[Mark McDonnell]

rev


Of The Rest Of Your Life

Surfacing from a dream of sacred fire
this ticking dawn, you shake the bedding loose
to find only the window's light, the room,
the shattered planet hurtling still through space,
still beautiful and baffling. Wake
your macrocosm, cringing ape. Here is
your own eyelid fire, your ceiling shapes,
your own slow breath of chemistry, slow stumble
for this one-time-only curtain pull ta-da —
the bluest sky with one faint lingering star.
Howdy, neighbours — bin-men, registered
sex-offenders, kids on bikes, sparrows,
barking husbands, sniffing mongrels, wives —
what spitting embers glow behind your eyes?


major rewrite of L1-4
L9 rewrite
L14 rewrite





Of The Rest Of Your Life

Don’t let’s talk about the ancient gods
and all that crap, I’m sure we’ve got enough
on our plates, death for a start, what with the planet
boiling, hurtling gamely still through space,
still beautiful and baffling. Wake
your macrocosm, cringing ape. Here is
your own eyelid fire, your ceiling shapes,
your own slow breath of chemistry, slow stumble
for this morning’s one-time curtain crack ta-da —
the bluest sky with one faint lingering star.
Howdy, neighbours — bin-men, registered
sex-offenders, kids on bikes, sparrows,
barking husbands, sniffing mongrels, wives —
and how's the tangled life behind your eyes?
X
X


L7 was “but not like lions. Quick! Create! Here is” then
“to macrocosm. Quick! Create! Here is”

[Glenn Wright]

I like the idea that in a frightening, banal, and chaotic world, the poet can create an inner life of beauty and goodness. “Eyelid fire,” which I take to mean the creative impulse that projects “ceiling shapes” or imagination into the creation of beauty, is a memorable metaphor which you drive home skillfully in your last line.

The word “still” in L4 and again in L5 carries two meanings, as it does in the first line of Keats’s “Ode on a Grecian Urn,” (a poem that also depends on the contrast between the busy, common world of the senses and the eternal, Platonic, ideal world of art). The boiling planet still [yet] hurtles gamely through space, but surrounded by chaos, it is also still [unmoved or unmoving].

The word “tangled” confused me. I like the sound of it, but it seems to me to work against the point you’re making that the common, chaotic, dangerous, “tangled” world of experience provides the raw material for the pure, Platonic, “untangled” world of art “behind your eyes.

Very promising sonnet, Mark.
Glenn

[James Brancheau]

I think it's terrific, Mark. First read (and I do mean the very first read), I was a little thrown by the close, but it makes perfect sense. I think part of the effectiveness (and charm) of it is that it does, for me, take a small leap. In other words, I think the close adds a nice dimension, perspective/state of mind, instead of summing up, for example.

I knew I was going to comment on this when I got to "eyelid fire, your ceiling shapes," but the voice, the momentum of the poem worked magic on me as well. Btw, I read the eyelid fire as the glow you get (or at least I get) sometimes when you close your eyes, especially if you do so tightly. Kind of like the mineral glow of cave walls. If I'm way off on this, it wouldn't matter to me. I think it's a really good poem.

[Joe Crocker]

I like the zooming in from abstract philosophy and the universe’s vastness to the detail of our everyday lives, and the stuff that matters, that actually confronts us.
The line that threw me was the “Wake, but not like lions”, which I guess is a reference to Shelley and the Masque of Anarchy. I see you have now replaced it with “macrocosm”. But although I didn’t quite get what you were trying to say with the lions, I’m not sure macrocosm does much more than repeat the opening lines, and in fact the lines that it introduces seem more about microcosm. The “Howdy Neighbour” brought back memories of Bonzo Dog’s "My Pink Half of the Drainpipe”. I loved the barking husbands.

[John Riley]

This is the type of poem I read over and over. Congratulations, Mark.

