Bas Jan Ader ‘I’m too sad to tell you’
Brutality Between the Lines (<—click to hear the poem read)
“I don’t really like human nature unless…”
requiem for the unsung
Phillip Glass scores
obsessive tracks
drama at river Ouse
mourning, death grimace
cataleptic rigidity
art forms suicide note
Bas Jan Aders
missives of pain
I’m too sad to tell you
broadcast without expatiation
Rothko’s emanating spirituality silences
she fills her overcoat pockets with stones
sexual abuse knocks mental illness
click and add the weight
there are more
you won’t drown with less
art as consoler
doesn’t transform the pain
allures with vows of immortality
Pol Pot slaughtered millions
driving toward the tabula rasa
an entire society stripped
cinematic epic can’t revive
or ferry spirits home
from killing fields
burnishing aesthetic pall
this poem is a postcard
sugared and heating on the stove
thermometer ready
poisonous confection
Helen Chadwick’s golden locks
entwined with sow’s intestine
“You see, I can’t even write this properly.”
Ars memorativa; parlor tricks
trauma plays on the mind
positive bias memory distortion
works its illusions on all:
holocaust survivor
recovering addict
aspiring artist
schema of selective processing
regulates the current state
cooing emotional well-being
smoothes the heinous crimes
stories we tell evolve
voyeuristic titillations for consuming masses
molding the world into utopias of art
ignorant of the price
products worth infinitely more
than the life that birthed them
aftershock of naïveté
Adeline Virginia Stephen had a name before she was
“…all candied over with art.”
Notes: “I don’t really like human nature unless all candied over with art.” Virginia Woolf. “You see, I can’t even write this properly.” is from her suicide note. She drowned in the Ouse River. Bas Jan Aders was lost at sea while performing “In Search of the Miraculous”. His body was never found. Mark Rothko overdosed on antidepressants and slit his wrists. His estate was contested in a 10 year court battle know as the Rothko Case. Helen Chadwick died from a viral infection contracted at the hospital while shooting ‘Unnatural Selection’, a series on IVF embryos rejected for implantation. Killing Fields won 3 Oscars (nominated for 7), 8 BAFTAs (nominated for 13) and grossed $34,609,720 US. Haing Somnang Ngor, who won both the Oscar and BAFTA for his performance, survived the Khmer Rouge only to be murdered in Los Angeles. After the release of The Killing Fields, Ngor had told a New York Times reporter, “If I die from now on, OK! This film will go on for a hundred years.”
Chromapoetica 
Difficult to read. I am not well-disposed to suicide as a viable response to life’s bitter wounds, but you give some hard to discount spreadsheets for the math of it here. Art can’t candy over blood–it’s still blood–though perhaps it can make the blood earn its keep in some other way after being drained away and wasted from its own purpose. I’ve read Woolf’s suicide note–one of the saddest (and least self-indulgent) documents ever written. Your use of it here is intuitive, abrasively accurate, and darkly insightful. For some candied things, so easily gobbled in ignorance, the price paid is indeed disjunctively high.
Thank you, as ever, for you discernment and engaging comments. We should all be blest with marvelous readers like you. Suicide isn’t a viable response but one abused people are prone to, the fact that we create art out of it and other horrors may be a brutality in itself. As a society we value the story and the art over the human being behind it. An NEA study showed that while over 75% of Americans value art only 29% think artists contribute to society. There’s a huge disconnect between the creator and the object, one has infinite value and the other very little. Obviously I find this mortifying. As we struggle as artists to deal with wounding, as you so marvelously say make the blood earn its keep, there’s the insistent concern (for me at least) that it’s all a bit ironic and may sometimes contribute to the abuse. Do we have the right to create art out of the basest human suffering? Do we gain anything through it? Are we just smoothing the horrors of the past, a fundamental and natural positive bias memory distortion? How much can art do to exorcise evil? I am culpable but suffering just the same. I don’t have any answers but I really wanted to ask the questions and make myself and the reader uncomfortable. Here I go explaining again :); it’s such a bad habit but the house is clean and the in-laws haven’t arrived yet.
