If any should wonder, this is what inspires me. Keats Ode to a Nightingale.
My heart aches, and a drowsy numbness pains
My sense, as though of hemlock I had drunk,
Or emptied some dull opiate to the drains
One minute past, and Lethe-wards had sunk:
'Tis not through envy of thy happy lot,
But being too happy in thine happiness, -
That thou, light-winged Dryad of the trees,
In some melodious plot
Of beechen green and shadows numberless,
Singest of summer in full-throated ease.
Gender: Female Location: every which way but loose
Y'know, I personally dislike such poetry, anything where I have to stop reading and start a line again, poems that are jilted and do not run smoothly. Perhaps I am simply naive, ignorant to the possibilites, but it frustrates me to see talented poets of our age striving desperately to live up to such tosh
Gender: Female Location: every which way but loose
No, no... your work is fantastic. It actually makes sense and is relevant to the here and now. But there are very few 'classic' poets that I can really appreciate simply because they aren't contemporary enough I'm fussy...
I disagree. Their words may be archaic, but their themes are universal...
Taken from Ode on a Grecian Urn:
"When old age shall this generation waste,
Thou shalt remain, in midst of other woe
Than ours, a friend to man, to whom thou say'st,
'Beauty is truth, truth beauty,—that is all
Ye know on earth, and all ye need to know.' "
Also, check out Lamia for a comment on obsession...
__________________ Full fathom five thy father lies;
Of his bones are coral made;
Those are pearls that were his eyes:
Nothing of him that doth fade
But doth suffer a sea-change
Into something rich and strange.
i can understand your reasons, Sy...as it took me a while to finally appreciate the classics. But for Keats, his work resounds and tbh...affects me in ways i can't explain. Hence my style...archaic words, phrasings, and visual imagery which i've tried to employ....to say: "Had I but one erg of hope to profoundly end dismay" is to me better than: "I felt hopeless and so was sad." The difference being not so much the wording, but the flow and rhythm.
When his hour for death had come,
He slowly rais'd himself from the bed on the floor,
Drew on his war-dress, shirt, leggings, and girdled the belt around
his waist,
Call'd for vermilion paint (his looking-glass was held before him,)
Painted half his face and neck, his wrists, and back-hands.
Put the scalp-knife carefully in his belt--then lying down, resting
moment,
Rose again, half sitting, smiled, gave in silence his extended hand
to each and all,
Sank faintly low to the floor (tightly grasping the tomahawk handle,)
Fix'd his look on wife and little children--the last
Walt Whitman
__________________ Mah peeps: SlipknoT, Otaku, Wickerman, Ken Kenobi
Gender: Female Location: every which way but loose
Wilfred Owen ~ Dulce et Decorum Est
Bent double, like old beggars under sacks,
Knock-kneed, coughing like hags, we cursed through sludge,
Till on the haunting flares we turned our backs
And towards our distant rest began to trudge.
Men marched asleep. Many had lost their boots
But limped on, blood-shod. All went lame; all blind;
Drunk with fatigue; deaf even to the hoots
Of tired, outstripped Five-Nines that dropped behind.
Gas! Gas! Quick, boys! – An ecstasy of fumbling,
Fitting the clumsy helmets just in time;
But someone still was yelling out and stumbling,
And flound'ring like a man in fire or lime. . .
Dim, through the misty panes and thick green light,
As under a green sea, I saw him drowning.
In all my dreams, before my helpless sight,
He plunges at me, guttering, choking, drowning.
If in some smothering dreams you too could pace
Behind the wagon that we flung him in,
And watch the white eyes writhing in his face,
His hanging face, like a devil's sick of sin;
If you could hear, at every jolt, the blood
Come gargling from the froth-corrupted lungs,
Obscene as cancer, bitter as the cud
Of vile, incurable sores on innocent tongues,
My friend, you would not tell with such high zest
To children ardent for some desperate glory,
The old Lie; Dulce et Decorum est
Pro patria mori
'It is sweet and right to die for your country'... A fool's glory.
Gender: Male Location: ...cause I'm right here yo!!
I am amazed at the amount of posted poems that I most certainly did not think the lot of you had even bother to have read or post. Simply amazing! From the classicist to the modernists...which is my favourite authors.
If however your curiousity is aroused as is mine at the thougth of you fine young hotnessess (guys too) to grace my thread...I've been rather busy working on my thesis for my Masters, and I find it excruciatingly boring.
Please, to those posting your favourite poems, I would suggest a dialog of sorts to those that have never had the wit or opportunity to become intimate with such works...
learn from it, dissect it and be utterly AWED that mere monkeys like us dare dream to be higher than the angels that live in paradise!!!
That Wilfred Owen is da bomb, Blake is a jesus-lover and Keats will give you a masterclass in romantic poetry. Apart from that, anything written by Joyce is poetry, but not as we know it.
A Memory of the Players in a Mirror at Midnight
They mouth love's language. Gnash
The thirteen teeth
Your lean jaws grin with. Lash
Your itch and quailing, nude greed of the flesh.
Love's breath in you is stale, worded or sung,
As sour as cat's breath,
Harsh of tongue.
This grey that stares
Lies not, stark skin and bone.
Leave greasy lips their kissing. None
Will choose her what you see to mouth upon.
Dire hunger holds his hour.
Pluck forth your heart, saltblood, a fruit of tears.
Pluck and devour!
The superficial pleasure of Joyce's poetry is the quality of the sounds of the words as you say them. However, more intimate discoveries reveal greater discourses. He doesn't demand you to be well-read, but you enjoy his work more if you are.
For further nourishment, open any page of 'Ulysses' or 'Finnegan's Wake' and read for a while...
__________________ Full fathom five thy father lies;
Of his bones are coral made;
Those are pearls that were his eyes:
Nothing of him that doth fade
But doth suffer a sea-change
Into something rich and strange.
Last edited by Ya Krunk'd Floo on Sep 20th, 2005 at 01:54 PM
KMC Community Forums
Sep 13th, 2005 09:57 PM
I'm fussy...
Don't think I could write something like that tho 
