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Open Poetry #42
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Tet
| Open Poetry #42 |
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Tet |
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Huan Yi Member Ascendant
since 2004-10-12
Posts 6688Waukegan 
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. Another day in Illinois Ends layered in color Orange yellow The houses shadow Under a final blue It’s hard to imagine How much already Has gone away by now From somewhere south And far from here The sound of a helicopter In the sky . |
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| © Copyright 2008 John Pawlik - All Rights Reserved | |||
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Bobby Jordan Member
since 2007-08-13
Posts 491Philadelphia, Pennsylvania |
Huan Yi, This is a lovely poem. Have a great Tet. Bobby |
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secondhanddreampoet Member Ascendant
since 2006-11-07
Posts 6394a 'Universalist' ! |
lovely indeed! [superb imagery] much applause!! |
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Artic Wind Member Rara Avis
since 2007-09-16
Posts 8080Realm of Supernatural |
Very nice imagery Indeed |
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TomMark Member Elite
since 2007-07-27
Posts 2133LA,CA |
Another day in Illinois Ends layered in color<----beauty If I could stretch time into dotted net if I could let the unwanted sieve through If I could compress spectrum to a silhouette If I were the sky retaining only blue. Orange yellow The houses shadow Under a final blue If I could soon cross the raging river If I could paint you tonight in shining silver It’s hard to imagine How much already Has gone away by now If I could tranfer all memories into words if I could release them as caged birds From somewhere south And far from here The sound of a helicopter In the sky if only my thought was lifted up if not to heaven but to see wide and far If I prepared a spot crossed by my blood If I could make you landing down your heart  [This message has been edited by TomMark (01-31-2008 06:25 PM).] |
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Bob K Member Elite
since 2007-11-03
Posts 4208 |
Dear Huan Yi, Your method tends toward extreme compression. When you set up such standards, places where you pull away from them tend to stand out. Your hero and mine, Donald Justice, touches on this in his poem "The Thin Man," when he speaks of indulging in rich refusals. A poem of this sort, as I think you know, cannot afford to be visually unclear. Places where it is visually unclear have a disproportionate effect in blunting the impact. "Ends layered in color/ Orange yellow" is obscure. We don't know from the text what these "Ends" may be. The clarity that may and probably is there for you hasn't been communicated. Ah, I see! ""Ends" is the end of the day. This is my denseness, of course, but perhaps my denseness here indicates not merely my own failing, but some possible problem with lineation as well. At this point I can see the colors of a sunset in the "Orange yellow," that piece of the obscurity seems clarified for me. And the "Layered in color," seems to offer the suggestion of one color atop another in a stained glass window. If this is true, then you'll probably want some piece of imagery with that kind of clarity to capture it. "The houses shadow Under a final blue" The daylight is fading, yes? The houses are captured under the last dark blue before the light drains away, and all that's left turns gray or black. The question is, what are the details needed to illustrate this? The task you've set yourself is one, if I understand it correctly, that has its roots in the japanese and chinese poetry originally championed by Ezra Pound and whose vigor and clarity were admired by Kenneth Rexroth and many of the zen influenced and beat poets of the fifties and sixties. Pound admonished us to fill every rift with ore; and Williams said "No ideas but in things." These are elements of what I understand to be the rules you've chosen to play by, and because of the advantages they offer, they shouldn't be abandoned lightly. I think, because you have done, or are trying to do the work in the first two stanzas well, that the abstractions of the third stanza aren't needed here. If you simply go ahead to the last stanza, I believe the work of the third stanza will have been done without the need of putting it down on paper. I have my own ideas about the final stanza that I'd simply like to inflict. Somewhere far south The sound of a helicopter Assaults the sky I offer this not because I think it is the solution, but because it offers some compression and at least one different way of looking at the stanza, I've slipped in an active verb and tried to compress the time frame with the PTSD-like painfulness that I believe you're looking for. Please use or discard any suggestions. I'm offering these not so much as a way of getting at this particular poem, but as a way of trying to express an understanding of the type of work you're grappling with right now and the problems that that work in general seems to offer. Compression and specificity as a way of expressing the general in the particular. Or some such. BobK. |
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TomMark Member Elite
since 2007-07-27
Posts 2133LA,CA |
Dear Bob K, I agree with you. "Somewhere far south The sound of a helicopter Assaults the sky" I add more here, it is the possible that MAN-made sound assaults my mind. |
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Gentle Spirit Member Patricius
since 2000-10-09
Posts 13989 |
I enjoy the brevity of your works. Your words leave me with just enough to ponder all of the possibilities that my mind allows me to see and that to me, is fantastic poetry.....anything that makes me think is always my favorite kind of poetry. |
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GG Member Elite
since 2002-12-03
Posts 3532Lost in thought |
I always love your poetry. This feels, to me, like a soft, gentle day. I think too soft for anything to be assaulting the sky. I like it. ~alyssa Hupomeno. |
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Huan Yi Member Ascendant
