Shel Silverstein

I’ve heard lots and lots about you, and have not read one thing you’ve written … this, will, change. 

No Longer Mute

Wow … after a grueling 3 months of Muselessness, out of nowhere Calliope appears! 

 

Of a Mute 

He walks- in speechlessness he lulling strolls

Investigating gnarly twigs that fell

And fall'n autumn leaves that languish, lacking souls

Is he within a heaven, or he a hell 

The world around him-animated- threats

And he, a foreigner to it doth shy

As too the loneliness that in me frets

I know his state removed from all, but why

Is he, like me, in dreadful mystic state

Is worldly beauty too much for him to bear

Receiving it with joy, but too with fear

Or, and God forbid I ask, is his fate

A curse? Or even worse- does Life not care

That he's caught between the Now and Nowhere

-jwm

Of the Poem (Parameters) 

Stanza: A hybrid between an English sonnet and a French sonnet
Meter: Pentameter (line 10, however, has ten and a half syllables) 

Rhyme Scheme: abab cdcd eff eff

Side Note

I promise I’m not exaggerating when I say that I thought I was suffering Rimbaud's fate (a very famous French Symbolist poet who, at the age of 19, abruptly ceased to write poetry for the rest of his life).

The poem, done within 30 minutes after a 3 month dry spell, was inspired by a neighbor boy who is autistic (I think) and very quiet and very, very standoffish. It’s not about him, but definitely influenced by him.

Rilke on Canvas

Ran across this canvas representation of the well known German poet, Rainer Maria Rilke ... nicely done! Check out this poem:

Moving Forward

The deep parts of my life pour onward,
as if the river shores were opening out.
It seems that things are more like me now,
That I can see farther into paintings.
I feel closer to what language can't reach.
With my senses, as with birds, I climb
into the windy heaven, out of the oak,
in the ponds broken off from the sky
my falling sinks, as if standing on fishes.

Rainer Maria Rilke

****

I love that imagery … as if Rilke were watching a little bird flying out of an oak tree into the windy sky, but watching this happen through the medium of a pond of water (then imagining that the bird’s flight was descent into the deep). Very cool … read it again:

With my senses, as with birds, I climb

into the windy heaven, out of the oak,

in the ponds broken off from the sky

my falling sinks, as if standing on fishes.

In-fricking-credible!

I swear, as much as Pound and Eliot annoy me, the best thing that came out of the Imagist movement was without qualification Hilda Doolittle- one of thē most incredible poets to put ink to page. Happy birthday, lady …

Serious, experience how she employs poetic imagery so magically … in-fricking-credible!

Orchard

I saw the first pear

as it fell--

the honey-seeking, golden-banded,

the yellow swarm

was not more fleet than I,

(spare us from loveliness)

and I fell prostrate

crying:

you have flayed us

with your blossoms,

spare us the beauty

of fruit-trees.

The honey-seeking

paused not,

the air thundered their song,

and I alone was prostrate.

O rough hewn

god of the orchard,

I bring you an offering--

do you, alone unbeautiful,

son of the god,

spare us from loveliness:

these fallen hazel-nuts,

stripped late of their green sheaths,

grapes, red-purple,

their berries

dripping with wine,

pomegranates already broken,

and shrunken figs

and quinces untouched,

I bring you as offering.

Yep ... awesome ...