thoughts of an unborn child

[jon1jt]

thoughts of an unborn child

[TheFifthElement]

Well jon, I have to confess I've missed your poetry. The sheer voluminious expansiveness of it, and the feeling you've been taken on a dizzy, uncertain ride. This is no different. I noticed you're using a lot of internal rhyme which is nice, makes it a nice poem to read out loud.

I'm not sure I understand the point of the Hemingway reference - this seems maybe a bit too random, but the rest is lovely. I loved these parts:


Skin blue & black smeared,
fingers picking for a seam.


Do not stall, for I stew in the
eves of your innermost space,
where your words gather.


it’s the color of clouds I care about---
(me too ;) )


And If I’m deceived, reader,
let me moan in the bone of life, then—
let my eyes sweat like windows, then—
the day I breathe myself out into the world,
waddling to my where-to, pennywise—
amazed by the existence of blue.

I see you're still talking to that reader ;)

As always with your poems jon, I think this needs to be read, digested, regurgitated and reabsorbed to be fully appreciated. One to read again, definitely.

Oh, and I meant to ask, here:

eves of your innermost space,

did you mean 'eves' or 'eaves'? I thought 'eaves' when I read it then I thought 'eves' made a nicer image. Hmm.

[SleepyWitch]

welcome back, jon. I missed your poetry, too. will re-read this later when I have more time

[Virgil]

Well jon, I have to confess I've missed your poetry. The sheer voluminious expansiveness of it, and the feeling you've been taken on a dizzy, uncertain ride. This is no different. I noticed you're using a lot of internal rhyme which is nice, makes it a nice poem to read out loud.


Yay!!!! A Jon poem. :D :D :D

Fifth said it so well above I have really nothing to add except my enthusiam. :D

First what a marvelous thought for a poem, the thinking of a child in the womb, and if I can put on my literary criticism hat on (as opposed to my creative writing hat on ;)) I would say that it implies a certain apriori knowledge. Cool. Plus anything that humanizes an unborn child is a-okay in my book. ;)

What a marevelous beginning, especially from here:

Dear woman, face of firelight,
shouting glance---
my dancer of dance:
Do not stall, for I stew in the
eves of your innermost space,
where your words gather.
Only the word 'eves" makes me pause. I'm not exactly recalling, but it does have an echo of a cliche in my ear. But other than that, really good stuff, especially addressing her. Hey why "Dear woman" instead of "Dear mother?" Juat a question that popped into my head, and guess might be something any reader will also consider.

The rest of the poem is a sort of accumulation of all the implications of the baby's "stewing" on her words. Intersting sets of mages: winds and snow crags and clouds and sky and birds. The expansiveness is great, especially this:

the horizon clicking with inner mechanisms of me;
my brain open to a sky of a hundred thousand birds.

Two places I didn't like the phrasing: (1) where every atom of my body flows and (2) the foothills of Hemingway. The first is definitely a cliche and the second is kind of absurd though I do know what you mean. I would somehow keep Hemingway in there because I do like the italic part that follows. :)

I'm not sure I understand the closing stanza. Way too much philosophical mumbo jumbo, in a pop philosophy sort of way.

It's good to hear that poetic voice again. :)

[blp]

Ha ha. Great. I knew you must be back because of the nice new profile pic, (which I saw while narcissistically reviewing some of my old threads). Good to have you back, matey! Don't stay away so long next time. I hate the poem.

[blp]

Kidding. Reading it now.

[blp]

Yeah. Actually, I do kind of hate it at the start, up to the very worst bit, 'dancer of dance'. What's that supposed to mean? That the dancer dances? Well duh.

The rest is you at your ecstatic best, best since this one (http://www.online-literature.com/forums/showthread.php?t=32248), and better than that. [NB John's actually deleted this one and replaced it with some doggerel, but the post below quotes the original in full].

I don't like 'It's the colour of clouds I care about' being on its own the way it is. It looks like you're saying, 'Look at this. What a great line, eh? Eh?' I've done the same myself. It's wrong. Just be a love and budge it down into the next strophe, will you? I'll be much more impressive if it looks like you just knocked it off.

EDIT: I mean, 'It'll be much more impressive...' God, was that more narcissism Freudianly slipping out? Probably.

Leaving forever, he says. As if. It's cold out there, jon. Colder even than in here. But you found that out, no?

[kiz_paws]

When I read your poetry, I never know quite where I'll wind up. Part of the mystery, part of the charm. Yes, it is good to see ya posting here again, Jon!

I liked
watching the world cupped on an elbowThat was an amusing thought, that an unborn infant pondered life outside the comfort...


It's the color of clouds I care aboutI love that thought, too.

You began with BLUE and ended with BLUE. And of course blue is my favorite color to mull over (blue as in sad, the seven shades of blue -- where sky meets water and all blends therein, la la la la; but what has that to do with it all....)

Enjoyed the poem.

Welcome Back! :nod:

[jon1jt]

Fifth: hey you! yes, glad you're liking the rhyme. I played with a couple lines from an older poem I wrote and added it to this here, the line with undersound and the next. I think blp might have located it I'll check. I intended eves for the obvious reason but reading it now I just don't like it so it's as it should be. As far as the randomness of the Hemingway reference, I guess I just dunno. Isn't the act of poetry writing itself a form of randomness, and must poetry be necessarily diametrically opposed to its own imaginative leapings and boundings from nothing to somethingness? or something like that. What do you think?

Sleeps: hey there good seeing ya stop by. Get some sleep and come on back, yes yes.