since 2004-10-12
Posts 6688Waukegan |
. "The sound of a helicopter Assaults the sky" Absolutely not . . . Thanks all for reading John . |
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secondhanddreampoet Member Ascendant
since 2006-11-07
Posts 6394a 'Universalist' ! |
Although I am not as fond of the ending of this 'write' as I am of its beginning, I must second the thought of : "Absolutely not(!)" . . . to the idea of: "The sound of a helicopter Assaults the sky" |
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Bobby Jordan Member
since 2007-08-13
Posts 491Philadelphia, Pennsylvania |
Huan Yi, I wouldn't change a thing from the original. It's very fine the way it is. Bobby |
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Bob K Member Elite
since 2007-11-03
Posts 4208 |
I'm not insistent on anything except my preference for staying alive, let alone a specific change for a poem. It was a constructive suggestion with constructive intent. As the statement "I offer this not because I think it is the solution," suggests, I don't think it solves the actual problem with the ending. I still feel there is an issue with the ending. I may be wrong about that, certainly, but I'm not an unpracticed reader of poetry. Saying "Absolutely Not!" to a suggestion that wasn't meant to fit in the first place seems to miss the point, doesn't it? If you can take out lines that don't pull their weight, why wouldn't you? Poems are poems, they don't have pride; only authors do. A poem isn't attached to a particular ending; only a poet is. The issue is how to bring helicopters into the ending in the way that serves the poem best. I've already said that I know my suggestion isn't right. Two other folks have said they think the ending isn't quite right either. Does "Absolutely Not!" serve your poem here? (Changing the ending to please any or all of us, of course, WOULD be worth that "Absolutely Not!" A poem can't be a democracy, and I know it. You're probably not best served by a poem written by a committee.) This doesn't mean that Huan Yi is anything other than a very fine poet. I like his poetry a great deal and have said so to him. If that is unclear, I will repeat myself: Huan Yi is a talented poet. Even very talented poets, if they are lucky, do not have to go entirely without feedback before critics start taking their books and the poems in them apart in public. Huan Yi should—I think— actually be thinking about a collection about now, and sharpening up his poems for a collection. No matter how wonderful any writer is, revision is still an issue. I still face looking like a fool every time I put a pen to paper, and I'm still considerably short of wonderful. I frequently end up looking foolish. Anybody who wants can see me look like an idiot in the postings, if they want, and can have a shot at telling me what they think I can do about making things better. All suggestions are welcome, and many are accepted. I'd rather somebody here tell me; editors are usually too busy to say anything, and it sometimes happens that you'll get something published that you cringe about later. The "Absolutely Not!" bothered me, in case you didn't pick that up. I felt that my regard for Huan Yi as a writer was being disparaged, and the importance of what we are attempting to offer each other is being diminished. Others have given me useful feedback, and I've tried to do the same. I wanted to be clear about that and not simply let it pass unremarked. [This message has been edited by Bob K (02-03-2008 10:20 PM).] |
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Huan Yi Member Ascendant
since 2004-10-12
Posts 6688Waukegan |
. I had thought of: “Above the trees” as a changed last line but was convinced otherwise.* John *I still like it as an alternative. . |
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Bob K Member Elite
since 2007-11-03
Posts 4208 |
I like it too, or even leaving it with the helicopter. The connection between Illinois, Tet, then and now shouldn't be rung like a gong. Brushes the trees Something that makes the helicopter closer, perhaps, more intimate than is comfortable, a piece of the past that is unsettling out of perspective after forty years. Possibly not. I'm trying to reach for a sensation here I can't quite grasp. Of course it's yours, so all I can do is make some sort of empathic leap, but that's the feel. I'm afraid that may not help, but I like your Above the trees and that set off my chain of associations. Good luck here. Bob. It's a good poem. |
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secondhanddreampoet Member Ascendant
since 2006-11-07
Posts 6394a 'Universalist' ! |
For what my ever-most-humble opinion is worth (or not?!): "brushes the trees" is significantly better than "assaults the sky" and "above the trees" also works...(both rather more effective, I believe, than the current last line) any of us who remember Nam far too well would have a variety of emotive connections to this imagery... also for those of us who appreciate Zen poetry and any form of minimalism... this was an interesting initial poem and subsequent 'poetic commentary.' |
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TomMark Member Elite
since 2007-07-27
Posts 2133LA,CA |
Because the first and second stanzas were visual. So I may add my opinion the ending might be its blinking light was the first star tonight. |
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Huan Yi Member Ascendant
since 2004-10-12
Posts 6688Waukegan |
. The reason I like the alternative is that: . . . helicopter Above the trees slips in what was and still is an almost iconic image from then John . |
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Bob K Member Elite
since 2007-11-03
Posts 4208 |
Then you need to go with that for now at least. Live with it and get a feel for how the poem likes that set of duds. A week or two and it should be able to get back to you. You do have the right instincts, you know. After a certain point, it's you and the poem in a cage. Then you let it alone for a while, look at it again. If you need some further snappy repartee, it's available. It's a good poem. BobK, |
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