A Personal Poem

Commentaries

Moves without ripples

Splashes with a

Devil may care

Lives for calm

Feels the tempest

Sees the

Tranquility

Flown

With the Outer Most

Stars

                        &

Find the Emptiness in Between

…***…

“

So You think you can tell

I hurt Myself Today

I know I’ll never be Lonely

Where was I?

A face of Puzzle Pieces

has a Madman

got a Quick hand

i can see the Magic in the Day

I’m on It

finding out about

it’s so re-arranged

WHY YOU IN SO MUCH HURRY-IS IT REALLY WORTH THE WORRY?

I’ll make out The Tides gonna turn

thefirstthingirememberihearditwasyourbirthday

There is a Light that will keep on shining

Just a little bit Shy

The Atmosphere is less than Perfect

Can You put your hands in my Head(?!)

Get a hold on Believe it

I Came To See The Light

Feelin Alright

if the course is right

\

…dlrow eht elur ot desu I…

/

That’s the way it seemed

something I Feel

No  Joke

͜͜

I don’t know how to tell

That

I’m at my wit’s End

”

“He’s like a Radio…”

Sure.

\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/

I see in Color

Not because I always want to

My head hurts

I’ve Run

            For a Long Time

Just as much to as from

But mostly for the In-Between

To feel that feeling

of sweet-sour

Pain

and see it too.

A book is an aggregate escape

But it rips my Life away

pours some more in

a poor consistency

My life is pretty Plain

The Blind will see

Tomorrow
Is frightening

Infinity in more

or less

is

uncomprehendable

Mindbender

A spiral

Galaxy

Smallest of small

largest

to the edge of light

to come back

a clash

 of interest

more than that

paradigm

Red Shift

blue-shift

All the colors a-whirl

Proof that begs existence

All claim that, Don’t they?

                    t

All A sigh of a seashore.

Rockets Blazing

Cannons Razing

Fire Hazing

            the sky

Scholars Booking

Men Farming

People Looking

            to the sky

From the seed, Stem

Violent Flower

Bearing Fruit soon

I expect it to be sweet.

The mind is

Unfathomable

terribly deep well

A much better Window

But outside

It’s

so

foggy

            A Coating

            of

           

Stardust

…

Alternate Ending to Heart of Darkness

For all those that felt that Conrad did not end the story “right” with Marlow actually giving the truth, here is a possible ending in which he gives the truth to the Intended, coming in right after she asks him to give her Kurtz’s last words, and returning right before the perspective returns to the Narrator.

“I could feel the Darkness rising up, the fearful thing from the past colliding solidly into the present, trying to connect and re-live itself, to continue itself to infinity. Then I felt the fear, the pain, the insanity, the thing which had changed the memory of this Shade wrapped in the shadows into something else, something that would become the Kurtz I thought I knew, from the amount I could glean from the instants I felt his presence, this being, that had left the earth long before I would hear of him in the Darkness.

“Then I turned to her, and told her the feeling that was all around. The rising thing that had rose up in Kurtz at his last, ‘The Horror, the Horror.’

“She looked at me first as if this was impossible, that would not his beloved’s name be the only thing he could have thought at his lowest? Then, she changed, to question why I would commit such a crime as to give the painful, sharp Truth, which cut through all veils, and then her, too, like a bright, flashing saber. At last, she finished with understanding, as if she actually understood what Kurtz had meant in his view from and into the abyss, that the only horror was that he could not be there with her then in the present.

“She then turned, lost in thought, back into the shadowy recesses of the room, to dwell on her now seemingly complete memory of her devoted.

“I turned and left after as she did, horrified at what I had done, my mind petrified in what I could have done…”

Inoculation by Susan Donnelly

Cotton Mather studied small pox for a while,

instead of sin.  Boston was rife with it.

Not being ill himself, thank Providence,

but one day asking his slave, Onesimus,

if he’d ever had the pox.  To which Onesimus replied,

“Yes and No.”  Not insubordinate

or anything of the kind, but playful, or perhaps

musing, as one saying to another:

“Consider how a man

can take inside all manner of disease

and still survive.”

Then, graciously, when Mather asked again:

My mother bore me in the southern wild.

She scratched my skin and I got sick, but lived

to come here, free of smallpox, as your slave.

