Poems (UPDATE — New Poem, 12/3/12)

[Chosen One Ephant Mon]

In the spirit of this weekend:

 

The Crown-Maker

 

To one of matchless skill and vision rare

Was given life extended for his craft:

To forge and cast for kings of nations old

The crowns befitting of the blessed staff.

 

He dressed in many forms and names to serve

The kings of every continent and age;

Dominions flourished and fell with history's tide,

But still the goldsmith labored at the swage.

 

Wealth, esteem, and royal favor met him

For the mastery of his work; he rendered

For the lords of earth, o'er gilded halls and

Treasures vast, the jewel of regal splendor.

 

The kings beheld his work amazed: whose hands

Could shape such beauty? Nature's precious stones

Encrusted aureate and argent frames,

United by the master for their thrones.

 

Unrivaled his creations stood in time

And even after centuries would last;

Till his immortal benefactor once

Informed him that his work had been surpassed.

 

The master fell in disbelief: what man

Could best the one who ever had no peer?

The story sent him lower to the ground

And rent his heart as like to those who hear:

 

A dying shrub had lent its thorny twigs,

Encrusted by the offered blood of one;

It graced the head it most and least deserved

Upon the hill where victory was won.

 

All earthly riches tremble at the wreath

Which never fades, and kingdoms fall prostrate

Before the one to rule them evermore,

Begun that Friday in his broken state.

 

The master's works were brought to nothing then

By he who suffered for him to be free;

For none could stand comparison against

The crown worn by the outlaw on the tree.

Edited December 3, 2012 by Guest

[Lord Ar-Pharazon]

This was great COEM. I've never been one to analyze poetry, but I think I knew what this was about. Did you write it recently? It seems it comes a day past what I was thinking about yesterday. Granted, it's still relevant, but you know... I didn't eat meat yesterday. Well done.

[Chosen One Ephant Mon]

Thanks, man. It is very recent, actually: I had the idea a little while back but only sat down to write it last night and today, so I just finished. It is more about yesterday but I think it's still relevant given what the whole weekend is about.

 

Apart from grade school assignments this is actually the first poem I've written so while I tried to do some basic stuff with rhyme and meter, I am no expert myself. I was almost thinking of telling the story in a different form because I'm so underqualified in this area, but decided to just go for it.

[Sasori]

That's what I love about poetry/prose. You don't have to have skill to accomplish it, to write it, and for it to be successful. Rhyme matters very little. Just do it and write from your soul and it works.

 

Which is what I enjoy about this, it is isn't just a tribute, it is a record of your love for Christ, which even us godless folks can appreciate the art in. Just a wonderfully written piece of work COEM. Well done.

[Chosen One Ephant Mon]

Thanks dude, that means a lot. I'm glad you enjoyed it and that you could sense the feeling behind it.

[Amidala Skywalker]

That was really top-notch! Very artistic, flowed well, and what a neat premise for a poem! I think my favorite line was "It graced the head it most and least deserved". This poem is full of great imagery and really neat observations. Brilliant stuff, COEM.

[Chosen One Ephant Mon]

Thanks, Ami! That's nice of you to say and I appreciate your feedback.

[Delta73]

I really loved it COEM, it really hits me today. Thank you for putting this forward.

[Chosen One Ephant Mon]

Thanks, Delta, and you're welcome; hope you had a great Easter Sunday.

 

Lately I've felt the desire to begin writing devotional poetry, so while I have nothing planned out for the immediate future, I do hope to update this thread with additional pieces.

[jedi_master_gimpy]

Excellent, COEM! I'm really glad I checked this out. I think what Sasori said rings true - poetry can often have little to do with rhyme or meter, and much more on the emotions and thoughts expressed. Poetry can be both carefully measured out and very emotionally drafted, free of particular form. You had a good mix here.

 

The emotion behind it was clear, and the contrast between what people expect royalty to look like and how Christ actually came described in a fresh way. Those last three stanzas really caught my attention. Wonderfully done!

