A poetry thread for the DU poets

[Droopy]

I read the poetry threads here and there. I tend to like the original poems written by our own DUers better because I know you guys. I can put a face and a personality to those poems. And if I were a good poet I'd post one of my own poems in tribute to you guys. It turns out that I am a terrible poet, however, so I will post a classic poem by a classic poet. :)

Langston Hughes was writing about politics, civil rights, and equality in his poetry as early as the 1930s. He was a black poet and a forerunner of the civil rights movement. Another reason why I like Hughes is that he tended to write in a style that was direct and easy to understand. At the same time, some of the poems seem to have a "tip of the iceberg" kind of quality to them. They were deceptively simple and pointed to so much more if you read them in the context of the politics of the times that they were written in. Here is one of those kind of poems. I think it was written sometime in the 1940s.


Democracy by Langston Hughes

Democracy will not come
Today, this year
Nor ever
Through compromise and fear.

I have as much right
As the other fellow has
To stand
On my two feet
And own the land.

I tire so of hearing people say,
Let things take their course.
Tomorrow is another day.
I do not need my freedom when I'm dead.
I cannot live on tomorrow's bread.

Freedom
Is a strong seed
Planted
In a great need.

I live here, too.
I want freedom
Just as you.


Let's hear it for the DU poets and feel free to add a poem of your own.

[EFerrari]

1. I loved your poems, Droopy, and I'm a very cranky reader.

:kick:

[Droopy]

5. Thanks!

Maybe I'm my own worst critic, but I still doubt that I'll see my poems in print some day. :(

[BlueIris]

2. Awww. Droopy, you should post in the poem threads/breaks more often.

You are obviously a great critic of poetry.

I'm a little short on original writing at the moment, but I'll try to come up with something for later.

[Droopy]

4. Well, I'm a simple kind of guy

And sometimes those poems are over my head to be honest. But I will try to post more often in the poetry threads, and, if anything, give you guys a kick. :thumbsup:

[EFerrari]

3. Yerbera women

Between the sour grass
and the dry lipped child
no regret flowers.
The best stalk snaps
between tooth and tongue.

This morning's roses razed,
dry on a screen, flat in the shade.
Petals tighten and tic,
synchronous eyelids.
Tonight they go to press
vanilla bean
to orange rind in a stone crock,
tomorrow's potpourri. My ears were pieced
when I was two, threaded with silver adders
(how useful said a teacher is her anger)
for low impedance.

One night I heard
one night animal eating
another. The eater ate and
the eaten bellowed. Under an aging tree, periwinkle stretched to
sip the rich red fund
and cover the cracked bone
firmly, with green economy, having a constellation to fund
and illuminate.

Manzanilla hides
but tricked out and ground
brews strong colic tea.
Yerbera women teach
the secret of the grind.

(1989)

[Droopy]

6. Very nice

I'm getting a vision of a dimly lit cabin on a warm, summer night with the windows open and a slight breeze running through the place. There's a woman cooking and I've got a pleasant, beer buzz. I'm not sure if I understand ther poem right, but that's the image the words evoked in my mind.

[Xipe Totec]

7. The soldier of Liberty

On a spirited steed
a young warrior rides,
covered with solid steel
and filled with bellicose ardor.

He carries his sword on his belt,
and at his side the spear:
His face shines the light of hope,
and in his eyes the flash of valor.

From his right hand he draws the glove
And caresses the stout neck,
and the mane that waves in the wind,
of his faithful companion.

The noble charger proudly lifts,
his hear with a neigh
on feeling the caressing hand
of the fearless rider.

His black breast and limbs
With white foam are covered;
His hooves clatter
upon the hard flint;

And at the measure of his steps,
and the sharp sound of the steel,
the warrior raises his voice
with these immortal words:

Fly, fly,
my intrepid charger:
The hostile squadrons will
Not beat thy nobel spirit
That has always proudly despised,
The cannon blasts,
and a thousand times
thou hast heard,
It's terrifying
Report,
Like a song
of victory;
A precursor
Of thy Glory.

In irons, with opprobrium,
may others enjoy peace;
Not I who seek in battle,
Liberty or Release!













http://books.google.com/books?id=YjtDAAAAIAAJ&pg=PA226&dq=entre+hierros+gocen+todos+de+la+paz#PPA223,M1

[Droopy]

8. An exercise in imagery and beautifully done

I see you had to dig kind of deep for that one. :) I've never heard of Fernando Calderon. Does the poem have any special significance to you?

[Xipe Totec]

9. It is one of those poems

you have to learn by heart in high school,

if you go to high school, in Mexico...

I had to dig real hard to find any reference to it, in an English speaking world.

And, as you see, I had to fix some of the sloppy translation.

Sometimes, I feel sad for my brethren who speak only English,

that they will not be touched, first hand, by the beauty of Hispanic poetry,

and have to experience it, through the murky lense of us poor imperfect translators.

:hi:

[Droopy]

10. Ahhh

If I were going to learn a second language it would be spanish. I'm a trucker and one day I was sitting in a recruiting office of a trucking company that I had just signed on with. There were three recruiters there and I noticed one was speaking in spanish. The company recruited heavily out of southern California and they had hired a bi-lingual recruiter just so they could talk to the Latino drivers in spanish and make them feel a little more comfortable.

[Xipe Totec]

12. Something in English now, equally praise worthy...

All are architects of Fate,
Working in these walls of Time;
Some with massive deeds and great,
Some with ornaments of rhyme.

Nothing useless is, or low;
Each thing in its place is best;
And what seems but idle show
Strengthens and supports the rest.

For the structure that we raise,
Time is with materials filled;
Our to-days and yesterdays
Are the blocks with which we build.

Truly shape and fashion these;
Leave no yawning gaps between;
Think not, because no man sees,
Such things will remain unseen.

