Mount Milton.
Shakespeare Pass.
The River Joyce:
So large at places,
it is almost like a sea.
I look at the geographical map
of those who have written before me.
So many obstacles to overcome,
So many dangers to surmount.
How do you survive
(or thrive)
In a field of mines?
How do you inscribe yourself
in so rigid a world?
How do you scratch your name on the worn marble
already darkened with
ink
and blood
and sweat?
Everything has been said.
Everything is set.
Stagnant.
The Canon has been fired already.
A stream of inflamed confetti
Has illuminated the vaulted minds of many.
An all encompassing brightness.
Nothing else can shine through.
The voices that have spoken
Can be shunned or ignored
But not undone.
They have spoken
And they have spoken so well...
The muses have sung for them.
I do not think they will sing for me.
-- Even that's been said before
By a mind greater that mine,
In a previous century.
Before the blank page I bend my mind
and scribble inconsistencies.
My words lilt for a moment
Then wilt
wither
and die.
In comparison.
Yet how not to compare?
If I can't ignore the great
I must acknowledge them
And tread in their steps.
I must take the ruler
(As long and hard as Hemingway's ego)
And measure myself to them.
So I am doomed
To forget myself
In their shadow.
4 comments:
I know this feeling.
Except I could never say it quite this well...I'm trying to find my favorite lines, and there are too many of them, so I think I'll just have to conclude that I like this entire piece.
And am amused by the double meaning of "Canon", what with the canon of literature and the literal canon.
The last three lines bug me, though...they feel somehow...out of place? I don't know. They just don't feel quite right, although they nicely sum up the general feeling of the poem, so maybe my out-of-place-radar is just acting up.
Well, jessica, your out-place-radar isn't totally off. Most of the piece was already written when I posted it and I just added those three lines to conclude the poem. It had to end with a sense of despair and inability, and I thought the "forgetting myself" fit in because it's never about how he feels other people view or judge his work but how he perceives it in relation to what's been written before... And shadow offers a contrast with the luminous imagery in the second stanza.
I do agree that the last lines don't really fit in, however. They were thought up very fast and end the whole thing rather abruptly. However, I am, as yet, too lazy to rework them.
"Three cheers for mute ingloriousness!"
JSMC
I also enjoy the pun on the word canon. I really like this.
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