Death and the Beach-ball

[PrinceMyshkin]

What’s all this folderol about death?
It’s simply one moment we’re here
and then we disappear.

Like that woman I flattered at the café
who never came back.

Did she think I wanted to sleep with her?
(I did!) But I’d just as soon
make love to a beach-ball
as to a woman whose soul
or sense of humour
I’d never touched.

And as for death, I’ve never found
the humour or the soul in it.

[hillwalker]

An intriguing title - the juxtaposition of two such contrary subjects.

There's a very jaunty humour running through this - but also a subtle determination not to allow anything like a lady allergic to flirting (who failed to recognise your undoubted charm) or even death itself, to spoil your day.

H

[Hawkman]

The title reminds me a little of the film, Dark Star. The homicidal, beach-ball alien and the neurotic Bomb, who, having an existential crisis, reasoned that the purpose of it's existence was to explode, and so decided to do so, in spite of the powerful arguments put to it describing reasons why it should not.

Personally I have never succumbed to erotic fantasies about beach-balls, probably because their sense of humour is unfathomable. :D How do you tell when they're laughing? One can usually work out when you've upset them though, they bounce away, into the water and float off, never to be seen again, rather like the woman in the cafe...

Still, Death seems to be a popular subject at the moment. I wrote my poem this morning, so I wasn't cribbing :D

Thanks for the read, My Prince.

Live and be well. H

[dafydd manton]

I just loved that third stanza - summed up my attitude to life. Mind you, you have the edge on me when it comes to a relationship with something totally circular - except my ex-wife, of course! Most enjoyable - the poem, not.....oh, never mind. Thanks.

[Jerrybaldy]

Im with Hill (usually a good place to be) loved the juxtaposition, three ways, death, the beachball and the woman who saw right through your lascivious flattery ;)
best wishes
Jerry

[AuntShecky]

Re: your intriguing title.
The two "disparate" items "yoked by violence together" fit Eliot's definition of metaphysical poetry, a genre which he disparaged. Many poetry lovers do like it though, even those of us in the post post-modern twenty-first century. Another metaphysical quality with which this piece shares is its linking sex with death-- the former was often called "a little death." That linkage has a long tradition, from the Renaissance all the way to French noir films and modern American literature, cf. "Love and Death in the American Novel," by Leslie Fiedler.

Whether or not it fits the metaphysical category, I like this verse of yours , even though it's a tad sparse -- just like the would-be romance that died a-borning.

(If the speaker had confronted the woman while washing his underwear in a Laundromat, would that have been a "brief encounter?)

[Delta40]

I'm intrigued by the word juxtaposition...

[Jerrybaldy]

why? oh hold on cant post my message is too short. lets try again. why?

[angliholic]

One of the meanings I got from this masterpiece is,
I think of that woman as death itself,
or the tender sex as the end of one's life.

[PrinceMyshkin]

Hillwalker, Hawkman, Dafy, AuntShecky, Delta, JerryB, Angliholic:

My thanks to all of you. I wish you a bouncingly good dat.

[Lumiere]

This, sir, is brilliant.

[miyako73]

With your poem, I've found death can be humorous. I loved it. Brilliant juxtaposition of two feelings-- those of mourning for a loss and wanting to make love.

[Bar22do]

(If the speaker had confronted the woman while washing his underwear in a Laundromat, would that have been a "brief encounter?)

Such an exact meeting took place in a Paris Laundromat approx two years ago between a suicidal acquaintance of mine (she had plenty of good reasons) and a guy who was there to wash his underwear... their encounter was brief, but decisive - they soon moved together, got married and live happy till today...

Regarding the following lines of your poem, PMyshkin,

And as for death, I’ve never found
the humour or the soul in it.

you can't really pronounce yourself before the moment comes, well, and afterwards, no one pronounces oneself anymore... this total surprise leaves all speechless if I may.
In addition I'd believe you're not in a hurry to check for the two dimensions in this particular case.

[breathtest]

this is one of my favourite poems on the site i think, Prince. humour, sex, death and a woman. And a beach-ball. it's magic. a wonderful creation.

[PrinceMyshkin]

Lumiere, Miyako, Bar & Breathtest: Many thanks...

[blank|verse]

An enjoyably bizarre poem Prince, linking the serious with the frivolous (and I don't think I can name another poem with the word 'folderol' in!).

That word, and the humorous aside '(I did!)', present a jokey mask, which starts to crack by the last stanza when the narrator comes to realise death isn't quite so frivolous after all.

[Haunted]

Freud said there's only 2 things in life, death and sex. Though he didn't say anything about a beach ball. I think you just outdone the father of psychoanalysis.

[PrinceMyshkin]

Thanks, B|V and Haunted. No doubt, had Freud lived a bit longer he'd have gotten around to writing about beach balls!

[Jerrybaldy]

Here is the beachball I refrerred to and a gem of many from the past of the Prince.

[PrinceMyshkin]

Here is the beachball I refrerred to and a gem of many from the past of the Prince.

Thanks, dude! and remember this immortal line by Baudelaire:


Et toi, mon semblable, mon frere

[Apostrophe]

Didn't realize you had a thing for beach balls...

[PrinceMyshkin]

Didn't realize you had a thing for beach balls...

Didn't realize it myself until I ran into one - or she ran into me. Uhf!!