Trev again. Stored in his desk, the one supporting a bottle of blue snoot. Translated from the original Hynerian.
I try to think
but you are in every thought
memories crimson stained
in the carpet of my mind
Tonight I met my father
in the way a son
can only know
I lived within his skin
and I ask myself
where did he end
and I begin
I felt his pain
and his choices
not as the son
in the storm of his anger
nor in the memory
of movies I can't return
I lived the choice
and felt the impulse
to do the things
I saw him do
He sought relief
in a bottle
and I held it against him
for more years
than I have fingers
I knew why
why he did what he did
and I could write you a letter
he would not disavow
But tonight
I tell you this
I know the answer
from the other side
the side
a son
knows
because he is
without break
without a start and a stop
the father
he once had
I ask tonight
for mercy
for people need things
from me
things I do not have
and cannot give
Their eyes haunt me
for I see the pain
not as other
but as a boy
who in every cell
stained within my very membrane
an agony
a partner
in this life
from which
there
is
no
divorce
13 comments:
This one is dedicated to Rilke. Damn you in your eternal grave. I would say FU in deutsch if I knew how.
Hey you
Poppet, genius, friend, she writes in pause, in feeble attempt to gather the wow, I can tell you now how inadequate will be any comment that I write for this post, to comment is to break it down, to Read it is to conserve it whole.
The definitions of simplicity are
absence of complication,
lack of ostentation or pretension,
Some of the synonyms are Candor, Clarity, Integrity, Openness, Clear lines. All of the above and more is what I refer to when I write about simplicity, direct simplicity, it is there to be seen (throughout) in your choice of words, phrases, metaphors, it is how you reach a pitch within your writing that few others can equal and certainly none that can uphold in the way that you do. This statement is of course influenced by this being an on-going, present-time body of writing and not a book that is picked off a shelf, but even then, it would only be the rarest, most special of authors, poets, lyricists, that could hold both heart and head so closely and so lingeringly...
Each of these I could write, given time, spurning order and sense, for an eternity upon and these are just some, the memories staining crimson, the living within his skin, the insight unprepared for despite the endurance of the questioning, the storm of anger, as with other phrases that you have written, perhaps not the first time that such an analogy has been seen, yet somehow you make it yours, somehow it is seen within as though never seen before, not quite in this light, not quite in this manner, not quite so intensely or lastingly, and your gift reveals a prime example in the part about memory and movies that cannot be returned, and what that phrase does to, as others have done before in other chapters, is corroborate the initial conclusion that to begin commenting on particulars is like forsaking the piece as it exists in its entirety. I could take the place of our St Louis friend and there would be universe behind each letter. The last part is, it rises to a crescendo that is absolutely tormenting.
Knowing that there have been two tellings of the story of his father makes this even more poignant, knowing, or at least presuming through what we know from the chapters and from the less reliable imagination, that his father is so closely bound to the Why, to the outcome, to where he is and why he is there, personally, with Em, to the pain of which he has spoken in these poems, and most of all to the unknowing-ness. On a side note, one wonders how Em could ever truly understand his heart, never having lived anything that can compare and yet the answer is right here, his writing so demonstrative, were his heart any closer, it would no longer be his.
Two and one half hour I have been reading this poem, determined to reign the wow, and the above is yet all I have managed. I tell you these things to show you the power of your writing.
To have lived as one, as child first, grown man, as grown as he has been able with fractured roots, second, to have walked along one side of the bank only, seeing the other side only from that view, as - to use one of yours with that intent and triggered by the words within the poem - the river flows between, knowing only the aftermath, the injury, his own mangled soul to then be cast, so to speak, upon the other shore, to be both self and the other, to perceive his father from within, not as father but as individual, to see him not through his patrimonial eyes again so to speak, inherited or as son, but for the first time to know the heart, understand the mind. What must that be like. Sigh. Unimaginable in a word, but Trev's words provide an approach and though one cannot know what it would mean to be him at this moment, closer I doubt it would be possible to bring another.
To summarize what has not been said, this is a phenomenal piece of writing and to think, just days ago, we had no idea Trev was capable of such composition. So dear before, so did the heart break for him as he stood upon the cliff, as he sat on the edge of the bed, with Mairi, as joyful as when Em reached his heart time and again, as much as then, one cannot compare it to now, to how he lives and breathes after having read these poems penned by him.
Gosh Tree! This is so poignantly beautiful!
I found myself speechless for a while & read it ever so many times, each time with a new feeling it evoked!!
Bravo!
I know, this couldn't have come, without pain...
Mona, your kind words are like honey on my toast. Thank you for touching me with your words. As for the pain, sometimes I fear that I like it a little too much for my own good. But it does feel good to feel and I'd rather feel pain then nothing at all.
Ms Storm, I will deal with you and your comments later. :-D
Okay, I was offline for a while, so I am reading these in reverse.
But, My goodness you have been VERY busy writing!
Meleah, better my hands on the keyboard than somewhere else. :-D
The fact that Trev went to a place emotionally and actually feel as if he was walking in his fathers shoes so to speak...to feel something inside you that you detested as a child in your life...to relate completely, that surely must have painful. Tormenting but Beautiful Tr'ee.
Thanks Kimmie. Trev has some father issues and I believe this was at the root of his fight with Em.
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