| Poem: Submit | Random | Best | Worst | Recent | Comments |
|
Camera Obscura (Free verse) by Fear of Garbage I am making my hand into a camera obscura.
It is hard work, very hard but I am making it until
I am free.
I have a pretty happily battered room
At the end of a hotel with a slanted door
And air fresheners attached to the sink faucets.
I will not go back until I am fair and finished.
I wait and I sit by the black ocean
Eating my cake with a fork and grating.
The manager watches from the door of the office.
He is old and he likes to look at the young,
beautiful things of the world.
I hold my hand up right in front of my face.
I have five leaves left.
Excellant. Excellant.
I walk the powdered white line to the bathroom
And wash my face with water pumped in
Straight from the black black ocean.
There is so much black plastic, tape,
And light holes to be done yet.
This may be my last day.
And with it my last sit by the ocean,
My last cake,
And feel of the managers stare.
He is old. I am not.
The slanted door slams behind me
And I hold my hand up right in front of my face.
I have five leaves left.
If this were a line I'd be first.
Up the ladder:
My nieghborhood(1)
Down the ladder:
Against the Gorgon
Votes: (green: user, blue: anonymous)
Arithmetic Mean: 8.375
Posted: August 21, 2003 7:30 PM PDT; Last modified: August 21, 2003 7:30 PM PDTWeighted score: 5.907677 Overall Rank: 1448 Comments:
Bueno.
Excellante. oh yeah I'm in a mood now
I could tell you were a woman. Dickens could tell George Eliot was immediately, too, or so the anecdote goes. Are the leaves from O.Henry?
Isn't it a treat to find these pomes after all the unoisuckkok's and KrazyLoveDazy37's and CristalWanker's? it's worth enduring a couple dozen inane, mindless whining teenagers to find one who's a gothic genius.
The mix isn't so bad - about half and half, maybe. Better than I expected when I came here. <<<Secret-hopefully-run-off-the
God if the sages read this I'm doomed.
Do you know Charles Frazier? I believe he has taught at the University of North Carolina.
I've met him once on his speaking tour right after Cold Mountain, but if he still teaches in NC it's not here. I remember being more impressed by his person than by the book, which I found a trifle dull the last time I read it. Incidentally, I can see the actual mountain from my front porch. It looks a lot like the movie (which is surprisingly good, by the way.)
I thought the film was excellent. Haven't finished the book yet.
Oh, well I'm sure the <<< >>> will help it escape notice.
Who are the poets-of-note these days? I've been completely out of touch with poetry & fiction for many years. I just buy each Iain Banks novel as he releases them, and that's about it.
It's different everywhere and every day. Most 'poets of note' get in the New Yorker at some point, I know that. But really the whole field's fragmented to the point of being meaningless. Everybody likes to flaunt their current local poets, who are generally little known outside of their region (Okay, Fred Chappell may be an exception from these parts, but Katherine Stripling Byer, anyone? Yet she's in the new Norton Modern Poetry) What it comes down to is we're more or less as famous as the latest North Atlantic all-star - that is, we get our poems read by maybe 20 people each. And we get fun comments, which they don't. As far as fiction, I read a lot of Carol Shields (whom you probably know,) and think she's one of the best writers of the last ten years. I recently read Bel Canto and thought it was good, and Francisco Goldman's two weird novels.
You might also consider the new _Compleat Annotated Jodhpur Manuscripts_ (in folio with -=darkangel=-'s original marginal notations and squiggle-pen doodlings: www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/jodhpur.html) with a fascinating forward by Sir Hilary Wainscotting of the Cumberland Gazette Enquirer and Sunday Book Supplement entitled "The Mistress' Jodhpurs: Proto-feminism and Authorship Issues in the Manuscripts" in which the author argues (cogently, I believe,) that the near-complete absence of women (ie, Lady Proud-Stocking) in the so-called 'Proud-Stocking Canon' belies a nascent proto-feminist sympathy (ie, the Lady has indeed been 'liberated' from the text itself.) He goes on to suggest (compellingly) that Lord Proud-Stocking (who notoriously denengrated his estranged wife) did not possess the degree of sophistication which is evident in the careful layering of imagery and allusion in the Manuscripts, concluding that the 14th Duke of Northumberland, Percy Cackering (who notoriously shagged Proud-Stocking's wife,) is the most likely real author. This is, you should know, considered heresy by many Judhpur scholars. Wainscotting supports his argument (assiduously, I should add,) with a fascinating reading of the Jodhpur Sequence in light of Northumberland's own close studies of the early hymns of Caedmon, in which he reads the old English 'Geæfpðhr' (ie, husk,) as 'Jodhpur'. The rest of the essay is more difficult to decipher, consisting mainly of (seemingly) drunken tirades against the aforementioned Jodhpur scholars and random speculations on the possibility of wearing husks instead of woolens. The editors also provide an extensive concordance, none of whose entries (which are all distinctly scatalogical, I should add,) lead to real pages. I hope this helps you on your search.
The amazon link doesn't work for me, but instead takes me to either "Middlesex: a Novel" or "One Hundred Years of Solitude (Oprah's Book Club)"
I fear the _Compleat Annotated Jodhpur Manuscripts_ have been withdrawn from amazon owing to a devastating misprint, in which Lord Proud-Stocking had accidentally advocated the use of streamlined jodhpurs for female riders. Clearly an assertion that runs contrary to every fibre of instinct and conviction in a Gentleman's conscience.
The story (which is of course unconfirmed,) is that the book was under consideration for Oprah's Book Club, which would have been a tremendous boon to the already fabulously wealth Proud-Stocking estate, until progress was brought to a near-complete halt by the powerful American Shepherders and Wooldarners Lobby, which believed it portrayed Jodhpurs in an unflattering light as merely the toys of the (as aforementioned) fabulously wealthy.
I think I know Fred Chappell from eratosphere.
The most contemporary poet I know is Martha Hollander. Some years ago I spent a day reading obscure poetry reviews in the library, hating almost all of it save this one poem by Martha Hollander. So I bought her book, Game of Statues, which I still read occasionally and still find beautiful.
Have you read The Player of Games?
Yes, it's excellent. My favourite of the Iain M. Banks bunch is Use of Weapons. And of the Iain Banks bunch, I guess I would say The Crow Road. With The Bridge as a close second. I think there's only one that I haven't read yet.
I don't know anything about recent sci-fi. What's he like? I'm reading all his reviews on Amazon and getting intrigued.
'Player of Games' is the best science fiction book ever written. I recommend 'The Bridge' and 'The Wasp Factory' from his non-science fiction line. Probably anyone else would say the same.
His science fiction is far above almost all other science fiction. They are novels first, science fiction second. Player of Games is indeed excellent, but Use of Weapons is my favourite. If you're an old school science fiction short story fan, you'll remember the twist is the thing. Use of Weapons is the best twist evar. In any case, start with Wasp Factory and read the whole oeuvre, there aren't any stinkers in the lot.
Christ, this is a good fucking poem.
I read it a year ago, and it was still in my head...so I came looking for it. And it's still gold. 270 view(s)
|
||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Clearly I am not.
it is not clear at all that you are a chick. you're not posting chick poems. you're not showing any softened edges. the words you post are meticulous. genderless. human.
F.o.G., do you know Martha Hollander? You might enjoy her.
I like "eating my cake with a fork and grating"
I don't get the connection between five leaves left and the camera obscura. Can you enlighten me--I hate feeling stupid.
Oh, and fix the spelling of excellent.
Bukowski would have liked this poem.