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A Post-Modern Romance
| Critical Analysis #1 |
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A Post-Modern Romance |
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jenni Member
since 1999-09-11
Posts 478Washington D.C. |
In your arms on a moonlit night, I know you want to say you love me madly; But you know we both have seen and read Countless movies, plays and novels Where the hero, with his arms around his love, Whispers near those very words; And you know That I know You know this. So in your arms on a moonlit night, You gaze into my eyes and whisper, “As Danielle Steele would say, ‘I love you madly.’” We giggle and I pull you close, We kiss; But you know, That I know, That you know Something has been lost. j.p. [This message has been edited by jenni (edited 01-06-2000).] |
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| © Copyright 2000 jenni - All Rights Reserved | |||
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warmhrt Senior Member
since 1999-12-18
Posts 1563 |
jenni, I hope this didn't really happen to you. I know men often find it hard to say those words (without the "Danielle Steele says"), but to make it a quote, and then cause a giggle would surely ruin the moment. Entertaining piece of work. warmhrt |
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jbouder Member Elite
since 1999-09-18
Posts 2534Whole Sort Of Genl Mish Mash |
jenni: What snagged my attention first was the title (great title, by the way). Your use of meter is very interesting too. The first lines of both stanzas roll off the tongue ... very musical. I also love your word play, particularly the use of "I love you madly" in two separate contexts. A meter question: The last line of the first stanza ... YOU know THIS ... or ... you KNOW this. Just curious. But you are such a gal!  The narrator is saddened because the novelty is gone when, in its place, she now has commitment. WH, men are more afraid of commitment than they are of saying "I love you". Just a matter of perspective, I guess, and proof that it is easier to write a double sestina than for a man to understand a woman. Excellent job on this jenni. Inspite of my levity (above) I really enjoyed your story line too and can relate. Thanks.  Jim "If I rest, I rust." - Martin Luther |
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John Foulstone Member
since 2000-01-01
Posts 100Australia |
Very good, Jenni! Ain't it the truth. When you start to pretend, the game is really over. Re Jim's query, I read it as "and you KNOW that i KNOW you know THIS." Something for everybody in poetry! |
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Hawk183 Member
since 1999-12-24
Posts 130 |
Jenni, I have to agree with Jim on two things here.. The meter was very intriguing and reads very well...and secondly on the issue of "love". I see the tragedy described here, yet there seems to be, for the nararator, too much importance on the material aspect of this commitment..(I get kinda huffy about love sometimes...sorry) Great poem though! |
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manalive325 Junior Member
since 1999-12-15
Posts 21 |
Jenni, I think you captured a feeling in this that is expressed better here than to try to describe it. I like that it reads easy. The meter worked for me. And the repeated phrase "you know, that I know, that you know", does a good job giving me the reader that feeling. To be honest, I hate that feeling. We men can be more creative in expressing ourselves. New words can be found. Laziness is just that. You have inspired me to be more expressive, because it is so sad to leave it unsaid or ruin it with a used quotation. |
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roxane Senior Member
since 1999-09-02
Posts 505us |
i'm not going to comment on meter or the like, because i know very little of it. i only want to say that there is a side of this poem that touches me, probably a side that you don't even see. but i see it as this sarcasm, this inability to convey one's true emotions as ruining beautiful moments. i guess i see it that way because i relate to it best. anyways, i enjoyed it, and i hope that i am somewhere close to your meaning on it. |
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J.L. Humphres Member
since 2000-01-03
Posts 201Alabama |
jenni, I loved reading this; the idea behind it is so lacquing in cliche. Very original in its presentaion as well as the: "you know, That I know, That you know," parts. Wonderful. J.L.H. We all go a little mad sometimes... --Alfred Hitchcock |
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Brad Member Ascendant
since 1999-08-20
Posts 5705Jejudo, South Korea |