 

I am also always wondering how I can bring God into my works in both little and big ways, and it is so encouraging to see how this came straight from your heart. Happy Resurrection Sunday (a day late)!

[Tiana Calthye]

I'm not much of a poetry buff, so I'm afraid I can't tell what's good and what's not, but it's nice. Reminds me of a hymn and I can definitely tell what it's about... which is a good thing, some poems are definitely very abstract! This is just a nice... picture, crafted with words.

[Chosen One Ephant Mon]

Less form-driven than the previous, but nevertheless:

 

I Lie Along a Dream

 

I lie along a dream,

The truth released, spread thin

Across the soporific firmament

And grayed by all the fancies of

A none-too-meager whim.

 

The daemon reigns, accoutered

With the playful art of artifice,

Delighting in the idealistic dance

Of doll and string.

 

The elemental verities compose

A foreign verse, the rightful substance

Warped, aberrant creatures rising forth;

Thus purity begets exotic issue,

Truth the father of a fount

Of charmed mendacities cascading,

While tangentially I glide and guess

The matter far below.

 

The current bears the steward down

Along the daemon's airy den;

Its shorelines host alchemic feats

To conjure up on order

As the charmer, merry, calls

For dames or diamonds on a ring.

 

A conscious prod unfurls the thought:

Who puppeteers the puppeteer?

Above the rolling waves a stranger scent

Betrays the secret of a sea of wills,

Where mind is left to wondering if

The steward bankrolls chaos.

 

A signature I seek among the scrawl

And in recoil detect familiar hand:

Was daemon loosed by one so close,

A witness to the throes of fact,

Or steward, author, I?

 

Here Nature and Unnature meet

With penmanship throughout,

Complicity in plots to lose

Reality to perfidy.

 

Can faith yet make a final stand,

Embattled so by selfish foes,

Or have I signed away the truth, that now

I lie along a dream?

Edited September 6, 2012 by Guest

[Amidala Skywalker]

Dude, you are an awesome poet. That was really deep and haunting, and captured the circular, mixed up style of that particular kind of poetry. I loved all the uses of beautiful language; you never get to hear people using words like that nowadays.

 

Very nice.

[Chosen One Ephant Mon]

Wow, thanks, Ami. That was very kind. I had fun writing it and playing around to make it loose and dreamy.

 

I don't really know what I'm doing, though. I wish I had taken an English poetry class in college, because my exposure to great poetry is woeful and I am pretty clueless about meter (besides iambic pentameter). I feel like I don't have a good enough base under me to know what is good. But I would like to start reading more poetry. I tend to be a sucker for lofty, flowing language (probably to a fault), but that's when I tend to have the most fun writing, and I feel like that sing-song sensibility fits well with poetry (or at least is more permissible).

 

These two are all that I've written but I have enjoyed it so far and would like to keep trying, so I will start posting new poems here if/when they are written.

[jedi_master_gimpy]

So, I'm not going to say anything quite so eloquent as Ami, it's been super busy but I did want to pop in and comment on a few things. I liked it a lot! Nice use of language, and interesting subject matter.

[Chosen One Ephant Mon]

At The Water

Here at the water fateful stuff’s decided.

How long can I hold my conscience under?

The human heart’s not made amphibian.

 

A flicker’s all my hope for things confided.

“Adapt or die,” the serpent says mid-plunder.

No wretch could call this soul empyrean.

 

A heart slow-baked in pitch and rolling swinish

In seasoned vice and all its fragrant spices

Defends the secret tucked inside its throat:

 

That sin, the traitor, promising the finest,

Strings loopholes tight as leashes and entices

When pleasure’s gone and all transgression's rote.

 

Yet as my world drops out and sinks to bottom

A gentle ray lights on me from the surface

With whispers of a source I cannot see.

 

I need not clear a path that leads to Sodom

While living Hope prepares a higher purpose:

“My robe and fatted calf are here for thee.”

 

I cling to yet, my spirit plucked from autumn,

Belief that past the circles of this corpus

One day with Him in paradise I’ll be.

