Make fast your home ‘ere the storm,
no matter what you believe, no child needs
the madness of creativity. Once the sleeping muse
awakes, she will tease then take, steal the peace
from the heart, unless the child creates a new
form in art. Once found, what you can mold
from what the soul would have told, life
burns bright. Quickly, curiosity provoked
begins to explore and question everything --
what was once settled, held true comes
back under review. God can die or be
brought back to life, truths decried
as lies and bulldozed under.
Come the poem, the tale, the sculpted form,
a splash of paint, please, raise alarm. For
music can still the fevered breast,but
drive mad its creator. Many, once
bitten will know this blight. Life becomes,
but one of many forms, to be explored.
Technique and style contest with voice, the path
plagued with all it means to be creative. Life is
often hard enough, with bills to pay and a family
to raise. Be aware of this. Creation. Febrile minds
caught in the awakening hormones of creative bliss.
Science and invention are iconoclastic as defined.
Yet, we all enjoy the results once tamed and refined.
Artist are a rowdy lot always doing what we think
they should not. They talk of artist’s bloc like it is
death itself, but constantly redefine our conception
of what is in or out, like we had any doubt. Be it
dance, music’s harmony, pictures supposed to stir the soul,
a poetic voice or another form as yet untold.
“There is only way for an artist to be alive.” they cry,
“Let us spread our wings.
See what happens when we try things.
Have faith, we seek to illume
a greater truth than you ever knew to exist.”
Pray your child is satisfied with simple crafts. Shallow
in its perceptions, at peace with common commercialism.
For if they seek to lead, feel driven to have you understand
their vision, you had best believe, they have been bitten
by the bug of creativity. Peace, as you would have it be,
is now, part of history. If they turn away, greatly saddened,
sure they do not have the talent to support their madness,
be not sure this is a last minute blessing. Beware the blues,
the sagged shoulders and sense of cosmic loss because
they have tossed the cost of this disease. Now they have
nothing left to lay at the feet of creativity and are zombies.
Heed my warning! Do not let this happen to you!!!
11:23 AM
05-10-09
Sidwell Friends School, WDC
Author notes
Prompt:
"And I tell you that you should open yourselves to hearing an authentic poet, of the kind whose bodily senses were shaped in a world that is not our own and that few people are able to perceive. A poet closer to death than to philosophy, closer to pain than to intelligence, closer to blood than to ink." - Federico Garcia Lorca, 1934
I thought this would be ecstatic or dance with madness, but it verged on too much seriousness and I have been to deep too much lately. So you got a rant quite tongue 'n cheek to make my point another way. Hope it is not too heavy handed and leaves you with a smile or two.
In a list
- Very best of tomisb • next in list
- Me and poetry • next in list
- Other Poets-My Favorites • next in list
A contest entry
- Poets: Closer To Death Than Philosophy by CarolDesjarlais.
1400 points, ended May 12, 11 entries
Honorable mention
• next poem in this contest, remove from contest
Please tell me what you think, what it makes you feel, how you are moved.
Comments
1 - 26 of 26
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My grandson, Cainaan (age nine) claims to be a quadruple threat because he can draw, sing, dance, and act. Now I have taught him the art of Mime and he doesn't quite know how to say "quintruple".
So, he adds..."oh and I can mime too"! LOL
Creativity is a gift from God because we all can stake claims there. Well...some not as well as others. I think children are far more brave in the area of creating because of their imagination, than adults, and when it comes to stepping outside the box because they have no idea the way grown-ups contain themselves.
This poem makes me ponder on many levels. Which is normal for you! Thanks for making me wear my thinking cap today.
Always Loving YOU ♥
Renee
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I don't do rants. The only one I can remember writing was in 1975. It was more of a rift. I didn't plan on this one either. I am starting to talk more like I write and write more like I talk. This may not be a good thing.
I understand about being a kid who wants to make something, something that makes a difference.(I have since learned: good art touches people, great art provides an opportunity for transformation.) I grew up with parents who were closet beatniks and I think a little uncomfortable because they needed to be normal like everyone else and they needed to be artistic to feel alive. My father retired to work for government contractors He had been a LtCmdr. in the Navy.
People love artist. Want artist. Pay to see artist. As long as they are famous, make big money and don't date their daughter. They aren't safe. As one of my good friends once pointed out, (he is the head of the Louis Armstrong Library in New York) a lower percentage of musicians make it as musicians than athletes make pro.
I think my parents were terrified of the "starving artist effect." Being a Quaker and being willing to be arrested was bad enough but fortunately it was on my mothers side of the family and had been that way forever. (It is too bad you can't hear me, 'cause then you would know how much I say dead seriously with a twinkle in my eye. Truth has to have an undercurrent of humor or we can get seriously hurt by it.)