Jenni, (and yes I'm very, very happy that you're back) When I read the first line here, I went geez, Jenni, what are you doing? Then I remembered the title and finished the rest of the poem. I enjoyed it very much and remember with fondness Beaudrillard (the postmodern guru as some have called him) -- simulation, damn it, it's all simulation. However, you end the poem in a very Modernist way -- a longing for some pure, untainted moment, some lost emotion that we know was once there and can see it just out of reach. A Post Modernist doesn't believe such a moment ever existed for all situations are socially constructed. A Post Modernist would laugh and giggle and not worry about the 'something lost'; he or she would just ride the moment and enjoy what happens. I don't believe such a moment ever existed as well. "Nothing is outside the text." J. Derrida |
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jenni Member
since 1999-09-11
Posts 478Washington D.C. |
warmheart, guess what? yes, this actually happened to me, danielle steele and all, lol. what i was trying to say here in this piece was pretty difficult (for me, at least). we've seen it out here at the forum, lots of times, when someone will say a phrase or even the entire idea for a poem is a cliche, it's been done before, especially with love poetry, how hard it is to say anything original. yes, brad, everything is simulation, a reference to something else. and that depresses me, actually.... if "i love you" (or anything else) has been said 100 billion times before by 100 billion people, what do any one particular person's thoughts or feelings matter? well, they matter because they are one's own, i guess (although hardly original), but that leaves me feeling pretty alone. since we still feel a need to share ourselves with others, yet our own thoughts and feelings really just aren't all that important, one way to connect is to show that you're "in" on the whole thing by cloaking what you have to say in sarcasm, or by turning your expression into something that could, if necessary, be turned into a joke with a quote or a reference. but as roxane recognized, yes, this inability or unwillingness to convey one's true emotions straight up leaves us (or me, anyway) feeling even more alone. and that, brad, is why i ended the poem not with the giggle and the kiss (warmhrt, you'll be glad to know the quote didn't entirely 'ruin the mood', lol), but with the sense of "longing for some pure, untainted moment, some lost emotion" in your words; or put more simply, with the sense that something has been lost. we are all post-modernists to some degree, i don't think we can avoid it, but not all of us like it. i guess i didn't do too good a job at showing this in the poem, though, lol. thanks, everyone, for your comments. and jim and john, i intended the cadence in those lines to be as follows: and YOU know that I [emphasized] know you KNOW this. (not a very strong emphasis, though, you know? ) thanks everyone! |
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Poertree Senior Member
since 1999-11-05
Posts 1359UK |
Jenni I was getting more and more excited reading down the comments on this poem everyone seemed to like it (even "Know it all Mr. double sestina addicted Jim" toed the party line) and have nothing negative to say. Then I got to Brad who regrettably said more or less exactly what I wanted to except more succinctly and using convincing name dropping and established theory to support a cogent argument . How am I to compete?This post is clearly fated .. here I am trying to get back into CA and just about to hit the submit button .. get bumped .. get back on again to find you Jenni, have just posted a lengthy reply ... ohh well .. It was a great poem .. it is necessarily .. as you say very personal because, what I was going to say before, was that in different circumstances .. in a different stage of a relationship such silly playfulness could well be seen by the respective partners as a reaffirmation of deep affection ... not clearly in this case though Thanks again Philip |
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Brad Member Ascendant
since 1999-08-20
Posts 5705Jejudo, South Korea |
Jenni, I don't want to twist your words around to fit my arguments but I see a solution to your "I love you" predicament. In linguistics, there is a distinction between types and tokens. As a type, "I love you" are the same three words but the moment they are used in any given situation they become a token and are necessarily never repeatable. Thus, "I love you", even if said a hundred billion different times can mean a hundred billion different things. Well, it's not quite that simple but I hope you see my point. When it comes to language, all words must be repeatable in order to be understandable -- an unrepeatable word would be a moment out of context with no history or social interaction and thus incomprehensible to anybody including the speaker. It follows that when any one of us writes an understandable poem we are using words and phrases that have already been used. So, am I saying that all poetry is a cliche? No, not really, because in poetry (in my opinion) we don't read for the types but for the tokens and a cliche is a poem that comes too close to another token which will necessarily lose its power: "She walks in beauty like the night" loses its token force when read by a reader who knows where that line comes from. We've already read it before. If someone hadn't read it before, it may still retain that force. It may not, of course, but that's just