I'm being particularly thick this evening, but I can't work out who
the poet is addressing here. I have thought of God, Australia, a
lover, ... I dunno. Maybe it doesn't matter: maybe it the angry energy
that is the 'point' of the poem. I do feel that saying 'unspeakable
name' twice weakens it - It has more power if you just use it once. &
I'd drop the second verse because too many unspeakables in that
line-broken way becomes a gimmick if used too often.
I wouldn't be saying this if I didn't think the poem had legs. (It may
even have balls.)
Good to hear from you, JJ. I can hear your voice saying this one :-)
Andrew
On 03/12/06, Janet Jackson <[log in to unmask]> wrote:
> A bit of a rant, this one
> Janet
>
> Un/speak/able
>
> With what's left of my face after you
> have finished with it, your sun
> melted it, your shocks and switches
> scoured and scarified it, your challenges
> chopped and chiselled it, your licks and lays
> licked and lavaged it,
> ravaged it with your un
> speak
> able ways
>
> with un
> speak
> able devotion, un
> speak
> able elation, elevation, libation, translation
>
> with whatever skin I still have,
> whatever still works in my eyes,
> whatever screams I have left,
> with all my remaining teeth,
> with a ton of drop-forged belief,
> with spider veins in my cheeks
> and enough flesh for one kiss
> in the thin ghosts of my lips
> I will finally speak your name.
>
> When you can see all of me,
> when you can hear all of me,
> when all the red things, sad things,
> good and bad things inside me
> no longer divide me from you
> I will finally, at last, in ecstasy speak
> your name, your name, your name, your un
> speak
> able name.
>
> Throw off all fakery and surgery,
> present your name in the city,
> howl it in what's left of the country,
> throw it all over the Net.
> With every note left in my mouth I will,
> I will, I will speak
> your un
> speak
> able name.
>
> -------------------------------------------------------
> Janet Jackson <[log in to unmask]>
> Poems at Proximity:
> http://www.proximity.webhop.net
>
> You cannot love alone
> -------------------------------------------------------
>
--
Andrew
http://hispirits.blogspot.com/
http://www.bam.com.au/andrew
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