|
|
 |
|
Reply
| |
I haven’t written anything for the past two years I thought was worth a tinker’s damn. This is one of two that come closest to something I’d care to show anyone. I’ll place it here for criticism or comments. Feel free to rip it to shreds if you wish. “I pound at all my clay.” And this is the best version so far, in my opinion. If it proves useful—or entertaining—I’ll post the other, which isn’t—and may never be—finished. Well, I’m not even sure this one is finished. And just for the record, whether I post something here, or on the General board, I am open to any and all criticism. You may fire when ready, Gridley. Mind you, I’m not a masochist, either. It’s just that I prefer honest comments to either empty paeans or flaming.
Who Killed Iphigenia?
Some say she never died. The less sanguine
Have other opinions on the matter.
I will not apologize for something
I didn’t do, intentionally at least.
I may have learned to wield the manacles
My father lent me, but I gave them up
Years before he died, though he didn’t know it.
I like to think he would have approved, but
It doesn’t matter. They are gone, dead and
Buried now and there is no use trying
To fit them on when they no longer serve.
Not that there ever was such a time or
Such a place. The Greeks went hunting Trojans
When Paris of Troy—not to be confused
With Paris, France, or Paris, Illinois,
Or Paris Hilton, that Paris, son of
Priam, brother of Hector, beloved of
Hecuba and the scourge of Illium—
Abducted or eloped with fair Helen,
Which would not have been so much a problem
Had she not already been married to
Menelaus. Divorce laws being what
They were in those days, the armies of Greece
Were compelled to fight not, as you’d expect,
By Menelaus, who was dishonored,
Rather by his brother, Agamemnon,
Who felt his brother’s loss personally,
And so off they all sailed to ransack Troy.
Ten years later, they’re still standing outside
The gates of Troy fighting to get inside.
Like trench warfare, there is no advantage
To either camp while the rectitude of
The gods, who are more human than we are,
Favors no one side over the other.
God knows Zeus tried to keep all things even.
Didn’t he forbid any interference
On behalf of either Greeks or Trojans?
(No impediments to his plans allowed,
Of course. You see, “It’s good to be the king!”)
And still Hera schemed to help Achaeans,
And how many times did Aphrodite
Save Paris’ skin by snatching him from harm?
An ass, is an ass, is an ass. Whether
It is a male ass, or a female ass,
It is only an ass and nothing more.
You could argue that Paris was blameless.
Did he not simply accept the gift of
A goddess? Or was it a cynical
Bribe he took? A Vote for Aphrodite
Is a Vote for…whom or what…exactly?
By making Paris the judge, I suppose
Zeus was trying to keep his own ass out
Of the fire; but then such a repayment!
True, Paris gets Helen, but Troy must fall.
Had Paris been told all the quid pro quos,
He might have chosen differently. Who
Knows if, civic-minded, he might now spurn
The sex and savor the polis. But would
Another choice have been any safer?
Then again, when your head is being turned
By goddesses, is not safety the least
Of your concerns? I wouldn’t know myself.
Paris plots the abduction of Helen,
Who, whether by divine inspiration
Or her own, doesn’t strenuously object.
Agamemnon plots the destruction of Troy,
Perhaps at the expense of his daughter.
Meanwhile, back in Argos, Clytemnestra
Plots the murder of her husband (and his
Concubine!) with her lover and future
King. It is the stuff of soap opera
On a grander scale, involving heaven
And hell, and everything in between.
As the line from The Unforgiven goes:
“Dē-zérts ain’t got nothin’ to do with it.”
Myths happen. That doesn’t make them wonderful.
|
|
Reply
| | | From: _susan_ | Sent: 4/17/2008 3:12 AM |
you don't need the italics you insert either. so basically, to sum up i: - cut 2 stanzas
- rearranged the order of the remaining stanzas
- forget the italics - smoother & more sensible read without them
- added a couple of dots (ellipses?): Some say she never died.[..] The less sanguine
- added an exclamation point: Save Paris’ skin by snatching him from harm[!]
c'est tout! voila.