an extrapolation of what I've already said. What am I trying to say? Cliches are in the eye of the beholder (cute, huh?) as we are all individuals with different contextual backgrounds and any cliche I or other people have mentioned could conceivably be used in a poem in such a way that is not a cliche for someone else. We can agree on certain phrases being overdone because we, while all individuals, still have common points of reference (the English language, what we were told was poetry in school, the more poetry you read on your own, and a lot of other stuff). A common problem among poets is a kind of hyper-individualism (not talking about you specifically)-- a belief that whatever they write is unique and original because, well they wrote it and even if someone else said it, that doesn't matter because, well, they wrote it and felt it. First, if your writing something I can understand, you've written words that have already been used. Second, for me, words and poetry don't work that way. No one is denying a sincerity of feeling but if a poem resembles another token (not necessarily another poem), it sort of reverts back to a type (the same words) for me and is thus void of feeling. This problem becomes more apparent the more general you make your writing and, in my opinion, actually does a disservice to your own feelings or intent. On the 'lost' feeling: while you don't have to like it of course (although as you mentioned it didn't ruin the mood), the only point I was trying to get across is that you 'lost' one simulation for another. I think we both agree on this and yet that feeling of loss can only come from an expectation that it should have been different. That expectation comes from a socially constructed type when we live in a world filled with tokens. Never leave Jenni, Brad |
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jenni Member
since 1999-09-11
Posts 478Washington D.C. |
brad-- wow, you ARE an english professor, aren't you? lol i understand what you're saying about 'types' and 'tokens'. the thing i was trying to get at in the poem, though, was the problem of KNOWING that everything is simulation, of knowing at some level that the words are 'tokens', as you put it. this peculiar kind of self-knowledge, almost ironic self-awareness, creates a kind of distance, i think, the sense of being like a spectator. thus, in my poem, what is lost is not merely one simulation, traded for another, but also the 'innocence' (for lack of a better word) of not knowing. (hence all the emphasis on 'you know that i know that you know' etc.) so many things in our culture these days -- from 'the simpsons' to movies like 'l.a. confidential' or 'wag the dog', 'old navy' tv commercials, certainly any media coverage of nearly any event (i could go on and on) -- are virtually impossible without this kind of self-awareness. it's not simply that the 'simulation' of some idealized romantic moment was lost with the quoting of danielle steele (as i said, we had a very nice simulated evening even with that having been said, lol; it wasn't until later that this really began to bother me), but that i recognized that a more 'innocent' world has been lost, gone forever, and replaced with this ironic self-awareness. whether the 'modern' (as opposed to post-modern) world was actually 'socially constructed' or not, the crucial difference, as i see it, is that of awareness. and like i said before, i think we all have this post-modern awareness to some degree, whether we actually 'know' it (or like it) or not. (does this make ANY sense? lol) i'm learning alot from this, brad, things are gradually getting a little sharper focused in my mind, thanks! maybe i need to read some beaudrillard or derrida? or maybe just some danielle steel, lol. your turn to simulate some tokens, lol. |
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patchoulipumpkin Member
since 2000-01-01
Posts 196Bermuda |
Great, this is fantastic, the title is great and it just makes the poem even greater. Oh wow, i know exactly what you are saying, Where is the feeling? When we are so friggin ironic all the time, its great, it reminded me of this essay i read written by David Foster Wallace who writes about what you talk about, the notion that irony is scaring us from our emotions because we assume they are too sentimental and cushy. He later theorizes that the next revolutionaries will be the ones who stand up for their emotions, and risk being chastised from the "ironic gallery" to express how they really feel, instead of side-stepping it through sarcasm. Great poem, loved it. |
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jenni Member
since 1999-09-11
Posts 478Washington D.C. |
patch-- thank you thank you thank you! lol what a relief to know i'm not losing my mind here! "irony is scaring us from our emotions because we assume they are too sentimental and cushy" -- this is exactly what i was trying to get at, expressed much much better than my silly ramblings. any clues as to where i could find this essay you're talking about? i'd love to read it. thanks again, jenni |
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