[David Callin]

It's interesting that Glenn is detecting an inner life of beauty and goodness. That's not what I'm picking up at all.

The "crap" brings Big Phil unavoidably to mind - well, it does for me, at least - and the poem has some of his no-nonsense briskness.

Cheers, Mark

David

[Carl Copeland]

You gotta love a sonnet with registered sex offenders in it. Seriously. It tangles a poem that started out seeming a little facile: Wake to macrocosm! Save the pale blue dot! We are the world! I’m not exactly sure what the takeaway is, but the language of the poem’s second half is worth the ride. Just add a comma after “Howdy.”

[Mark McDonnell]

Thank you, Glenn, I'm glad you enjoyed it. The speaker is addressing the neighbours in the last line, which includes some non-human denizens of the neighbourhood, and wondering about their "tangled" inner life. I don't think the speaker's inner life is one of Platonic beauty, necessarily. I think he's talking to himself, and the reader if they're inclined to listen, giving himself a talking to, as we all do, about living in the moment, expanding his consciousness and empathy, seizing the day and all that. I wanted the tone to be vigorous and sharp, amused, with a darkness there.

Thanks James,

Yes, you're absolutely right about the "eyelid fire". From "Here is" at L6, the poem basically describes the speaker waking up, going to the window and opening the curtains on the day. That's it.

Hi Joe,

Well yes, I changed that line yet again. It's now a rather stern sounding injunction to a "cringing ape" to wake "your macrocosm". The poem started with me scribbling down the first line, having no idea it was going to develop into a poem let alone a sonnet, because I got tired of reading poems referencing classical myth. Not that I think there's anything wrong with that of course, I just can't seem to do it haha. So the "lions" line was initially in the same ballpark; a negation of the idea of poetic allusion. But it didn't work. Human consciousness as where macrocosm and microcosm meet is the idea, I suppose.

Thank you, John. That's the most gratifying response.

Hi David,

I promise I wasn't thinking of Larkin haha. "A Study of Reading Habits" is the only "crap" that comes to mind but yes, it's a fairly famous one. Though he did have his problems with the "myth-kitty" too, which may have rubbed off on me.

Thanks Carl,

Yes, I'm quite pleased to get the planet hurtling through space into the same sonnet as registered sex-offenders. An achievement of some sort. I added that comma. Thanks.

Thank you for all these responses, folks

[Matt Q]

Hi Mark,

For me, the poem takes a few lines to get going. It really takes off, both in terms of its pace and language, from with "Wake / your macrocosm", or maybe a line or so earlier -- I do really like the world as "still beautiful as baffling". Once that happens, I'm fully engaged. I really do enjoy the ride, once (for me) it starts.

I guess I'm not that sure what ancient gods have to do this with this. Maybe. I guess, the idea is that we should be creating our own mythology? Or that the poem is an alternative take on talking about what some might talk about using ancient mythology? So, I guess I'm on the fence about it. Sometimes the line that seeds a poem, as you say this one did, has done it's job by seeding it and might then be discarded. I dunno, or maybe it would be lifted by something a little fresher than "and all that crap"

And "we’ve got enough on our plates" strikes me as rather flat, it being a stock phrase and all. I might be tempted to play with it a bit and make it "on our platelets", which has some connection with death, or mortality, I guess. Though that might not be your cup of tea, or fit the tone. What follows, then, seems to be a reference to global warming and the death this will cause, though I'm thinking that many of us have more immediate causes of death and suffering on our plates, that will likely come quicker.

Anyway, I get the sense that in the opening lines you're still feeling your way into the poem. Likely I'm not doing a good job of explaining why they don't work as well as the rest for me, so maybe I should just say that I'm just not all that taken with the opening lines, but I really like it once (for me) it takes off.

best,

Matt

[Carl Copeland]

Originally Posted by Matt Q

I guess I'm not that sure what ancient gods have to do this with this.

FWIW, I took the ancient gods as including the Abrahamic religions.