There's not much analysis compared to some of the other posted poems. Do you think the subject matter excludes?
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There's not much analysis compared to some of the other posted poems. Do you think the subject matter excludes?
I agree with your statement about aristocratic self-entitlement. Although interesting, I don't particularly care for the libertine personality.Quote:
Originally Posted by OrphanPip
Yes, you are right, there isn't much analysis. I don't necessarily think lack of discussion is due to the subject matter, just that it isn't as open for different interpretations as some other poems posted here. Next time I'll throw out an out-there John Ashbery poem for a range of varied responses. :)Quote:
Originally Posted by Paulclem
I agree that the poem is less open to interpretation, but only one Lady has posted upon the poem. I think the subject matter has affected the discussion. I'm not being censorious, just making an observation.
Who wants to choose the poem for this week, or should I choose that Ashbery poem I was thinking of? :)
post-it- why not?
OK, here goes:
Farm Implements and Rutabagas in a Landscape by John Ashbery
The first of the undecoded messages read: “Popeye sits in thunder,
Unthought of. From that shoebox of an apartment,
From livid curtain’s hue, a tangram emerges: a country.”
Meanwhile the Sea Hag was relaxing on a green couch: “How pleasant
To spend one’s vacation en la casa de Popeye,” she scratched
Her cleft chin’s solitary hair. She remembered spinach
And was going to ask Wimpy if he had bought any spinach.
“M’love,” he intercepted, “the plains are decked out in thunder
Today, and it shall be as you wish.” He scratched
The part of his head under his hat. The apartment
Seemed to grow smaller. “But what if no pleasant
Inspiration plunge us now to the stars? For this is my country.”
Suddenly they remembered how it was cheaper in the country.
Wimpy was thoughtfully cutting open a number 2 can of spinach
When the door opened and Swee’pea crept in. “How pleasant!”
But Swee’pea looked morose. A note was pinned to his bib. “Thunder
And tears are unavailing,” it read. “Henceforth shall Popeye’s apartment
Be but remembered space, toxic or salubrious, whole or scratched.”
Olive came hurtling through the window; its geraniums scratched
Her long thigh. “I have news!” she gasped. “Popeye, forced as you know to flee the country
One musty gusty evening, by the schemes of his wizened, duplicate father, jealous of the apartment
And all that it contains, myself and spinach
In particular, heaves bolts of loving thunder
At his own astonished becoming, rupturing the pleasant
Arpeggio of our years. No more shall pleasant
Rays of the sun refresh your sense of growing old, nor the scratched
Tree-trunks and mossy foliage, only immaculate darkness and thunder.”
She grabbed Swee’pea. “I’m taking the brat to the country.”
“But you can’t do that—he hasn’t even finished his spinach,”
Urged the Sea Hag, looking fearfully around at the apartment.
But Olive was already out of earshot. Now the apartment
Succumbed to a strange new hush. “Actually it’s quite pleasant
Here,” thought the Sea Hag. “If this is all we need fear from spinach
Then I don’t mind so much. Perhaps we could invite Alice the Goon over”—she scratched
One dug pensively—“but Wimpy is such a country
Bumpkin, always burping like that.” Minute at first, the thunder
Soon filled the apartment. It was domestic thunder,
The color of spinach. Popeye chuckled and scratched
His balls: it sure was pleasant to spend a day in the country.
http://www.poetryfoundation.org/arch...html?id=177258
Just a reminder:(Just to be able to give everyone an opportunity to post their choice of poems).Quote:
Originally Posted by Scheherazade
I am not familiar with Ashbery and will read/post my thoughts later on.
(I was extremely busy with school last week; sorry for neglecting this thread).
Oops, sorry, it seems that that rule passed into the realm of forgetting. If anyone wants to, post another and I will scratch this one.
It was a reminder for coming weeks, Silas. We can discuss this one this week.Quote:
Originally Posted by Silas Thorne
I'm not familiar with this poet, and I'm looking for a lead into the imagery he is employing.
The comments below seem consistent with the poem as read it. Clearly there are recurrent themes - the spinach, scratching, cartoon figures, and a narrative where Popeye has gone to live in the country whilst Olive takes sweetpea, but I'm unsure what he's getting at. Is it some comment upon the influence of screen culture on everyday life?
he characterizes himself as having been described as "a harebrained, homegrown surrealist whose poetry defies even the rules and logic of Surrealism
Although renowned for his complex, post-modern and opaque work
From his Wikipedia page.
So I'll post a poem this week.
Mr Bleaney by Phillip Larkin.
This link will take you to the poem, and a sound recording of Larkin reading it out.
http://www.poetryarchive.org/poetrya...do?poemId=7077
I like a jolly whizz.
