But birds that are canorous
and whose notes we most commend,
are of little throats, and short necks,
as Nightingales, Finches, Linnets, Canary birds and Larks."
— Sir Thomas Browne, Pseudodoxia Epidemica
***
But of course the poem swam up
on small red fins,
from that area that hangs the oxygen
in suspension
a gaffe; a cough,
that caught the speaker’s voice
in mid relief
the remaining stitches-
those not connected to the verse-
gasped grasped their throats
and thrashed their thighs in unison.
Once That Had Been Accomplished
wet cigars were passed around the room
o & once the tangled limbs untwined
the mangled bodies sighed
with the hiss of unused breath
said the poem
peeking over the edge of the wave
with unblinking eye;
The speaker continued,
his cheek warm,
certainly had it been me
who rode up on the easterlies
with my eye upon the storm
I would have arrived here in any case
to watch the disaster unfold
a patchwork of many hands
breaking the surface.
In a list
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Comments
1 - 9 of 9
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i'll mark a few -
Excellent
A very unique write, describing, methinks, the creative process. Quite well written. Thanks for sharing this one. -
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ah. yes. good. -
I can't understand why this works -- I've tried to string together a comment that sounded sensible
but I can't. I think that might be good -- for if it is so easily attainable how could it really be striving toward art?
Something about being swept along and actually becoming the poem even though I'm the reader -- when I get to that "said the poem" I am there on the edge of the wave peering
You continue to provide me inspiration both as a reader and as a wanna be poet.
I like oddness this supplies. I really do.
Lisa
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congratulations
you just discovered why giraffes can't sing
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Hmmm I think I prefer the feathered variety rather than the loose limbed, loose tongued version of them in the feminine form but then again I'm no Monica but I swear a wet cigar? lol
C
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When I finished reading this it made me instantly think of a pond I run around during the week. Fish jump all the time and I always am wondering why!... I wonder if there is a bar just under the surface and those are the troublemaker fish being thrown out by more muscular ones...
or...
maybe they are all at work and together for a meeting and a proposal was rejected by the boss so.. OUT he goes....
I guess your first stanza took me there with the suspension of oxygen and thrashing thighs... sometimes two or three come out at a time and they do take a leg form sometimes...
anyway... it was just an odd place I was stuck in but did enjoy lots!
and yea... i am one to watch the train wreck be it myself or another - specially if i have notice! lol
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