first read
http://hellopoetry.com/poem/life-circles/#after-reading
After-reading
including the notes and the exchange in the comments section. Then begin to read the words below, for they are derivative thereof.
Also
ponder this quote from a play by Richard Greenberg.
''I speak when I have something to say. When I have nothing to say, I write.''
the contriving is all that remains,
so,
with a bow and a great flourish,
my hat, right-handed swooping,
grazing my knee,
I tender my amazement at what the
lives of all these contrivers,
bring me each day.
Long Live All Poets!
the contortionists, the evolutionists,
hard working smithies, risers with dawn,
selectors, all day long tasters,
all night long scene stealers,
of each word that parses their
five senses,
even the contrivers,
need, deserve,
get their day in court.
you know the real poets
by their every day
discourses,
for your subconscious
rhymes their every response,
even their *thank you's and yes, please,
please all nearby,
like a thanksgiving prayer
spent, sent heavenwards ,
each word
lifted up skyward, alongside the hearts
that move to hop on, join their
poetic alephs and bets.
the haiku masters who
breath lifetimes into a moment,
the balladeers who ferment
tales unseen but conjure them
as forever keeps of yes! I was there,
the sonneteers, the lyricists,
so powerful these wizards place their
visions in our throats to hum when hearing
spoke a single one, a phrase, of their words
the contriving.
how I adore that word
as if the work was
the easy part,
and the insighting,
the feeling,
the noticing,
the tugging at the heart was
the easy art.
oh lord forgive me I write too much,
see beyond what I see,
hear the street snatches of conversation
and drip those reformatted words from mine eyes,
is that your blessing or your curse?
let me be just a contriver,
a poet who
follows form and function,
and gets an A from his English Lit. professor,
acknowledging expertise
at contriving
per poetic custom acceptable
whY did you insert this knowing,
this sensory malfunctioning that cusses
lest I not transform the everyday of the
everysay into verses and stanzas.
Reimer, Reimer, beloved scoundrel and schemer,
what have you undone to me!
he who never sleeps, just
weeps and weeps,
for you have contrived me yet gain
to see something I saw before,
always knew but never wrote,
in this exact format,
but all life long knew, and blubber anew
at words that I never knew existed in
this precise combination.
you can cannot contrive the spirit that
moves us to write, the words employed,
yes perhaps, but all
even the struggle for
le mot jus,
oft for naught^^
the repetitive, the uninventive,
glorify.
I survive,
I contrive.
but far more imposing,
is the knowing,
that tho the contriving still remains,
it is a cost so costly,
and I must include herein
that every verse
of every poem
ever writ,
every contrivation,
every submission,
even the worst simplest is a blessing,
even the simplest worst is a blessing.
all are:
"the fruit of promise,
a table replete,
hope restored,
a circle complete."^
Yet, t'is the fluid visionaries shall lead us
to our restful place
even if they cannot speak,
even if they cannot write,
just contrive.
___________________________________________
^
http://hellopoetry.com/poem/life-circles/#after-reading*It is in an instant, that life makes a poem in a man's mind, that will live longer than that that oak.
Nat*
*Reply
SE Reimer
i've reflected on your words, several times now, Nat, and find them to be such an accurate description of my experience with writing... though the words may move around a bit, once conceived, the contriving is all that remains.*
^^le mot juste
"the right word" in French. Coined by 19th-century novelist Gustave Flaubert, who often spent weeks looking for the right word to use.
Flaubert spent his life agonizing over "le mot juste." Now Madame Bovary is available in 20 different ****** english translations, so now it doesn't really make a **** bit of difference.