In Paris

[delph_ambi]

Original:

In Paris

I think you have many such pyramids in Paris,
she said, and I couldn’t deny it, though this one – this
was something new

she walked away and into a kiosk
I followed, but all I could see was an elderly woman
dressed in blue stripes
far too short to see across the counter
her eyes on a level with Marie-Claire
but that wouldn’t satisfy her ugly demands in her stockings
criss-crossed with veins and treachery

I left
and rested my eyes on the statue which wielded
a sheaf of corn
above the pale plants
and between the two, a movement –
a cat sweeping by, black and agile, mimicking shadows
then gone, and all I had left was a memory

of pyramids, splashed with graffiti
wrought with solitude


Revision:

In Paris

I think you have many such pyramids in Paris,
she said, and I couldn’t deny it, though this one – this
was something new

she walked away and into a kiosk
I followed, but all I could see was an elderly woman
dressed in blue stripes
far too short to see across the counter
her eyes on a level with Marie-Claire
but that wouldn’t satisfy her ugly demands in her stockings
criss-crossed with veins and treachery

I left
rested my eyes on pale plants
and between them, a movement –
a cat swept by, mimicking shadows
then gone, and all I had left was a memory

of pyramids, splashed with graffiti
wrought with solitude

[ray miller]

Another poem I don't much understand except it's a bit scary in a Don't Look Now kind of way.It is a very intriguing beginning but I keep thinking about dressed in blue stripes. Blue and what? Or are they alternate shades of blue. I'm sure this isn't the crux of the poem but, you know, the devil's in the detail.
Took me a while to realise Marie-Claire wasn't a woman but a magazine.
"stockings criss-crossed with veins and treachery" is great.
It's the ending that baffles me but mimicking shadows is also very nice.

[delph_ambi]

Thanks Ray. The blue stripes are whatever image 'blue stripes' brings to your mind. I think I was looking at a black and white photo when I wrote that line (which doesn't help). I know there were definitely stripes. I chose 'Marie-Claire' deliberately as it has the potential to be confusing, which I hoped would add to a general feeling of unease in the reader.

[brianedwards]

Catherine, how important is the statue? It breaks the movement I think, and I have an issue with the idea of wielding corn. Would you consider reducing that stanza to the cat image? "Black and agile" is superfluous, borderline cliché, and mimicking shadows is such a wonderful description you don't need anything else. Perhaps "a cat swept by, mimicking shadows"?

That aside, there is an extraordinarily unsettling mood pervading the poem. "Don't Look Now" -- YES!!

B.

[delph_ambi]

Thanks Brian. The statue isn't important. I put it in, because it's there, and I tend to be punctilious in observation. However, as in painting a picture, you don't have to put in every signpost along the road if the trees overhanging are what matters. I'll try a version sans statue and see how it looks (ditto the 'black and agile').

I saw 'Don't Look Now' in the cinema when it first came out, not having read any reviews or anything so not knowing what to expect. It scared me witless. I'd forgotten about it until mentioned in this thread, but I'm sure it's influenced my horror writing (of which I do quite a lot - mostly short stories) and something of the atmosphere will have crept into my poetry, especially the multitude of poems set in Paris (not exactly Venice, but not Stoke-on-Trent either). Apologies to anyone on this board from Stoke. I've never even been there. That was mean.

[calico]

Lovely, and unsettling -I can see it all, the woman and her stockings (I'm getting some sort of idea of varicose veins bulging through too. Nothing wrong with that of course) and the statue threw me a little bit of track - a sheaf of corn is such an organic image - could you give it some weight or something that helps it be a statue - is it bronze/silver?
It's beautiful sounding and resonates at the end....Ray, when he is not yawning at my poems, once gave an inspired description of the word "wrought" as a combination of right and wrong.
I know you from TWI by the way where you judged my poems I am mew. Nice to meet you.

[delph_ambi]

Hi Mew! And thank you. Yes, I was hinting at varicose veins there with the stockings. I'll probably ditch the statue. I think the revised version without it doesn't feel as if there's something missing. Then again I could develop it. Give it more solidity.

Love that idea of 'wrought' being a combination of 'right' and 'wrong'.

[David]

Woah. Where did the treachery come from? Is this the uneasy uncertainty that one has in Paris about who did what during the war? Or is that a thing of the past?

Great details, but I couldn't understood who "she" was, nor why you were talking about pyramids. (Is this the courtyard of the Louvre? We're not in Da Vinci Code territory, are we?)

Still, a neat - but not too neat - evocation of a moment and a mood. I would end with graffiti - the last line seems over right and wrong to me, too sighingly poetical. I'll be in a minority on that, I'm sure.

Cheers

David

[ray miller]

Ha! I'm now hearing the opening three lines spoken by Rene in 'Allo 'Allo!

[delph_ambi]

Thanks David. The pyramid in question is a graffiti covered sad little thing in Belleville, probably in a cemetery. Nothing like the Louvre one, I assure you. You know, I almost agree with you about ending at the graffiti. 'wrought with solitude' is authorial intrusion for effect, and really nothing to do with the poem, any more than the treachery has anything to do with anything. My poems rely far too heavily on smoke and mirrors. Occasionally I get found out.

Ray: René? Noooooooooooo!!!!!!!!

[ray miller]

Merde! Now I'm hearing the 2nd verse also as spoken by Rene. Thankfully, after treachery the plague has encountered Le Resistance.

[Denis Joe]

I like this very much. The revision has tightened it up, but rather than simply changing the narrative you have created a different perspective.

her ugly demands in her stockings
criss-crossed with veins and treachery

is just a powerful image. However do you need to use the description of the woman as 'elderly'. it imposes a little to much and seems to be telling the viewer what they should see rather than allowing them to make their own conclusions. For the same reason I would agree with David: end on 'Graffiti'.

[brianedwards]

I agree that "wrought with solitude" is perhaps too much of an intrusion, but ending on graffiti doesn't quite reach, for me. No suggestions here, of course.

B.

[delph_ambi]

Agreed, I don't really need 'elderly', do I.

Still thinking about the end. Last line will probably go, but the graffiti line isn't a great ending, BUT if that goes it ends with 'all I had left was a memory' which is pure cliché so would have to go. That's the trouble with lopping off first and last lines. Eventually you're left with nothing. The title isn't even particularly strong, so that ought to go too. That leaves an invisible poem, spoken in a fake French accent by an inaudible René soundalike. Nice idea, but not practical.

Thanks everyone for all comments and suggestions on this one. I'm putting it to bed for now, but will probably resurrect it in a month or two and have another look.

[brianedwards]

That's the trouble with lopping off first and last lines. Eventually you're left with nothing. The title isn't even particularly strong, so that ought to go too. That leaves an invisible poem, spoken in a fake French accent by an inaudible René soundalike. Nice idea, but not practical.

Seriously Cath, the poem needs very little work. Never a bad idea to get some distance though.

B.