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plinth for an urn
holds a few strewings of nest-builders
above the shadowed universe a bright top
an ant did crawl in - here's his corpse
to fill with soil or water is to kill
what it is, an empty thing
a vessel may be made to fill
but once made is better left alone
to stand hollow and dry in the day
my darling you decided my moods
when you joked mildly I was content
when you raged I became suicidal
when you were absent I barely moved
dreamed of your insults and praises
you were everywhere filling me
empty again I smell old apples
from when you stored your fruit
this is not a reproach this is a plinth
I must stop making plinths and start making soap
'
'
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May/23/2010, 8:55 pm
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Re: plinth for an urn
Auto,
I can't separate the meaning of the words from the visual image of the urn--it's the weirdest experience to read this. I mean, in a really interesting way.
These lines are wonderful, "empty again I smell old apples/from when you stored your fruit." and the whole exploration of what it means to be a vessel; a thing designed to contain something other than itself...
Those last two lines are very puzzling. What is a plinth in relation to the urn? the narrator? soap?
What a cool, mysterious read.
Chris
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May/24/2010, 9:02 am
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Re: plinth for an urn
Hi, Christine,
Thanks for your comment and encouragement! Oh, the plinth is the base of the poem and the visual. I should stop making poems and wash that scent out of the urn! Or something like that...
Take care,
Pam
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May/24/2010, 6:20 pm
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Re: plinth for an urn
You know something? There is nothing can reconcile me to the Deepwater Horizon dread, nothing to make things okay. But I'm finding that poetry is shoring me up. Making it possible to find an exception to the perfect equation of perfect dread.
This poem really affects me. I haven't figured out why yet. Please don't abandon the visual pun, the concrete thing, of urn footed on its plinth. Something about the shape itself that carries the poem all the way over from you to me.
And then the poem itself, both in text and texture. I think I get intention. How the poem starts out discursively, in play, then gets laser focused. Right here: my darling you decided my moods. That is a brave line. Spoken by someone who has maybe loved too much and too well. So it seems to me. What follows I feel builds on the line in a clean, almost tectonic way.
Something else, Auto. I am paraphrasing here but the best definition of the sonnet I've found suggests that it starts out with a situation, a problem, an argument that then gets resolved. To me this is the gestalt of the form, no matter the variations and formal rules of versification. By my definition you got a sonnet.
I am hoping the poem gets taken up on an IBPC type board. Its shapeliness will be too nuanced, maybe too understated, for most. But to me this is poetry of thought.
Tere
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May/29/2010, 7:18 pm
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Re: plinth for an urn
Hi Auto,
A lovely, effective poem. The shape works well and the use of plinth in the title and strewings in the first line is inspired. I enjoyed the turn the poem takes, moving from an outer, physical description to an inner, emotional one. The merging of form and content is seamless. Very deftly done.
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Jun/8/2010, 8:51 am
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Re: plinth for an urn
Hi, Tere and Kat,
Your encouragement is greatly appreciated. Thank you both!
Auto
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Jun/8/2010, 6:48 pm
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