in my humblest opinion. s. |
|
Reply
| | | From: _susan_ | Sent: 4/17/2008 3:17 AM |
oh! sorry - no question mark after title. FINI from me!! |
|
Reply
| |
Thanks for the link, wrongside..., hmm. May I call you boxman? It rolls off the keyboard easier. I've only just glanced at the Duffy poems. Will have to spend more time with them later. One of my favorite small collection of poetry is something called "Ain't I a Woman." I forget offhand who the editor is, but it is a collection of poems written by women from ancient Greece to modern times. Many poems and poetesses I'd never heard of before. One of my favorites is a poem titled "Lillith Retells The Story Of Ruth." Ann Sexton's retellings of fairy tales are also among my favorite poems. I've always wanted to try my hand at doing something like that. Maybe this was a subconcious effort in that direction. I agree that it does go off in a lot of - maybe too many - directions. Just so you know where I'm coming from, suse: for me Frost's blank verse is masterful. Like a Mozart or an Astair, everything seems effortless, fluffy even, but underneath...underneath is the world in all its ambiguity and restlessness; its good and its evil all at once. Shakespeare always sounds fresh to me. I've no argument against calling him the greatest writer in the English language, as many do. But many also then name Milton the second greatest, and there we part company. There's nothing wrong with Milton that a little Pope wouldn't cure. I enjoy Milton in spots, but I tend to bog down with his diction and his - I don't know what to call it, exactly - his arrogance, I guess. He isn't that way everywhere, to be sure, but he is enough of the time that I have to force myself to keep reading sometimes. I can pick up the collected poems of Milton and saturate within 15-30 minutes. With Frost, it may take me an hour or more. |
|
Reply
| |
Got the name of the poem wrong. It's re-telling the story of Ester, not Ruth. Lilith Re-Tells Esther’s Story.
by Michelene Wandor the world rustles for Esther
in her best red weave
only nine chapters, she has
little time to coin a magic mine
meanwhile, back at the palace, King Ahasuerus
feasts the men, while meanwhile
behind the palace, Queen Vashti
feasts the women.
Vashti is summoned to the king’s presence
but being rosy with the jokes
of women, she puts her foot down
fuck off, you wally (or some Old Testament
equivalent), I won’t be shown off like
a prize cow this time
the lads, of course, don’t take to that at all
because everyone knows that once a queen
sets a bad eg
any woman could take it into her
head to disobey
her lord and master
get rid of Vashti, advise
the princes, fear seaming their pores,
replace her with another—after all,
every man
should bear rule
in his own house
so King A orders a load
of virgins (what’s so special
about virgins?) from whom
to choose a replacement
for Vashti
meanwhile, back in the ghetto
Mordecai, the Jew, hears of this and sends
his cousin Hadassah (Esther to you)
along with the other virgins, and lo,
she is chosen with a select few
for further tests (the king conveniently
unaware of her ethnic origins)
a year of ‘purification’; oil of
myrrh, sweet odours, and one by one,
in turn, in turn, the young women
are set before the king
for him to try
till he gets bored
Esther, however, does not bore him
at all, and as her reward, King A
sets the crown upon her head
and her body in his bed
Mordecai meanwhile hovers round the gate
also meanwhile, a bad man
called Haman
becomes King A’s right-hand man,
a misnomer for such a sinister man
who likes all
to bow down
before him
Mordecai, always a meanwhile man,
refuses to bow, and in revenge Haman
decides to kill all
the Jews (where
have we heard that one since?)
anyway, the long and the short of it is that
Esther so continues to please King A
with her courage and her beauty
that Haman is sussed out
and hanged
the Jews are saved
and Mordecai rises
to be second-in-command
to King A
there is something missing
from this story:
someone
somewhere
doesn’t bother to say
whether Esther
actually liked
King A
|
|
Reply
| |
| This message has been deleted by the author. |
|
Reply
| |
sorry to hijack your thread again, but it seems a good a place as any for another such wife. at the mention of Lot, earlier, i recalled the poem by wislawa szymborska, whose poetry i admire greatly, at least as it can be hinted under the dubious veil of translation: Lot's Wife They say I looked back out of curiosity.
But I could have had other reasons.
I looked back mourning my silver bowl.
Carelessly, while tying my sandal strap.
So I wouldn't have to keep staring at the righteous nape
of my husband Lot's neck.
From the sudden conviction that if I dropped dead
he wouldn't so much as hesitate.
From the disobedience of the meek.
Checking for pursuers.
Struck by the silence, hoping God had changed his mind.
Our two daughters were already vanishing over the hilltop.
I felt age within me. Distance.
The futility of wandering. Torpor.
I looked back setting my bundle down.
I looked back not knowing where to set my foot.
Serpents appeared on my path,
spiders, field mice, baby vultures.
They were neither good nor evil now--every living thing
was simply creeping or hopping along in the mass panic.
I looked back in desolation.
In shame because we had stolen away.
Wanting to cry out, to go home.
Or only when a sudden gust of wind
unbound my hair and lifted up my robe.
It seemed to me that they were watching from the walls of Sodom
and bursting into thunderous laughter again and again.
I looked back in anger.
To savor their terrible fate.
I looked back for all the reasons given above.