In the elder days of Art,
Builders wrought with greatest care
Each minute and unseen part;
For the Gods see everywhere.

Let us do our work as well,
Both the unseen and the seen;
Make the house, where Gods may dwell,
Beautiful, entire, and clean.

Else our lives are incomplete,
Standing in these walls of Time,
Broken stairways, where the feet
Stumble as they seek to climb.

Build to-day, then, strong and sure,
With a firm and ample base;
And ascending and secure
Shall to-morrow find its place.

Thus alone can we attain
To those turrets, where the eye
Sees the world as one vast plain,
And one boundless reach of sky.


- Poetry of Henry Wadsworth Longfellow



http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=132x7615950

[Droopy]

14. Yup

If you start with a good foundation you'll have a stable house/economy/country/education/body/child. :)

[peruban]

13. I know exactly what you mean.

One of my favorite poets is the Peruvian poet Cesar Vallejo and I've literally spent days trying to translate his work into English only to give up because I can do them no justice that way. As an example I post one of my favorites of his below:

LOS HERALDOS NEGROS

Hay golpes en la vida, tan fuertes… Yo no sé!
Golpes como del odio de Dios; como si ante ellos,
la resaca de todo lo sufrido
se empozara en el alma… Yo no sé!

Son pocos; pero son… Abren zanjas oscuras
en el rostro más fiero y en el lomo más fuerte.
Serán talvez los potros de bárbaros atilas;
o los heraldos negros que nos manda la Muerte.

Son las caídas hondas de los Cristos del alma,
de alguna fe adorable que el Destino blasfema.
Esos golpes sangrientos son las crepitaciones
de algún pan que en la puerta del horno se nos quema

Y el hombre… Pobre… pobre! Vuelve los ojos, como
cuando por sobre el hombro nos llama una palmada;
vuelve los ojos locos, y todo lo vivido
se empoza, como charco de culpa, en la mirada.

Hay golpes en la vida, tan fuertes… Yo no sé!

-César Vallejo

--------------------------------------------------

You see, a proper translation could do no justice to this poem. It robs it of its power.

[Xipe Totec]

17. The Black Heralds

There are blows in life, so hard... that, I don't know...
blows that are as hard as the wrath of God; and that, to feel them,
is like feeling the rip-tide of all suffering
blows that make a pit in the soul... that, I don't know...

They don't come often; but they... mark dark grooves
on the most stoic faces, and on the strongest backs.
They are, perhaps, as Attila's barbarous horses;
the black heralds; the harbingers of death.

They are the deep crumblings of the Christs of the soul,
of once beloved faith, blasphemed by destiny.
They are bloody blows, and crepitations,
burnt bread upon faith's furnace.


And man... Poor man!... turns his eyes, as...
as if a tap on his shoulder calls attention;
and turns his maddened eye to a life already lived,
whose gaze gets buried in a puddle of guilt.

There are blows in life, so hard... that, I don't know...

-César Vallejo

[peruban]

18. You see?

Not too easy to decide on the right words, is it? The second line could be also translated as "Blows as if from the hatred of God; as if before them", also "abren zanjas oscuras" could be more properly translated as "open dark trenches" instead of "mark dark grooves". And "deep crumblings" does no justice to "caidas hondas" which would literally mean "deep fallings". And a "palmada" is more personal than a "tap", more like being grabbed by the shoulder. Also, "Yo no se!" is more properly translated as "I do not know", the insertion of the word "that" creates a linking with the line that doesn't exist in the original, the author is simply exclaiming "he does not know" as a way of proclaiming his inability to describe the emotion he is presenting. There are other examples of his work that I could mention, like his collection of poems "Trilce", a title which has no translation. But you see what I mean.

[Xipe Totec]

19. Yes, I do see

you have to translate all the way to imagery, and then back to language.

As in "mark dark grooves", rather than "open dark trenches". The poetic meaning has to be translated to English imagery in order to make sense to the English ear.

One has to practically reinvent the poem, in order to preserve it's meaning.

[peruban]

11. original and improvised

"The Intractable"

Withered expanse within your eyes
Hiding the pleasure of your disguise
The roads are slick with weathered tears
And draw in thick the harbored fears

Together we ran across the field
Where you and I, we sat and kneeled
A quick response we gave away
Into the wind which washed away

To brew and brood we slyly slide
Upon the wishes of the reddened eye
My counterpoint you nimbly evaded
If only just to be more jaded

How can this feeling be more spent
For only in prisms can light be bent
And where to choose the place of offer
But where we knelt, as if on alter

Hide, then, be gone, and come no more
For these emotions grow and sore
A kindling of faith you hold within
A finding of love you scold under skin

The chance we take, to become found
The kiss we steal to grave and ground
Will never be spoken, never an utter
Never more shall we have to shudder

The will of man is easily swallowed
By actions enacted and, hencely, followed
Rivers of joy we may evade
Until the day we find our shade

Underneath the willow tree
Underneath the you and me
By coming, then, you broke a vow
To promise never to see me now

In this feeble form I have collapsed
And want no more to be considered
An invalid with no more to hap
And then to be the constant withered.


-peruban

[Droopy]

15. A story of a love gone wrong?

I was getting an image of a young couple sitting in the shade of a tree. Now there is just the male half of the couple there and he's got some books.

That's probably not what you were getting at, but I just thought I'd report the image your poem evoked in my mind.

[peruban]

16. I kind of let that one write itself.

But if I have to pin it down, it's about love rejected, not out of lack of love but out of protection for the other party. The classic "it's not you, it's me" line. But the other party can't or won't understand that it's for the best, a lamentation of having to send away that which you love for its own good. But again, I'm looking in retrospect as I let that one sort of lead me along.