A mighty write Anna..hard hitting but never abrasive..great scope..I’ve been to her house, & the river, a bit surreal..thank you for sharing
The visit to the river and house must have been difficult. I was thinking about The Hours and how Nicole Kidman in exercising her art had a lifeline in that river. She was tethered to a steel cable. Virginia couldn’t find her lifeline out of madness anymore. Thanks so much for stopping by and commenting. As I said to Joy, I am fortunate to have insightful and thoughtful readers like you.
It’s a tough row you hoe here, Anna — the artist and the madman and the addict and the suicide share common ground; art cannot heal but it can make a gorgeous enough music of the madness so that one exists like a schizophrenic who has learned to stop paying attention to the voices. I take the tack that art is a survival of shamanic practice, a way of naming and illness sufficiently so that it can be put to a use, even a good use. However, there is little tradition for the artist to cling to these days, so its as easy (and compelling) to make bloody noise as it is to balm the nerves with a specie of rapture. And there isn’t, to my knowledge, an Artists Anonymous to help disordered creatives find their right productive tracks. All of the poets who have committed suicide — from Marina Tsvestaeva to Hart Crane to Sylvia Plath to Deborah Digges — show that its a precipice we climb with our verses, one that has as much the power to kill as quell. Artists I think have always been tempted to suicide because the music of the heavenly spheres is so damn beautiful, and so hard to find in the Orphic scatter of this life — “allures with vows of immortality,” yes. And to what end our art? How does it serve humanity, and how much of it has become wholly the service of self? All I can say is that while art never taught me to live better, it did make me love life infinitely more — and a lover is a far, far more passionate member of the tribe. We do have a responsibility to pass this on in better shape than how we received it …
I certainly approach my work, in whatever form it takes, as a spiritual practice which has distinct and lasting benefits. The closest I’ve found to Artists Anonymous is the Artist’s Way though Julia Cameron suffered a psychotic break so she didn’t find her lifeline either. I find that in improving my life I’ve improved my art and that making art keeps me happy and healthy in a largely insane world. Remaining an amateur (lover) has been a constant source of artistic renewal for me. I’ve been fortunate to not suffer from mental illness and addiction though they’re prevalent in my family. It’s why I go to Al-Anon. There are not enough stones in my pockets to drown me, which I give thanks for everyday. I’m honored you stopped by to read, and as always, have learned something in the dialogue. Thank you.
Our family is riddled with alkies and crazies and walking wounded, too – something about the creative springs from all that violence. Hermes did make the first music after murdering a tortoise. And yes, the artist is a lover is an amateur, fresh and alive to aesthetic encounter, always a student. Congrats on Al-Anon, its a family of broken people who grow to love (I’m a member of that other fellowship, the one comprised of the wreakers of damage in the name of bottomless thirst, who learn to grow or die).
Do we have the right to create art out of the basest human suffering? Do we gain anything through it? Are we just smoothing the horrors of the past, a fundamental and natural positive bias memory distortion? How much can art do to exorcise evil?
Interesting questions. They remind me of Adorno’s oft-quoted line that writing poetry after Auschwitz is barbaric. Years later, Adorno revised his position while giving it an even sharper edge:
Perennial suffering has as much right to expression as a tortured man has to scream; hence it may have been wrong to say that after Auschwitz you could no longer write poems. But it is not wrong to raise the less cultural question whether after Auschwitz you can go on living–especially whether one who escaped by accident, one who by rights should have been killed, may go on living. His mere survival calls for the coldness, the basic principle of bourgeois subjectivity, without which there could have been no Auschwitz; this is the drastic guilt of him who was spared. By way of atonement he will be plagued by dreams such as that he is no longer living at all, that he was sent to the ovens in 1944 and his whole existence since has been imaginary, an emanation of the insane wish of a man killed twenty years earlier. (Negative Dialectics, 362-363)
Personally, I find Adorno’s position ludicrous. Art cannot exorcise evil, nor can it be judged complicit with evil (unless it is used as propaganda for evil ends), nor should the artist or anyone feel guilty for merely being alive or having been spared death. The absurd conclusion of Adorno’s thesis is that, until we eliminate evil (through the materialist dialectic of Marxian praxis, presumably), we have no right to do good.
