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Randallstown came back to me again: the image.
I had gotten away, but escapism is fiction,
when the mind is born to stand on one place
of familial history. Feet are nomads
on the bottom of bodies. They possess their
own agendas, staying fixed upon the truthful lights
of ones viewpoint; the city which resides behind the
eyes: cleftnotes rising from cottages of said cities.
My hands are the hands of family; my mother's hands,
my father's hands, inverted replicas of my own,
matches, as in one flowing species, and
the copies going out into a temporary world.
It is remembering the times wrapped in frilly ribbons
or the burgeoning oceans bringing relief
to lives and dusty hearts. One can gorge on predictions.
They tend to kill, in their deceptive clothes.
Or they can uplift one's consciousness till one can
see the burned tops of mountain ranges, or at least
know they are there; know that, within human grasps,
are peaks to purify destiny's lungs.
Childhood has sank, dust of the sea. An inner child breathes;
has his way, and the days roll, propelled by passion.
Lamont Palmer
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Christine Austin Cole (5/23/2008 5:38:00 PM)
I'm with Raynette on the title... it pulled me in straight away. Your opening line locked me in. It's a superb opening, really - the whole of this piece slides off its back like water off an umbrella and the context serves what follows enormously well. There are, too, some terrific lines in this piece that define both the conscious and unconscious place that it came from. Lines like 'Feet are nomads...', 'My hands are the hands of family' and 'copies going out into a temporary world' were like a roadmap for me - setting the direction for where you were going as you drew to conclusion. Your conclusion, itself, come across as quietly emotional and really rather victorious to me. I completely concur with your OR statement. We have a choice. We can bemoan the loss of childhood experience, exuberance, passion and place, even... or we can carry the magic forward with us by making a conscious decision not to leave it in the past. All in all, a great piece... and even more notably, perhaps, some fine thinking. Personally, I love that you didn't just 'hand it' to the reader (no pun intended) . A good reader prefers to be prompted to thinking, I believe.
Forgive the lengthy comment if it seems intrusive. I concluded, hopefully correctly, that you would not be offended by a more detailed review based on the other comments here. Recognizing that some may prefer an abbreviated response, I do hope I'm not off base.
Christine |
Not a member No 4 (2/25/2007 8:49:00 AM)
We all see different things in complex poems, and this is one of those. The product of high intellect and enlightening insight. The opening couplet really sets the scene for me (the past is where the heart is at home) , and I can easily see the way from there to the exit couplet. Childhood is missed and you let it have its way, the dirges have come, and no doubt there are rays of sunshine, and there are always unknown corners to turn of course, but the day to day can still be very bleak when the extent to which our lives are determined becomes clear - all of that is very poetically charted, as is all the in between detail - the replication of the generations into the future etc. But yes, that the happiest days are probably behind us, without our ever being able to appreciate that, is a realistic point to make in my view. There are many gainsayers out there who may be fending off reality to some degree in my view to rationalise their point of view. They may find it very difficult to look this reality straight in the face. But I can't help believing (Oh my God Elvis is alive after all! Shit!) that the vivid rainbow of emotion we're born with is at it's brightest in childhood and through the teenage years, and gradually bleaches as we age, which to me explains why memories of that phase of our lives are always so much more intense and attractive. It's not that we see them through rose tinted spectacles. The opposite is true in my view. From the bleached vantage point of age they look vivid because they were. The past was actually a more vividly colourful emotional experience for each of us. Nostalgia is a myth I believe in that it is blamed for distortion of the past. The past as we experience in retrospect was real. Too many fail to see the reality of the bleached (and thus darker) present in my view. Or does it all bleach out earlier for some? Now, where did I put that gun? No, we live on for different reasons. Some good, some bad. But regardless, I do believe there is some scope for real volition. Not a lot, but enough, and we will always be capable of happiness so long as we can feel its opposite. When we have nothing left but the middle of the road emotions, then the point of a future becomes harder to justify. Look what you made me do! ! Rabbit again. Wrong ship I know. But it was a very, very stimulating read and reread. It's an exceedingly powerful piece of work, written with great poetic skill from end to end, and very importantly it seems to me, with great passion and honesty. It seems to come from somewhere very genuine and deep within you. When Michener said 'Man springs from the Earth but he doesn't spring very far' I think he was pointing down your road a little. Just a thought or two. Thank you for sharing this excellent piece of poetry. Regards, jim |
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