Thursday, September 8, 2011

Your Departure

Departure

Written for Bluebell Books Short Story Slam Week 9


Joseph Brodsky said,
"After all, it is hard to master both life and work equally well. So if you are bound to fake one of them, it had better be life."

"Bad literature is a form of treason."

"For the poet the credo or doctrine is not the point of arrival but is, on the contrary, the point of departure for the metaphysical journey." 












Iosif Aleksandrovich Brodsky (24 May 1940 – 28 January 1996), was a Russian-American poet and essayist. He was expelled from the Soviet Union in 1972 for alleged "social parasitism" and settled in America with the help of W. H. Auden and other supporters. He taught thereafter at universities including those at Yale, Cambridge and Michigan.

Brodsky was awarded the 1987 Nobel Prize in Literature "for an all-embracing authorship, imbued with clarity of thought and poetic intensity". He was appointed American Poet Laureate in 1991.

A movie based on his life has been made, "A Room And A Half", directed by Andrey Khrzhanovsky.

Your Departure

I doubt I can say
what it is you did to me
when taking your leave,
acting the pirate
as if this was a movie
and you a golden
coin with evil eye
upon me striped and flayed, flensed,
my strips left out to
dry.  That good enough?

Written September 8, 2011   10:12 PM

3 comments:

  1. I like this! so few words, but each fitted perfectly to paint the portrait of the one left behind.

    My entry for this prompt: http://charleslmashburn.wordpress.com/2011/08/31/dearest-john-2/

    ReplyDelete
  2. and you a golden
    coin with evil eye
    upon me striped and flayed, flensed,
    my strips left out to
    dry. That good enough?

    stunning lines, glad to see your poetic talent, superb entry.

    ReplyDelete
  3. This is wonderful... such vivid imagery :-)

    ReplyDelete

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


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