for GI have tried to sketch you
with a few spare words
but they were raggedy
old women with angular,
aching bones and twisted features,
used too often to flatter or deceive.
I could compare you
to the gentle pacific dawn
in the embrace of summer–the soft rose
and peach mingling with the cerulean
sky and bay–but they are only collections
of letters and image, pastel memory
combined with a fleeting warmth
that shivers with longing
as winter nears.
If I could capture the wonder of stars
gleaming steadily through the fog
that nuzzles comfortably atop these ridges
rising gracefully over the bay
then with what poor adjectives I possess
perhaps this pale reflection might suffice
to light your depths.
Yet what is true
is that I know no word
with soul deep enough,
no sound sufficiently lithe
to embrace this beauty
that shines within you,
I have no power to illuminate
with any light so sure and healing
as your own.
4 comments:
PB, this is good stuff. The blend of painting and "word painting," and the impossibility of capturing the sublime with either, seems quite appropriate.
I also like the shift from complex language in the first stanzas to simple, direct words in the last. My advice is to run with this a bit more. For instance:
In the fourth line of the last stanza, you use "adjective" for the second time in the poem. Once was probably enough, and I think this stanza demands something simpler. Perhaps "sound" would suffice? It might demonstrate how the sublime so often strikes us dumb.
In the next line, you use the word "encompass." Seems to me that the poem isn't about how you want to encompass the "beauty" but about the failure of adequately depicting it. How about changing "encompass" to "tell of"?
Actually, that's about it. Nice work.
I've known there was something I didn't like about that last stanza but I could never figure out what it was. I'm very much obliged to you Sam. You were exactly right. Sound is a much better word there even if I had not used adjective already. It's the perfect word in fact. I decided to go with embrace instead of encompass, even though I see your point about keeping the metaphor parallel. Almost always I would agree with you about that too but part of what I was trying to illustrate was the futility of capturing someone in words because a person is so much more than the sum total of what you perceive with your senses. That would be why I was deliberately mixing things up. Encompass was definitely the wrong word there, too sharp for one thing. Anyway, I am very grateful for your comments. Thanks!
No problem. It's one of those poems I kind of wish I'd written myself. Embrace works just as well as "tell of." Good stuff, PB.
You can always spot a man in love by the words he choses. God I love this, it is one of the most romantic poems I have ever read. Dreamy and soulful. It was so good I missed the double use of 'adjective' the first go round. the word 'encompass' could be changed but I think you will get around to the detail of that later. Awesome piece.
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