http://anointedruins.wordpress.com/2011/07/16/the-impossibility-of-poetry-after-auschwitz/
Thank you for your thoughtful and informative comment; I will read your poem. I agree with your criticism of Adorno (as a caveat I admit he is not a philosopher I have previously encountered). I wanted to explore the limits of art. Art isn’t, for me, a viable substitute for therapy or active engagement in trying to ‘do good’ in the world. Art isn’t capable of fulfilling my need to connect with other human beings intimately though it can certainly be a starting point to building relationships. Art can’t resolve ethical issues simply by declaring their presence. What is the role of art in psychological health is it merely worthwhile as sublimation or can it heal? This was particularly of interest to me when I ran a nonprofit arts center that provided art therapy. I chose artists in the poem that use(d) art to process trauma or social injustice to highlight these issues. What are our ethical obligations as artists? This query bothered me when writing about the first degree murder trial where I served as a juror. Thank you again for engaging my work and bringing so much to the table with your comment.
I think that art exists to raise thought into something other than the purely mechanical nature that it exhibits in our lives…to get beyond the ideology, propaganda, and conditioning of thought that we all are subject to. The pure savagery, cruelty, brutality, and impersonal nature displayed by both humans and nature itself, is enough for us to deny thought and simply live and make art.
Suicide is an understandable reaction to what seem to be intolerable thoughts, but these thoughts can be recognized for the sheer mechanical quality they exhibit. We may do good and art at the same time and not submit to the world. Most interesting post and intriguing poetry.
Thank you for your enlightening comment. Positing art as a form of higher level thinking that allows us to resist the world and be empathetic, engaged citizens is appealing to me. As someone who’s dedicated enormous amounts of time and money to community art programs I agree with you.
Though poignant but it was a nice read..
although some words were beyond my understanding but I just loved it.
I’m happy you are finding meaningful engagement even when it isn’t all clear. I think this is always true in poetry, we enjoy the feeling of being suspended, like in water we are out of our element but fascinated by the experience. Thanks again for commenting and reading.
I have been reading the comments, but when you said:
I think this is always true in poetry, we enjoy the feeling of being suspended, like in water we are out of our element but fascinated by the experience.
It struck me. It is SO true, at least for me. Thank you for the words that describe my feelings. You write very intriguing poems, Alway an expierence to read.
Thank you, I’m glad you found words for your feeling and that you’re intrigued. I’m honored you stopped by and look forward to reading your poem.
tories we tell evolve
voyeuristic titillations for consuming masses
molding the world into utopias of art
ignorant of the price
brilliant, well done.
Thank you for your compliment. I look forward to reading your work.
Whether by art or education or by temperament, I cannot say; but suicide is no answer for me at all–it is waste, selfish and brutal. Against all odds an entity has life. I consider my own children, here against many odds some of which involved my choices. For me life is all about choices and doing everything, every step of the way to expand those choices. Choice equals personal freedom, but with every choice one limits freedom. It behooves one to seek the route to fulfillment by making choices that fulfill one’s promise and talent. If nothing else is given to a child, I believe the gift of understanding this is paramount. To expand on Auschwitz metaphor, I think Anne Frank showed us all how precious every drop of it is.
Interesting exposition here regarding the thinking of those who chose to stop.
Some of these artists lost their lives indirectly through their art by the risks they took. Choice, I feel, is the primary ingredient in restoring mental health or healing wounds. It opens the prison door of insanity and self harm. I’ve worked with so many vulnerable populations over the years. First and foremost I want to say that valuing the human life behind the product of their talent is my top priority. I think too often artists fall prey to being defined by their art and in that lose a vitally important part of their dignity as a human being. Art as expression has an infinite ability to heal and fulfill. The comodification of art and ignoring the needs of the very human people that make it does the artist great harm. Thank you very much for reading and your humane, insightful comment.
