Doesn't everything rushto be something else?
Mark Doty (Nocturne In Black And Gold)
from the boy's view:
I sat upon the days
as a cat upon the mouse
not whole upon the hole
did I watch
silent in wait
a thundering hunger
tolling angst
of a bell unseen
through a fog impenetrable
tolling
toiling
these storms of stomach
as if I were an eater
of church bells
and the hours of the day
were clad in veils
of lace
black and bottomless
as if I were an eater
of church bells
and the hours of the day
were clad in veils
of lace
black and bottomless
as mice eyes
mourning or message
mourning or message
message of mourning
I cannot fathom
the tingle
my bones a tuning fork
tined as battlements
before the oncoming
charge
of silver ghosts galloping
across translucent landscapes
of nocturnal visions
what am I to be
that I am not now
what am I to know
that is beyond the horizon
of my years
what am I to do
with the blackness
of my blood
in the night
I have no answer
in my gut
to the pain
in my gut
so I wait
just sitting upon
the dim hours
feeling as useless
as I did
upon the day
when steel rained
and cheeks drained
upon a soil
so stained of me
of mine
of an our
sundered
in a sky
without
thunder
arraigned
perhaps
ordained
I could not
explain
nor
chain
the pain (that)
one,
somewhere,
a who
of blood concealed
surely
must
have
entertained
hand on rope
pulling
tolling
calling
resonant
as the hunger
tolling
thundering
across the plains
of my youth
I cannot fathom
the tingle
my bones a tuning fork
tined as battlements
before the oncoming
charge
of silver ghosts galloping
across translucent landscapes
of nocturnal visions
what am I to be
that I am not now
what am I to know
that is beyond the horizon
of my years
what am I to do
with the blackness
of my blood
in the night
I have no answer
in my gut
to the pain
in my gut
so I wait
just sitting upon
the dim hours
feeling as useless
as I did
upon the day
when steel rained
and cheeks drained
upon a soil
so stained of me
of mine
of an our
sundered
in a sky
without
thunder
arraigned
perhaps
ordained
I could not
explain
nor
chain
the pain (that)
one,
somewhere,
a who
of blood concealed
surely
must
have
entertained
hand on rope
pulling
tolling
calling
resonant
as the hunger
tolling
thundering
across the plains
of my youth
__________
version 2:
I sat upon the days
as a cat upon the mouse
not whole upon the hole
did I watch
silent in wait
this tolling angst
of a bell unseen
tolling
toiling
these storms of stomach
as if an eater
of church bells I were
and the hours of the day
were clad in veils of lace
black and bottomless
as eyes of mice
mourning or message
message of mourning
I cannot fathom
the tingle
my bones a tuning fork
tined as battlements
before the oncoming
charge
of silver shinning ghosts
galloping across translucent landscapes
my nocturnal visions
tongues of steel
what am I
to be
that I am
not now
what am I
to know
that is beyond the horizon
of my years
what am I
to do
with the blackness
of my blood in the night
no answer have I
in my gut
to the pain
slutting me
so I wait
the dawn
just sitting upon
the dim hours
feeling as useless
by dusk
as I did
upon the day
when steel rained
and cheeks drained
upon a soil
so stained of me
of mine
of an our
sundered
in a sky without thunder
arraigned perhaps
ordained
I could not
explain
nor
chain
the pain
that
one,
somewhere,
a who
of blood concealed
surely
must
have
entertained
hand on rope
pulling
tolling
calling
resonant
as the hunger
thundering
across my empty plains
8 comments:
Doesn't everything rush
to be something else?
How anyone could ever be bored is beyond me. Above is weeks and days and hours.
I sat upon the days
Here it is, the blissful sigh. I abso*lutely love that expression, love the potential that it has for interpretation, it is a beginning sentence of the elite, the type of sentence that could launch poem after poem, story after story, an imagination catcher.
My awestruck-adjectives are bubbling forth. Infinitely fascinating, indescribably delightful.
And then some.
Triple that.
With a half dozen exlamation marks.
(commenting in parts)
That quote by Doty has been stuck in my mind since I read it a few days ago. And I keep asking myself, where am I rushing, is the rushing such I forget where I am, so fixated at where I'm going; and then I ask myself how long it has been this way, this rushing, this always wanted to be something other, something different, something better.
As always, your comments are like a warm oven in the kitchen. :-)
Your second stanza is incredible. Your unsettling utterances more intense by their respective pairing. thundering hunger, silent..wait and the summit and centre point fog impenetrable. So visually expressive, so rich in association, the whiteness of fog, surrounding, blinding, consuming, such fog seems to steal everything around, swallowing and hiding, robbing sight, partially robbing sound, and one cannot help but wonder, despite logic, whether everything and everyone else is still there. This kind of surrounding whiteness immediately tinges (my) thoughts to death, not necessarily physical, of seperateness, being lost, disoriented, aimless.
as if I were....as mice eyes, to avoid an embarassing, over-awed spiel ;-), to sum up, captivating, exciting, creative, marvelous.
Life is over in no time at all, and we are all too aware of that. I think sometimes we are so fearful of wasting it that this is precisely what we end up doing.
mourning or message
message of mourning
I cannot fathom
the tingle
my bones a tuning fork
tined as battlements
before the oncoming
charge
of silver ghosts galloping
across translucent landscapes
of nocturnal vision
Bliss once more. Once more acutely aware of the melodical shapeliness within your writing, and I wonder at the wonder of poetry and poets, the multi-tasking of the writing process, meaning and melody, tuned, not only complimenting but raising, enhancing. This stanza makes me want an audience to whom I could read it. And on that note, an official request kind sir for a reading if it pleases you to do so. :-)
Within the whole are little pieces of genius.
Impressionistic phrases, slapped upon the canvas, which, only from a distance, can be seen. The problem I have is, I see it all from very close up and close up, it just looks like a muddy mess of colors blending into dead leaf brown, breaking and crumbling under the foot of inspection. So, what happens is, you get a version 2 as posted below. :-D
My first choice was to use shotgun barrels, the bottomless barrel ends instead of mice eyes, but of course, the reference would have been out of place given the timeframe of the poem. :-)
Ms Storm, in time, this one will be read. I may wait till I get home with the snowball or, if the mood strikes, I do have my snowflake with me and could do audio from the road. :-)
from the road sounds so consequential, :-), professional, it suits.
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