Poem of the Week '10

[zoolane]

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.

[zoolane]

[QUOTE=jersea;980105] 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.

[zoolane]

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

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.

[Paulclem]

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.

[Gilliatt Gurgle]

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.

???

.

[zoolane]

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.

Maybe Edna is refer to male maybe in 3 verse lines:2,3. First then could be love reference.
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.

[zoolane]

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 she to with meet a man and him being marry not be stay so that unoffending evening: unevent.

[Paulclem]

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.

[AuntShecky]

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.

[zoolane]

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.

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.

[OrphanPip]

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.

[L.M. The Third]

Fascinating poem. I find the speaker's feelings to his mother more ambiguous than her character.

[Silas Thorne]

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.

[OrphanPip]

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.

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

[L.M. The Third]

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".