PostPoems Be Artistic. Be Creative. Be Inspired!

'Another storm has

clothed me

in the silk of purity,

and I rehearse 

my transition.'

beautiful

imho You are one with the Lord of Love

"crystal fire" beyond exquisite. 
 

Can a reader every make a final, summary comment on John Milton's verbal grandeur?  Or Wallace Stevens' precision in the deployment of his descriptions in support of his poems' search for the supreme fiction?  Or the elegaic emotion that permeates all of Vergil's poetry?  To comment on a poet of their quality---which means, a poet of Patriciajj's quality---is to invite the paradox that, while the poet seems to have an infinite number of ways to express the soul of his or her poetry, the reader who wishes to comment starts to go in circles because, in a response to the greatness of a particular poet's poetry, the commentor still finds a limitation in what can be said in response.  I think of two metaphors:  the earth follows the same annual ellipse around the sun, same path, year after year, and yet that path is what provides the variety of our seasons; and, when looking at, say, a huge mountain peak, how many ways can you really say how hight and elevated it is?  Finally, we must assume simply an admiring silence before the presence of the poem; the way, for example, one looks at the constellated sky and just allows it to flow over, and around, and through the consciousness without attempting to further define it.

   And this is how I feel about this new poem Patriciajj has posted.  What I like about her perspective is that it always seems to function on a triple spectrum; perhaps I should say like the three sides of a triangle.  There is the acknowledgement of the common exprerience (the storm beginning to gather as the poem commences); there is the poet's personal perspective ("I choose art," "I will come here," "I will finally believe"); and there is her cosmic awareness ("no place to be alone," "return to the beginning of everything"); and here I realize (note to future grad students working on dissertations about her poetry:  this is my metaphor, not yours; do your own prep) that she triangulates every experience, consistently, from these perspectives.  This allows for her to construct both harmonies and counterpoints between the three perspectives; the way, to extend my metaphor, that writing a sonata for a trio, rather than a single instrument, allows for a more elaborate texture.  I was taught to read Wallace Stevens' poems with a doubled focus:  the individual poem, and its place in the overall development of his work:  "Peter Quince At The Clavier" is part of the same poetic cosmos as Auroras Of Autumn.  The same principle of reading obtains in Patriciajj's poetry on postpoems:  one cannot read one her individual poems (except, of course, one's very first experience of her poetry) without an awareness of the collection of which it is a part.  Another example is Shostakovich's use of the celesta in the third movement of his Fifth Symphony.  Heard on its own, it is very moving, emotionally; heard as part of the entire experience of the symphony, it is overwhelming.  This is what Patriciajj does---consistently, adroitly, and humbly (I use that third adverb because she never gives us a sense of "showing off"; no aspect of, "Hey, look what I can do").  She is one of the most powerful poets I have ever encountered, on and off the internet.  When I was first directed to Stevens' poetry, in 1978, I always had the question, in my mind, "What would it have been like to have watched this great universe in his poetry assemble itself, poem after poem, as well as having the finished, completed work in front of me?"  Now, I have had the great privilege of seeing a poetic cosmos develop right in front of me.  I do not think I shall live to see its completion; but what I have seen is so overwhelmingly satisfying that the completion is not the main point.  The journey, and not the arrival, is the more important experience; and for what time I have left, this journey through Patriciajj's always expanding universe is, to borrow a phrase from Stevens, one of the great experiences of life.