So, Dancer
So, Dancer,
You pluck me from the wall
And I put on a brave face.
I know little and with humble attention listen,
But I know this,
You know,
I have my own expertise
And dancing's not so different.
Mendicant
I don't want to be
Your mendicant
Far across the raucous music faced room.
Just forget I'm here
Like the parade that doesn't notice.
Like Death
Like Death itself
I should sweep away
My former selves
Which would be just as well
As surely on meeting some
You'd say,
Go to hell.
Stone Face
One can get
Climbing a stone face
Stuck
No way
Up
And
No way
Down
And
Out of
Luck.
Without Applause
Without applause
Beauty wilts
In solitude.
Without applause
Homely dares
Intrude.
Natural Prisons
Natural prisons
Grow within,
Labyrinthian thickets
You're maybe out
Or maybe in.
Prison Is Ugly
Prison is ugly,
Homely isn't
"Fair is foul, foul is fair."
So, don't unfairly compare
You with me
And make prisons two.
DolphinWords
Notes: They're all goofs...but I worried over Without Applause a lot...I got as far as 'solitude', and tried to find a rhyme and keep the sentiment, sense, conceit...sometimes I get lucky, and the rhymes I find further the sense...but I was really stuck (yes, like Stone Face!), 'solitude' didn't seem to go with anything that might fit...so, so, I resorted again to the rhyming dictionary, and made a discovery that may have me going to it often!...the dictionary not only gives rhymes, near rhymes, odds and ends rhymes, but gives little snippets from poets' poems that have a rhyme for the word one is looking up...for 'solitude', there were 88!!!...Thomas Jefferson's home had secret passages in the walls that the slave servants would use going about their duties...during a dinner, one would hardly know they were about as they popped out and in from hidden doors...all the things on the web remind me of this, the anonymous sorts who do these dictionaries and encyclopedias, unheralded and invisible...anyway, I had great fun reading the sample bits of poems with 'solitude' and another rhyming word...and out of all of them, there was only one I found that had rhyme and sense/sentiment/conceit in really close alliance, which is my goal to do!...and it's not sublime, or over the top deep, it's a 'just is' bit of poetry...another goal...in fact, I think it's the whole poem, not an excerpt...
quote
From "Fake Your Beauty" by Bertine Zetlitz:
Sister, sister, solitude |
unquote
...didn't notice they linked to where poem quotes are from...brb...oh...that blue texted link takes one to a youtube...it's a song!...and, and, I've got a segue with the title, Fake You Beauty...this whole bunch of poems started out as a contemplation of Beauty...and it's opposite...in the poetic philosophical sense that Allston, Poe, Coleridge, everyone, goes on about...and right away in that study I went to Shakespeare's Sonnet 130...
SONNET 130
My mistress' eyes are nothing like the sun;
Coral is far more red than her lips' red;
If snow be white, why then her breasts are dun;
If hairs be wires, black wires grow on her head.
I have seen roses damask'd, red and white,
But no such roses see I in her cheeks;
And in some perfumes is there more delight
Than in the breath that from my mistress reeks.
I love to hear her speak, yet well I know
That music hath a far more pleasing sound;
I grant I never saw a goddess go;
My mistress, when she walks, treads on the ground:
And yet, by heaven, I think my love as rare
As any she belied with false compare.
unquote
...and too of course in trying to figure this out I contemplated Miley Cyrus' bum...she's cute, and she's looks to be trying her best to lose her cuteness!...our culture has a monomania...Beauty...but I realized right away, scribbling, ugly isn't Beauty's opposite...the opposite of harmony isn't dissonance, things being out of tune...I don't think Beauty, or harmony, have opposites...which took me to Shakespeare again, and Macbeth's three witches...'fair is foul, foul is fair' which I found in a real good article...
quote
In every century, philosophers and artists have supplied definitions of beauty, and thanks to their works, it is possible to reconstruct a history of aesthetic ideas over time. But this did not happen with ugliness. Most of the time, ugliness has been defined as the opposite of beauty. But almost no one ever devoted a treatise of any length to it.
http://www.latimes.com/opinion/
...so, I went about changing 'ugly' to 'homely'...but it is a real word use problem...consider the slogan, 'black is beautiful'...well, wait, lemee go to the 'servants'...wiki's take...
quote
Black is beautiful is a cultural movement that was started in the United States of America in the 1960s by African Americans. It later spread beyond the United States, most prominently in the writings of the Black Consciousness Movement of Steve Biko in South Africa.
It aims to dispel the notion in many cultures that black people's natural features such as skin color, facial features and hair are inherently ugly
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Black_is_beautiful
and that about has it...oh...I have a pic...lots in fact...I've been wanting to have illustrations to go along with OTI...and not illustrations that 'fit', are derived from the poems and notes...there's an art term for that, when there's text and an illustration that has nothing to do with the text...forgotten...anyway, I'm in the garage in and out, trying to make room, and trying to sort through old stuff...and found my old Palomar art class notes...I actually did something foresighted...I'd gone to Staples and bought a ream of acid proof card paper, vellum color?...tan...and I took my notes with a pen and ink steel pen...I wanted to get used to using such...and too, on occasion, in life drawing class, my instructor would have us do black ink washes, or pen and ink...kind of a break from just charcoal or pastels...all my big pastels and charcoals are gone...tossed 'm...no where to keep them...and this was before digital, so I didn't photograph them...wish I had...anyway, on the card stock note paper I was using, I still have some of my life drawings, and scribbles and sketches from other classes...some of them are very small, like Hokusai's, covering the whole 8 by 10 card paper, but photographed, they can be blown up big...the detail of pen and ink, or black ink wash, allows that...kind of like scratchboard...so, anyway, I have plenty of illustrations now!...but, I'm going to go get some card stock, and find my pen and ink, and take class notes again...it was fun!...
:)
DavidDavid
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