30·Aug·2007 · "Thrown Clay" · champagne1982

[champagne1982]

It's enough that her hands
warm the clay and smooth
the surface even as she moulds
folds and creases in a spiral
down the barber-pole hardness.
She loves this work, fabricating
something out of clay, as if divine:
She makes him.

He takes shape, round and masculine,
a simulacrum of Adam with feet
of clay, waiting for Her to descend
and breathe life into this, Her Art.
She accepts this divinity as her fingers
sweep along his rigid symbology.

Her new religion allows
this manifestation of the need
that, clasped tightly in her hands,
consumes her as she holds
this symbol out, in offering,
to her mother goddess. Phallus,
fertility and ritual, sublimating
need through Her art
in a garage-studio out back,
behind the kitchen of her reality.

This is hopefully, a smoother read that will make a bit more sense with the addition of the word "need" to refer back to what our housewife goddess is sublimating.

Thank you both for your thoughtful critique.

 

[Anschul]

It's enough that her hands
warm the clay and smooth
the surface even as she moulds
folds and creases in a spiral
down the barber-pole hardness.
She loves this work, fabricating
something out of clay, as if divine:
She makes him.

He takes shape, round and masculine,
a simulacrum of Adam with feet
of clay, waiting for Her to descend
and breathe life into this, Her Art.
She accepts this divinity as her fingers
sweep along his rigid symbology.

Her new religion allows
this manifestation of the need
that, clasped tightly in her hands,
consumes her as she holds
this symbol out, in offering,
to her mother goddess. Fertility,
phallus and ritual, sublimating
need through Her art
in a garage-studio out back,
behind the kitchen of her reality.

This is hopefully, a smoother read that will make a bit more sense with the addition of the word "need" to refer back to what our housewife goddess is sublimating.

Thank you both for your thoughtful critique.

When I read your rationale on her and Her, she and She, I was confused. On this read, I am completely in tune with your choices. I love all of this, but I still stumble over your choice of not to break the line at the period after Goddess. I'm sure your choice is sound, but I just don't get it. If I wrote those lines, I'd break after "Goddess." and after "ritual,". I'm sure it's a me problem. Otherwise, I love it to death.
xlnt!

 

[champagne1982]

When I read your rationale on her and Her, she and She, I was confused. On this read, I am completely in tune with your choices. I love all of this, but I still stumble over your choice of not to break the line at the period after Goddess. I'm sure your choice is sound, but I just don't get it. If I wrote those lines, I'd break after "Goddess." and after "ritual,". I'm sure it's a me problem. Otherwise, I love it to death.
xlnt!

I'm glad the diety attributions are clear now. As to where I'm breaking, well, if this poem were unpunctuated I'd have no option but to break where you've indicated as your choice. It would be comfortable and since that's the feeling, I think the break would show as rather bland. This way, with the break at fertility, you can refer back to goddess and grab at least Isis and Hera out of the association. It follows that the words phallus, ritual and sublimating would show precisely what and how the sexual sublimation is happening.

It makes sense to me, does it work for you?

 

[Anschul]

I'm glad the diety attributions are clear now. As to where I'm breaking, well, if this poem were unpunctuated I'd have no option but to break where you've indicated as your choice. It would be comfortable and since that's the feeling, I think the break would show as rather bland. This way, with the break at fertility, you can refer back to goddess and grab at least Isis and Hera out of the association. It follows that the words phallus, ritual and sublimating would show precisely what and how the sexual sublimation is happening.

It makes sense to me, does it work for you?

It has always worked for me. I like to read aloud and hear the words. (It's one of the reasons my sonnets read the way they do. I hear them, and the rhymes are there because the form requires them.) In my reading this poem, the word "fertility" flows nicely through the lines, and the thought works. It just looks jarring to me, but that doesn't affect the impact of the work. As I said, that's a ME problem, not a YOU problem. I think it's wonderful, and now that I get the diety references, I can't think of anything else I'd fix. I got the kitchen-of-her-reality reference on my first read, and I don't know what anyone found problematic with that. I thought that was great. Wish I could write like that.
Having fun yet?

 

[radtea]

Two points in defence of parts of the original version against the amended version, which I agree is overall a stronger poem.

1) I prefer the version where the line reads:

"to her mother goddess. Phallus"

rather than:

"to her mother goddess. Fertility"

Having the word "phallus" dangling out there in the breeze seems to me to pick up on the similarly sticking-out-ness of the thing-in-itself. While I'm not about to mount a full defence of concrete poetry, I do take delight in seeing these sorts of structural resonances in more conventional poems.

Having "phallus" sticking out like that also picks up on the theme that her art is in this case moulding a disembodied part of a man, disconnected from the body.

So I respectfully disagree with Anschul on this, although I might not have even noticed this feature if he hadn't questioned it.

2) I particularly like the "simulacrum of Her Adam", which I think reads better with the "her" in place as it was originally. The sense of possession that "Her Adam" produces is I think more evocative, more intimate. The capital "Her" works for me as well, evoking the sense of a creator god.

Also, keeping the "Her" in place strengthens the interior rhyme, and given that there are several others throughout the poem it seems worth keeping on that basis as well, strengthening the unity of composition on a purely technical basis. Feel free to take all this with as large a grain of salt as you like, though!

Either way, it's a lovely poem, executed with a very light and competent touch. The manner in which mundane reality is evoked at the end without a hint of maudlin is very well done.

--Tom

 

[champagne1982]

Hi radtea. Thanks for your thoughts on this most recent change. I particularly like the analogy you draw in #1. The phallus will be moved. Thanks for pointing that out to me... ok, enough. I'm making myself squirm from bad puns. Your second suggestion doesn't make a significant change in the feel of the poem for me, I'll think on it some more.

Now, I've got a phallic object to dangle. If you'll excuse me?

 

[Anschul]

Hi radtea. Thanks for your thoughts on this most recent change. I particularly like the analogy you draw in #1. The phallus will be moved. Thanks for pointing that out to me... ok, enough. I'm making myself squirm from bad puns. Your second suggestion doesn't make a significant change in the feel of the poem for me, I'll think on it some more.

Now, I've got a phallic object to dangle. If you'll excuse me?

Duh....did I really say THIS: Not sure why you hung "Phallus" out there...
It generated a few notes of "hanging out," and "sticking out," and such. Oh My God...

 

[champagne1982]

Duh....did I really say THIS: Not sure why you hung "Phallus" out there...
It generated a few notes of "hanging out," and "sticking out," and such. Oh My God...

Y'know, it's been so long since I wrote this piece that I'd forgotten how much fun I was having insinuating the oral aspects of the poem... the phallus held in both hands, lips descending, kitchen = food. I guess I've regressed to the oral level of development over anal.

I'm betting that I even left the phallus out there because of where it is physically as well as the cereberal rhythm/idea line break aspects in the poem. I think we're all guilty of subliminal suggestion and thought, that's just another (good) example of it.