I looked back involuntarily.
It was only a rock that turned underfoot, growling at me.
It was a sudden crack that stopped me in my tracks.
A hamster on its hind paws tottered on the edge.
It was then we both glanced back.
No, no. I ran on,
I crept, I flew upward
until darkness fell from the heavens
and with it scorching gravel and dead birds.
I couldn't breathe and spun around and around.
Anyone who saw me must have thought I was dancing.
It's not inconceivable that my eyes were open.
It's possible I fell facing the city. From Poems New and Collected 1957-1997, written by Wislawa Szymborska and translated by Stanislaw Baranczak and Clare Cavanagh. |
|
Reply
| |
i liked the lilith poem, btw. maybe we should form a reading cycle? heh |
|
Reply
| | | From: _susan_ | Sent: 4/18/2008 5:17 PM |
like i said, ws. there are two. that i know of. and although i adore Szymborska -- and i think Clare Cavanagh is tops (i met her! ooh! she read this one!) i adore this poet more... loved lilith btw. and a new poet for me. yea! thanks er um a Lot, or! |
|
Reply
| | | From: _susan_ | Sent: 4/18/2008 8:05 PM |
i am not enamored of the Kunitz translation though. i will type up the one i have later. s. |
|
Reply
| | | From: _susan_ | Sent: 4/18/2008 8:42 PM |
i liked this book over the Kunitz one (whose translations and poetry do not leave me ecstatic - although, he was an exceptional man & the founder of Poets House). it is a book of Akhmatova's Poems which were selected and translated by Lyn Coffin, with an introduction by Joseph Brodsky. published by W.W. Norton. i like it because she gets more of the rhymes and rhythms and power which proliferated and dominated Akhmatova's poems in russian. translations are very tricky, and vary greatly. it is, ultimately, a matter of how you like them served up. i liked these translated by another woman. Lot's Wife And Lot's wife looked back and became a pillar of salt. And the just man followed God's ambassador here, Huge and bright against the mountain black. But alarm spoke loudly in the woman's ear: It's not too late, you can still look back At red-towered Sodom where you were born, At the square where you sang, where you sat to spin, At the windows of the high house, forlorn, Where you bore your beloved husband children. She looked,---deadly pain found the fault, Her eyes couldn't see if they saw or not; And her body became translucent salt, Her lively feet were rooted to the spot. She's seen as a kind of loss and yet Who will grieve for this woman, cry for this wife? My heart alone will never forget: For a single look, she gave up her life. 1922-1924 |
|
Reply
| |
OK, working backward from the most recent posts--I can see I'm going to have a difficult time keeping up here. I like both versions of Lots Wife, if that's allowed. I like the woman's translation because it is more likely to pick up the femine perspective, but the Kunitz translation feels rougher to me. You thought Coffin's translation picked up the Russian better? Maybe it's just different ears, but I thought the Kunitz did that better. Russian is a very choppy and gutteral language to my ear and so was the Kunitz. But the rhymes are more obvious in the Coffin. So I have to go with--both of them. I wouldn't mind a reading thread, something. Maybe we should start a new one. Not that I object to hijacking this one. Could be fun. Getting back to Iphigenia...I like the idea of putting the current opening at the end. That works for me. I'm less certain about starting with the Ass bit, but I'm still thinking about it. I think I'll go look up some more of the Iphigenia stories and see what I can come up with. |
|
Reply
| |
That's guttural and feminine, of course. Man, someday maybe I'll actually learn to spell. Without the imperfect spell checker. |
|
Reply
| | | From: _susan_ | Sent: 4/19/2008 6:34 PM |
| i onlie car abud spilling in posted pooms. i can no be a profisure of spill-chick 101 in ripliies. esse. pee. esse. u can star noo tred four reedink. |
|
Reply
| | | From: _susan_ | Sent: 4/20/2008 9:51 PM |
sorry if this is still slightly off topic, O, but - i don't know if you got a chance to listen to anything on our old sound board. although hmm.. it is still connected to The Poets' Place, but not very active. however, i have a translation by Lyn Coffin for The Muse, posted on the old. if you right click on the .wav file attached, and save the target in whatever file you have for .wav sounds, you can hear the poem in its orginal russian recited by Akhmatova. a little bit guttural - maybe - but i think she is as smooth as silk. ok, i won't "hijack" this thread anymore. maybe. s. |
|
Reply
| |
I haven't had a chance to listen yet, suse, but I will. Thanks for the link. I don't mind having my threads stolen anyway. Who knows where anything will end? |
|
|
|
Important Announcement
Prev Discussion
Send Replies to My Inbox
Recommend
Return to Metacriticism