I used to sit unreconciled in leaning greenhouse
With triffid tomato plants in miasma steamheat
Stinking and hacking at the back of my throat,
Eying their thick, bristled stems in block of silence,
Sour, yellow baubles hanging off spider clamps.
It seemed to suit the mood, the tracts of empty soil
In sweating plastic bags, and all the creatures
Who want to wriggle in clotted dirt, the cholera pools
Rank by watering-can reflecting a frown, unblinking
Stare, bitten lip, all churning my anatomy of sawdust.
It is here they bring in the leeches, cupping,
And bleeding, lay me out upon the splintering bench, look
For comets as they purge and shake their heads, it is here
In nuthouse, doghouse, the outhouse, that I sit under smashed
Panes in self - imposed exile filling my glasshouse with stones.
Comments
keleph | May 10, 2008 - 13:16
hi, doeslittle
i really enjoyed this style. its sensuously descriptive and full of well crafted feelings and sensations. however, this is slightly at the expense of narrative meaning which i just lost. as i say i enjoyed it but perhaps there is a balance to be found between your incredible plasticity of description and a progressive narrative meaning... whatever that means ;)
thanks.
Doeslittle | May 10, 2008 - 13:32
It was supposed to be about a greenhouse I used to sit in when I was in a bad mood - only it was full of ugly looking tomato plants, was hot and smelly - I'm not sure it ever really made me feel better sitting in there dwelling on whatever had put me in a bad mood. Hence 'unreconciled' and in the end sitting with the stones in the glass house - ie, the saying...people in glass houses should not throw stones. Nevertheless, description is all very well, but if it's unintelligible then it's pointless nonsense and I didn't realise this was. Thanks for pointing it out.
keleph | May 10, 2008 - 14:00
sorry if i was too negative, 'pointless nonsense' is far too harsh. i just meant i got lost in the feeling of the poem while a few actions would have brought it together to an engagement with the reader.
i also didnt know that expression which would have helped, :)
the version i knew was Kenneth Horne's, " people in greenhouses should'nt .... and that stands as it is"
Doeslittle | May 10, 2008 - 17:12
You weren't too negative. Am grateful for feedback. I understand it because I wrote it, it's not the first time I've been told my poems were hard to understand! :)
Ewan | May 10, 2008 - 17:24
Just the same, a little mystery or a little effort required by the reader is no bad thing, is it? I loved the glasshouses/stones ending.
As far as I am aware 'glasshouses shouldn't throw etc' is quite a common proverbial usage, but it probably depends on your place of origin as so many of them do.
I liked it.
tcook | May 12, 2008 - 11:57
I thought this was seriously good. I took another meaning entirely from it - I thought it was about cancer cells in the body, relating to cancer in society - and the rank pungent aroma of the growing tomato plant was the stink of the rotting, ever mutating body (individual and politic). It just goes to show that it doesn't matter what was intended by the author - it's what the reader gains that it the thing!
anipani | May 12, 2008 - 12:39
packed full with feeling, and with imagery that is lively and imaginative, i love the last verse and the lines 'doghouse, nut house out house' It is well crafted, retaining all the sense of dislocation from society. I get that feeling of cutoffedness, and I am learning not to care! great writng though. I really like your stuff. theres another site i use, which is interesting in a differnt way, has alot of younger writers, alot of American writing, some is out of my arena, but some of the crit is worth posting poems on . its poetrycritical.net. Maybe worth a look.
sunshine | May 12, 2008 - 17:35
wonderfully descriptive and although I didn't read it as intended at first, I agree as long as a meaning, a relevance is found does it matter. The final verse has a lovely rhythm to it.
paulycannon | May 13, 2008 - 09:31
this poem makes you work and has confusing image-ideas, its taut and hard and I like the rhythm and imagination. nice one!