Poetry Forum

It is a night of resurrection, a territorial end.
An odyssey through the fatherland,
my heritage between the marshes.
The infrastructure of the tethered soul;
a reservation beyond hope- I have no beginning.
The traditional threshold of meditation,
a familiar pursuit through the coastal plains,
a progression through the formless labyrinth
in terror. “Take heed” my mother would say,
“it will be over soon.”
I shivered with reproach;
no thought is random-
our prayers will never be answered again!
I sowed the ashes of mutability
towards the higher ground
and unraveled the symmetry
of decadence marching;
a spectrum of synthetic harvest-
the miasmic season, vacant;
it takes a while to grow anything.
“I ask of you”, the people from my village would say
“is it in you now to gaze at the imperial coalition,
the peripheral revolution?
Don’t believe what you hear, don’t believe what you see.”
They pulled me under the disheveled fabric
of time, brittle as the wind is brittle.
On arrival there were no release,
no shelter.
The spatial communion, the mutual dialogue
between the things behind the chirping colony
of skewed dimensions and morals;
the inner resources
beneath the farmyard.
The unseen forces
toiled and caressed
the strange tongue of the herbalist,
the voice of injustice.
We listened:
“Do you feel like you have found your past
little boy? Outside
is a flute, a trumpet and a horn-
let me play it for you,
the ancient compositions
of deprivation.”
And he played
the howls of the primal drone.
Its very foundations,
its courtship and tension,
its bewitchment and salvation
were torn to the ground.
The gesture then ceased and the howling
faded.
“You see what you have done?
You peasant! You coakroach!”
I knew
as surely I knew
the holy spirit has departed
and the human race is enclosed.
I know there’s an answer
and I will wait, shrivelled
by the mist of lamentation and haze
that is gathered on this foreign land.
The echoes of my father’s last words
finally sang to me:
preserve your determination,
you have come a long way

Hi Mulbery, welcome to PG. I rather enjoyed this mix of the concrete and the abstract, but I think there's a bit too much abstract. Ignoring for a minute the fact that I'm not sure what your poem is about, I think there are parts that work well:

a spectrum of synthetic harvest-
the miasmic season, vacant;
it takes a while to grow anything.

for example. Other phrases make no sense to me:

“I ask of you”, the people from my village would say
“is it in you now to gaze at the imperial coalition,
the peripheral revolution?

- it seems a rather unlikely thing for the people to say, and without more context, is lost on me.

Realms of the living dead is too much of a zombie-cliche to be found in a serious poem! Why are there resources below the farmland?

I'm getting something of a feeling of someone returning to their homeland and some sort of ritual taking place, but I think you need to concentrate a bit more on the physical and ignore the seduction of the abstract.

Ros

I have to agree with you Ros, I do feel it is too abstract, and I will be honest with you, it was very unintentional. I have always kind of struggled to really convey concrete images very well- but it is something I will definitely try to do the next time I write something.

I agree with you about what you highlighted- it is a very unlikely thing for a villager to say, but what I initially intended was that the villagers were acting as a vessel to give the protagonist a revelation that his foundation (destiny) is and continues to be under-attack. Phrases like 'peripheral revolution' gives hope to the protagonist that he can make that change, whether it is a spiritual change or an aesthetic change such as a change in lifestyle et cetera.

I took away the 'living dead' line, as it was REALLY cliche, like you mentioned. The 'inner resources' below the farmyard is actually the continuation of the 'harvest' imagery that I used previously. You may never reap your labour; your prosperity may never be conceived. So that was my main idea.

Do tell me if there's anything else you would like to know. Thank you for reading.

Mulbery, I'm going to move this one to beginners, as I don't think it's quite up to the standard we expect for this board. You'd probably get better help with working on the concrete as opposed to the abstract there. I very much look forward to reading your future work, though. Come and introduce yourself in the Hello forum, if you'd like.

Ros

I'm enjoying navigating this one, Mulbery, but I've had to stop to ask for directions. Is that mashes or marshes?

I'm guessing marshes.

Now you just set me on the right road and I'll be on my way again.

Cheers

David

Hi, Mulbery.

Quite an entrance to PG!

The effort you've put in here is quite clear to see. It's a long and challenging piece with some great lines:

pulled me under the disheveled fabric
of time

chirping colony
of skewed dimensions and morals

etc.

Like Ros & David, I'm not left with a sense of what you're trying to say. But, I'm a bad reader, so add a little salt to that .

Ros mentioned some abstraction, which I feel is a fair point.

It's hard work, but certainly a re-reader.

