by GlottalGreekGeek » Thu Jul 21, 2005 5:08 pm
An important element of this poem is how screwed up the sense of direction is : Up is forward, down is backward, and left and right are chasing each other in circles, and, oh my lord, did I mention that I can see the entire universe this way? It's not supposed to be a calm poem. I'll be frank, the TE at the end of the first line was mostly to make meter, but I do like how it acts as "and the gray sky is in front of me too." As I've noticed in my other attempts to write poetry, form sometimes points the way to meaning. As to reversing the traditional order of MEN ... DE, it's another element of vertigo, and I planned it that way before I figured out how it would go into the meter.
This is, in fact, based on a real experience. I had been running at the track (which meant my energy was up) and then when I finished I took the shortcut out of the stadium by walking up a mildly sloped grassy area out. I diidn't feel like walking all the way up just yet, so I lay down on the grass for a moment. I do not remember which feeling came first, but there was a) the fact that I could see all the trees, light posts, arches, and other tall things which formed an oval aroud the track from all four sides - I am only used to seeing them on three sides b) It seemed like the sky was in front of me, the earth was a wall behind me, and gravity was pulling me to the bottom of the grassy slope. These feelings, and the fact that I still had my running endorphins, added up to "Wow, I'm psychic".
It gets a little easier after each couplet.
Do I need a special font perhaps? It comes out looking like the quote above.
