Poetry

[Vanadís]

“I am too alone in the world, and yet not alone enough
to make every moment holy.
I am too tiny in this world, and not tiny enough
just to lie before you like a thing,
shrewd and secretive.

I want my own will, and I want simply to be with my will,
as it goes toward action;
and in those quiet, sometimes hardly moving times,
when something is coming near,
I want to be with those who know secret things
or else alone.

I want to be a mirror for your whole body,
and I never want to be blind, or to be too old
to hold up your heavy and swaying picture.
I want to unfold.

I don’t want to stay folded anywhere,
because where I am folded, there I am a lie.
and I want my grasp of things to be
true before you.

I want to describe myself
like a painting that I looked at
closely for a long time,
like a saying that I finally understood,
like the pitcher I use every day,
like the face of my mother,
like a ship
that carried me
through the wildest storm of all.”

― Rainer Maria Rilke

[Mimesis]

Sonnet of Black Beauty
By Edward Herbert

Black beauty, which above that common light,
Whose Power can no colours here renew
But those which darkness can again subdue,
Do'st still remain unvary'd to the sight,

And like an object equal to the view,
Art neither chang'd with day, nor hid with night;
When all these colours which the world call bright,
And which old Poetry doth so persue,

Are with the night so perished and gone,
That of their being there remains no mark,
Thou still abidest so intirely one,
That we may know thy blackness is a spark
Of light inaccessible, and alone
Our darkness which can make us think it dark.

[obnoxion]

A DREAM OF GESTAS
- obnoxion, 05/2017 -

In a dream he came to me
In a night-vision I saw
And I beheld the Nazarene

(My pillow is a sack of bedouin's gold
My pillow is a sack of bedouin's gold)

By the Witch's well
He came at me
The sun went down
He came to me

Dressed in red
He came for me
In a woman's veil
The Nazarene
He came at me
In a dream

He carried a basket
In his hand
And pomegranates
- They fell on the sand
From the Basket of Man-
And he whispered,
"Bolchoseth"
Into my ear
Inspiring fear

Those were strong sinews of a man
I watched his hand
The moon did rise
I watched his eyes
I saw the black eye-paint of Koptos!
(A white donkey in silence
approached from the forest.
And I swore it was about
to open its mouth
and speak that name
again, aloud...)

In a night-vision
The Nazarene
He put his sandal against my chest
And around the blinking stars
The black eye-paint of Koptos!

He was the Nazarene
Of my dreams

[Heith]

Wonderful, brother Obnoxion, thank you do much for sharing!

[obnoxion]

Wonderful, brother Obnoxion, thank you do much for sharing!

Thank you!

Today I was startlet to see my vision of the white donkey at the edge of a dusky forest in a news story on a Finnish news site. It turned out to be a photo of a white moose that was sighted in Hyvinkää (a city in Southern Finland). But the picture was exactly how I had imagined it when I wrote the poem.

[Mimesis]

I would second this gratitude, brother Obnoxion, for sharing this poem of yours. It is quite beautiful; enigmatic yet at the same time clear, particularly in its sincerity. It truly owns the title of 'poem'.

[obnoxion]

IN MOSQUE AND CHURCH
Hatif Isfahani
translated by David & Sabrineh Fideler


In sanctuary and monastery,
a hundred songs
declare your praise.

You're the clearest light,
but shine forth
in every hue.

Each day and night, your name is called
in Islam's mosque and Europe's church.

[Mimesis]

Mewlana Jalaluddin Rumi
(From a 13th century collection of Rubaiyat)

The heavenly rider passed;
The dust rose in the air;
He sped; but the dust he cast
Yet hangeth there.

Straight forward thy vision be,
And gaze not left or right;
His dust is here, and he
In the Infinite.

[obnoxion]

Mewlana Jalaluddin Rumi
(From a 13th century collection of Rubaiyat)

The heavenly rider passed;
The dust rose in the air;
He sped; but the dust he cast
Yet hangeth there.

Straight forward thy vision be,
And gaze not left or right;
His dust is here, and he
In the Infinite.

I adore Rumi and Persian poetry, but I can't get over how weird it is that Rumi is the most popular poet in the US. I first got into Persian poetry in my early twentie, when I was absolutelly blown away by some Finnish translations of Omar Khayyam's poems, and Omar was the first non-western poet that I realy loved. I do not have the book beside me right now, but the one where he went to mosque to steal a prayer mat, and the next time he went there was because the old mat was worn out, and he decided to steal a new one, is my favourite. It has a priceless theme, but the whole poeam was beautiful like a string of pearls. If you enjoy Persian poetry, you would do well to get Annemarie Schimmel's "A Two-Colored Brocade". I bought it two months ago, and already it is one of my poetry-bibles

I read a lot of books about reading poetry. At the moment I'm reading John Blades' analysis of Wordsworth and Coleridge's classic "Lyrical Ballads", and it is quite good. Helen Vendeler is always brilliant. But right now I would like to praise Jane Hirshfield's "Nine Gates".