Kindest,

- Neil

Thank you very much for your comments. David, it certainly is 'marshes' and not 'mashes'- thank you for pointing that out to me.

My first reply to Ros pretty much explains the basic outline of the poem but I could always explain it further, if you wish.

Mulberry. You have some GREAT lines in the first half of this creation - I see you suffer from meandering fever that I once had. Get in & get out -
Tell the story is what they say. But sometimes it feels great to wander with wordings & create an epic adventure !!
As with a good sauce - trying reducing in half &
Keep the best ingredients

Peas

Chicory

The opening line is powerful

Mulbery, welcome. This is a very rich narrative. You have gotten some good feedback and I look forward to seeing what you will do with this. I liked the undercurrent of a driving motion, a constant moving forward. I also liked the last 2 lines. Thanks for the read. Suzanne

"I know there's an answer"

Telling and compelling me to say this is a good add to your poem. Although I believe you don't actually know there's an answer. If there is, it might not be considered an answer because questions are immutably human, yes? Sorry for the digression- this sentence promotes the dialectical crises of the poem. This is the expectation that suffering be answered, only to find that expectations, and needing suffering to have an answer are more palpable within fear, hence more suffering.

I would expect within the theme and tenor of the poem you might add a cathartic release, even if it were to understand its futility. In that case you could play with acceptance, whether it be opposed, conditioned, redefined or integral in collapsing the gap between what you feel, what you need and what you know. It is a common and shared psychical crises. I would not dare say you should contrive some sort of defining message that would indicate growth, rather, I encourage you to look at this as a cyclical process. Think. Test your reality. Write a new poem to be its dialectical opposite. 'I have suffered unto the world within a void of understanding, and that makes me yearn for something I know does not exist - but now, futility- demise, or futility- freedom? Or both and yes both, where understanding futility is what you need more than being given a ubiquitous, omniscient and delusional truth.

I should really apologize and add a caveat: I tend to enjoy, and really must, relate to human expressions on a concentrated level of understanding. I can play around with diffusion and ego-speak but care only to discuss the meat- even as a vegetarian. That was a joke.

Understanding you existed previously is reminiscent of advaita non-dualism and its assertion that earth bound boundaries are unnecessary and actually obstructionist to spiritual freedom. Being that you referenced the theme to be about destiny, I carried that out farther than where you are right now. I hope that might be helpful. I like your bitter attempt, regardless, and view your stasis as consequential to feeling the universe is somehow standing in your way more than it is to others.


Regards,

D

Thanks everyone for reading. I will post another poem later on, once I know where I stand here- as a beginner or an experienced writer.

Danaleekss, thank you for your comment but I am not sure if what you're saying is a positive or negative criticism, or really just your interpretation of the entire poem. A little summary would be cool, if you haven't done that already. But thank you very, very, very much for your efforts, same for the rest of you!

Always positive criticism with me, to be sure. I don't want to knock down your art, your expressions, rather, I felt compelled and related to your poem, which is why I wrote so much. As far as it being my interpretation, I would think that would be obvious, haha (teasing). I definitely felt the psychical crisis of the poem and believe it is entirely relevant to you. I think you have your compass pointing you in the best direction, as I was just talking about how you can't argue something that is entirely subjective, that expression is never deficient just under-expressed. I may very well get more out of listening to a man playing the sax in the street, rather than the opera - it depends. That is who I am. I understood more about myself when I read your poem, and probably more so when I critiqued it! And you're very welcome! Nice to E-meet you!

I guess I should also add when I said 'bitter attempt' it had a good connotation. Bitter is hard to experience with clarity and felt you nailed it. Also, I was expressing to you how I feel about the intent of the poem, to recognize stasis as being consequential to feeling unfairly picked on. That may be true, but you certainly get stuck in the mud if you stay in that perception, blow it up, and let that define you.

Your poem is perfect. I think if you believe that first you'll see that your expression has real beauty, and might be better expressed with critique, yet I feel that it is unhealthy to neurotically conform to others' standards -one can lose themselves in that process. There is a lot of good feedback here but I feel the community of it is more profound.

This is quite epic in scale I think. Some great lines. I'm wondering if the line break in the following is really necessary though:

"The gesture then ceased and the howling
faded."

Welcome to PG. I look forward to reading you in future.

my brain pretty much resembles mush right now so i won't pretend I fully understood the content, but just in terms of the structure - I wondered if more enjambment would help the flow, at the moment it seems to stall in places, it's a very evocative piece, it conjured up a landscape extremely well for me.