Edited September 6, 2012 by Guest

[Chosen One Ephant Mon]

Untitled

 

This poem’s past redeeming;

Take my word before the verse

Accrues a power in its seeming

Charm beyond its merit purse.

 

Let fall it to the level

Low belonging where it stoops,

Impudent writhings of a devil

Desecrating nature’s groups.

 

Stop here and now redouble;

See, the magic has its hook

Already sprucing reed from rubble

For a favor-laden look.

 

No devil’s been enlisted

Here, much less a rightful muse;

The pageantry of rhyme consisted

Here is naught but fear to lose.

 

But don’t be swayed by sympathies:

A whimper’s won too many alms;

So strike it, storm it, stomp it, please:

It’s mercy more than pity palms.

 

The gavel goes to history,

The verdict, Silence, final foe

Of all that scampered blistery

For just a word—just a “No.”

 

What time you’ve lost I can’t redeem

But if you’ve come so far you must

See through the muck the faintest gleam

Of something there—Alack! No—dust!

 

Dust in pretty patterns now,

If prettiness you’ll grant at least,

But to the point I’ll make you vow,

When all the tinkling chimes have ceased:

 

To Memory my lifeworks lie

So far beyond periphery;

So ease them to their long December.

You must forget—remember.

Edited September 6, 2012 by Guest

[Vaderman]

I don't really know what I'm doing, though. I wish I had taken an English poetry class in college, because my exposure to great poetry is woeful

 

I think most great artsits are wholly "unlearned" in their art. I always chuckled at the art majors at my college, because they spent so much time focusing on drawing trees and the such. It's one of those things that you're either good at...or you aren't. Sure, schooling can help aide in perfection, but really, art is a talent, not something learned. And you sir, you have talent! This is great stuff! I generally don't read poetry, but this stuff is gold! Keep it up!

[Amidala Skywalker]

Ah, those are both brilliant! I liked the first one a little better, for the neat imagery, but the second has a brilliant, witty rhyme scheme that makes it a lot of fun to read. Nice job on both! Have you looked into getting some of these published?

[Chosen One Ephant Mon]

Many thanks, V and Ami. I really appreciate your readership and the nice feedback.

 

And no, Ami, I really haven't looked into it much but recently had just begun thinking about it and running some shallow Google searches. Not that I have any more experience in fiction, but I have done more reading up on that process and hearing how it goes from other people, whereas with poetry I have no idea where even to begin looking or what are considered solid publishers. I'm having a lot of fun writing these though and it's encouraging to hear they may be worth something.

[Chosen One Ephant Mon]

Tripart

 

Observe ye, sons, the vivisected soul:

What passions by synapses psychic fly

Around the feckless kingly absent pole,

Poor syllogisms rimming at his eye,

And checkless currents rearing swiftly down

A frightful breeze between the head and crown.

 

A bitter subject.

 

Wheel round the gurney next, a heavier case

Where spirit meets a gastronomic end,

Constructive aims left dusting at the base

Or ground to spice another soothing blend—

No sight or will for anything to forge

And appetite unknowing but to gorge.

 

One more, the last.

 

The stethoscopic steps announce a man

Who is no patient, yet is that and kind;

Though stigmatized, he wields a steady hand

To stitch the maws of death where once he dined;

In men as these he sees beyond the Fall

Whose heart contains the best of both and all.

 

Now Grecian wisdom runs into the sea

To meet the weary-wending desert tribes—

Well-ordered veins, whose limbs upon the tree

The Doctor grafts and history inscribes—

A world with no imaginings above

The dint of reason superfused with love.

Edited December 5, 2012 by Guest

[Travis]

I understood about a quarter of that. If you came up with that on your own, you have mastered the art of obscurity, good sir. I suppose in the modern world, that makes you a superb poet.

[Chosen One Ephant Mon]

Ha, thanks, Travis. I suppose I could be the arch-(post-)modern poet and say the obscurantism is exactly the point and you should decide on your own interpretation, but I won't. It's inspired by Plato's tripartite theory of the soul with examples of men ruled by passion, appetite, and reason, with the twist in the last being that Christ is both fulfillment of a soul well ordered by reason, and innovator by locating that reason in abundant love. The coda comes from Christianity having often been considered the intersection of Greek and Jewish thought.