Sorry for not commenting until now. I like this poem and the excellent use of enjambment throughout, though I get a little lost in the last sentence, which starts at the beginning of the second to last stanza. Also, the rhyme on 'nature' and 'sure' seems to be quite different from the perfect rhyming the rest of the way through the poem. Maybe I'm reading it with a different pronunciation to him (unfortunately I wasn't able to tune in to his reading of the poem in my office).
It's a rest home, right? I love the way he describes the room as 'one hired box', as if it was a coffin. As it has no place for books, no coathooks etc, it might as well be. The 'four aways' are the four holidays away from the place, yes? The frame seems to be the plan he fits into other people have organised for his days away.
It seems the narrator of the poem shares the same fate as Mr Bleaney described in the last stanza, as well as sharing his room, and that he reflects on his own fate through that man.
I'm not sure why he plugs his ears up with cotton wool though. Is there someone else in the room using the TV?
I also just got around to reading this poem. I think that Mr. Bleaney is a very ordinary character, although quite noble. I was also struck by the room description and lack of personal possessions and furniture. I suppose that is the way it is in an old folks home, who knows. I was wondering how the narrator is connector or related to the deceased. Maybe he is a son or a person who worked for him.
Thank you very much for getting the discussion going, Silas. :)My impression is that it is a rented room; something like a B&B maybe?Quote:
Originally Posted by Silas Thorne
The persona in the poem is the person who rents the room after Mr B, I believe, and it was Mr B who had persuaded the landlady to buy a TV (or radio?) for the room. The new comer claims not to enjoy it but not sure why he turns it on if that is the case.Quote:
I'm not sure why he plugs his ears up with cotton wool though. Is there someone else in the room using the TV?
I think the narrator is the person who replaces Mr B in the room. He gets to know Mr B through the landlady's chatter: There are speech marks in the first, second and third stanza, which indicate that certain things are quotes/direct speech.Quote:
Originally Posted by jersea
I quite like this poem; it is quite interesting that even though the persona does not tell us anything about himself, since he is in a similar situation to that of Mr B's, it might be safe for us to assume that it is actually him who thinks that he deserves no matter than this bare room maybe? Rather poignant.
I think Larkin is such a good poet that the last discordant rhyme is not a mistake. It's a good point, and perhaps it reflects the discordant feeling that the narrator has about Mr Bleaney, and himself, ending up like this. A rhyme can make a poem a thing of beauty, all sewn up and tidy, whereas Mr Bleaney's life is a bit frayed around the edges.Quote:
Originally Posted by Silas Thorne
I think in the second stanza, ther Landlady is trying to convince the narrator to do the garden by implying
"Mr Bleaney took
my bit of garden Properly in hand"
whereas in fact it hasn't been touched as it is still
"...a strip of biuding land."
Good choice. I can't say that I have read too much Larkin at all, but I think I might dip into him after this one, if time and motivation permits. I agree with your phrase "grey around the edges" I was thinking that "bleak" would be too strong a word, but your phrase just hits it. I like the way that he almost lists the items as if scanning the room "bed, upright chair, sixty watt bulb, no hook" its all a bit, well, grey, dreary, sigh, can only afford a dim 60 watt bulb etc. I like the house keeper's natter which comes to us as Scher says, second-hand - second-hand, sort of sums up the mood of the poem really, in a purposeful way. Interesting.
Yes, I was quite sure it was a deliberate thing too, I just wasn't sure why.I think you've made a good point here about the discordant nature of such a life.Quote:
Originally Posted by Paulclem
I like the dark imagery of the 'flowered curtains...fall', which makes me think of wilting flowers.This links up with the general description of the place as a worn-down place of decay and death, such as the 'tussocky, littered, building land' , the 'fusty bed' and 'the hired box' (which gives the feeling of a coffin).
That the narrator draws attention to the absence of room for books, bags or hooks, and then chooses to take the room, is interesting. It seems he chooses the room due to the absence of these things. Maybe the narrator wants to get away from his life for a while, or maybe he doesn't see the point in these things any more.
The place is called 'the Bodies'. Maybe it is a place to cease to be a person any more and just be a body. If there is little joy left in life, perhaps there is no difference between being alive in such a place or being dead.
Thanks for sharing Paul. I too enjoyed it.
I was struck by the detail; "Fall to within five inches of the sill" followed by "...a strip of building land"
Perhaps the land is perceived as a strip created by the five inch gap between the sill and the closed curtains, as much as Mr. Bleaney cares to see of the "littered" land.
Who are "they" that moved him? His children that washed their hands clean of an elderly father by exiling him to a nursing home?
.
I've listened to this poem several times now and I really enjoy it --
Notes: I think that the "set" that Mr.B egged her on to buy was something that "she" -- the landlady, I assume, purchased for herself. Perhaps the landlady lives in the adjoining room?
