus Day and/or Thanksgiving pageants. If the character were wearing "cowboy boots," I think the reader could readily understand that no actual herding of cows would be done while wearing the boots, just as no burial of the dead will be done in the undertaker's suit. In other words, I easily parsed both dress-up items as fake, notional, spurious.I write, however, from a position of ethnic privilege, being Whitey McWhitepants, and cannot speak to whether any actual indigenous people might or might not be offended. I liked the poem as is; your mileage may vary.
I just took it as an incongruous get-up. A ridiculous combination (somewhat like a parrot-ox.) Any derogatory intention completely passed me by.
I say problematic in that I don't think the intention is to set up the connotation of an Indian drinking. I don't think avoiding that connotation in a poem about paradox is being politically correct. If the intention is to set a contrast to the undertaker, symbolic of the end of life or someone who ushers us out of this life, then I'm not sure how the headdress,a seldom used warbonnet it what usually comes to mind, fits in. I don't think it is just dress up that is being represented. I also don't believe that Jane was being intentionally derogatory. It is not my belief that the writer can't write about the other without paying their dues as that is impossible and would limit what is being written akin to censorship. To answer you Jim I think I as a reader find it problematic, both as an image that plays with a dangerous stereotype in my mind and as a line I don't think does what it intended. Certainly mine is only one reading and obviously not a popular one.
This month was super-hard to vote. So many good poems! But I choose "Tom’s Quality of Light" by Jan Steckel.
Yesterday, after four days of reading, re-reading, and re-re-reading, I finally chose "The Parrot-Ox," an amazingly rich poem that speaks, using its quirky irony, to the many levels of the human condition.Well done, Jane!
tlj
Sandra wrote: "I say problematic in that I don't think the intention is to set up the connotation of an Indian drinking. I don't think avoiding that connotation in a poem about paradox is being politically correc..."
Sandra, your opinion may not be a popular one, but I certainly respect your right to offer it based on your comment "I don't think the line does what it was intended to do." This is a valid and possibly constructive point to offer. On the other hand, what the writer chooses to do with that comment will be her choice. A way to extend that criticism in a positive manor is to now offer some possible suggestions for the writer to consider in revision. What image may work better in its place and why? Had you said something reproaching the writer's personal sensitivities, I might have offered a different response. Thanks.
Jim wrote: This is a valid and possibly constructive point to offer. On the other hand, what the writer chooses to do with that comment will be her choice. A way to extend that criticism in a positive manor is to now offer some possible suggestions for the writer to consider in revision. What image may work better in its place and why?As a practicing poet, I both value and welcome good, constructive criticism. Both of you have excellent points. I consider none of my poems--not even the published ones--finished. I will turn away from a poem, go back and change one word or image. I keep all drafts to show the progress and changes that I make. One can always go back and undo an edit. Until the poet dies, the poem is ripe for revision.
The one thing to remember is that for a poem to have literary value, it must stand on its own, leave few questions that interfere with its enjoyment, for the poet should not have to "be there" (nor will he/she always be there) to explain.
I like this kind of "workshop" discussion. Valuable!
tlj
Sandra wrote: "I say problematic in that I don't think the intention is to set up the connotation of an Indian drinking. I don't think avoiding that connotation in a poem about paradox is being politically correc..."Thanks Sandra! If you didn't point out those lines I would've zipped past them. Going back, that is where the whole poem made sense to me.
Since a good deal of the poem is about comparing dualities (play / work, practical / idealist, busily doing nothing, etc) I assumed that the purpose of this stanza was to highlight two opposing styles of fashion. In this case, it is an "undertaker's suit" to an "Indian headdress," one of which is supposedly more somber than the other.
It does seem risky to evoke the alcoholic Native American stereotype. In retrospect, this might actually be intentional in the poem as there seems to be link between the drinking to sober up with the Indian headdress and the die at birth with the undertaker's suit in the later stanzas. I suppose that a tragic stereotype at the end contrasted against a comedic make-believe beast at the beginning makes the entire poem fitting to the paradox. And more compelling.
On a side note, I am going out on a limb and making the claim that this poem is literally about a Native American undertaker because the idea is paradoxical: how does an individual balance tradition with modernity and survive without betraying oneself in the historical context. It could have strayed into the derogatory but I think the author is sympathetic.
