“whet” villanelle
Today seems the day of missed events, say, birthdays. Since I come from a tradition that does not celebrate ancestor worship, the two "life events" (for lack of a better term) we pay attention to in other people are their births and their deaths … and not much in-between. I thought about this when I received an invitation in the mail today from Project Save announcing Ruth's 60th birthday celebration, on October 1st (!) I am not sure who Ruth is, but as Fred said in Subway (1985), "I simply adore birthdays." It is a shame I missed yours, Ruth.
Minutes later I discovered that last week, on Wednesday, September 28, Denver poet Shin Yu celebrated her own 30th. She is working on a project I will be interested in viewing once she presents it. As she puts it: "I've been rereading Japanese Book-Binding by Kojiro Ikegami and thinking about structures which might be interesting to experiment with for the love hotel poems presentation."
Love hotel poems? What an interesting idea. Perhaps the The American Poetry & Literacy Project should start a Tokyo, Beijing or Seoul branch office and consider donating poetry books there? I wonder what a found Chinese "love hotel" poem would look like? I found this at chinadaily.com., posted, I think, by a Deborah, simply entitled: "good poem."
一位校监正在听一堂英语课，她对一位学生的笔记本产生了兴趣，因为她看到一首写得很好且充满感情的诗，她觉得有必要念给大家听听。诗是这样的：
"Yesterday,Yesterday,Yesterday,Happiness,Happiness,Happiness;Today,Today,Today,Grief,Grief,Grief;Tomorrow,
Tomorrow,Tomorrow,Death,Death,Death."(昨天，昨天，昨天，快乐，快乐，快乐；今天，今天，今天，悲伤，悲伤，悲伤；明天，明天，明天，死亡，死亡，死亡。）校监一念完，那位学生赶忙举手说："老师，那是我抄写的生词。
Maybe we could get a DJ to mix together some background music while someone sings this?1 I would like to see that happen; it should be on my "to do" list. Ginger Heatter's #4 wish on her "Seven Things I Want to Do Before I Die" is: "Write one important poem — i.e. a poem which no one else could have written, and which fulfills some widespread emotional, intellectual, spiritual, cultural and/or aesthetic craving." We need to remember our widespread cravings. Perhaps that is where I should begin today's villanelle? A little obsession about wide cravings, perhaps?
call this: memory. memory, call this
love, call this bliss; yes, love, call all this bliss.
The authors of about.com say "the villanelle incarnates obsession in a poem." I like that too. It is interesting Heatter phrases it the way she does: "a poem which no one else could have written." I would argue, if I did argue, that by the very act of letting the "Martians in," the Ego out, all this glorious negative ecstasy, as it were, one is creating something no one else could; our masterpiece inspirations, our creative reflexes, our ignis fatuus sensibilities … unless we are simply prefabricating or plagiarizing. So here it is, todat's experiment in villanelles2 Let us try to recall that moment of splendor, something low and hissing through the tall prairie grass, some song warmed from the Badland's sun.
call this memory. memory call this
song back to me, I forget. and yet, pet
love, call this bliss; yes, love, call all this bliss,
undone glee. over the prairie, the hiss
of grass, kiss of dust and fear. fear will fret
with this "memory." memory? call this
fear "memory"? glee, my love, we dismiss
it so fast. wet words and wet lips make: "whet
love." call it bliss, my love, call all this bliss.
i fall apart: here is my dutch tongue, swiss
laugh, belarus grunt. i am broken yet
call memory "glee." memory? call this
"memory"? it is wet. whet. i shall miss
all this: whet words, whet lips and making "wet
glee." call this bliss? yes, this! call all this bliss
back to me! songs of the prairie, the kiss
of grass, hiss of dust and these lyrics set
to this: memory. memory, call this
love, call this bliss. yes, love, call all this bliss.
***
Technorati Tags: Love hotel poems, villanelle, poetry, poem
- I had this idea of bringing opera to a new generation by having DJs remaster original operatic scores the way old dance music is made new again through the deconstruction and reforming of the original melodies into brand new songs. I was simultaneously repulsed and fascinated by the track "Night on Disco Mountain" from the Saturday Night Fever (1977) soundtrack. It is a dated work, it doesn't sound good to my ear, and yet one can easily dance to it; ah, the burden of potential. I think it is like Ray Charles playing a couple of lines of Beethoven before breaking into a jazz lick. Perhaps the same thing could be done to opera? A fugue: a thousand sweaty bodies dancing to Maria Callas' narcotic "Un bel dì." But I don't know any DJs so the project will have to wait. [back]
- A note on all the villanelles you have read so far. Until I set up this blog, I had never written a villanelle. I probably had heard the term, but would have failed on Jeopardy had that been one of the answers ("Please state your answer in the form of a question" still amuses me). Each villanelle is written as I work my way through that day's entry. I have gone back to tighten up a word here or there, but these are first drafts, more or less. I find it odd that I don't give these poems any time to grow and revise. I understand it is popular in some circles not to revise, that revision in poetry is some form of debauchery, adulteration, depravity. Having read far too many poems where I might find a gem haiku hidden under 72 stanzas of free verse, I will give you my mantra in three simple words: edit until it croons, revise until it yowls, renew each word until it ululates. [back]