The additional notes add, and I’ve enjoyed re-reading the poem, as well as all the very intelligent and insightful comments it has elicited since I was here last. Re-reading brought forth a singular appreciation for some of the very alive and simple pictures embroidering the more complex tapestry, such as “…this poem is a postcard / sugared and heating on the stove…” Beautifully done.
Thank you for taking the time to revisit and engage the additional material. We’re all so lucky to have you in our poet’s community!
Hard hitting and so ‘real’ that it hurts…speaking as someone who wraps up pain in beautiful words (or at least tries to) I found this a difficult read, even though I would agree with your sentiments. Writing poetry is sometimes a way of dealing with things, with the world we live in and our place in it. Only today I felt compelled to write about the riots & violence that is currently sweeping through the UK. Maybe a way of making sense of it (if that is possible) and a justification for our existence in all the madness & mayhem. I don’t know, but if it helps make people think then that’s got to be a good thing..
As I said to Gay, I want to also call attention to the human behind the art. That the artist needs additional love and support and to not only be valued for their work. Poetry has a marvelous place in the therapeutic healing bag of any person. Art is one of the primary ways we can make sense of things and create stories that help us transcend hardship. I agree with you that creating thought provoking works is a fundamentally important role for the artist to play in community. In the end I hope to call attention to the dangers, both societal and self inflicted artists and writers face in order to acknowledge the value of their contributions to society and their needs as human beings. Thank you for your thoughtful comment and all my best for you as you continue, as we all do, to heal through writing.
Oh wow! Your poem is about what is going on behind the lines of my poem… i think! I have been so angry today as events have become frustatingly provocotive in the UK.
I had doubts about publishing my poem because of its subject matter and the amount of anger i invested in it….but my only rule is authenticity…..and my passionate feelings regarding events here are authentic….we are getting constant reports at the mo on more arson attacks, rioting and now vigilaties are taking to the streets. The whole affair reeks of zero intelligence from top to bottom…seething!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Your poem is very heavy (emotionally speaking) but you treat your subject well – with skill – and as always authenticity is present and qualifies all else (in my humble opinion). Unfortuantely i am no stranger to suicide and many other things of which you speak but these are the things that construct my character – flawed as it is. Art is the only true therapy (at least for me). It is the love of my life and life support.
Your reference to Rothko reminded me of my first visit to Tate Britain in 1994 – the first time i saw the Seagram paintings -i was 18 and had been going thru a rough time. I wept. The first time art ever moved (healed) me in that way, but boy did he move me… i knew nothing of the man etc…just those metaphysical introscapes that seemed to eminate from somewhere i knew so well.
Enough deep meanderings – I loved your write for its rawness and applitude, knowledge and understanding underscored by your bravery.
I am saddened to hear of your intimate knowledge of suicide. In response I believe in your lifeline and life support through art. If anything, I am calling attention to the fact that the product becomes valued over the person so that we often neglect or berate artists leading them to desperate acts. Some of the artists I mentioned died not by their own hand but through the risks they took to produce their art. I think this is symptomatic of our consumerist culture. No photograph or performance is worth a human life. The life of the person is more valuable than anything. As Alain Arias-Misson said, “purpose of art is not a rarified intellectual distillate – it is life; intensified, brilliant life.” I hope that through communities like dVerse we learn to value the person behind the product more than their talent and can act as a support system for one another. I know, I know, I’m ever the idealist but I believe in the transformative power of art and love.
Hi again – im stll up its 1:30 am but i cant leave the bar!
Having re-read you poem which is important as you explore such wide ranging issues – i have begun to understand its meaning on a deeper level coupled with your illumination it becomes even more poignient. I have often considered the things of which you speak.. as a painter i have often exhibited works that feature unpalattable subject matters drendged from my experiences and exposed for my own good – i have often wrestled with ethics issues and consequences but have found that i have managed to connect with people who are grateful to discover they are not alone. Thanks for your provocative poem.
I have also found that surrounding yourself with the right people is vital – in my past lives i have made bad choices to my detrement but now i am far more sensetive to the company i keep.. I posted recently an extract of a poem called ‘she replaced Jesus’ dedicated to a good friend of mine who without her goodness and virtue i would nor be here today. I wrote and posted as a tribute to her as my sponsor… 6 years to the day – dry and clean… sober till the day i die -so help me.
