Dark Light
the rock, ocean and sky
on which we fly through space
drew its shadow like a slow shutter
across the face of the shining moon
and soon the last glinting
of that familiar mystery
no longer shone
yet it was far
from gone
the rare phenomenon of a total lunar eclipse
had not concealed our cosmic companion
but revealed it
sombre and strangely new in our night sky
a living, solid object I could feel
ominous and
somehow
real
and in its halflight
why
the ancients would have kneeled and cowered in fear
believing their final hour had come
waxed
clear
dark and powerful it hung there
a world? a million miles away in space?
or a pearl divinely dangled
so close to my face
I might...
reach..
touch?
an orange, pulsing, three-dimensioned ball
I’ve known it all my life
yet not at all
oncoming headlights all look much the same
yet each car has a shape, a weight, a name
the light in the tunnel goes out -
we see the train
slowly hurtling
In a list
Please tell me what you think
Comments
1 - 8 of 8
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great!
really enjoyed this! the timing and pace, the slow development of images, and general awe that com through, all make it an enjoyable experience. It feels like a poem that records for post-human posterity what this amazing universe can offer - like describing to a blind person, or some such. Nicely done.
. Rewarded 6
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Thanks JJ
Don't know how you came to dig this one out but thank you for doing so. I think if I ever get round to 'clearing house' in my collection of poems, this would be one that would stay - and I'm so glad you liked it.
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I'm a little late, but I suppose I can still comment on this little ode to my lunar namesake? I wondered if one of SP's crafty wordsmiths would pen something to honor the eclipse. I can't think of anyone better for the job.
The first stanza is really incredible, one of the strongest I've ever seen from you. I love the brevity and precision of "rock, ocean. . .sky." So simple, yet so profoundly evocative of the range and scope of the universe.
You have penned some very interesting observations-- it's interesting how we come to view the moon as a mundane sight. It's there all the time! But an event like an eclipse does give it something "new," makes it "real."
I think the tie-in to oncoming headlights was very clever. Using words like "ominous" and "cowering" were a good lead-up to that sort of conclusion, where we realize that we can see a thing all the time, yet never recognize or appreciate what lies beyond.
Hugs,
Pie
. Rewarded 4
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Wonderful....
I do love your poem.It is one of the best I ve found in here and the use of lunar image is astonishing.I hope you will have great comments on this.I am wordless.
What should expect after a red moon like this , I hop not to be announcement for bleeding war...Congratulations!
. Rewarded 4
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A thousand thanks L.
Such a warm and flattering comment is really encouraging. My Best to You. Peace. >W<
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I can feel the sensibility here.
JohnBird, it's palpable: that inner sense we have that darkness, often terrifying, can reveal realities which light often cannot. (That's probably why medieval monks - and modern ones too - pray at evening Vespers to be protected "from the angels of the night.") I get another thought from your poem: contrary to the old saw that 'what we don't know can't hurt us', or 'out of sight out of mind', the opposite - "the train" - is "slowly hurtling." A beauty and an omen.
I admire the images you chose: rock, ocean and sky; slow shutter; halflight; final hour; pearl; orange - and "inches from my face" brings them all together and inward. Nice.
Two images, though, strike me as maybe a bit too easy, maybe even mundane for this highly metaphored meditation: "beautiful" "satellite" and "celestial companion." I'm wondering if your skill would dig up something there more seductive.
I like, often envy, your ability to move your poetic ideas from object to being to meaning with the barest vocabulary from your huge barrel of them, without any pedantic need to wrap things up too neatly from first to last line. And - shutter, shinging and shone are pleasing.
Offhand thought: are "in space" and the comma after "living" really needed? Up to you as always.
Lad
Hats off!
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2 lunatics!
My Fellow Traveller! I have taken what you said on board and it fair set me to tinkering ( it suddenly strikes me that gypsies in these parts are known as both tinkers and travellers - but let it pass!) I have reworked my little lunar lyric and it is hopefully now less lunatic.See what you think.
I believe you may ascribe more to this one than was intended though I realize the poetic thought inspired by a (magnificent) lunar eclipse here on Saturday night will go which way it will. Primarily I wanted to express how different, real, somehow naked, exposed, revealed the moon looked with the clothing of its radiance removed. I realize now I used no such references in the poem. But I hope I got that 'feel' across.
Thanks for your insightful, careful, and inspirational comment. >W< -
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One loonybird, one moonstruck...
and, alright already, I'll be the loonybird, you the one struck poetic by the moon's dark. I like the results of the tinkering, especially "touch." I tried to see the eclipse here; would have been a good one but the sky was too clouded: now there's an idea for a ditty.
Lad
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