I wrote this last September, while feeling weary. It seemed that creation, too, was tired, and waiting for consolation.
The stones of the eastern wall are weary; Dew drips from the roof with resignation: Come, come; when will he come? The bones of the trees ache with age And the wind grows weak and cold.
Pale light sweeps the battered creation— It is John the Baptist, come with his lamp. Knees aching as he climbs the horizon, Still he ascends to his pulpit.
one more day, one more day. He will come, he will come soon.
I wrote this poem last June about my wrestlings with sin and desire for Christ. I hope it serves as an encouragement. Continue reading “Sinner’s Verse”→
Reading through Eliot’s poetry, I’m trying to decide how much to look for meaning in his poetry, and how much just to appreciate the beauty of words and sounds, knowing there’s no meaning to be had. Some of his stuff definitely carries meaning in it, but some of it seems random. I love T.S. Eliot, but I’m not a big fan of this idea of separating sounds from their meaning. So, I wrote a poem about it in the closest appropriation I can come of about his style. Continue reading “Dear Mr. Eliot”→
Reading through Eliot’s Prufrock and Other Observations this morning, I came across this gem. The last two lines of the first stanza made me laugh. I love Eliot’s ability to describe what he sees.
They are rattling breakfast plates in basement kitchens,
And along the trampled edges of the street
I am aware of the damp souls of housemaids
Sprouting despondently at area gates.
The brown waves of fog toss up to me
Twisted faces from the bottom of the street,
And tear from a passer-by with muddy skirts
An aimless smile that hovers in the air
And vanishes along the level of the roofs.
Last night I was reading some T.S. Eliot, an experience which somehow manages to enthrall and confuse at the same time. I came across this line in “The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock” which gave me pause:
I grow old… I grow old…
I shall wear the bottoms of my trousers rolled.
(If you think it’s weird that I picked this line to get all analytical on, you need to read the whole poem. This is tame.)
Just look at the little guy.
What’s the point of poetry? I know Robin Williams told us it’s to woo women, and there might be some truth to that– the first recorded words of man were a poem about a woman (Genesis 2:23). I used to think the point of poetry was to express thought and feeling more poignantly than is capable with prose, but I’m not so sure anymore. I think poetry is to the consciousness what a shell is to a hermit crab. It gives us space. Specifically, space to think and express. We don’t need poetry to survive, or even to communicate; but those of us who enjoy poetry know that it can give us words to say when we have none, or add depth and height to expression and emotion. A line of poetry or a poetic phrase that just fits is like… well, I suppose it’s like apples of gold in a setting of silver.
I’m not a deconstructionist, and I’m not a postmodernist. I believe that words and phrases have meaning. The meaning of a poem comes from the author, not the reader. But poetry, like all art, exists in time. It’s written, then read. If it’s any good, it keeps getting read. Some people talk about it. Other people listen. Lines are appropriated in other poems, movies, prose, music. They rebound and echo off of our cultural context, and pick up new meaning as they go along. From the author’s point of view, meaning precedes expression, but from the point of view of the reader, expression precedes meaning. This interplay between content and form can create some pretty jazzy metaleptical feedback. Poetry shapes readers and is shaped by them in return, as they share their insights with other readers who will never be able to view this line, this poem again without thinking of that interpretation.
Poetry shapes individuals, and it shapes communities. It does so on an affective level beneath that of ideas, able to access forbidden byways that proposition cannot touch. I wonder if this is why so much of the Scripture is written in poetry.
Cultus and Culture 