An Exercise in Thought/Soul Analysis.
Confessions of an Inner Life Artist
One.
When the feelings are
deepest, they tug on your
insides and it
stings a little.
Hearts had strings
all along.
Two.
A cry resounds-
A great incessant wail
that the cosmos joins
though it’s only your voice inside,
echoing like an
abyss, but suffocated by the
Ocean of Things.
Three.
It’s a great wonder that I
fit inside myself-
A little woman with big dreams.
Four.
My soul speaks another
language-wild, strange, and beautiful
whispering her secrets to the moon
like wizard women of the North.
Something from a little while ago as sort of a response to this:
Confessions of the Life Artist
Thom Gunn
I
Whatever is here, it is
material for my art.
On the extreme shore of land,
and facing the disordered
rhythms of the sea, I taste
a summoning on the air.
I derive from these rocks, which
inhibit the sea's impulse.
But it is a condition,
once accepted, like air: air
haunted by the taste of salt.
II
I think, therefore I cannot
avoid thought of the morrow.
Outside the window, the birds
of the air and the lily
have lost themselves in action.
I think of the birds that sleep
in flight, of the lily's pale
waxy gleaming, of myself,
and of the morrow pending.
The one thing clear is that I
must not lose myself in thought.
III
You control what you can, and
use what you cannot.
Heady,
to hover above the winds,
buoyant with a sense of choice.
Circling over a city,
to reject the thousand, and
to select the one. To watch
the goodly people there, to
know that their blood circulates,
that it races as yours does,
live between extremities.
IV
But what of the unchosen?
They are as if dead. Their deaths,
now, validate the chosen.
Of course, being left as dead
may lead to the thing itself.
I read about them: and what
could be more fortifying
to one's own identity
than another's suicide?
If there are forbidden arts,
mine must indeed be of them.
V
She is immersed in despair,
but I am here, luckily.
She, become indefinite,
leans on me who am starkly
redefined at each moment,
aware of her need, and trained
to have few needs of my own.
As I support her, so, with
my magnificent control,
I suddenly ask: 'What if
she has the edge over me?'
VI
To give way to all passions,
I know, is merely whoring.
Yes, but to give way to none
is to be a whore-master.
I stride through the whore-house
when my girls are off duty,
I load them with chocolates,
but cannot for one moment
possess red hair like hers, fresh
cheeks or bee-stung lips like hers,
or a wasteful heart like hers.
VII
I elevate not what I
have, but what I wish to have,
and see myself in others.
There is a girl in the train
who emulates the bee-hive
of the magazine stars of
four years ago.
I blush at
the jibes that gorw inside me,
lest someone should utter them.
Why was something evolved so
tender, so open to pain?
VIII
Here is a famous picture.
It is of a little Jew
in Warsaw, some years ago,
being hustled somewhere. His
mother dressed him that morning
warmly in cap and cloth coat.
He stares at the camera
as he passes. Whatever
those big shining dark eyes have
just looked on, they can see now
no appeal in the wide world.
IX
I grow old in the design.
Prophecies become fulfilled,
though never as expected,
almost accidentally,
in fact, as if to comform
to some alien order.
But I am concerned with my
own knowledge that the design
is everywhere ethical
and harmonious: circles
start to close, lines to balance.
X
The art of designing life
is no excuse for that life.
People will forget Shakespeare.
He will lie with George Formby
and me, here where the swine root.
Later, the solar system
will flare up and fall into
space, irretrievably lost.
For the loss, as for the life,
there will be no excuse, there
is no justification.
[I couldn't find the poem online to link to, so I typed it out because I think people should read it.] We talked about Thom Gunn's poem in class, and had a fairly lengthy discussion on what it meant to be a 'life artist'. We eventually decided that it was a people-watcher, the kind that doesn't help the couple out of the mud puddle because they can't find out how it plays out if they interfere--and then they derive some sort of art from the experience. I did this poem as sort of standing back and observing what was going on in my head and making art out of it. Not really sure if it worked out like I planned, but the people in my class seemed to like it. Anyone care to critique?
