Honey and Salt

[Jack of Hearts]

Honey and Salt by Carl Sandburg. Let's talk about this poem.

http://stees.wordpress.com/2008/01/0...salt-sandburg/

Here are three bits that were superb.

They all help: be cozy but not too cozy:
be shy, bashful, mysterious, yet only so-so:
then forget everything you ever heard about love
for it’s a summer tan and a winter windburn
and it comes as weather comes and you can’t change it:
it comes like your face came to you, like your legs came
and the way you walk, talk, hold your head and hands—
and nothing can be done about it—you wait and pray.

... and...

Yes and it gathers dust and mildew
and shrivels itself in shadows
unless it learns the sun can help,
snow, rain, storms can help—
birds in their one-room family nests
shaken by winds cruel and crazy—
they can all help:
lock not away your love nor keep it hid.

... and...

Bidden or unbidden? how comes love?
Both bidden and unbidden, a sneak and a shadow,
a dawn in a doorway throwing a dazzle
or a sash of light in a blue fog,
a slow blinking of two red lanterns in river mist
or a deep smoke winding one hump of a mountain
and the smoke becomes a smoke known to your own
twisted individual garments:
the winding of it gets into your walk, your hands,
your face and eyes.

How the end of the poem relates to what he said in the beginning. Is nice. Very nice.

What say you?









J

[cafolini]

I agree fully with you and this poem. One of the best ever written about this subject.

[Jack of Hearts]

We've always been in some weird fundamental agreement about things Mr. Folini. This is not surprising. Just disturbing.






J

[Jack of Hearts]

Tangentially related, here's the only video this reader could find of Carl Sandburg. It's from What's My Line.

Carl Sandburg What's My Line





J

[cacian]

How does Honey and Salt relate in this context?
I am not sure what this piece is talking about
I have reread it many times and I still cannot see how the title relate.

[Jack of Hearts]

There are sanctuaries holding honey and salt.
There are those who spill and spend.
There are those who search and save.
And love may be a quest with silence and content.

Here's the line from the poem. This is the end of the response to Sandburg's question How long does love last? It seems to be saying that some people, in how they love, 'spill' honey and 'spend' salt. And still other types of people 'search' for honey and 'save' salt. These two tastes really seem to go together. Maybe 'honey' is the part of love we, as humans, crave and 'salt' is a necessary counterpoint? Anyways, immensely interesting lines.







J

[cacian]

Hi J this an interesting piece thanks for adding it up.
I never knew about it.
I still cannot see how honey and salt conjur up a theme for love.
I can understand honey and honey moon expression but salt is often associated with injuries like the expression ''to rub salt on something'' or as a deterent or prevention.
There seem to be quite a contrast.
Honey is also supposed to be medicinal and is also used as a preventive potion.
Sorry I do not mean to be difficult I am just trying to find my own understanding on it.
When I saw honey I thought of sweet and sour.
Salt is not sour but honey is sweet.
I am not sure where I am going with this.
I tend to associate salt and sugar because they look the same and are of the same consistency.
Honey is liquidish and so salt and honey contrast to me is too obvious.
Sorry again I do not mean to be confusing.
I hope you do not mind me adding this up.
I propably stop now before I get in trouble.

[Jack of Hearts]

It seems the biggest thing to focus on is the contrast. Honey and salt are both sought for their flavor... But for different reasons and in inverse quantities.






J

[Jack of Hearts]

Kisses, Can You Come Back Like Ghosts?

A poem from the same collection ('Honey and Salt'). Simply astounding. Here's the middle stanza:

Love is a clock and the works wear out.
Love is a violin and the wood rots.
Love is a day with night at the end.
Love is a summer with falltime after.
Love dies always and when it dies it is dead
And when it is dead there is nothing more to it
And when there is nothing more to it then we say
This is the end, it comes always, it came to us.
And now we will bury it and put it away
Beautifully and decently, like a clock or a violin,
Like a summer day near falltime,
Like any lovely thing brought to the expected end.

Thoughts?






J

[cacian]

Hi Jack thank you for posting.
May I ask why you do find this piece astounding?

[Jack of Hearts]

Its treatment of love. Sandburg expresses the sentiment that we start with a living, breathing thing. But it dies and we're left with an object or a memory, a souvenir for our shelf, and then we go again. Seems pretty profound and practical.







J

[cacian]

Hi Jack I think there is something about this piece that feels wanten needed almost crying out for help.

I feel that it is too compressed and incorrect and many places for me anyway.
Poetry I find is a very a private affair and so declaring one's love under the sun in poetry and then taking it away as if it was a tragedy is rather uncompelling to me.

I like poetry that does not generalise and condem very public topic such as love or feelings in general.

For example inciting love as it being something forbidden like Adam and Eve and the forbidden apple is exactly what this piece is sounding to me.

There is tragedy and then there is positive uplifting feelings such as loving which an endearding natural feeling to us humans.
I feel that poetry many times then none has let down this very feeling and has given a tragic name.
I think love is to celebrated and looked after by us because the more we trample on it and treat as some kind of a curse, a punishible lovers deemed act or some kind of 'dirty affair'' between two unfaithful people then I am afraid it will trample on us back.

It is the old wheel's tale 'what goes around comes around' endlessly tragic and rather oppressive.

I believe that whilst we are able to write and think and free to feel in anwyay we want when it comes to sharing with the public ie writing poetry then I believe we must write carefully tread as not tho drag the rest of the world down with us.
Not everyone have affairs mistresses agree with Lolita''s publsihing and believe Romeo and Juiliet is the It.
Writing about public subjects such as love one must take care in the way one portrays it so not to project the idea that we are all in it because at the end the day that is anything but the truth and it does not reflect me or many others.

I feel literature should be truthful and exempt from stereotypes and illusions in order to exempt everyone from being the same tragic and pointless.
If anything we are different and literature should reinforce the differences in order to empower encourage an engage.

The issue I have with this piece is that it is depressing and does not engage me in any way shape or size.



Sorry I hope you understand this is not against you and I do apologise in advance if it came across as that.

I hope this makes sense.

I look forward to more of your poetry posting !

[Jack of Hearts]

Couldn't disagree with you more. If somebody is going to write a poem, they'd better not have room for anybody else's truth. They'd better present their truth like it's the only truth there ever was.

Don't be careful. Be honest. Break toes and fingers but not your own heart.







J

[billl]

Yeah, it didn't really resonante with or appeal to me, probably for the same reasons it didn't work for cacian, but the poet can write whatever he or she wants, especially if they think it's true for them, that's the best policy of course. From the language, it might look like he's aiming for a universal statement, but it's a poet, and a manner of speaking.

[Jack of Hearts]

It's easy to see the strength in your assessment. This reader finds himself in opposition, naturally, because he believes in the sincerity of the poem (at least, at this point in time). But, as matter of curiosity, where do you two find yourselves in disagreement? Is it that you've experienced the things the poem speaks of in a different manner than it presents? Or do you feel that this poem lacks the authority to generalize across human experience?






J