It recurs. The town mounts a steep hill, houses on stilts
plastered to clifftops. The views must be tremendous,
but I’m breathless from climbing and glued to the dust
of brick-lined bent roads.
Lost, listless, need to meet friends, don’t know who.
Sun beats peach-painted walls, I have no shades,
my face is sore from squinting.
A Kia sputters and dies. The brakes don’t hold.
Goats, kids, careen out of the way. There is a sea
somewhere, blue respite if I can find it, breakers wash the skin of grit.
It recurs. A creeping vine of a village, a Wandering Jew
strung up by the stripes. A casino in the basin below,
and factories, a car repair. No pavement, gravel scatters
beneath tires, clouds betray arrival.
Cracks in mud made weeks ago, broken by boot prints,
toe prints, some people go barefoot all the time.
My blisters bleed, my soles wear thin.
A distant rumble, a closing caravan, soon the tanks.
Concrete crumbles in afternoon shock. A blue bird
lands in the berry bush.
It recurs. A shackled ruin up the slope, walls upon walls,
mortar ground to chalk. A rubble pile from Paradise.
Where is the sea, the cleansing holy sea?
A contest entry
- Enter Sandman - a suzi & jan contest by jantastic.
3500 points, ended November 7, 2008, 13 entries
Bronze trophy winner
• next poem in this contest, remove from contest
Comments
1 - 18 of 18
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fifth stanza really stood out for me, the implication that you're barefoot. nicely done.
if this had been a creation rather than a dream, I was going to suggest another tactile sensation: the vibration felt through the ground from the tanks.
very descriptive and skillfully done. -
Nice job on this. I too like the words, "Where is the sea,the cleansing holy sea". Thanks for a beautiful piece of poetry.
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"Where is the sea, the cleansing holy sea?"
I like this stern to stem -
a blue bird in contrast of the concrete surrounding - such a great image among many in this. Simply wonderful writing Zara.
Kim
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I came back to leave applause. Was really happy to find this here.
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thanks, Suzi, kind of you to come back
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my favorite part, as you may have guessed is...
mortar ground to chalk. ...from glued to the dust
and soon the tanks,; te voy hacer polvo, Cabeson de Piedra.
a wandering jew is some kind of plant, right?
wander, is that this does. I can't find a flow, which I am sure was intentional. Dreams are like bad TV shows with far too many cuts, shaky closeups of cheesy cop shows desperate for the viewer to think it's real.
I also like the blue bird in the berry bush. I imagine the berries to be red or purple, the bird's feathers a royal, vibrant blue, and this makes me think of a bowl of Trix, silly rabbit.
I didn't know you were in this one. I don't know how I missed it. Meaty, thick poem.
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I thought the second part was a repeat of the first, with variation. Maybe if I change the formatting that will be more clear.
I didn't mean to be in this one, but I read the prompt and my recurring dream barged right in, damn it. I'm writing a novel, no time for little poems. I have to be done by November 30; it's for National Novel Writing Month. Call me crazy.
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Well, I don't know about you, but I'm glad we made you write...
Structurally I'm sure this was difficult, you've accomplished the disconnectedness yet kept it cohesive with the repetition of "it recurs". It also paints scenes that are almost palpable.
I have no energy for more in depth crits at the moment, just going with my initial reactions and feelings.
Thanks for writing.
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I hate to be too forward about my opinion on poems, or how much I like them when judging a contest, but this .. this is what I would hope to find in a contest with this prompt. It reminds me of trying to remember a dream... the foggy/hazy quality I am left with, only you wrote it with much more clarity than I have ever been able to.
Thank you Zara...
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the apocolypse is now!! and then through the chaos sits normality and calm and beauty... even in death beauty creeps in trying to cleanse us of what we have seen and heard
is it holy? is it faith or something politically correct?
it recurs and recurs
brilliant work Miss Z... oh yes!!!!!!!
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This reminds me of things, recurring thoughts with the feelings of a vision of something/place so familiar...and then again , again... and alaways reaching for an answer...thoughtful and evocative here...got me to thinking...always a risky thing... ...Pk
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You don't post a while and then you come with the best ever- there is an inevitablility- it recurs because we fight this war for millennia over and over. It is hot and dry and crack and we are weary of it, long for the coolness of the sea, the peace of a darkened room to dispel the headache.
The language of war and the language of peace entwine most cunningly- mortar- we use to build, mortar -we use to destroy. I somehow doubt the holy see is the answer, but the holy sea of humanity might be.
Not only the language of meaning is impressive here, but the laguage of poetry. The short 'i' and log 'I' sounds hold this from beginning to end like the terrace layers of buildings, like the rows of stnes and bricks that make them.
This really is quite special. Very special. Do not change it - rewrite if you want to change it or some editor tell you to, but please do not alter this version.
Love Stef and Niko
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Oh the weariness in this piece, the almost desperate longing for relief jumps from these lines . . . oh so well written fellow Vancouverite . . .
Marc
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Enola Gay
you're gay, out of the blue
drop a mystic 4.17 little boy and disappeared
maybe back into the clouds
left behind, a ruin
the town mounting the edge of sea smokes
and smoking kills...
the sea is visible now,
salty and see
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Super Good...
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what a journey...
i am left back in time sneakily hiking through ww2 territory.. at least that is where i went in my own mind...
a lot of this though was so familiar to me just from my own backpacking journeys around the world..
sore from squinting... i know that
i loved the contrast of destruction mixed with beauty
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