cat in the orchard in the fog
Let me see if I can translate the hints about the cat stalking through the barren orchard in the fog of an early morning drive…
I am talking about the production of poetry, and there have been a lot of posts on our respective blogs recently that try to tackle this issue, or aspects of it. Truth is, I was coming home early, not alone in the car, from some place that I should not have been. There was small talk going on between the four of us. I was sitting in the back, playfully rubbing the shoulders of the woman in the passenger seat in front of me. Everyone was quiet in the early morning cold but me. I couldn’t stop talking, joking, singing to myself and trying to break up the strange dynamic. I mention the incident of driving home in the car in the early morning fog because it was the apex of an arc that my life has been taking recently. And I mention the cat in the orchard, because, as I was rubbing the shoulders of the woman in front of me, I turned to my right in mid sentence as the car passed an empty space and then a small orchard. There were no leaves left, and the fog hung on the ground like mustard gas. The only thing remarkable about the orchard was a small white cat that moved without playing between the trees with cautious steps, as if hunting.
I stopped when I saw the cat, realizing the complete image I had just seen through the fog. I took my hands off the shoulders of the woman in front of me and was quiet the rest of the way home.
That cat, that orchard, and that fog, will one day find themselves expressed as images in one of my better poems. A poem must grow out of this. There was something in the morning, and the night before, and the actions of last week, and the conversations from months ago, that led me to a realization about many things. There was something about myself that congealed in the image of a cat in an orchard in the fog. I wont write about the cat for some time, until I can resist the urge to try and set up parallels between the image and my situation, but I know that image now with such an intensity, that I can wield it as a poet and make it something far more beautiful. I think this is what Leslie Norris is talking about when he says you must wait for the poems to come. I have my scheduled times to write, and I need not wait for a stroke of inspiration to drive me to the keyboard, but unless I have stored up these experience-images, then I will write weak and forgetful things. I have waited for the image of the cat in the fog for a long time now, and am still waiting for other experiences to congeal into other images. And some I have stored in my mind that are ripening for use. A poet must live his/her craft in an intimate way, and though removed from their first connotations, the images a poet uses must remain as intimate as my cat in fog. There is a sincerity to such things, which any reader will understand. This is what Whitman was referring to when he said “I wish I could translate the hints of the young men…” There was no removal between Whitman and his images, and the sprawling song of myself shows only the surface of Whitman’s powerful images, but the sincerity of his earnest wish is clear.
I will one day translate the hints of the cat in the fog, and the images before that, and the images that will come after. Our power as poets will always lay in how vivacious we live, and how observant we are to the immense images within and around us. My contract with the reader is merely to be fertile soil, and when I harvest with my poems to be sincere to the images and express them as beautifully as possible. I require no understanding, and demand no vindication. The better I am at being fertile soil, the better I become at translating the hints of it.
All for now--
I am talking about the production of poetry, and there have been a lot of posts on our respective blogs recently that try to tackle this issue, or aspects of it. Truth is, I was coming home early, not alone in the car, from some place that I should not have been. There was small talk going on between the four of us. I was sitting in the back, playfully rubbing the shoulders of the woman in the passenger seat in front of me. Everyone was quiet in the early morning cold but me. I couldn’t stop talking, joking, singing to myself and trying to break up the strange dynamic. I mention the incident of driving home in the car in the early morning fog because it was the apex of an arc that my life has been taking recently. And I mention the cat in the orchard, because, as I was rubbing the shoulders of the woman in front of me, I turned to my right in mid sentence as the car passed an empty space and then a small orchard. There were no leaves left, and the fog hung on the ground like mustard gas. The only thing remarkable about the orchard was a small white cat that moved without playing between the trees with cautious steps, as if hunting.
I stopped when I saw the cat, realizing the complete image I had just seen through the fog. I took my hands off the shoulders of the woman in front of me and was quiet the rest of the way home.