The last few lines. . . .when the narrator reflects on the possibility that how we live -- our house or "hired box" reflect upon our own nature reminded me of Thoreau's discussion of how he selected his house in Walden. Of course the "Mr. Bleaney" narrator only offers this connection as speculation, then later backs off of it with an "I don't know" to end the poem.
EDIT -- of course, the narrator himself now resides, at least sometimes, in the "hired box" -- and these grim reflections most likely reflect those of the narrator about himself. . .and then he extends them onto Mr. Bleaney as a way to ask if he is alone in thinking that one's residence reflects "his own nature".
When I read this I thought of the TV in the sitting room being watched by the landlady - and the narrator trying not to listen in his room.Quote:
Originally Posted by Scheherazade
I always thought of the narrator as Larkin surveying the scene with his poet's eye. He typifies - for me - the fifties - a bit drab.
The mysterious nature of this poem can be deconstructed by a very close read. There are many clues that one can use to conclude the proper meaning. I found, after reading the thread and reading a few on-line resources, that the poem makes much more sense if one is clear who the narrator is and where the poem takes place.
It is not a TV, but a radio. One can read further here:
http://www.authorsden.com/visit/view...e.asp?id=16998
This listing of the items in the room almost sounds like it would in a newpaper ad for such a room but, ironically, instead of the positives, here everything -good and bad- is listed with a severe honesty.Quote:
Originally Posted by Neely
Yes, that's my impression too that he was either put into a nursing home or died and his body was removed.Quote:
Originally Posted by Gilliatt Gurgle
Oh, please don't do that. I really enjoy discussing poems in this thread and reading ready-made critiques somehow spoils it for me. :goof:Quote:
Originally Posted by jersea
The word "Bodies" gives an eerie air to this poem. I even wondered whether our bodies and our presence in our bodies are compared to rented rooms ("hired box") at one point but I don't think they would work out well as a metaphor.
The reference to The Bodies sounds as though it may refer to some kind of firm. The strip of building land suggests an industrial environment, and, as Larkin was from Coventry originally, it could refer to the car industries. There was a firm I used to pass on the bus called "Carbodies".
The radio fits, but also a TV does too. I think the effect is similar.
Your link raises an interesting point about poetry Jersea. The link you posted still only represents the views of one person - or the accumulated views abosrbed by one person. In my opinion they have no more validity than yours or mine so long as an idea or opinion about the poem can be supported by the text, and perhaps references to the poet's biography. I think a poem should be able to stand on it's own without reference to the poet's bio though or it can't be a complete piece.Quote:
Originally Posted by jersea
I'm of Scher's view - I think we can reveal the important aspects of the poem with our discussion, and if we differ to critical opinion then perhaps we are seeing it in a new light. :D
:eek6: Sorry to spoil the fun. I think we all pretty much in agreement about the plot of the last poem.
How about this poem next:
The Plaid Dress
Strong sun, that bleach
The curtains of my room, can you not render
Colourless this dress I wear?—
This violent plaid
Of purple angers and red shames; the yellow stripe
Of thin but valid treacheries; the flashy green of kind deeds done
Through indolence high judgments given here in haste;
The recurring checker of the serious breach of taste?
No more uncoloured than unmade,
I fear, can be this garment that I may not doff;
Confession does not strip it off,
To send me homeward eased and bare;
All through the formal, unoffending evening, under the clean
Bright hair,
Lining the subtle gown. . .it is not seen,
But it is there.
Edna St. Vincent Millay
Just from glance I think element of shame or unburden oneself (Edna) and made judgement being made on confession or act.
I hope you all don't remind me butt in like this. I am get more adventure now.
[QUOTE=jersea;980105]:eek6: Sorry to spoil the fun. I think we all pretty much in agreement about the plot of the last poem.
How about this poem next:
The Plaid Dress
Strong sun, that bleach
The curtains of my room, can you not render
Colourless this dress I wear?—
This violent plaid
Of purple angers and red shames; the yellow stripe
Of thin but valid treacheries; the flashy green of kind deeds done
Through indolence high judgments given here in haste;
The recurring checker of the serious breach of taste?
The second line is suggest that " you will not be able mend her, persons or action". Colourless dress= she feel not guilt maybe?
but something still is bother the writer.
The rest of this verse is about well to me, shame,anger. I sort under the illusion that act was force upon the writer.
Last two lines are some reciever judge from others but if get if no judgement was give the act will happened again.
I will get back on you all on rest of poem.
Quote:
Originally Posted by jersea
Second verse could be suggest that person in question has decide with this problem is can not be solve so it actual fact she had just acceptance the reality of the situation.
Third verse be cleanse, away the brute act but no matter how much person clean themself always going to be here.
The colour reference is maybe to the mood change of the person as the poem was wrote.
Through this poem are elements of subtle self loath.
I wonder if the dress, with its colours, represents the facets of personality - and perhaps the Scottish psyche? It seems to have everything - anger, good deeds, treacheries.