Well, pass on our gratitude to your sponsor as well. Here’s to many more healthy, happy years clean and the wonderful people who support us through life’s tragedies.
Hey,
Thanks for visiting and your – as always- kind, fantastic and informative comments.
I know how he feels – it can be a long road back – severing ties with the addict inside is really tough – actually like losing a loved one (that you eventually hated) – real grief sets in.
Time, momentum and replacing that crutch with healthy external stumuli – good family and friends make all the difference. I have been lucky in as much as my personality lends self to strct abstinance as much as it did to burning myself up. Im a Monk.
Take care – see you at the bar
Powerful. I would love to hear this read out loud.
Thank you, I’ll get to that soon :).
Colleen, I have posted the reading of the poem, you can click where indicated. Thank you very much for the suggestion. I had to get into the right emotional space for this one.
she fills her overcoat pockets with stones
sexual abuse knocks mental illness
click and add the weight
there are more
you won’t drown with less
art as consoler
doesn’t transform the pain
allures with vows of immortality
my fav lines…i live in this world…these are the kids i counsel. one step from the razors edge, some having tried…its a hard life…i have also recently been using poetry as a tool for therapy which has been nice to bring my worlds together and for some it really has provided an incredible outlet…i also do some art therapy which is real effective with kids in things they are afraid to express…
That’s fantastic Brian, see my reply to you in the dVerse comments tonight.
Without an outpouring of expression, our souls will wilt and wither. This I know. My writing life is reflected in my real world life, and if I manage to convince myself that this “hobby” is a futile waste of time (as so many have tried to convince me) and I stop, then my life soon unravels. The courage that it takes to bring your passion into view, to hold it out for judgement, is like asking our innermost selves to stand before the masses. We reveal our secrets, our desires, and they are not always well received. To open yourself up to criticism, is to open your heart, and some end up falling prey to mass consciousness, losing themselves and the purpose that put them under the spot light. I think we need to question our purpose, but when doubt settles on the heart, it can be difficult to push through…Suicide? Couldn’t imagine. But I have chased dangerous dragons in pursuit of the purest inspiration, or so I thought…so perhaps first, we must define our definition of suicide. For those not lucky enough to catch it…it can be slow and painful. My goodness…look at me prattling on like I have any clue of what I’m talking about! Anna, an amazing post, prompting amazing and well received conversation. Thank you…for all the time you invest here, and for sharing your work with us.
This is a profound statement and I am honored that you’ve shared it here. You speak of self possession and passion, the boundaries required to create and remain grounded, and the inner work that allows us to be brave enough to show our faces in the world. This is beautiful, you are beautiful, and I hope you continue your virtuous fight against doubt. Your participation in a supportive and engaging community of poets at dVerse is a wonderful gift you have given all of us.
Ow. It rings in my head, and hurts me. So much pain on the page.
It is a poem well crafted. It is a pain uncrated.
I’m here from the pot luck. Here is my offering: http://shawnbird.com/2011/08/09/okanagan-mountain-fire-evacuation-august-2003/
What a beautiful turn of phrase, pain uncrated – it’s one of the great advantages of having poets as readers! I enjoyed your piece, thank you for sharing it.
Anna, I’m glad to see that your poem is still evoking such insightful and heartfelt discussion. Definitely a tribute to its depth and substance. Thank you for adding the notes about the dramatis personae in your poem.
Thank you David, I’m honored you returned and glad the notes were of use. I sometimes forget that, especially with our limited time, it is best to provide the references here instead of expecting people to put the pieces together. Do you think it would be better for me to incorporate this within the poem itself? I have had difficulty with this issue, I don’t want to spell it out or make the poem feel didactic. A.S. Byatt’s novels often have to walk along this balance beam more or less successfully. I’d love to hear your thoughts, especially since you are a poet of explosive verse in small packages.
Interesting theme put well in what I experience as a particular American poetic voice but perhaps I haven’t read enough UK English poets! I liked being able to hear it as it as I think this a key part of any poetic experience.