That cat, that orchard, and that fog, will one day find themselves expressed as images in one of my better poems. A poem must grow out of this. There was something in the morning, and the night before, and the actions of last week, and the conversations from months ago, that led me to a realization about many things. There was something about myself that congealed in the image of a cat in an orchard in the fog. I wont write about the cat for some time, until I can resist the urge to try and set up parallels between the image and my situation, but I know that image now with such an intensity, that I can wield it as a poet and make it something far more beautiful. I think this is what Leslie Norris is talking about when he says you must wait for the poems to come. I have my scheduled times to write, and I need not wait for a stroke of inspiration to drive me to the keyboard, but unless I have stored up these experience-images, then I will write weak and forgetful things. I have waited for the image of the cat in the fog for a long time now, and am still waiting for other experiences to congeal into other images. And some I have stored in my mind that are ripening for use. A poet must live his/her craft in an intimate way, and though removed from their first connotations, the images a poet uses must remain as intimate as my cat in fog. There is a sincerity to such things, which any reader will understand. This is what Whitman was referring to when he said “I wish I could translate the hints of the young men…” There was no removal between Whitman and his images, and the sprawling song of myself shows only the surface of Whitman’s powerful images, but the sincerity of his earnest wish is clear.
I will one day translate the hints of the cat in the fog, and the images before that, and the images that will come after. Our power as poets will always lay in how vivacious we live, and how observant we are to the immense images within and around us. My contract with the reader is merely to be fertile soil, and when I harvest with my poems to be sincere to the images and express them as beautifully as possible. I require no understanding, and demand no vindication. The better I am at being fertile soil, the better I become at translating the hints of it.
All for now--
posted by Aaron Allen at 5:33 PM
6 Comments:
AA, you really need to stop being so superficial on your blog. Oh wait. That's me.
Part 1: Wow.
Part 2: In an act of female solidarity, I feel a little sorry for the "woman" who's shoulders you were rubbing. I think every woman wants an act like that to initiate a poem, not a stray cat in an orchard.
Part 3, which has to be separated from the previous superficialities that I specialize in: we approach poetry from two very different, yet complementary angles. E.g., you write, "A poet must live his/her craft in an intimate way." I agree with this tentatively. A poet must live with passion and write with passion before the logic of revision enters the picture. At the same time, would you argue that William Carlos Williams or Wallace Stevens lived poetry intimately? It was almost a business-like approach. Read Williams's "I Wanted to Write a Poem." I'll lend it to you.
I do like this idea of accumulating images, not to mean what they were in their initial situation, but to step up and play their role in a later poem.
Last thought. I didn't understand your whole "fertile soil" metaphor at first. Not sure I wanted to. And I'm still not sure what you meant. But this is how I explain it, with a quote from the incomparable Mr. Norris: "What you read is not what I wrote." How does that suit, Mr. Allen?
eg,
Thanks for your comment, and your email, and ditto to all you said, which is about all i can say at 2 in the morning. also, the poem is lovely, and is probably a more interesting subject matter than the cat or the orchard. Let me clarify "fertile soil/ground" What i meant is that the poet has to be the fertile soil. This is all very biblical. if a poet does not live life in quest and observance of the experience images i was talking about, then they have less ability to write well when they sit down to write. i.e. their ground is barren. I dont want to stretch the metaphor too far, because it will fall apart, but i think that the act of living with this desire to experience is what i was referring to when i talked about the soil. The harvest of that soil is the creative process. The images ripen in the poets subconscious and then are harvested in the act of literary creation. It gives a rather new meaning to "writing organically" dont you think :) I imagine many more things go into poetic fertility, like rewriting etc. but i dont hold with you for one instant that people like WCW or WS could possibly write without such a dedication to living live through its powerful images. I would theorize that both of them had many ex. images to harvest before they "sat down and decided to write a poem". In my limited experience poems always seem to come this way...and so maybe its just for me, but then again, maybe its broader. anyway, its an interesting metaphor. so...chew on that for a while...and youll probably be able to spit out something better.
I hate to keep referencing Norris, but that's what in front of me, so here's the bit for today: "Writing poetry is at once a communal and a highly individualized thing." What forces to step back from your impressive extended metaphor is that it assumes too much. There isn't a universal answer here. What works for you won't work for me, and vice versa. I think poets often have a heightened attention to images, but this doesn't dictate every poet or every poem. Kim Johnson collects words. What is missing from your argument that allows people like Richard Hugo to say things like this is the disclaimer. Without it your theories feel too didactic to approach earnestly.
Dear Aaron Allen:
I demand that you post a new post. Even I have posted within the last, oh say, two weeks!
I have made my demands.
I second Miss K's demands. We want Aaron!
um, also, I would like to say that if a certain, Oh, I don't know, Professor on campus, maybe he specializes in American Lit, maybe not, anyway if He wants to weigh in, it would be interesting...
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