           

This is such a rich poem. It is hilarious. But maybe I see that because I find satire and irony funny. And this poem is full of it. It seems every two lines or so, there is a spike that jabs at the point of life, and poor Cotton Mather is at the tail end of every joke. However, perhaps the most ironic point about it, and the subject of the poem, is the slave Onesimus. Biblically, Onesimus was a slave that ran away from his master, and encountered and became good friends with Paul the Apostle. Why he becomes worth notice in the Bible is because he becomes “useful” to Paul and the early Church. Here is the quote that mentions him.

“Therefore, although in Christ I could be bold and order you to do what you ought to do, yet I prefer to appeal to you on the basis of love. It is as none other than Paul—an old man and now also a prisoner of Christ Jesus— that I appeal to you for my son Onesimus, who became my son while I was in chains. Formerly he was useless to you, but now he has become useful both to you and to me.” Philemon 1:8-10

The ironic thing is that in Greek, onesimus means useful. So ‘formerly Useful was useless to you, but now Useful has become useful to you and to me.’ This is all meant to illustrate the fact that Onesimus to Mather was all that his name implied: Useful. It’s the end that brings this home, to be freed young only to become a ‘useful’ slave, and becoming an example to free others.

The White Man's Burden by Rudyard Kipling

Take up the White Man's burden---
     Send forth the best ye breed---
Go bind your sons to exile
     To serve your captives' need;
To wait in heavy harness,
     On fluttered folk and wild--
Your new-caught, sullen peoples,
     Half-devil and half-child.

Take up the White Man's burden--
     In patience to abide,
To veil the threat of terror
     And check the show of pride;
By open speech and simple,
     An hundred times made plain
To seek another's profit,
     And work another's gain.

Take up the White Man's burden--
     The savage wars of peace--
Fill full the mouth of Famine
     And bid the sickness cease;
And when your goal is nearest
     The end for others sought,
Watch sloth and heathen Folly
     Bring all your hopes to nought.

Take up the White Man's burden--
     No tawdry rule of kings,
But toil of serf and sweeper--
     The tale of common things.
The ports ye shall not enter,
     The roads ye shall not tread,
Go make them with your living,
     And mark them with your dead.

Take up the White Man's burden--
     And reap his old reward:
The blame of those ye better,
     The hate of those ye guard--
The cry of hosts ye humour
     (Ah, slowly!) toward the light:--
"Why brought ye us from bondage,
     Our loved Egyptian night?"

Take up the White Man's burden--
     Ye dare not stoop to less--
Nor call too loud on Freedom
     To cloak your weariness;
By all ye cry or whisper,
     By all ye leave or do,
The silent, sullen peoples
     Shall weigh your Gods and you.

Take up the White Man's burden--
     Have done with childish days--
The lightly proffered laurel,
     The easy, ungrudged praise.
Comes now, to search your manhood
     Through all the thankless years
Cold, edged with dear-bought wisdom,
     The judgment of your peers!

What a poem that can be interpreted (or misinterpreted) in so many ways. One, on the surface, can understand this poem as a promotion of imperialize or colonization. I, in my interpretation, disagree. I see this poem not as a promotion, but instructions once did (perhaps it would have been better to call it ‘The More Fortunate’s Burden’ to avoid certain stigmas an confusion, but it does not have the same ring, nor were there the stigmas stigmas back then.) Nowhere in the poem does it say that one should go out and capture people and lands. The closest it comes to promoting this is "Your new-caught, sullen peoples, Half-devil and half-child." and "The ports ye shall not enter, The roads ye shall not tread, Go make them with your living." However, the people are newly caught, not to be caught, and the new land does not have the roads and ports for they are not created yet. This is post-acquisition, not pre. 

            So what is one to do with a newly obtained land? That is what the poem is driving at, what one is obligated to do, not to abuse, subjugate, or misuse, but to lift up, empower, and free. Kipling even warns that it will not be easy, that the natives will probably hate anyone involved with their freeing, but his allusion to the Hebrews in “‘Why brought ye us from bondage, Our loved Egyptian night?’” assures that it’s for the best, to give them voice in the first place. To thanklessly fight the maladies of the ‘un-developed’ world will be reward in itself. In a way, he is almost daring a power to see if they can take up new land, do the right thing, and not get lost in persecution and slavery.

Mr Fear by Lawrence Raab

He follows us, he keeps track.
Each day his lists are longer.
Here, death. And here,
something like it.