One.
When the feelings are
deepest, they tug on your
insides and it
stings a little.
Hearts had strings
all along.
Two.
A cry resounds-
A great incessant wail
that the cosmos joins
though it’s only your voice inside,
echoing like an
abyss, but suffocated by the
Ocean of Things.
Three.
It’s a great wonder that I
fit inside myself-
A little woman with big dreams.
Four.
My soul speaks another
language-wild, strange, and beautiful
whispering her secrets to the moon
like wizard women of the North.
Something from a little while ago as sort of a response to this:
Confessions of the Life Artist
Thom Gunn
I
Whatever is here, it is
material for my art.
On the extreme shore of land,
and facing the disordered
rhythms of the sea, I taste
a summoning on the air.
I derive from these rocks, which
inhibit the sea's impulse.
But it is a condition,
once accepted, like air: air
haunted by the taste of salt.
II
I think, therefore I cannot
avoid thought of the morrow.
Outside the window, the birds
of the air and the lily
have lost themselves in action.
I think of the birds that sleep
in flight, of the lily's pale
waxy gleaming, of myself,
and of the morrow pending.
The one thing clear is that I
must not lose myself in thought.
III
You control what you can, and
use what you cannot.
Heady,
to hover above the winds,
buoyant with a sense of choice.
Circling over a city,
to reject the thousand, and
to select the one. To watch
the goodly people there, to
know that their blood circulates,
that it races as yours does,
live between extremities.
IV
But what of the unchosen?
They are as if dead. Their deaths,
now, validate the chosen.
Of course, being left as dead
may lead to the thing itself.
I read about them: and what
could be more fortifying
to one's own identity
than another's suicide?
If there are forbidden arts,
mine must indeed be of them.
V
She is immersed in despair,
but I am here, luckily.
She, become indefinite,
leans on me who am starkly
redefined at each moment,
aware of her need, and trained
to have few needs of my own.
As I support her, so, with
my magnificent control,
I suddenly ask: 'What if
she has the edge over me?'
VI
To give way to all passions,
I know, is merely whoring.
Yes, but to give way to none
is to be a whore-master.
I stride through the whore-house
when my girls are off duty,
I load them with chocolates,
but cannot for one moment
possess red hair like hers, fresh
cheeks or bee-stung lips like hers,
or a wasteful heart like hers.
VII
I elevate not what I
have, but what I wish to have,
and see myself in others.
There is a girl in the train
who emulates the bee-hive
of the magazine stars of
four years ago.
I blush at
the jibes that gorw inside me,
lest someone should utter them.
Why was something evolved so
tender, so open to pain?
VIII
Here is a famous picture.
It is of a little Jew
in Warsaw, some years ago,
being hustled somewhere. His
mother dressed him that morning
warmly in cap and cloth coat.
He stares at the camera
as he passes. Whatever
those big shining dark eyes have
just looked on, they can see now
no appeal in the wide world.
IX
I grow old in the design.
Prophecies become fulfilled,
though never as expected,
almost accidentally,
in fact, as if to comform
to some alien order.
But I am concerned with my
own knowledge that the design
is everywhere ethical
and harmonious: circles
start to close, lines to balance.
X
The art of designing life
is no excuse for that life.
People will forget Shakespeare.
He will lie with George Formby
and me, here where the swine root.
Later, the solar system
will flare up and fall into
space, irretrievably lost.
For the loss, as for the life,
there will be no excuse, there
is no justification.
[I couldn't find the poem online to link to, so I typed it out because I think people should read it.] We talked about Thom Gunn's poem in class, and had a fairly lengthy discussion on what it meant to be a 'life artist'. We eventually decided that it was a people-watcher, the kind that doesn't help the couple out of the mud puddle because they can't find out how it plays out if they interfere--and then they derive some sort of art from the experience. I did this poem as sort of standing back and observing what was going on in my head and making art out of it. Not really sure if it worked out like I planned, but the people in my class seemed to like it. Anyone care to critique?