To Grandfather

[armen_r10]

Looking for some feedback to be grateful for. Thanks!

(Note: "The Golden Fish" is some fairy-tale)


To Grandfather

Not because the stories—Loosebelly Nun
for example, or that one about the redbreast
trilling from the redwood’s breast—
were told by you, I
told myself, but because they were stories.

But now that memory is
like grandmother’s jar of jam (sour cherries,
not pitted) or like the mosquito mesh
meshing its afternoon shadow and the hookah’s smoke
over the spread of watermelon
and cheese and tea and bread
(should I have saved the crumbs
and river-tossed them for the Golden Fish?)—
now, I know the cherries’ sour,
the too dark tea, the sun, were all as much your tell
as were the words I heard
and hearing did not hear just words,
but you.

[Delta40]

I had to read this a couple of times to grasp it. I'm thinking the closing lines don't quite capture what you're trying to say - that the words which made up the stories echoed by your grandfather and heard by you, meant so much. Perhaps I'm missing something here. Otherwise, I rather like the potential of this poem.

[DieterM]

I really loved this but, like Delta40, had a hard time grasping all the meanings at first read. Maybe it's those "unnatural" line breaks? I copied your poem and tried to play around with "easier" line breaks, and the poem does read better. As much as I enjoyed the images you painted, I do agree again with Delta that the ending, even if I understand what you want to express, is a bit twisted. In line 4 + 5 of the first stanza, you should try to find another word for "told". And why use the passive voice, anyway, in this sentence? "the stories… told by you" could be "Not because it was you… who told the stories…".
In short, there's even more than just potential in here; I found it touching at first read, but the structures came over a bit "raspy".

[MorpheusSandman]

I do not mind (at all) long, complex sentences and jagged line breaks, but I really don't think they serve this particular piece. This feels like it wants to be a simpler, almost pastoral, imagistic piece. The first stanza basically states, once you take out the examples, "I told myself not because the stories were told by you, but because they were stories." You've seemingly elided the verb and perhaps the article (an implied "I told myself (it was) not..."?), and perhaps a subordinate clause beginning with "that" ("but because they were stories (that)"?). I think the second stanza does a good job at making the impression that the place was just as much a part of the memory as anything else. In that sense, I don't think the parenthetical question really fits, and "river-tossed" feels like one of those Gerard Manley Hopkins inventions that calls attention to itself. I think in "were all as much your tell," "tell" should be "tale," because "tell" is not a noun. I'm with Delta and Dieter on the last two lines; I think the reason they don't seem to fit is that the second stanza builds up to the place being "as much a part of the tale," and not hearing your grandfather instead of the words.

[armen_r10]

Thank you all for the feedback. This has been a good exercise in bringing out the inadequacies of an approach to writing poetry that starts with an idea rather than letting the poem be the idea as it unfolds one (if that makes sense). The following is what I wanted the poem to do (not that it does it).

My intent in the first stanza was to dramatize a desire that when "I" heard those stories, I was drawn to them qua stories, and not because they were told by someone already dear to me—I wanted to believe that, say, had I read them in a book, those stories would be no less valuable to me. Hence the attempt to distance the stories from the teller via the passive voice (this distancing effect of the passive voice should work in theory, but is clearly not effective here).

But in the second stanza I surrender to the idea that, yes, the fact that it was the grandfather who told the stories did matter. In fact, it was not only the stories that were dependent on him for their hold on me, but his presence made the entire scene more vivid (a vividness, again, not of the scene itself, but dependent on the grandfather: the scene was as much part of his "tell" as the stories). The parenthesis about the Golden fish is to express the boy's absorption in the tale of the Golden Fish told by his grandfather—in fact, he is so absorbed, that conflates the boundaries between reality (the plane on which the bread exists) and fiction (where the Fish exists): you can't toss real crumbs for fictional fish, as he wishes to do.

I know "tell" is not a noun. The idea was to pun on "tale" while emphasizing the "told-ness" of the stories. I don't know. Or rather, I do know: it's too strained. You're right. The poem lacks a general impression of artificiality that would justify, and make seem natural in its context, efforts of language like "river-tossed" and the usage of "tell" as noun. I am frustrated because I feel like I can indeed spot these faults but leave them in anyway because its just hard to make a damn poem cohere. They don't teach you much at school; they really don't. Apologies for the rant, and thanks so much for your responses, really.

[Delta40]

Ah the frustrations of a poet! Keep at it. It wasn't entirely lost on your readers who definitely appreciated the piece.

[hillwalker]

An idea with potential and there are some great expressions but in places the words trip over themselves. Perhaps 'told by you, I told myself' and 'I heard and hearing did not hear' are too indulgent to work even though I assume they were intentionally phrased this way.

At least I can understand the ending (I think) - it's not the stories themselves that mattered but the person who told them - and as the narrator keeps reliving elements of the stories he was told as a child he remembers his grandfather by association.

H

PS - 'tell' can be a noun if you want it to be and it makes sense in context (which it does here)

[hallaig]

I think it's great, no hard to grasp, loads of atmosphere, nice end...wee quibbles:

now, I know the cherries’ sour, (should there be a comma after now? What's the cherries' sour? sourness?)
the too dark tea, the sun, were all as much your tell
as were the words I heard
and hearing did not hear just words, (This is the only bit I'm no sure of, 'hearing did not hear' 'my hearing'?)
but you.