We seem to be back in an old argument. What does it mean to ‘understand’ a poem? It’s not something I care all that much about, to be frank. I care more about how it works, how it sounds, how it moves, how it calls up feelings. Sheila's poem does all those things, & indeed various lines & stanzas call to mind possible ‘meanings’ without insisting on just one. And the mastery of tone is part of what delighted me, anyway. How does it end aloud? What delightful confusions does it entertain?
Doug
> On Jun 24, 2020, at 4:43 AM, Patrick McManus <[log in to unmask]> wrote:
>
> Gosh not just me !
>
> On 24/06/2020 00:24, Bill Wootton wrote:
>> Hi Sheila.
>>
>> Like Patrick, I am not sure what is happening here.
>>
>> Bill
>>
>> On Wed, 24 Jun 2020 at 4:23 am, Patrick McManus <
>> [log in to unmask]> wrote:
>>
>>> Hi Sheila I am not sure what is happening here -P most ancient
>>>
>>> On 23/06/2020 01:30, Sheila Murphy wrote:
>>>> How do we unrest together?
>>>>
>>>> Form fitting innocence
>>>>
>>>> delimits our research
>>>>
>>>> aspiring to a feigned rapport,
>>>>
>>>>
>>>>
>>>> shuttering the views
>>>>
>>>> of youth in peril
>>>>
>>>> seeking to distinguish flowers
>>>>
>>>> from devouring clans who pluck them.
>>>>
>>>>
>>>>
>>>> Set the tone with pursed lips
>>>>
>>>> making points sans impact
>>>>
>>>> vocalizing to the empty
>>>>
>>>> chairs chastising
>>>>
>>>>
>>>>
>>>> gravitation light and
>>>>
>>>> whims downsized to form
>>>>
>>>> a colony of dogma leaving home
>>>>
>>>> a glut of old codes that demand a clash
>>>>
>>>>
>>>> Sheila E. Murphy
>>>>
Douglas Barbour
[log in to unmask]
https://eclecticruckus.wordpress.com/
Recent publications: (With Sheila E Murphy) Continuations & Continuations 2 (UofAPress).
Recording Dates (Rubicon Press).
Listen. If (UofAPress):
When thugs were in power, educated people were the first
to feel their fists. It was so pathetic, really, how so much violence
came from someone feeling small. Small of mind, and it did not
matter how big the sword in hand, that essential smallness remained, gnawing with very sharp teeth.
the scholar Janath Anar
in Steven Eerikson’s Reaper’s Gale
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