Mr. Fear, we say in our dreams
what do you have for me tonight?
And he looks through his sack,
his black sack of troubles.

Maybe he smiles when he finds
the right one. Maybe he's sorry.
Tell me, Mr. Fear,
what must I carry

away from your dream.
Make it small, please
Let it fit in my pocket,
let it fall through

the hole in my pocket.
Fear, let me have
a small brown bat
and a purse of crickets

like the ones I heard
singing last night
out there in the stubbly field
before I slept, and met you.

            What I love about this poem is it reminds me so much of Ray Bradbury’s themes on fear. Bradbury is perhaps one of my favorite authors, and reading of Mr. Fear and “a small brown bat and a purse of crickets” brings to mind “The Next in Line” or The Halloween Tree. Mr. Fear knowing what scares us, always bringing the future or the past (“like the ones I heard last night”) out to frighten us about what is out in the dark (“stubbly field”) or what is inside.

More specific to the poem, I find it clever how the author personifies those nightmares that happen, when something that happened during the day (“He follows us”) or an old memory (“he keeps track”) resurfaces as a bad dream at night (“what do you have for me tonight?”) Thankfully, we mostly forget the dreams or mind makes up during the night (“Let it fit in my pocket, let it fall through the hole in my pocket”) but occasionally we remember those seemingly innocent things of the day turn absurdly sinister at night that only we understand.

To Myself by W.S. Merwin

"Even when I forget you
I go on looking for you
I believe I would know you
I keep remembering you
sometimes long ago but then
other times I am sure you
were here for a moment before
and the air is still alive
around where you were and I
think then I can recognize
you who are always the same
who pretend to be time but
you are not time and who speak
in the words but you are not
what they say you who are not
lost when I do not find you"

The first response I receive from this poem is the choppy–ness of it. The first four lines start out nicely, ending the phrase with a complete thought. Nevertheless, slowly it moves from smooth connected thoughts, to a more frantic phrasing (sometimes long ago but then… other times I am sure you… were here for a moment before) and ending in near incomprehensible words (what they say you who are not… lost when I do not find you.) However it is the last phrase “I do not find you” that jumps out at me (I would warrant that would be climax.)

But luckily, I did not despair at the complexity, but was rather intrigued at what an Author would want to say in such a masked way, for does not the poet write but to lead the reader to be understood? Re-reading (several times) the poem reveals the search that Merwin wants the reader to feel. Reading the disconnected run-on thought (for me) expresses the convoluted thoughts on his search for “you who are always the same…who pretend to be time but you are not time…” From this, one can interpret that this is his search for an other worldly power or state (supported by him being a devout Buddhist according to Poets.org). “Who speak in the words, but you are not what they say, you who are not lost when I do not find you.” [Punctuation added] The Words, or perhaps teachings, contain a piece of the searchéd, but is not contained, and is not dependent on the searcher if not found.

The Kite Runner by Khaled Hosseini

           What a horribly fascinating book. It has been quite a long time since I have read a novel in which the main character has real problems and defects within himself, not outside.  Most books out there, especially fiction, but other genera too, make the main characters so that they can do no wrong. Sure, they may make a wrong choice, but there is always an excuse that saves them from being bad. Amir, on the other hand, is given a choice, but fails (literally) miserably, which haunts him the rest of his life.

            What I really admire about the story is how Hosseini lures one into feeling for Amir. The perfectly timed phrases, like the reoccurring “a thousand times over,” bring memories of other characters, which in turn brings a sense of reality to the reader. Then there are the memories themselves, which collectively reveal the true nature of all the characters within the book. Finally, the descriptive nature of Hosseini’s style brings all the events into clear focus, moving the reality up one more notch, almost but-not-quite to sureality.

            The only thing that I found that I disliked was the lessening realism toward the end. Everything was flowing smoothly (as in it made sense, not that the events were smooth) until (spoiler alert!) Sohrab attempts suicide. From there, the main characters no longer seem as true within their nature. Sohrab, for example, goes from being able to take care of himself (nailing a thug in the eye) to a wisp of a person. To me, if this was how Sohrab responded to the orphanage news, then he would have committed suicide far earlier, at least when Assef got his hands on him. At first Sohrab is strong, but overnight becomes weak.

            On the whole I greatly…experienced (enjoy would not work for it was not full of joy, but pain and redemption) this book and would suggest it to anyone else for its richness in style and culture.