(no subject)

[lucifermourning]

Do not go gentle into that good night,
Old age should burn and rave at close of day;
Rage, rage against the dying of the light.

Though wise men at their end know dark is right,
Because their words had forked no lightning they
Do not go gentle into that good night.

Good men, the last wave by, crying how bright
Their frail deeds might have danced in a green bay,
Rage, rage against the dying of the light.

Wild men who caught and sang the sun in flight,
And learn, too late, they grieved it on its way,
Do not go gentle into that good night.

Grave men, near death, who see with blinding sight
Blind eyes could blaze like meteors and be gay,
Rage, rage against the dying of the light.

And you, my father, there on the sad height,
Curse, bless, me now with your fierce tears, I pray.
Do not go gentle into that good night.
Rage, rage against the dying of the light.


-Dylan Thomas

so i've officially decided that i hate 'poetry voices.' i hate it when people read poems that are full of passion or tenderness or pain in that gentle, moderated voices that has no sense of what they are reading. no sense of the meaning and feeling behind the words. and i want to know who exactly decided this should be the convention.

otherwise, basingstoke was much fun and not at all as scary as people led me to believe.

Comments

[kimkali.livejournal.com]

I know for my part I can only actually 'perform' a piece when I properly know it by heart... otherwise my eyes kinda glaze over as I'm trying to remeber...
Blah

Glad the weekend was good.

Friday 13th Feb. Full Tilt. I'll learn more poetry in the interim ;)

[lucifermourning.livejournal.com]

this entered my mind as i sat in my poetry class. first, there's the way the course leader reads--always that same gentle, even tone, regardless of what is reading. like the above poem, which is a favorite of mine in part because it's so passionate and fiery and emotional. makes me want to scream. he's obviously familiar with the works--he teaches the bloody course. not that he's a bad teacher otherwise, it just kind of grates at my pet peeve.

second, we listened to recordings of dylan thomas reading his own work. he's got a beautiful voice--very big, prophetic-like. but it just sounds wrong when he reads a poem like 'Fern Hill':

Now as I was young and easy under the apple boughs
About the lilting house and happy as the grass was green,
The night above the dingle starry,
Time let me hail and climb
Golden in the heydeys of his eyes,
And honoured among wagons I was prince of the apple towns
And once below a time I lordly had the trees and leaves
Trail with daises and barley
Down the rivers of the windfall light.

And as I was green and carefree, famous among the barns
About the happy yard and singing as the farm was home,
In the sun that is young once only,
Time let me play and be
Golden in the mercy of his means,
And green and golden I was huntsman and herdsman, the calves
Sang to my horn, the foxes on the hills barked clear and cold,
And the sabbath rang slowly
In the pebbles of the holy streams.

All the sun long it was running, it was lovely, the hay-
Fields high as the house, the tunes from the chimneys, it was air
And playing, lovely and watery
And fire green as grass.
And nightly under the simple stars
As I rode to sleep the owls were bearing the farm away,
All the moon long I heard, blessed among the stables, the nightjars
Flying with the ricks, and the horses
Flashing into the dark.

And then to awake, and the farm, like a wanderer white
With the dew, come back, the cock on his shoulder: it was all
Shining, it was Adam and maiden,
The sky gathered again
And the sun grew round that very day.
So it must have been after the birth of the simple light
In the first, spinning place, the spellbound horses walking warm
Out of the whinnying green stable
On to the fields of praise.

And honoured among foxes and pheasants by the gay house
Under the new made clouds and happy as the heart was long,
In the sun born over and over,
I ran my heedless ways,
My wishes raced through the house-high hay
And nothing I cared, at my sky blue trades, that time allows
In all his tuneful turnings so few and such morning songs
Before the children green and golden
Follow him out of grace,

Nothing I cared, in the lamb white days, that time would take me
Up to the swallow thronged loft by the shadow of my hand,
In the moon that is always rising,
Nor that riding to sleep
I should hear him fly with the high fields
And wake to the farm forever fled from the childless land.
Oh as I was young and easy in the mercy of his means,
Time held me green and dying
Though I sang in my chains like the sea.

which has so much gentle imagery. he just reads it in a big echoing voice, which sounds really nice if you don't pay attention to what he's saying--just listened to the ebb and flow--but which, to my mind, absolutely wreaks havoc with any desire to understand the feel of the poem, should you care about what the particular words and meaning happen to be. maybe it's because i come from a theatre background, but i just get really frustrated with the tradition of poetry reading that puts everything in the same tone of voice and says you should just listen to the way the words flow without paying attention to what the poem is saying.

and i have every intention of being at full tilt.

like sisters

[grey-damaskena.livejournal.com]

I am, somewhat bizzarely, wondering how well I know you (no relation to actual topic of post, for which I apologize). Nine years is not long enough to fathom a person . . . judging by my parents, 28 years is not enough to fathom a person. A lifetime is not enough to fathom a person- I am arrogant, then, to think it possible at all. As if such knowledge were the secret key to connection? Perhaps one assumes it, and thus is forever deluding one's own self. I do not know you, then, and do not pretend to know you: nevertheless, I feel I am connected to you. Where, then, does this come from? Is it merely that we have known each other long enough to be comfortable in each other's presence? That implies that, given time, one could feel comfortable in anyone's presence, and this is obviously not the case. Some inherent personal quality, perhaps, some strange item held in common that, by having it ourselves, we recognize it in someone else? But if you ask me to identify this thing, I cannot, so such recognition cannot be on a concious level; yet I can say, conciously, that we are somehow connected and thus are friends.

Too . . . much . . . philosophy class . . .

Re: like sisters

[lucifermourning.livejournal.com]

i think you are asking the questions artists and philosphers have been trying to explain since they began artisting and philosophizing. which is to say, explaining why some people connect and what makes some connectiones strengthen and grow while others die is quite beyond anything we've figured out yet. i don't know what the answer is. nine years and common interests certainly help, but that's not really the answer. nor do i particularly care. i adore you and i think you are wonderful and love you very much and i can't bring myself to worry too much about why we should be thus connected. i'd rather accept it. why do we love those we love? does it matter?