Comments | write_away: In the Garden

willabee in write_away

In the Garden

Mar 30, 2008 15:07

Ginseng MacKay-Tisbert

In the Garden

Standing here, I feel so large

The Milky Way is pinned

Safely to my toes, the galaxy

unfurls up, and back on me, wordless

The Milky Way is pinned

to the pocket over your breast

Unfurls up, and back on me, wordless

We kneel in the garden

Into the ( Read more... )

user: willabee, type: poetry

Comments 14

chibibluebird March 30 2008, 19:48:29 UTC

In the first verse, I assume "The Milky Way" is how you are describing the plants at your feet.

But in "The Milky Way is pinned

to the pocket over your breast"

what is it? a pin?

willabee March 30 2008, 20:31:28 UTC

um...a pin? as in a safety pin, or a sewing pin...to connect two pieces togetther...the milky way, our galaxy...have you ever stood outside and looked up, the sky is clear and it looks like a scarf caught on/in wind...been awed that you're standing in it/ yet are looking at it. think standing/ with it pinned to you/ my toes, sort of billowing up over you. it is a big and small kind of feeling. i guess...i don't know what you mean.

chibibluebird March 31 2008, 00:41:52 UTC

I don't know what *you* mean.

If you're standing in a garden, why would the literal Milky Way be at your feet? Why would it be pinned above your pocket as opposed to above your head?

That's why I assumed you were using the Milky Way as a metaphor for something else.

If you want to compare the Milky Way to a scarf, I think you are going to have to use the word scarf. Because I'm pretty well-read when it comes to poetry, and I had no idea that's what you were attempting to do.

willabee March 31 2008, 04:13:25 UTC

i'm not comparing it to a scarf in the poem. it says pinned to toes...not that it is "at my feet" but that it is connected to me. not only connected to me but "unfurling up" (beyond me) and over me. i'm not changing it to a kite, because a person is not connected to a kite. and i'm not flying the milky way/ a kite/ something that i control. it is pinned but of its own accord. it is a mood, and it is a love poem. i shouldn't of said anything about scarves. i was carelessly looking for another way to explain how it looks. but, heck, i'm sure you know what a clear night sky looks like. ummph. it is pinned to the pocket over the breast, and not my pocket ("your pocket", "we kneel") but the pocket of my lover. it is not above us but in us, as we are in it. not only are we connected to that something larger, which is pinned to us, like a ribbon or a badge, pinnned to the pocket over their breast; over the heart, but that something so small as to be pinned, so concrete that we are standing in it (as we are standing in a strange quiet love) ( ... )

chibibluebird March 31 2008, 00:46:33 UTC

& maybe comparing it to a kite would work better. because if the Milky Way was a scarf pinned to you there would be stars all the way from you to the sky. whereas with a kite there's a string which may be undetectable from a distance.

eien_no_sakkaku March 31 2008, 09:26:34 UTC

I think you definitely have some promising images in this poem, but they're getting lost in translation. I understand what you're doing with the repetition/form, but I'm not sure that it's actually helping your cause-it makes me focus less on your words and what your poem is saying and more about how the structure works.
The Milky Way is pinned

Safely to my toes, the galaxy

unfurls up, and back on me, wordless I think it's good that you're trying to take this rather abstract image and make it concrete, but I'm not sure you're going far enough. I'm having a hard time imagining the galaxy unfurling, and the Milky Way being pinned anywhere. Once I get my head around that Milky Way image-which I think is better than the galaxy- I like the concept. The rest of the stanzas read the same way to me. Abstract concepts+concrete verbs... doesn't necessarily mean concrete imagery. I do like the quiet encased in bone. You could maybe go ahead and do more with that ( ... )

willabee March 31 2008, 20:09:15 UTC

thank you. i do understand what you mean, about the concrete images not quite representing the abstractions in the poem. hmmmm.... thanks again.

eien_no_sakkaku March 31 2008, 20:22:00 UTC

You're welcome. I wish I could help more!

mspixieears April 2 2008, 00:05:03 UTC

The repetition is very, very effective.

cloudwrapdcity April 2 2008, 03:33:09 UTC

I really liked the intro, but the bits near the end left me kind of miffed. I'm also a bit uncertain (and didn't quite like) the italics of "I slipped my fingers in." Why is that italicized? The fifth and sixth stanza started getting a bit too abstract. With so many abstract words (shadow, memory, darkness, light, etc.) clanking against one another, I started to lose the poem.

As to the beginning of the poem -- we have this place around here, we call "top of the world." It's this obscure, no name hill and when you go there at night, you can stand on the top and see over the entire bay. With its lights, it really feels like you have the galaxy pinned to your feet, yet at the same time all around you, so that imagery really worked for me, but I'm not sure if someone without a similar experience would get that.

willabee April 9 2008, 06:47:00 UTC

yes! yes! it was just like "top of the world"
how super lovely. thank you for your critique...it was very helpful, but the italics stay...i change my tone when i read it out loud, and i need to express it on the page. i luff them there.