In the afternoons we slink out over the city,
pure clear squares of grey leading around corners
to wrought-iron and wood, constructs that claim
other people live here too.
Other people in the park, by the boulangerie,
down the hill, other people tut-tut-tutting along
the square with the glass pyramid that nobody understands
but everybody sort-of likes.
We pass other people’s gardens with ivy overflowing,
other people’s lights illuminating their swan-laced curtains,
other people’s beat up desk discarded on the sidewalk that hey,
we could use.
We come home when it’s too dark and too cold.
Across the way, the neighbors sit down for dinner, just as we do.
Do they look happier than us? We wave at them,
we watch them moving about like mimes;
to us they’re more than strangers.
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12 comments:
Heidi, I really love this. It is true and funny and poignant: the glass pyramid, the tutting, the overflowing, the curtains. Reminds me of the principles of uncertainty.
The first stanza is very difficult, though. In the first line, "we slink out over the city," the combo of "slink" and "over" makes it sound like you and Travis are a chenille blanket or a very big little black dress. The next line disorients me further, because I am linking the descriptors to the pronoun "we" from the previous line, although that cannot be right. Also, can't picture the scene: do you mean "sqaures" the shape or the city-feature? Do you mean "leading" the metal or the verb? "Constructs" noun or verb (of course at the end of the stanza I understand, but the lead-up doesn't give me context.) I did love that this stanza had no people in it: it gave the impression that this poem is a telescope and we were starting out just getting the big picture in focus so we could begin to identify things clearly and truely.
Yes I see what you mean now! My little black dress of a day, it makes me love it more! But I'll change it! The "grey squares" were meant as sidewalk (I'll try someway to clarify) and the leading was indeed a verb. The contructs also a verb. I'll find a way and post a revision...
T has problems with the "Do they look happier than us?" I thought you might find the last stanza too unrhythmical. But alas it's the chenille blanket!
Did you notice I stole the last stanza from a story you once told me about when you lived in your apt in Portland, Me? Ha!
an excess of exclamation points, which can only mean in Paris its very late
Don't tell me the reason I related so much to that poem was that I had already lived it! (I like "Do they look happier than us?" I think it's shocking. But I do think the last stanza feels weighty. Don't know what you could cut though.)
okay, I said constructs was supposed to be a verb but I lied. It is a noun. I'm realizing now how confusing that is. I hate that everything in English is spelled the same, makes my job harder. (MY JOB)
Working on the revision as we speak.
In the afternoons we slide out into the city,
sidewalked squares of grey guide around corners
to wrought-iron and wood, paradigms that promise
other people live here too
??? is paradigms that promise too lame? Anyone have a good suggestion instead of the troublesome "constructs"?
The first line still sounds too playful with "slide."
Are you totally opposed to
"sidewalked squares of grey lead us around corners"
I think that clarifies things enough so that you can keep constructs in the next line.
a few ideas:
you can eliminate all "constructs" confusion by omitting the comma before it.
i like having the squares lead you, and agree that neither slink nor slide works. both made me think of a spreading cloud of ink, and make the "we" weirdly sinister. so. why not just begin with sidewalks leading us? i think that might also strengthen the kind of backwards logic that dominates this part of the poem. (because buildings exist, people must exist).
i think "do they look happier than us?" is shocking and grand. for me this is the emotional core of the poem. what about
Do they look happier than us?
We wave at them, they move
like mimes, they're more than strangers.
or maybe not as spare as that, but something in between.
also i wonder if you could make the image of the discarded desk stronger by making it seem fated rather than accidental. discarded for us, maybe. but perhaps here my solipsistic nature is taking over.
wait, or,
Do they look happier than us?
We wave at them; they move about like mimes.
They are not strangers to us.
?
love,
elizabeth
Many thanks...I'll have to come up with a better verb (something less sinister and more fun) for the first stanza. I also agree that I'd like to lighten up the last stanza but I'm feeling so attached to it. I think I'll have to get over it for the health of the poem. Am thinking about what you said, Elizabeth, and reworking.
I would actually prefer a less fun or more sinister verb in the first stanza. A more mechanical verb--I picture the two of you being expelled onto the pavement at that twilight hour where you're ambushed by feelings of loneliness. In my opinion, it works to have this first stanza be the coldest, almost devoid of human life, and then as the poem progresses you draw the comforts of other people around you until--bam--you ask the question in the last stanza, then recoil from it.
well I could skulk out over the city, but that seems a little slouchy. I'm going to keep thinking about it.
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