Tuesday, January 4, 2011

Fatigue


Everything Has Frozen by
Evgeniy Lauk
Nick: laew
City: Germaniya (Germany) / Paderborn
Site: http://eugen.lauk.photosight.ru/


THE MEANING OF EXISTENCE

Everything except language
knows the meaning of existence.
Trees, planets, rivers, time
know nothing else. They express it
moment by moment as the universe.

Even this fool of a body
lives it in part, and would
have full dignity within it
but for the ignorant freedom
of my talking mind
.
- Les Murray



Leslie Allan Murray (born 1938) is the outstanding poet of his generation and one of his country's most influential literary critics. A nationalist and republican, he sees his writing as helping to define, in cultural and spiritual terms, what it means to be Australian.




When I lift from a standing start, with both of my feet firmly planted on the planet, I do not disagree with Les Murray about the nature of things. But I came at this wondrous poem of his looking to frame my own work. It was not today for me a standing start. I was already in the air. So I must say there is yet more. There is a place for the words, for the worlds within the words. In this I stand with the producers of fantasy art in all its manifestations. The inner world is pressing in its demand for expression in some of us and is appreciated by so many more. There is a place for all that. I have a modest following here on this blog, with over eight thousand hits in seven months, and that means that many of you agree with me, or are at least entertained by me. When I "remember" other lives and other shapes in this life, I accept the presence of this and other inner worlds, the imaginings and the dreams. So here's a brief display of another world, one of the worlds that can be found within the words:

Fatigue

As you sink with grace
and place your crown aside, place
your head on my knee:

Milady, I am
perplexed, in wonder, half-smile
on my boyish lips.
I recall other
nights and feel the full presence
of your throne beside
this stoop where I sit
lower than you would if you took
your true rightful place.

October 13, 2009 12:43 PM

3 comments:

  1. Perhaps it is the poet's job to use words that are not quite ripe enough with meaning on their own, to shed light on the meaning of existence. Perhaps the words themselves are too lonely, too lifeless. Perhaps it is a poet's job to press his lips to the words, animate, then lift them like a body and pass them as a body through the crowd. Perhaps it is the poet's job to be a part of that crowd, as well, to lay his hands upon that body, to feel the warmth. Perhaps the poet sees, then says what he sees, creating tiny volatile corporeal bodies of words, and then must continually experience those bodies, both creator and consumer. I believe we are all poets when we allow ourselves to be.

    It's funny. This reminds me of a poem I wrote some time ago and now I wonder if you didn't write it as a response as I remember your poem from somewhere before.

    xo
    erin

    ReplyDelete
  2. I have had the same feeling about musicianship, that most of us could be tolerable musicians, though few of us really have the talent to rise above. I see this clearly. We lost ground creatively when we allowed media to take our music and our words. While it gave careers to a few, the raw capacity of the many now idle in consumer grooves.

    There used to be parlors full of creative people in the evenings. Now we have groups gathered in front of the TV. Of course, lately there is this return of creativity because the internet lets us publish as if we were pros.

    It is highly likely that this poem is one you have seen before. Most of my poems are first published in the comments of various blogs. Your work is a great resource for my work. The comments are the best parts of our relationship since we can't hang out and have tea and whatnot. The date is key. Check your archive for 12 or 13 October, 2009.

    ReplyDelete
  3. No, I suppose not. I was thinking of this, my post:

    (i am tired. i am tired and inside of that fatigue i push at its walls and find a place where i belong. it's me with my head pressed to his knee. his hand isn't as large as you would think. small even. and that is fine. it is not size that soothes but intention. and here at knee, my head heavy and free, i could sleep, but instead I choose to sit forever.)

    My head is to your knee
    my hair your instrumental strings
    hum to me another story of your life
    as i nod off to the trembling
    of your throat

    corn silk corn silk corn silk
    the words a complaint
    but the treble of your workings
    play me low and soft
    content

    i was a boy once
    you try to convince me
    a boy
    you get it wrong
    you think i believe you were never a boy
    but the truth is
    i don't believe you're a man

    my neck catches my head
    as I nod nod
    then plummet straight toward dream
    does god keep a stop watch?
    press buttons to mark time?
    control the spill of stories that transfer soul?

    I was a boy was a boy was a boy
    and you play my corn silk
    my head prostrated at the knee of your distant king
    so distant
    so distant
    so

    and you wrote:

    Erin, may I offer a vision of my own?

    Fatigue

    As you sink with grace
    and place your crown aside, place
    your head on my knee:

    Milady, I am
    perplexed, in wonder, half-smile
    on my boyish lips.
    I recall other
    nights and feel the full presence
    of your throne beside
    this stoop where I sit
    lower than you would if you took
    your true rightful place.

    xo
    erin

    ReplyDelete

The chicken crossed the road. That's poultry in motion.


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