I, just, wanted you to know that this was the exception to the rule. Of course I have always been and exception looking for the rule I belong to.
Love,
Tom B.
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Once, we had a coloring contest in grade One...happens, my mother was the teacher for a few months. I was full of art and expression. We were to color chicks for Easter, follow the lines, make it pretty. I pressed the crayon hard and got the most brilliant deep yellow I could find and my strokes made fathers, and perhaps a tear. I was remembering the little box of chicks picked up at the Farmers Union...their loud chirping of dismay and fear stuck with me. I colored help as best I could. After school, while I waited for my mother to finish her bookkeeping, she was giving marks to our work: "Look at Shirley's, it is gentle and soft like a chick....yours is too hard. Why do you press so hard?" I had no way to voice it.
Thank you for entering this poem...the last "Pray your child is satisfied with simple crafts. Shallow
in its perceptions, at peace with common commercialism.
For if they seek to lead, feel driven to have you understand
their vision, you had best believe, they have been bitten
by the bug of creativity. Peace, as you would have it be,
is now, part of history. If they turn away, greatly saddened,
sure they do not have the talent to support their madness,
be not sure this is a last minute blessing. Beware the blues,
the sagged shoulders and sense of cosmic loss because
they have tossed the cost of this disease. Now they have
nothing left to lay at the feet of creativity and are zombies.." speaks loud and clear to one who put her pencils down for a time. -
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Thanks for the HM. I wrote this to be silly, to tickle readers who I knew loved art and all the truths it reveals. I think I achieved more and caught the chord of frustration and bewilderment that occurs in the child, human, when wonder of wonders -- people like to be comfortable in the rut they already know. We forget to easily the time as a child when we wanted to create unless we are one of those blessed/cursed with never turning our back on the muse. Sadder, still, are those honking geese, the fools whose life has never reached past the shallows of their own seas.
opps! I'm and starting to rant again.
When the drums of the earth echo in your soul, your feet twitch to follow the dancing path of the rythmns, we both understand the demand and joy in answering. Let your wings be full of the wind and your soars allow you to receive the gifts of mountain tops and vallies rich.
Love, Tom B.
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i am blessed
with a son with a scientific mind too bored to be in school (they boxed him into a stereotype) and a daughter who is artistic and booksmart, but has the school making her feel like she isn't smart enough (to skip grades or be on NJHS)
i tell them...be yourself, and you will find your way....but its so hard when society says, be this or that...we need to say, be strong in yourself. Your writes make us all think tomisb...thank you...
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In society based in fear and denial of it, conformity is demanded. Excellence is okay as long as it is not too excellent or in something we find entertaining. Finding fulfillment and a sense of self in a world to often full of costumes and lies is difficult. Teaching a child what to trust and not trust, how to please themselves with out stirring the waters around them, how to achieve their goals with the minimum of waves is a great gift and one I strive to share with my son as I learn it as well.
Love, Tom B.
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BRAVO...I love this!!!! I was that child you write about and now I have one of my own...she is eleven. She wants to write childrens books about being eleven in today's society, with all the slang and rap music and etc...She has titled them "According to Alix"...about boys, or about school, love, etc...She is very creative and dramatic on top of that...she is what you wrote about and of course, her mothers daughter. I love the way this ranted as I read. Well done.
Shelly
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The school wanted a description of my son to append to his file. The school and I went around and around when he was in first grade because he was bored. I had them define him as a "creative intelligence." Two reasons: One, because they didn't know what it meant and could pigeon hole him, Two, because he truly is.
I, also, know from my mis-spent youth the trials tribulations of wanting to play with the world. A verbally abusive, shamed based father who was more afraid of me than he could admit. (He told my sister when I was thirty-five, after a conversations where we settled a few things, that I no longer threatened him.) Yes art is what brings the vibrancy into the soul and makes us addicted to being alive.
Thanks for enjoying this dance with madness.
Love, Tom B.
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I see you know the poetic soul...
Having began my poetic journey at age 16...yes,
"Quickly, curiosity provoked
begins to explore and question everything --
what was once settled, held true comes
back under review."
Every thought became a question.
"For if they seek to lead, feel driven to have you understand
their vision, you had best believe, they have been bitten
by the bug of creativity. Peace, as you would have it be,
is now, part of history."
There is still no peace with me (nor you?)
Yet this might yet be the result:
"If they turn away, greatly saddened,
sure they do not have the talent to support their madness"
For sometimes "madness" it surely is.
This is an incredible write poet.
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Thanks for being so taken by my tongue 'n cheek rant. Sometimes the best way to get others to listen is to play the fool. We, who have grown up with madness, know that it is a wild horse to ride. Yet, when we are thrown or have chosen to dismount for awhile, we find life a dull place. May your creative steed breath deep and carry you far in the race.