It's also a garment I could not doff - as in doff your cap - unbending perhaps? Not acknowledging other authority?it suggested this with the "formal, unoffending evening".
As Zoolane points out, the wearer parhaps wishes the colours to be faded by the sun - perhaps throwing off the fiery Scottishness embodid in clan colours.
The description of the dress calls to mind the uniforms worn by girls in private schools under the strict code of conduct enforced by the nuns.
"confession..." Even the act of confessing her sins does not free her from the bonds or guilt associated with the dress.
Going out for an innocent "unoffending" evening. The plaid dress is likened to a girdle "...lining the subtle gown" "not seen" but it is there (the guilt) restraining the freedom to break out and enjoy a night on the town.
???
.
Maybe Edna is refer to male maybe in 3 verse lines:2,3. First then could be love reference.Quote:
Originally Posted by Paulclem
Guilt of cheat on someone or forbid love.
Thinking about above quote from Paul. Still could act or sordid affair, lines of
'Confession does not strip it off,
To send me homeward eased and bare; guilt stay for while until slow eased of near home.
Maybe she to with meet a man and him being marry not be stay so that unoffending evening: unevent.Quote:
Originally Posted by Gilliatt Gurgle
I think the poem works on both the interpwersonal level with the sexual undertones, ut also on othe levels - nationalistic or personal feelings. Its layers are like the actual and metaphorical clothes she wears:
No more uncoloured than unmade,
I fear, can be this garment that I may not doff;
Confession does not strip it off,
and
Lining the subtle gown. . .it is not seen,
But it is there.
Take a look at this one, which posits universal truths without resorting to the excessive use of meaningless abstractions, using tangible objects of nature instead:
Continuities
by Walt Whitman
Nothing is ever really lost, or can be lost,
No birth, identity, form—no object of the world.
Nor life, nor force, nor any visible thing;
Appearance must not foil, nor shifted sphere confuse thy brain.
Ample are time and space—ample the fields of Nature.
The body, sluggish, aged, cold—the embers left from earlier fires,
The light in the eye grown dim, shall duly flame again;
The sun now low in the west rises for mornings and for noons continual;
To frozen clods ever the spring's invisible law returns,
With grass and flowers and summer fruits and corn.
Lovely meanless words which form this poem.Quote:
Originally Posted by AuntShecky
I think represent someone who believe that nature or this planet was produce of nothing but which been made into lovely existence for the human kind. The words description brilliant from which they began and development of nature and seasons.
Favourite lines are: The sun now low in the west rises for mornings and for noons continual;
To frozen clods ever the spring's invisible law returns,
With grass and flowers and summer fruits and corn.
Appearance must not foil, nor shifted sphere confuse thy brain. meaning that we should not take nature or this planet for granted.
I'm not sure it's an expression of universal truth, I would quite readily disagree with Whitman's transcendentalist view of nature. Nonetheless, there is always a loveliness to his language, he makes you want to believe him.
I'm in a bummed out mood, so here's an elegy.
Keine Lazarovitch 1870-1959 By Irving Layton
When I saw my mother's head on the cold pillow,
Her white waterfalling hair in the cheeks' hollows,
I thought, quietly circling my grief, of how
She had loved God but cursed extravagantly his creatures.
For her final mouth was not water but a curse,
A small black hole, a black rent in the universe,
Which damned the green earth, stars and trees in its stillness
And the inescapable lousiness of growing old.
And I record she was comfortless, vituperative,
Ignorant, glad, and much else besides; I believe
She endlessly praised her black eyebrows, their thick weave,
Till plagiarizing Death leaned down and took them for his mould.
And spoiled a dignity I shall not again find,
And the fury of her stubborn limited mind;
Now none will shake her amber beads and call God blind,
Or wear them upon a breast so radiantly.
O fierce she was, mean and unaccommodating;
But I think now of the toss of her gold earrings,
Their proud carnal assertion, and her youngest sings
While all the rivers of her red veins move into the sea.
Fascinating poem. I find the speaker's feelings to his mother more ambiguous than her character.
The speaker appears to say very little that is positive about his mother at all, that she was 'stubborn', 'limited' and ignorant', but in regretting her passing he shows how much he will miss her fire and her strength in being the person she was.
I think 'carnal' here must mean physical and temporal.
I think that's about right. There's a real celebration of her "negative' qualities though, as if it is that passionate ignorance and overbearing behavior that Layton most fondly remembers.Quote:
Originally Posted by Silas Thorne
I find it kind of interesting that if you look at video of Layton, you can see a bit of that character in him.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zl2ziCfSgTU
I see something condescending in some phrases (in the third verse especially), but there are also obviously elements of celebration of her spirit, even in its acrimoniousness. I find that conscious ambivalence interesting in relation to his phrase, "quietly circling my grief".