JP's take on assignment #4
Hello, e'erybody.
for our readership, we currently have one Rod moving to SF as we speak, via car, one Rod packing to move on Friday, one Rod living as a transient in Upstate New York, and one more actually learning and doing high intellectual thinking on a daily basis. We're going to become a bi-coastal rod soon, so be on the lookout for the dual-ocean hilarity that ensues. But if posts have been a little scattershot, that's why.
Secondly, this assignment. I wasn't sure if we are supposed to provide a description of said dream, so I won't.
Father Cyclops
Blue Styrofoam pressed in with red wires stabbing out,
a mother-of-pearl sphere dangling on the end.
Galway, let me not chew chicken feathers again.
Slats of wood arranged on pylons, jutting out
over water, a saggy bridge, water shooting up
between the cracks. My Father, eyeless and screaming
on the end of the pier, the beating outsize pearl clutched
in my hand. The mist turns bloody from exposure
to the socket, the recyclable in my hand staring
through thumb flesh straight at me. The barbeque tongs
swing wildly in a blind man’s hand. The sun shines
through the red fog, burning and roasting hemoglobin,
rendering air orange. Everything is sticky with fluid.
He screams, I can do nothing. I try to put it back in,
but the wires poke his head flesh, and he screams like an animal.
Twenty-year dream, what can I do for you? I claw
at my own eyes, live in sightlessness, but still
I see your dream, receiving the colors through
stringy red wires, dangling limp ocular coat hangers,
as we stare, screaming, into the other’s sockets.
for our readership, we currently have one Rod moving to SF as we speak, via car, one Rod packing to move on Friday, one Rod living as a transient in Upstate New York, and one more actually learning and doing high intellectual thinking on a daily basis. We're going to become a bi-coastal rod soon, so be on the lookout for the dual-ocean hilarity that ensues. But if posts have been a little scattershot, that's why.
Secondly, this assignment. I wasn't sure if we are supposed to provide a description of said dream, so I won't.
Father Cyclops
Blue Styrofoam pressed in with red wires stabbing out,
a mother-of-pearl sphere dangling on the end.
Galway, let me not chew chicken feathers again.
Slats of wood arranged on pylons, jutting out
over water, a saggy bridge, water shooting up
between the cracks. My Father, eyeless and screaming
on the end of the pier, the beating outsize pearl clutched
in my hand. The mist turns bloody from exposure
to the socket, the recyclable in my hand staring
through thumb flesh straight at me. The barbeque tongs
swing wildly in a blind man’s hand. The sun shines
through the red fog, burning and roasting hemoglobin,
rendering air orange. Everything is sticky with fluid.
He screams, I can do nothing. I try to put it back in,
but the wires poke his head flesh, and he screams like an animal.
Twenty-year dream, what can I do for you? I claw
at my own eyes, live in sightlessness, but still
I see your dream, receiving the colors through
stringy red wires, dangling limp ocular coat hangers,
as we stare, screaming, into the other’s sockets.
This poem is a little difficult to get into at first because the sense of place isn't exactly placed until the third full stanza. On the first read it felt disjointed and I kind of had to put it together myself on the second read. But I think you could always strengthen the coherence by shuffling the order of the poem around. If I think of how you might do that, I'll let you know.
ReplyDeleteThough the narrative is solid, I think some of your action/verbs could be refined to be a bit stronger: "stabbing out" (stz. 1), "jutting out" (stz. 3), "swing wildly" (stz. 6) and the repetition of the word 'scream.' They do the work of meaning, but they don't feel like they're doing much else. They give the poem the effect of being workman-like, indentured to the narrative.
I do enjoy the monostrophe starting "Galway..." even if I don't necessarily love the last line, but mostly because of the repetition of 'scream.'
Generally I think it's an interesting read, very Freudian. Congrats. Sorry if the comments were a bit rough around the edges, I'm still a little out of it from waking up.
This poem is SO 'Merica.
ReplyDeleteNo, but really. This assignment is bizarrely perfect for me with the driving and the moving and the trajectories of bodies that all constantly impose reminiscing on my childhood and/or dreams. I can't wait to crank this one out.
Jon...just quickly: there's something uncomfortable about this poem. (if at any point this seems like garbadlygook, blame it on Arkadelphia, Arkansas)...okay, so uncomfortable---it's so very much unlike both 1) Galway Kinnel's Book of Nightmares (which I could argue is told from the point of view of someone recalling a dream) and 2) W.S. Merwin's The Lice (which I could arguably argue is told from the point of view of someone actually experiencing a dream). Both books have a certain detachedness about them--- like a true archivist or historian attempting to look back with as little bias as possible (or at the very least recognizing their bias). This poem is full of bias. Bias of a 3 year old brain. Bias of 20 years worth of other dreams and perspective. It's colored and shaded in a way that makes me skin crawl (but in a good way).
I'll give you more line by line analysis as soon as I get more sleep hours than driving hours; but goodness gracious, Jon, this is a freaky ass dream, and I can feel that freaky ass reverberation through 2 decades worth of young life. Point of view and position in regards to language rock the most here. As far as general prescriptive advice goes: I'd make it bizarrer-- instead of making my skin crawl, make me want to peel it off my bones.
Mostly I just wrote a stream of consciousness review, but I hope it helps in some marginal way. At the very least I'm fucking Rod with a Rod while sitting on a shitter in Plano, Texas and it feels oh so
AD
PS-
"receiving the colors" is fantabulous.