One of the essays in her book is called "Facing the Lion: The Way of Shadow and Light in some Twentieth-Century poems." In this essay she makes the point that a substantial poem always has a shadow. She goes through an impressive lot of poems that feature lions, tigers and other similar beasts in relation of shadow as a dangerous power in all great poetry.

Perhaps the most interesting point comes, when she turns to Czeslaws Milosz seemingly light poem, called "Gift":

A day so happy.
Fog lifted early, I worked in the garden.
Hummingbirds were stopping over honeysuckle flowers.
There was no thing on earth I wanted to possess.
I knew no one worth my envyinh him.
Whatever evil I had suffered, I forgot.
To think that once I was the same man did not embarrass me.
In my body I felt no pain.
When straightening up, I saw the blue sea and sails.

As this is obviously an amazing poem, and if a good poem has a shadow, then where is the shadow in Milosz's "Gift"? Hirshfield claims that the lion is hidden in two different ways.

First, the shadow is in the inherent transience that the things mentioned in the poem embody - ephemeral fog, quick hummingbird, altering sea, the short life of a butterfly, the sails that pass us by. Second, there is the rethoric device of inclusion in the negative. By mentioning that there is no evil, no suffering and no envy, we have actually brought into the poem the words evil, suffering and envy.

So, first the poem made my heart light, and then it amazed me with its darkness; And how the darkness was one with light, and how well the shadow was hidden in plain sight. There is no other way to express such concepts in words, except through poetry.

[Mimesis]

If you enjoy Persian poetry, you would do well to get Annemarie Schimmel's "A Two-Colored Brocade". I bought it two months ago, and already it is one of my poetry-bibles

Thank you so very much for recommending this. Based on your recommendation and what I have read of it online since, I will be certain to ascertain a copy for myself. Unfortunately the only copies that I have found for sale thus far are a bit too expensive for me at this precise moment, but the moment I am able, I will be getting it.

I have read a lot of Rubaiyat's - particularly Omar Khayyam, of course - and adore them. I love how they encompass huge vistas of meaning in such a small form. What could in one breath be considered restrictive, are realised in another with a timeless freedom. What can seemingly appear as a small comment on trivial daily life links itself to such transcendental meaning and all intentions always seem to be hidden slightly.

Completely different in form, but they remind me of Koan's in that sense; of being almost riddle like. Every idea simple but meaning profound.

Ahh, I know the poem you speak of, I think. Is it the following:

I went into a mosque the other day,
But, by great Allah, it was not to pray;
No, but to steal a prayermat, now ’tis worn
I go to filch another mat away.

I read a lot of books about reading poetry.

I have always struggled with this slightly. When I apply hindsight, I think that a big part of this has been due to the way in which I - and most in the UK - are taught to read and consider literature. For example, Shakespeare is the greatest victim of this.
I was robbed of truly appreciating his work until very recently, solely due to how one is 'taught' to read poetry; specifically in this instance, Shakespeare's poetry.
Understanding and appreciating his work was blocked to me for so many years because I was trying so hard to apply this kind of critical pre-tense, which blinded me to all that his work is trying to say, in favour instead of some plastic analysis of language.
It is only recently, when I stopped trying to understand him, his use of language and the context of the time that he wrote within, that I really began to, ironically, understand him and the depth and beauty of his work. Now, his sonnets are to me among the finest and most beautiful - and at times - the most achingly relatable.

However, I think when one has learnt to absorb before understanding, rather than attempting to understand in order to be able to absorb, then this problem is solved.

As this is obviously an amazing poem, and if a good poem has a shadow, then where is the shadow in Milosz's "Gift"? Hirshfield claims that the lion is hidden in two different ways.

First, the shadow is in the inherent transience that the things mentioned in the poem embody - ephemeral fog, quick hummingbird, altering sea, the short life of a butterfly, the sails that pass us by. Second, there is the rethoric device of inclusion in the negative. By mentioning that there is no evil, no suffering and no envy, we have actually brought into the poem the words evil, suffering and envy.

So, first the poem made my heart light, and then it amazed me with its darkness; And how the darkness was one with light, and how well the shadow was hidden in plain sight. There is no other way to express such concepts in words, except through poetry.

This is fascinating. Reading the poem again with what Hirshfield suggests, the pinnacle line for me is:

'Whatever evil I had suffered, I forgot.'

In that line, which is also interestingly placed almost directly at the whole poem's pivot, all the potential for an understanding of evil and darkness within the words which could suggest it are activated. It is like a key which suggests previous experience to us, and therefore allows the darkness of those experiences into the poem. But in doing so, it also makes the light and the understanding behind this all the more beautiful. It balances and gives meaning to the darkness, in some ways.