Peace, Tom B.
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This rant is so rich in life, society and the path set before our children you have a deep sense of humor that made me smile alot reading the scenes. Oh what a creator I have been in the lives of my children....lol...you made me thank of myself in so many ways....Tom your quill is purely mystical.
I enjoyed this rant, all of the philosophy you shared with us.......an excellent mind speaking out; what a gift.........novy
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Having a son that is described as a creative intelligence, I have plenty of experience. Also my experience as a child and the fear you could create in parents with questions and the use of information about a world, I was stunned to find out, they often barely knew.
Truthfully, part of what I teach my son is not just how to be creative but also how to listen to people so they won't react negatively to his constant sense of humor and playfulness. Glad you enjoyed my rant. Thanks for seeing so much in it.\
Love,
Tom B.
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I like how this flows very well without rhyme..and how its correctly puncuated. great write.
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Just because I play with madness does not mean I can't be technically correct
I love the lyrical, even in the face of those who decry it as a passé mode of expression. Glad you enjoyed my attempt at humor.
Peace,
Tom B.
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Technique and style contest with voice, the path
plagued with all it means to be creative. Life is
often hard enough, with bills to pay and a family
to raise. Be aware of this. Creation. Febrile minds
caught in the awakening hormones of creative bliss.
Peace, as you would have it be,
is now, part of history. If they turn away, greatly saddened,
sure they do not have the talent to support their madness,
be not sure this is a last minute blessing. Beware the blues,
the sagged shoulders and sense of cosmic loss because
they have tossed the cost of this disease.
These two parts spoken clearly and loudly to me, even in jest, there is much dire truth to it. My children are constant generators of artistic expression, and I'm right behind them, cleaning up. And, I wouldn't have it any other way. Gramma is an established artist, as well as her uncle being a chef. They positively meltdown if not given an outlet. I love this write, it's refreshingly smart and funny. The rhyme
I thought I'd never live to see the day.
Kidding.
Love it Tom, much love,
jin
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Obvious genetic recidivism in the name of art. Little hope for you having a joyous moment unspoiled without somebody suggesting something to make. No quiet evenings at home without someone wanting to work on something, show something or screaming about how life just doesn't work. You got it bad, kid. You got it bad.
Of course, so do I and that is no lie. I am proud to be one of the carriers of the disease. I infect the minds and souls of others with the idea that there are possibilities for them to explore and perhaps something magic and delightful hiding behind the next closed door.
Love,
Tom B.
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Superb Plus
A very fine write, my friend. Aye, it did bring a smile or two. I quite like poetry about the creative process. Thanks for sharing. -
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glad you can enjoy this tongue 'n cheek rant of the way creativity owns us perhaps more than we control it.
Peace,
Tom B.
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Very well done sir, best of luck in your contest.
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Thanks.
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And the beat goes on...can almost see Graeme in this as well as the child in yourself growing up, the frenetic pace we all share as a youth trying to get somewhere quicker than we should. You'd read this well at open mic C
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I was going to read it at an open mic tonight except I didn't have any ink for the printer. I am learning that I can write my sense of humor. Least, I hope so. The need to create often runs upstream against what society believes it is supposed to be. Graham draws his space men and asks me if they look better, practices different voice intonations and the effect it has on meaning, but won't believe that is acting. Parental message, social, cultural, peer, school, media messages, messages cage and smear the voice that screams so clear we want to create something cool, something new something that lets you hear me as I want it to sound to you. I am ranting again. Glad you enjoyed.
Love,
Tom B.
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WOW OH WOW
Tom this is quite remarkable, itreally reeled me in, I can identify with this, I have ten kids, all driven from dawn till dusk,, with the need to creae, singing, poetry, art,, n if their projects are thwarted or unsuccessful, they are sooo wild and angry
still as i always say, mathematicians are cool, but its the creative souls who colour our world
you included
bravo
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Thanks for finding so much to enjoy in my simple words. I remember how I would drive my parents nuts as early as five saying I was bored. When in truth I just wanted to make something, but didn't know how to explain it. I know some say it is all a game of the intellect but I sense within them their own fear of feelings un-reined and allowed to run free. I made a point similar to this and now that person won't talk to me
Love, Tom B.
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lmao Too late...My youngest is a poet, singer and actress all rolled into one, so talk about drama
It continues to be fun ....
This is great....but some are destined from birth to be like us ...Its in the genes
Love it! lol
Lynda
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The prompt which I should post was about how Neruda was as a poet. I don't know why I chose to respond in this way, except I have been to heavy for too many days.
Love, Tom B.
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