Words

[Bar22do]

For Naï

It starts with calm, but for the sounds
I try on a Playel piano; words explode later,
gauche, they grip my chest.

In them, there is warning -
of death and life's lie.
They shout and abate,
disturbing witnesses to time,
to the turmoil in the autumn foliage -

occasionally, they thank and praise,
"Alleluia, to the Highest, alleluia,"
while I mumble: "...no matter who You are."

Creation is always hungry for words -
as if they built it -
bending at the edge of an abyss,
bathing in Spring grass, or grasping
constellations with the mind...

People thus cry their pasts into their now,
look for a future in their shy comfort.
Words in return - a river valley,
lightning, or a plotting forest -
swell the space,

but - hush...

a small still voice... ablaze,
loses my being’s shape in its flame -
I am its sweat, a tear of my essence
born from divine cinnabar threads,
offering myself to:

"Here, we all are innocent,
one,
the Same."

Jerusalem, March 2012

[Mojtaba-Iraqi]

It's a challenging theme and imagination. One should not encounter such thoughts unless armed with this confidence. I see the needed confidence rolling over your "words".

[Bar22do]

Thanks for your comment, Iraki, in the meantime I have checked my thoughts, this time with a lesser confidence and, as a result, revised my poem (a few times, since). :idea: Yours friendly!

[MystyrMystyry]

Nice fluid images Bar22do :)

[Adolescent09]

Aesthetic. But I don't think I've grasped the whole meaning of the poem.

[ampoule]

Whoa! This is gorgeous! I love the creation stanza and that line about people crying their pasts into their now. Wow!

[Bar22do]

Thank you Mystyr, Adolescent (you could perhaps read the revised version which I consider is clearer) and ampoule (you are so kind!), for your comments and remarks. Have a good day!

[Jeos]

"...no matter who You are." - who...or what.

"Creation is always hungry for words -
as if they built it -"
I like to believe that the world -"that which appears", was born maybe not from a whole word but from a sound, from a vibration-do not need to say which one...[/I]
it's the most ancient metaphysical wisdom in that subject.

So nice to read your text ! As we say here "ça coulait de source" !

soon I am going to post a text whose theme is somehow the other side of the coin......

[AuntShecky]

Some of your verses strike me speechless; others, such as this one, strike me "dumb."

By that I mean, I not only don't have much to say, but I'm also perplexed, overwhelmed with stupidity because I just don't understand this particular piece.

Instead of the vague pronoun "It" in the opening line, I would have preferred
a noun. What's with the piano?

That same pronoun vexes me in this line:

'Creation is always hungry for words--
as if they built it.
What's the antecedent for "it"?--"Creation"? So why would the words that built creation make it hungry?

Your images are always vivid and original, and therefore I was surprised to see this one, which appears in innumerable works a bit too often:

at the edge of an abyss

A clarifying article ( or pronoun) is missing in this line:

constellations with mind
the mind, a mind, one's mind, my mind?


People thus cry their pasts into their now
How about eliminating "now" and substituting "presents"? It would make a parallelism with "pasts" and also hints at the double-meaning of "presence."

At first I thought this line was missing a verb between "words" and "in"--

Words in return
Maybe you could put "swell the space" closer, instead of at the end:


words in return
swell the space
[with] a river valley
lightning, or a plotting forest



I don't understand the word "being's" this line:

loses my being's shape in its flame
and I don't get the closing stanza at all!

Maybe I'm tired. I know that you always have something important to say, and I wish I weren't so dense!

[Jack of Hearts]

Pictured a beautiful woman singing at a piano- and expressing her uncertainties about god, existence and beauty through song.

Maybe wrong, but a beautiful poem nonetheless.





J

[Bar22do]

Jack, when I was little, I would spend time lying on the floor, putting my ear against the piano "detecting" the sounds it would offer just because air was circulating within... it was usually a rewarding experience... thank you for your beautiful words.
Auntie, Dear, I'm always giving you a headache... I had nothing revolutionary to tell, I'm afraid, was just sharing impressions about speaking silence (beginning and end of my poem) and about how words are "bricks" this world is built of (too many bricks for sure), but since it didn't read clear, plus contained so many errors, I guess I still have a lot of work to do before it can really share something. Thank you so very much for your honest, constructive critique, Auntie.
Jeos, many are to maintain the world started with a sound, with a letter (that was also a number...); Maimonides, in his time, described some ongoing, formidable cosmic roar... We are all certainly too "deaf" to hear what really WAS or IS. Thank you for your involvement!

Thanks all for your feedbacks, always appreciated.

[Adolescent09]

I read it again Bar. It sure is a fine poem and as Jack thought... I too believe it is invested with a feminine touch.

[Bar22do]

Thank you very much, Adolescent!

[Delta40]

I always get carried away by your poetry Bar. If anything I read takes me somewhere, makes an impression on me or inspires me to write then it has done its job. I will agree with Aunties suggestion to change:

People thus cry their pasts into their presence

I loved this whole stanza but with aunties suggestion, its even more powerful for the reasons she states.

[Bar22do]

Thank you, Delta, I agree I need to improve quite a bit before I can express myself clearly as a poet. But I'm grateful for your words of encouragement.
'Presents' instead of 'now' in that L? I'm thinking and thinking about it and can't decide, for me, 'now' actually made a parallelism with 'pasts'...