[Chosen One Ephant Mon]

Seville

 

“Señor,” he sputtered, kneeling, daring, “Fall

Your hand upon this wretched soul you see

Before you.” Passing bearers of the pall,

 

The crowd pushed in to learn if it could be:

The one who married prophet and the law,

Who tore through Hell and blazed above it free,

 

Again upon the streets of earth and straw.

Soft amber clothed the hushes and the cries

And limbs were under spell as if in yaw

 

Had it been any other, yet the wise

Would hold all wisdom folly but be wild

The day the Lord descended from the skies.

 

“Arise,” he said, and ever softly smiled,

Embracing all Creation in his eyes;

With tender love the Spirit Undefiled

 

Released more power than evil can devise:

The peasant stood, his body unbeguiled,

And blindness followed death in its demise.

 

This train of grace with riches over-piled

Wrought hallelujahs ringing in the square,

Entwining with the rose-scent of a child

 

Whose coffin men of strength could hardly bear;

On steps below the heaven-piercing spires

The women soaked their rolling tears in prayer.

 

Then to the one whose mercy never tires

The mother, crowd in shouting, came to plead:

“If you are Him, a word she just requires;

 

“Restore her life: your lips attend the deed!”

Across the way a man who dreamed of fire

Was squinting ancient eyes with special heed,

 

And finding not a tittle to admire

Knew deeply all the world was now amiss;

With heavy note he said, “I will inquire,”

 

Then witnessed sorrow swallowed up in bliss.

As life prevailed he even saw the healer

Lean in to seal her saving with a kiss.

Edited December 5, 2012 by Guest

[Travis]

As before, while the words are beautiful and flow well, I must respond with a resounding "huh?" Every time I figure I am following what you wrote, I get suddenly find myself totally lost.

 

If you could, please explain in common terms what is going on here. I want to see if, by knowing the theme, I can follow the poetry better.

[Chosen One Ephant Mon]

Ah man, I thought I might have done better this time. I wasn't trying to be as deliberately obscure as before (I admit I had some fun playing it up a little last time) but I guess it makes sense if you don't know the story. It's a poetic rendering of the beginning of this parable: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Grand_Inquisitor

 

In brief, Jesus reappears on earth in 16th-century Spain during the height of the Inquisition, not as the Second Coming but merely to visit the suffering people for a brief moment in time. The people recognize him but are amazed and can hardly believe it. He performs a series of miracles (healing the blind, etc.) and a throng of people are shouting praises and following him in a frenzy as he walks through the city streets. At the foot of the great cathedral ("On steps below the heaven-piercing spires") he comes upon a funeral procession for a young girl and raises her to life. But catching the scene from a distance is the Grand Inquisitor, a ninety-year-old cardinal lifer in the Church institution. He sees Jesus has returned and has, well, other thoughts ("I will inquire," i.e., inquisit, i.e., Inquisition).

 

But you have to read it if you haven't before (https://www.mtholyoke.edu/acad/intrel/pol116/grand.htm). The whole book, really, but this episode is the highlight (along with the chapter before it) and a powerful, powerful story. My poem merely sets up the action, but Jesus's kiss to the girl in the final line is my own inventive prefigurement of the real kiss that appears in the story at the climax of Christ's encounter with the Inquisitor.

 

Do the the lines make any more sense in that light?

[Travis]

Indeed, it makes a lot more sense now. And no, I had never heard of the Grand Inquisitor parable before, so I had no way to know that was what you were talking about. The entire poem makes a LOT more sense and I can see how you illustrated the scene. It definitely helps me appreciate it more.

[Chosen One Ephant Mon]

Score!

 

I'm glad it helped. I also could not recommend The Brothers Karamazov enough, especially for any Christian. It's my favorite novel and a gem of world literature.

 

Thanks also for your kind words about the language and flow. I'm glad it sounded pretty.