They Couldn't See In The Dark

[teilo]

Let me know what you think. I'd love some suggestions.

They Couldn't See In The Dark

stars shine moon shines clouds cover
the snow falling softly into the brown
-white, half-glow midnight street lights
and it waits mutely footsteps
crunch in the silence
midnight, yellow-white almost
sunlight in the city
whirl whirl the frenzied snow dance
slow dance under yellow glow street lamps
whips up a whorl for
outdoor winter lava lamps
and feet entranced pause, cold
and covered to see man-made suns
of midnight lamp light dance
in forgotten joy.

[ben]

It's very vivid, but besides the excellent description, I'm left wondering what I am supposed to take away from this. My sense is that the crucial line revolves around the entrancement the subject feels at beholding the "man-made suns / of midnight". Does your point have something to do with human ingenuity inputting unnatural phenomena (light at night) into nature? If so, I'm still left without any tangible idea whether this "inputting" is a 'good' or 'bad' or 'blind' sort of act. Am I misreading you entirely? Or is the extent of your intentions for the piece encompassed in it's use of description and imagery? If so, how would you view it in terms with the manifesto of the Block?

Also: what about formatting it like a prose-poem, all in one block, except for the punctuation? As I said, I thought the description and imagery was very vivid and well-executed, and in that way it struck me more as a prose-poem.

[teilo]

The point is supposed to be in the title. The people who couldn't see in the dark are those who didn't have light bulbs. The piece is meant to be a comment about how much the light bulb has changed the way we see the world, and how we don't even realize it. A lot of the description is supposed to evoke tribal dancing and contrast it to how we view the night, how we've almost tamed it. It's not so much a good vs bad thing, but rather trying to illuminate something forgotten, the "forgotten joy" of being afraid of the dark and living in spite of that. Is any of that coming out here?

[ben]

I like the idea of tribal dancing, though I find it too abstract and unexpressed in its current form. That said, I really like what you're onto with the "forgotten joy" of such a world-changing invention. I think being shown the people who couldn't see in the dark, in addition to being shown those that could, would provide a better contrast. This contrast would make your whole poetic project pop and come to the fore. At least for me.

[teilo]

Well here's an edit, let me know what you think. I'm still not quite happy with it, but it's coming closer.

Tungsten Fire

stars shine moon shines clouds cover
the snow falling softly into the brown
-white, half-glow midnight street lights
and it waits mutely remembering
summers' footsteps over fires leapt
dark in night: flicker, the light
of red rising wild sight drumming
the frenzied trance of ancient dance
and now

midnight, yellow-white almost
sunlight in the city

whirl whirl the frenzied snow dance
slow dance under yellow glow street lamps
whips up a whorl for
outdoor winter lava lamps
and feet entranced pause, cold
and covered to see man-made suns
of midnight lamp light dance
in forgotten joy.

[jpazdziora]

Still very abstract, but I like it. Well done.

A few thoughts--

line 2: cut out your articles: 'snow falling softly into brown'. It scans better without them.

line 4: break after 'waits', and 'footsteps': 'and it waits/mutely remembering summer's footsteps/ over fires leapt.' You'll get sharper emotional punch, I think.

line 16: cut out 'feet entranced': 'and pause, cold'. The point, as I understand it, being at least partly the loss of our sense of ritual, and connectedness to the world, it helps if the imagery tapers off.

Also, you use the word 'frenzied' twice. Might want to rethink that.

I'd keep the original title, 'They Couldn't See in the Dark'; it has a subtle irony to it, and makes the poem a bit more cryptic. 'Tungsten Fire' doesn't do much for me.

Very well done, good sound, evocative images. It's going to haunt me for the rest of the day.

[teilo]

Thanks!

I really like the suggestions for lines 2 and 4, they definitely tighten up the poem. As for line 16 and "frenzied," actually the point is that the ritual is still there, only changed. We just don't see it very easily. The use of "frenzied" is supposed to tie the two halves of the poem together. I'll keep thinking about the title too, though I do like the way "Tungsten Fire" has the sense of tying the ritual/mysticism into modern day stuff with the light bulb, rather than "They Couldn't See in the Dark," which seems to only have negative connotations.

I've also been thinking about changing the image of the dance around the fire into a drive from the country, into the city, then getting out of the car and becoming entranced by the swirling snow. Seems to put the emphasis more on darkness vs light and the way we deal with the unknown that way, rather than ancient ritual vs modern day ritual. Might help with the confusion that seems to come whenever I get anyone to look at this poem (everyone reads it the same way you did, as something has disappeared from the world, rather than we've simply stopped seeing).

[teilo]

Hmmm, and as for being abstract, this might start an entirely different conversation, but I believe poetry should be abstract to a certain degree. Mystic, or mysterious, might be a better word though. I think poetry should focus more on making its language beautiful and breaking normal conventions of communication than making its meaning plain and clear. It's the poems that I don't get right away and have to do a bit of work to decipher, that are also hauntingly beautiful, or heartbreaking, or whatever, that stick with me and not the common anthems (i.e. I prefer T.S. Eliot or Wallace Stevens to Wordsworth or Pope). So I guess what I'm saying is that I'm not sure that abstract is necessarily a bad thing. I think academic, or intellectuallized, or phillosophical, or anything else that requires a specialized knowledge or background to understand the poem's meaning is. However, abstract simply implies a certain way of thinking about the poem to discover its meaning, not that the meaning is inaccesible.