Virge: you got me chuckling over here about this poem speaking for the baby...unborn fetus? Uhoh. This view makes me feel so abashedly...Republican! guilty? And yet you of all people know I didn't vote for John McCain! :lol:

Apriori?? Stop it you'll scare the readers! Don't you remember I once said that the poem is play?...Oh so you don't believe me. There is NO philosophy in this poem, I swear! :)

This unborn is speaking for all unborns and to all mommies or would be mommies. Oh you know what I mean. :p

I was really going after the expansiveness in this one, glad you picked up on it.

So you're not liking my foothills of Hemingway. Cliche?!?!?! And you're hating my atoms flowing too. You don't realize that when I wrote this poem I dispersed---like atoms. So the next time you're in your car looking in your rearview mirror, watch what's behind you go poof, that's me too. :sick:


blp: Why is it that after I read your first post that I knew what you really thought?! :lol: I'm glad to be back...glad you're still here, thought you might have rode off into the sunset or somethin. Hey you never know. But where the hell would you be had you rode off just like that, things being equal and all? :idea:

Okay, lemme squabble with cha some about this...ahem..theory of yours that one line that stands on its own smells of an egotist at work. I remember you made a similar remark about a line in my Jesus poem, and I think in that one I was, but only a little. :p

It's the color of clouds I care about

Was that just an egotistical act that I quoted my own line and bolded it? Jeez you're making me self conscious! Now c'mon you know and everybody knows that this line is hardly original. But..But...BUT...that's not the point now is it?...
because I think that in its hopelessly unoriginal state it serves as a function as line, one of timing. And isn't poetry supposed to be about locating the proper modality of breath, exclamation---sound and sense, within the limited repertoire available, or is that just a bunch of bull****?

Can I blow my trumpet for a sec and say with a straight face that the poet is a caretaker and that this caring has more to do with the sanctity of words and the songs they hope to become, which is about as unegotistical...disembodied? as one can be from one's own work.Or am I just nuts?


Kizcuzwuz: Your favorite color is blue and you picked up on that as the bookends of the poem, nice eye, yes! *winkwink*. My favorite color is pumpkin, which is why my cat's name is Pumpkin. I like Halloween too and on that holiday I get the urge to do some trick or treating, but instead I stay with the others here, at the poetry motel, and dance the monster mash. :pShhh...our secret. ;)

Thanks all.

[kiz_paws]

Can I blow my trumpet for a sec and say with a straight face that the poet is a caretaker and that this caring has more to do with the sanctity of words and the songs they hope to become, which is about as unegotistical...disembodied? as one can be from one's own work.Or am I just nuts? No you are NOT nuts. I love this thought. Bravo. :thumbs_up


Kizcuzwuz: Your favorite color is blue and you picked up on that as the bookends of the poem, nice eye, yes! *winkwink*. My favorite color is pumpkin, which is why my cat's name is Pumpkin. I like Halloween too and on that holiday I get the urge to do some trick or treating, but instead I stay with the others here, at the poetry motel, and dance the monster mash. Shhh...our secret. ROFLAO. BUT: no one monster mash is the same, you know! :lol:

[blp]

Yes, of course, profoundly unegotistical. What was I thinking? The words and worlds merely flow through you like cosmic nutriment. ;) I'm not really accusing you of egotism, jon, but as I said, it looks like you're drawing attention to that line, and the breath and timing contribute to that, and that's the problem that you as caretaker need to be concerned with (emphasis added for hyperbolic purposes). I actually think it's better than your assessment of it, but it needs to be embedded so the readers are tricked into thinking they found it themselves and, years later, an undergrad will say, Oh, I love all his work, but there's this one line in particular, and quote it and the other one will say, really, no burtling way (it's 2051 and slang has moved on), I love that line too! And babies will be born because of it. All because of the spacing.

[jon1jt]

Yeah. Actually, I do kind of hate it at the start, up to the very worst bit, 'dancer of dance'. What's that supposed to mean? That the dancer dances? Well duh.


Literally, it means exactly what you said it means.

Can you separate a painter from his painting?
Can you separate a farmer from his farming?
How's about the dancer from her dancing?
Can a child do that, blp?
Can you?

Take an imaginative leap---I know it's asking a lot---but just try to imagine:
You're stewing in your mother's womb.
She gets in her car, and she goes to the store, and she's mopping the floor, and she rolls on her tummy and back over, and she's got the music turned up real loud. You starting to stew with her...da de ba bum de dum de dum de da dem dum de ta detat tat tat...
Yeah, the dance becomes her, the dancer of the dance. That's why I didn't refer to her as mother. All the child feels is movement, unbridled energy. So then, no duh. :sick:

[blp]

Literally, it means exactly what you said it means.

Can you separate a painter from his painting?
Can you separate a farmer from his farming?
How's about the dancer from her dancing?
Can a child do that, blp?
Can you?

Take an imaginative leap---I know it's asking a lot---but just try to imagine:
You're stewing in your mother's womb.
She gets in her car, and she goes to the store, and she's mopping the floor, and she rolls on her tummy and back over, and she's got the music turned up real loud. You starting to stew with her...da de ba bum de dum de dum de da dem dum de ta detat tat tat...
Yeah, the dance becomes her, the dancer of the dance. That's why I didn't refer to her as mother. All the child feels is movement, unbridled energy. So then, no duh. :sick:

Fair enough. Maybe the line's just not to my taste and that was my bad attempt to explain why. The bit after it's so great and it just feels weak in its poetic effect by comparison. I much prefer what you wrote about it above.