Confessions of a philosopher by Bryan Magee is an autobiography of his intellectual developmental and he explores the role of writing and other art in the psychological stability of the artist. Which is of course only a part of the issues your poem rise.
And in terms of the question raised above, I would tend to ask who your the ideal reader is for the poem? I assume that the references would be understood those with an intellectual hinterland in the Arts but not many others. If you are happy with this readership then the poem works. For the others the questions arises how hard are they wanting to dig out the allusions – if they were classical ones many of us have dig around so why not!
Confessions of a Philosopher looks very interesting, especially since I just ordered a book on cognitive science and language (it would be good to hear both sides of the argument). I think I will agree with Magee’s criticism of analytic philosophy. My schooling was in continental philosophy (rare in American colleges) and feminist theory. The American poetic voice does tend to moralize (something that became clearer to me when I lived in England). It has its advantages and disadvantages and I’d be interested to hear your opinion about it and what defines it for you. Thank you for your thoughtful response and for the book recommendation.
Hi Anna.. finally got to this remarkable piece of art. You have treated a thorny, complex issue with great care and sensitivity.. but still retaining its power. That’s a very difficult line and I commend you. I admire how you have taken a point of philosophy and explored it poetically… not gratuitously.. nor ‘sugar-coated.’
I can see the connection with the poem I posted this week (Cockles and Muscles) and I did experience misgivings.. was I using the stories of the dead as entertainmant? I decided that it was better to record the waste and in so doing remember the loss and cruelty which human beings seem capable of inflicting on each other.
Your questions are good questions and your poetry does them complete justice.
Becky, I saw the comment Arron made on your poem and I refrained from commenting (but still ‘liking’) simply because I didn’t want you to misinterpret any comment as criticism. It is one of the difficulties of written exchange over a computer screen. Your poem stands, the way memorials honor, as a cairn for loss. Its brevity haunts us and calls our attention, it does not exploit as entertainment. As I said to Joy, in this poem I wanted to make myself and the reader uncomfortable. There’s a spectrum here not black and white. I am most grateful for your acknowledgment of the complexity of the issues, our role in these questions as poets, and the valuable service we can provide by drawing attention to atrocities. Thank you.
Brilliant, just brilliant, Anna. I caught the overall meaning/feeling on the first read and then read your process notes which made it even more outstanding the second go-around. I’ve written a number of poems that, I’m thinking now, could be much more meaningful to readers with a process note. I’ve heard you shouldn’t “pimp your work” and you should respect the reader’s ability to “get it” but when there is so much in a poem…thank you. Very sad what some of our most creative geniuses go through.
Victoria, I’m on the fence about process notes. As I said to David I’ve considered trying to better spell things out through the poem itself but it always feels like clutter and didactic condescension. For some poems I am beginning to understand it is necessary since I try to read several hundred posts a week and am pressed for time (I run a small business, make art, and volunteer) and therefore appreciate them when I come across them. I am coming around to seeing them like footnotes in books. Not as disrespect to reader’s intelligence but a helpful tool that respects their time. Ultimately, if the work can’t stand without them then I probably need to revise. Good question and I’m interested to hear more of your thoughts. Thank you again for reading, especially for sticking with me in my experimental poems, your visits are always appreciated.
Heavens, what a coincidence, the piece I have posted this week is loosely based on the suicide of Virginia Woolf. I caught the last fifteen minutes of the film ‘The Hours’ a few nights ago and this is what prompted the write. I found the image of Woolf stepping into the river with the pockets of her overcoat filled with stones incredibly powerful and moving.
This is a well-crafted accomplished piece of writing. This section in particular really stood out for me
this poem is a postcard
sugared and heating on the stove
thermometer ready
poisonous confection
Helen Chadwick’s golden locks
entwined with sow’s intestine
“You see, I can’t even write this properly.”
My only concern with a piece of this depth is that your readers may find the piece difficult to grasp without any background knowledge or without the help of your notes. Having said that I think a piece that is this well written can be enjoyed purely for its poetic quality.
