Why are there no precipices
when you need one?
Or they’re all occupied,
people doing cartwheels
in mid-descent.
I hear they plan to make suicide
an Olympic event
Why are there no precipices
when you need one?
Or they’re all occupied,
people doing cartwheels
in mid-descent.
I hear they plan to make suicide
an Olympic event
Holy hell. This was a moment of clarity, a snippet of truth, unabashed and uncensored...I appreciate poems like this, I appreciate you, for having the honesty and bravery to appease your quest to defend this thought in your memory--
thank you! thank you for not being afraid to show us REAL, living, breathing, thriving poetry amongst the suffering and desperation of the human condition.
love
kate
"real
loneliness
is not
necessarily
limited to
when
you are
alone"
-C. Bukowski
Thank you, my loving friend. In fact I hesitated to post this poem (and still review the rightness of having done so). It seemed even more bleak than I intended.Originally Posted by paperleaves
jesus...
as kate said, there's a level of honesty in this blunt little poem that belongs in the pages of the volumes of a prolific writer. i am blown away, seriously...
though i do have one question; why have you labelled it as r-rated?
I borrowed that rating from the habit of so-designated films... It was my way of apologizing in advance for a poem that was so bleak!
Ah, I see... However I don't think a poet of your calibre has to apologise for bleakness. I think everyone can relate to your poem on some level; the subject may be bleak but it is so well penned, with such an inspired last stanza, that it is not in any sense depressing.
I've noticed in other works of yours that you have a real talent for taking very large and complex subjects and writing beautiful and brief pieces. I find that quite uplifting
There's an interesting example of synchronicity in regard to these very generous remarks of yours. Just prior to receiving it I was having a skypeversation with a friend of mine who is compliment-phobic, and we tried to get at the root of what made each of us uneasy at receiving praise.
I don't like - or rather I'm uneasy - thinking of myself of a poet of any "calibre." If I fully accepted that, it might become a millstone round my neck... I'm just a guy with a certain degree of facility with words and (I hope) the tactics of poetry and with relatively open access to his feelings.
Did I forget to say Thank you? Thank you!
R-rated, sure; this perfect poem could inspire adolescent hearts... still, it puts one at the boundary between the light and darkness parallels, under the (not so) Almighty's perpendicular... it's hard to say of it - beautiful, but it is a great poem indeed. And the last two lines - only as if casual... Thank you!
it's at least good that we can descend into the bleakness of expression in poetry and art. i give it two r's, and leave the double x's for the dead. 'don't try this at home'.
Quite some bleak and haunting imagery there. Even though "people doing cartwheels /
in mid-descent" is a rather Fellinesque, it just adds to the discomforting atmosphere of the poem. Strange, unlike many of your other poems, I don't exactly know which side of the coin I'm on, but it is certainly effective in being so short and yet conveying such a disquieting atmosphere.
The Moments of Dominion
That happen on the Soul
And leave it with a Discontent
Too exquisite — to tell —
-Emily Dickinson
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TVW8GCnr9-I
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ckGIvr6WVw4
Daniel Benoit's: "I don't exactly know which side of the coin I'm on" -- "of the coin" or - of the pebble...
Hopefully not on that wrong-sided "unskippable stone" of Prince's "Anne Sexton"...
Lol no, what I meant was that I didn't know if I actually enjoyed it is all. It has some haunting and discomforting imagery, and as a result I had mixed feelings towards my reaction. In other words, I don't know if I like it or not overall. It certainly is effective though and I comend Prince's incredible ability to have so much in one poem.
Last edited by DanielBenoit; 11-24-2009 at 12:21 PM.
The Moments of Dominion
That happen on the Soul
And leave it with a Discontent
Too exquisite — to tell —
-Emily Dickinson
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TVW8GCnr9-I
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ckGIvr6WVw4
In an age in which personal poetry is nearly synonymous with
navel-gazing, it's refreshing to read a short piece that bites with
sardonic humor. Well done!
Bitter, biting, witty, sardonic, that's our Prince. You've gone and done it again, I see.I like, it, unequivocally.
"The important thing is not to stop questioning. Curiosity has its' own reason for existing." ~ Albert Einstein
"Remember, no matter where you go, there you are." Buckaroo Bonzai "Some people say I done alright for a girl." Melanie Safka
I'm not in the least put off by your uncertainty whether you "like" this poem or not - I had something like the same uncertainty whether or not to post it, whether it was in any coherent sense a poem...
And I frankly don't know from what depth of morbidity I derived the final lines. And I deeply regret a degree of mordant self-pity in them.
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