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Critical Analysis #1
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Midnitesun
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0 posted 2001-08-10 11:54 AM


Spelunk! spelunk! spelunk!
Falling drops of lime
Falling moments in time.
The twilight zone beckons,
Daring you to enter
The yawning chasm of
The crystalline cave below,
Where spelunkers dangle
From friendly threads
And crawl 'round majestic columns
And shiny soda straws, swallowed by
Earth's cavernous mouth.
Aeolian music curling capriciously
Through canyons and galleries-
An opus of Nature's chamber music.
Unexpectedly, the sounds of a saxaphone
Echo, point to counterpoint,
Blending harmonically, sensuously,
Dancing lovers entwined
Beneath surface sinkholes that
Camouflage hidden treasures,
Young vertical shafts
Cutting through moist passages
Of calcite speleothems,
A whirlwind melody
Enveloping reed-like stalagmites,
Notes dropping serendipitously
From crystalline stalactites.
Spelunk! spelunk! spelunk!
Bridging ethereal tunes of nature
Surrealistically with sax sounds,
A jazz fusion with licks of lime,
Aeolian chamber music sublime,
Beckoning you to enter
These chambers divine.

Midnitesun



© Copyright 2001 Kathleen Kacy Stafford - All Rights Reserved
paladin
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1 posted 2001-08-10 12:11 PM


Delightfull imagery.Combining the music of nature with definitely Freudian lines.

Young vertical shafts
cutting throught moist passages

Perhaps my mind is in the gutter.

After all Freud once said,"Sometimes a cigar is just a cigar".  

paladin

Midnitesun
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2 posted 2001-08-10 08:06 PM


No, your mind isn't in the gutter. While I believe this really is an accurate description for what you might encounter while spelunking, that phrase you focussed on struck me in the same way it apparently struck you. And although I've never heard sax music in a cave setting, my imagination fills in the empty spaces in my ears. Thanks for reading and commenting.  
Songbird
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since 1999-12-15
Posts 2184
Missouri
3 posted 2001-08-24 05:46 PM


Very good sense of place in this poem..I can almost hear the trinkling and feel the isolation of the cave.. but since I get clastraphobia I'll just enjoy your poem and stay above ground. Nice to see a new poet on the blue pages. Hope to see more of your poems.
hush
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since 2001-05-27
Posts 1653
Ohio, USA
4 posted 2001-08-25 11:13 AM


I think you have a lot of really neat images in this, and for the most part they flow wonderfully. There are just a few lines I'd like to comment on:

'The twilight zone beckons,'

This line didn't work for me- it's very hard to pinpoint exactly what you mean, to say nothing of the instant intrusion of Rod Serling's eerie music on the poem. It just kind of counteracted the ethereal quality of the imagery.

'The yawning chasm of
The crystalline cave below,'

I think these lines deserve some elaboration- yawning chasm and crystalline caves are a little commonplace, and I think you could use some imagination on those two images to make them extraordinary.

'Dancing lovers entwined
Beneath surface sinkholes that
Camouflage hidden treasures,'

I think you could also get a little more specific here- dancing lovers could stand alone, but maybe substituting another word for dancing, or adding a description could spice it up- also, hidden treasures is vague- I personally want to know hat the treasure is, or at least be given some hint to get my imagination going.

'Enveloping reed-like stalagmites,'

I can't help but think this line would be much stronger as 'Enveloping stalagmite reeds'.

'Bridging ethereal tunes of nature
Surrealistically with sax sounds,'

I don't really know that this poem is long enough to be able to use repetition for reinforcement- I personally didn't care for it, but that doesn't mean others won't...

'A jazz fusion with licks of lime,
Aeolian chamber music sublime,'

The licks of lime works fine, since it refers to the opening lines- I'm not so sure about Aeolian though.

'Beckoning you to enter
These chambers divine.'

Normally I don't think I would like these lines, but they really work for this poem.

One other suggestion- Maybe you would think about not capitalizing the beginning of each line? It was just a slight distraction, I think. Other than those nitpicks, I really enjoyed it- the lines I didn't pick out to comment on were all wonderful, so don't feel like I'm just trying to pick out the negative. Great writing.

I eat only sleep and air -Nicole Blackman

Midnitesun
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5 posted 2001-08-25 10:31 PM


Songbird-Thanks for reading it. I tend to  stay above ground, too, for similar reasons.
My imagination takes me all kinds of places where my body doesn't want to go.


Midnitesun
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6 posted 2001-08-25 10:43 PM


Hush, thanks for taking the time to read and make suggestions. I posted it here for that very reason.
Re: twilight zone, I almost didn't put it in for the reasons you gave, but the spelunkers all call the cave entrance the twilight zone, so I stayed with that for the poem
Re: yawning chasm and crstalline cave, they are probably overworked already, but my first draft was "gaping mouth of the translucent jeweled cave"...and I hated it!
Re: Dancing lovers entwined, I liked it because it seemed mysterious, and could be interpreted on more than one level, leaving it to the reader's imagination.
Re: enveloping...I was going for the obvious rhyme of stalagmites with stalagtights, but I do like your suggestion.
Re: jazz fusion and Aeolian chamber music, it originally read "mingled with Aeolian". Maybe I should have left that in?
And the ending "Beckoning" seemed superior to "Come into" or "Enter within"

Thanks for the ideas! I'll re-think a couple of these lines. Who knows? Maybe there are some other  changes that would take this poem to a higher, more ethereal level.
Kacy  


[This message has been edited by Midnitesun (edited 08-26-2001).]

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