I too share your concern about the notes; I haven’t found a good solution for it yet. Thank you so much for taking the time to critique it today. I greatly enjoyed your post and value your feedback here.
Hi anna – im up late and couldnt resist a reread – nothing more to add just letting you know i stopped by – re the notes – i think its incredible you go to so much trouble – i enjoy the difference between our approaches – if i were to write notes they would be twice the length of yours – i risk isolating a reader but feel thats not my concern and hope that if they are interested enough they may look a little deeper – also my style doesnt truly warrant a google search you either feel it or dont – with your work i guess your damned if you do damned if you dont in some ways but i think its cathartic – in conversation i feel my interlocuters could use notes – thats not to say im patronising them its just a problem of the meeting of minds. Your writing is great and your notes are just as intersting and expand the original conception – i think with this poem especially you get the whole thing just right. goodnight ;-}
Arron, I appreciate you taking the time to come back and inform me I’m screwed regarding the notes :). I don’t know if you could top the 35 notes in my ode to you though. Always a pleasure to hear from you; I’ve been swamped but will come to visit you now. Though don’t know if I can offer useful critique, this process is difficult across the internet where you make statements at one another, can’t rely on body language and tone of voice to convey meaning, and don’t know each other well enough to frame critique – which is probably why we’re asked to stick to word choice, clichés, etc.
I hear you re – the internet critque – hows this… your poem is great (shifts in seat – eyes shoot to the top left hand corner of his socket) your notes are awesome ( arms aloft he clenches his fists as if to celebrate a soccer goal) i agree with Becky this poem is a work of art – ( lighting a candle he places it under his most precious icon and preys)
LOL- i think i may of confused things………. i supose we have to just take what we like from critisism and what we cant relate to or contextualise we just laugh off or ignore – just like life i guess – your poem is great and thats that! –
by the by we English look down on everyone especially each other and most of all our selves -but we have good intentions – unless your french…scottish…Argentinian….australian… etc lol
Ok, here’s my blow by blow response to your comment – (shifts in seat – eyes shoot to the top left hand corner of his socket) I see where he’s going with this, big smile (eyes crinkled so you know it’s real)
your notes are awesome ( arms aloft he clenches his fists as if to celebrate a soccer goal)
I’m now shaking with laughter beginning to fall off my seat
i agree with Becky this poem is a work of art – ( lighting a candle he places it under his most precious icon and preys) Now I can barely see as I’m laughing so hard, have fallen off my bed and am choking on my spit which only makes it even harder to breathe.
Having done all that I have to take a moment to finish reading the comment (my dog comes and licks me to make sure I’m not dying or in need of rescuing)!
Then I get to the looking down on us part (it goes (head nodding – I did live there and get stopped in the street – are you American? like what the hell are you doing here) then hmmmm (I didn’t realize that in all its complexity until just now) then oh, that’s sad, explains a lot but it’s sad (mouth begins to turn down) and then the bit about the french and I can’t breathe again (turning blue, cheeks hurt, need a moment to recover). Fanfrickingtastic – I so needed that laugh!
You just made me laugh out loud – that doesnt happen often – sweet! Goodnight anna
Anna – thankyou for your V-FUNNY words on blog – also your thoughtful and insightful ideas and comments – i agree with all your musings speculations and just plain cool words. (screwing up his broken nose he nods to an empty room – for assurence from the key hole man)
When i was 18 i painted and wrote words (maybe poetry – who knows?) – perplexed, vexed and lacking in self esteem i collapsed in apathy and frustration – how could i confidently produce art ( a non descript projection of abstract ideas with no solid foundation) After my fractious 20’s and all the hell of hatred burnin up my arse hole – 3 near deaths – a couple of addictions and some fun (it wasnt all butt fires) – i realised i had to trust in myself or just jack it. I am an artist and a poet – maybe a bad artist maybe a bad poet – the adjectives are irrellevant – its the doing/the engagement but most of all the brave intent to work out loud without fear. i have also read enough to realise art is just life spelt differently – foundationless without rules – an abstract concept – its up to the subject to impose meaning and strive – or capitulate and rot.
