This year, James Wyman of Burlington Writers Workshop is offering a poetry 101 course, for free. When he sent out the syllabus he recommended we read Perrine’s Sound and Sense(Aal). It’s a wonderful, intense “Introduction to Poetry,” and I wish I had read it years ago. The title is from a poem called Sound and Sense by Alexander Pope.
A poet has a full tool box to for commanding the sounds of language to imbue each line with mystery and emotion. The work of the poet is to use these tools to match sound and sense: to make the poem sing with its meaning.
Example Poem: “Lightning ” by Mary Oliver from American Primitive(Aal)
Lightning
The oaks shone
gaunt gold
on the lip
of the storm before
the wind rose,
the shapeless mouth
opened and began
its five-hour howl;
the lights
went out fast, branches
sidled over
the pitch of the roof, bounced
into the yard
that grew black
within mintes, except
for the lightning—the landscape
bulging forth like a quick
lesson in creation, then
thudding away. Inside,
as always,
it was hard to tell
fear from excitement:
how sensal
the lightning’s
poured stroke! and still,
what a fire and a risk!
As always the body wants to hide,
wants to flow toward it—strives
to balance while
fear shouts,
excitement
shouts, back
and forth—each
bolt a burning river
tearing like escape through the dark
field of the other.
~Mary Oliver
How do the sounds of these words in these lines convey the meaning of the poem?
Prompt: Think of the onset of a specific fear. Write a poem using short, punchy phrases to express the immediacy and speed for which we feel fear.
Possible form: The Blitz poem
~
I referred to the Writers’ Digest article on the Blitz Poem for this form. I started numbering the lines just to keep track, and I’m not entirely sure why I left the numbers in, but once they were there, I decided to keep them.
~
monster over heart
1 write a dream
2 write a monster
3 monster over table
4 table under moon
5 moon keeps watch
6 watch through branches
7 branches hide eyes
8 eyes save secrets
9 secrets sink deep
10 deep beneath kitchen
11 kitchen hums quietly
12 quietly making warnings
13 warnings taste metallic
14 metallic like rain
15 rain over tent
16 tent inside forest
17 forest holding breath
18 breath turns brittle
19 brittle like vows
20 vows stitched crooked
21 crooked threads humming
22 humming small gods
23 gods in drainwater
24 drainwater names futures
25 futures bend gravity
26 gravity gripping ankles
27 ankles learn trembling
28 trembling around truth
29 truth stalks doorways
30 doorways leak stories
31 stories trade monsters
32 monsters borrow voices
33 voices chase silence
34 silence learns hunger
35 hunger loves sorrow
36 sorrow keeps Oizys
37 Oizys guards memory
38 memory bends light
39 light splits mirrors
40 mirrors hold shadows
41 shadows map bodies
42 bodies lose weight
43 weight leaves echoes
44 echoes taste iron
45 iron forgives hands
46 hands cradle fear
47 fear meets heart
48 heart chooses witness
49 witness
50 heart
~ Oizys.
Fun that you tried the Blitz. I really got into it around "gods in drainwater."
ReplyDeleteThanks, Maria! Blitz was a fun mess, that line just bubbled up from the gutter gods.
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