> Hello Sally,
              Yes, you´re quite right. The genital imagery here is quite deep-rooted, if I might express it so. The word `orchid´ derives from the Greek word `orchis´ which means `testicle´. Language is very prone to start giving one the impression that everything in this world is everything else, as some poets have remarked, at least implicitly. Funny old world, isn´t it ;-)



Best wishes,    Mike



> Lähettäjä: Sally James <[log in to unmask]>
> Päiväys: 2004/04/22 to PM 12:47:44 GMT+03:00
> Vastaanottaja: [log in to unmask]
> Aihe: Re: New sub: At Dawn  Helen and Mike.
> 
> I vaguelly remember as a former nurse a condition known as Orchitis which if 
> I remember rightly was inflamation of some aspects of the male reproductive 
> system. Sally J
> 
> 
> >From: Helen Clare <[log in to unmask]>
> >Reply-To: The Pennine Poetry Works <[log in to unmask]>
> >To: [log in to unmask]
> >Subject: Re: New sub: At Dawn
> >Date: Thu, 22 Apr 2004 08:06:38 +0100
> >
> >I've been waiting to comment on this, not wanting to reveal myself as the
> >only one with a dirty mind... but I guess it is too late to be coy.
> >On one level this is a poem about spring and birth, and the violence
> >implicit that.
> >But I can't help but observe that the orchid is often used to represent the
> >male genitals... and I wondered if you were hinting at another kind of dawn
> >rising here!
> >Helen
> >
> >
> >----- Original Message -----
> >From: "Mike Horwood" <[log in to unmask]>
> >To: <[log in to unmask]>
> >Sent: Monday, April 19, 2004 1:33 PM
> >Subject: New sub: At Dawn
> >
> >
> >At Dawn
> >
> >I never wanted this, the heart pumping,
> >blood punishing the veins in thin wrists.
> >
> >The skin below my ribs parts and tears
> >and the orchid pushes its silky stem
> >at the wound´s livid lips,
> >stretching flaps of flesh
> >into a red-raw O.
> >
> >Orchis raises his headbud,
> >dislodging cells like grains of soil,
> >rippling my belly and I cannot look
> >away, though the starting day lights
> >the vegetable world outside my window
> >and streaks the dawn sky.
> >
> >Could I rise and step out, barefoot,
> >on the cool grass beneath the trees?
> >
> >I lie back on my pillow in single
> >contemplation of the orchid blooming
> >below my heart, streaked purple and yellow,
> >lurid as any sky at dawn
> >and imagine the feel of cool grass on bare feet.
> >
> >
> >
> >Mike
> 
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