I will absorb your sound advice – but for now i wil settle for …’ a bonfire in the living room (it sucks all the air out of a place)’ … honestley if i had sat for a week trying to sum up what i try to achieve when i write i could never have come up with this even though it is exact. I would be lying if i said i doubt myself – but if i doubted myself i would be a lier.
thanks anna … (leaving the box he flicked 2 thumbs – it was an uncool gesture but not when he did it)
Everything is arbitrary……
‘the adjectives are irrelevant – it’s the doing/the engagement but most of all the brave intent to work out loud without fear.’ (or in spite of it in my case) This is precisely the thing (nodding and jumping up and down in affirmation). I do find it odd you refer to yourself in the third person, are you a member of the royal family or is this common over there :)? Joking aside I know that some of that drive toward self destruction/hatred was fueled by not coming to terms with being a person that needs to create, no matter the outcome. Your job is to do the work. To imbue it with the meaning that must come from your core. “A person’s life is nothing more than to rediscover through the detours of art, or love, or passionate work, those one or two images in the presence of which that person’s heart first opened.” – Albert Camus. How it’s received and what it means to others isn’t for you to worry your pretty little broken nose over. Thank you for visiting – I’ve got to run off to mentor the young woman I work with and provide emotional support to my Al-Anon Sponsee. Take good care, as Joy said, keep on rockin’ the free world.
Anna–
this piece is simply incredible.
I did find your notes helpful in connecting to the poem. I am concerned if you remove those, the piece might be less accessible to your audience.
particularly enjoyed this stanza:
stories we tell evolve
voyeuristic titillations for consuming masses
molding the world into utopias of art
ignorant of the price
powerful content. brilliant all through.
Thank you Christi, I think the notes should stay too. I put them under a lot of my poems because I don’t want the reader to have to look things up. Here especially it was important to use these specific artists but I didn’t want it to be inaccessible if you didn’t already know them. I greatly appreciate your input and look forward to reading your contribution.
It is very difficult for me to read, perhaps because sometimes the mirror reflects the less complimentary memories of life. Well written, powerful.
I’m sorry that it was difficult, I have a lot of grief (or as Carys better puts it, dolor) I work through in my poetry. This week I struggled after reading a lacrimose poem by a stellar poet on abuse. I wept for a full hour after reading it. Her piece ultimately had a deeply cathartic effect. If this was painful in a way that was injurious please know it was not my intent and I am deeply sorry. Take good care.
i always enjoy your poetry tremendously anna and this is no exception. though i have to confess i would be lost on many of your poems without your footnotes. i don’t think it is a bad thing though as i always find i learn a lot and my horizon gets wider with this. what i think is that a poem should be able to stand on its own…without picture, without footnotes, without explanation. and this poem could stand on its own. people wouldn’t get all the details but would have more room to interpretate it in different directions – and this is something i always welcome with poetry…
Claudia, thank you for your kind words, they mean a lot to me. I agree with you about the notes and pictures, the poem has to stand on its own two feet and rely on what the reader brings to it. I thought about this a lot as I was submitting some poems for a fellowship. Multiple directions and layers of meaning are a lot of what makes poetry so interesting. I do leave a lot out of the notes even when I decide to add then. Thanks for all your helpful feedback!
Intelligent, educative and emotional experience. I appreciate the footnotes for my ignorance about Alder and Chadwick.
Appreciate your comments on my poem. Thank you!
Cheers
Padmavani
Sorry this comment didn’t appear earlier, it went into spam. Thank you for your kind words, your poem was beautiful and affecting.
Glad this was linked via terricolous vulnerability — this is a much different style than the previous poems that I have read of yours. Nice control of competing fragments,seemlingly scribbled swiftly to make the next post. Life is short and we all end up victims of the final brutality whether surrounded by 22 great grand children as we tell our final story or whether victim of a drive by bullet. I am at work, but will try to listen to the reading at a later time. Definitely enjoyed this!
I like to be versatile and fit form to function :). Yes we do, just as all love stories are tragedies (as they end in death, of one kind or another). The recording is quite emotional (to warn you). Thank you so much for reading this from the link and, as ever, for your insightful comments.