The RetroLounge Daily Poem Thread (Fri 2/22/2008)

[RetroLounge]

She Considers the Dimensions of Her Soul

          (Mrs. Morninghouse, after a Sermon Entitled,
          "What the Spirit Teaches Us through Grief")

The shape of her soul is a square.
She knows this to be the case
because she sometimes feels its corners
pressing sharp against the bone
just under her shoulder blades
and across the wings of her hips.
At one time, when she was younger,
she had hoped that it might be a cube,
but the years have worked to dispel
this illusion of space. So that now
she understands: it is a simple plane:
a shape with surface, but no volume—
a window without a building, an eye
without a mind.
                    Of course, this square
does not appear on x-rays, and often,
weeks may pass when she forgets
that it exists. When she does think
to consider its purpose in her life,
she can say only that it aches with
a single mystery for whose answer
she has long ago given up the search—
since that question is a name which can
never quite be asked. This yearning,
she has concluded, is the only function
of the square, repeated again and again
in each of its four matching angles,
until, with time, she is persuaded anew
to accept that what it frames has no
interest in ever making her happy.

Young Smith

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Young Smith completed a Ph.D. in creative writing and literature at the University of Houston in 2003, where he received the James Michener Fellowship in poetry, a Krakow Poetry Seminar Scholarship, and a Donald Barthelme Fellowship for fiction. He has received grants from the National Endowment for the Arts and the Kentucky Arts Council. His poems have appeared or are forthcoming in Poetry, Beloit Poetry Journal, The Iowa Review, Pleiades, American Literary Review, Arts & Letters, Atlanta Review, The Midwest Quarterly, The New Orleans Review, and other publications. He is an assistant professor of English at Eastern Kentucky University.

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:hi:

RL

[lizziegrace]

1. ...

:(


:hug:


"she is persuaded anew
to accept that what it frames has no
interest in ever making her happy.

[RetroLounge]

4. ...

:hug:

RL

[xchrom]

2. the soul as companion.

this square poking you once in a while reminding you -- of something.

[RetroLounge]

9. and always just below the surface, reminding you...

:hi:

RL

[Inchworm]

3. So human to want.

Some things can never be reached or never reach back. :(

I like this one heaps.

A little OT- In the beginning part where he has the character determine where her soul resides within her reminds me of a relaxation thing I used to do on the 3rd night of a binge while trying to rest. I'd lay there and try to feel where I think from. It's pretty fun if you are in that fantastic part of awakenness. :D

:thumbsup:

[RetroLounge]

10. ...

:hi:

RL

[zingaro]

5. wow there's so much going on in that.

(Mrs. Morninghouse, after a Sermon Entitled,
"What the Spirit Teaches Us through Grief")

I already have more empathy for her than I know what to do with. My eyes are already brimming because I so grok her. *sigh*

a shape with surface, but no volume—
a window without a building, an eye
without a mind.

This, coupled with her former hope for dimensionality...

it aches with
a single mystery for whose answer
she has long ago given up the search—
since that question is a name which can
never quite be asked.

Vague chronic ache, sometimes forgotten but always there...

what it frames has no
interest in ever making her happy.

Lost purpose, lost focus. Pain pain pain that she has forgotten that she is the "what" in "what it frames...".

*sigh* Now I'm all melancholy and mid-lifey.

That was powerful.

[RetroLounge]

11. "all melancholy and mid-lifey."

Yeah, I feel that all the time...

:hi:

RL

[hisownpetard]

6. Sort of like a flat-screen TV.

[RetroLounge]

12. Without the high definition, apparently

:hi:

RL

[CaliforniaPeggy]

7. My dear Retro...

How evocative, how very beautiful...

And so damn sad too...

Thank you...

[Dora]

8. You did it again.

" James Michener Fellowship in poetry "