A Poem Joined In Marriage

Rene Char said “A poem is always married to someone.”

When humans are married, this means that they are partners in a legal relationship that has historically concerned with reproduction. According to Google Dictionary, marriage can more broadly refer to a combination, mixture, or amalgamation of multiple elements, such as "the marriage of wood and flame to produce heat."  

When Char states that a poem would be married to someone, I interpret this to mean that there is a bond of the poem to the someone, an attachment of the poem to the someone. The specific formulation "married to someone" leaves open the possibility that this isn't a symmetrical relationship. In other words, while the poem may be married to the someone, the someone may not be in a legal relationship with the poem. 

When is a poem intimately attached to an individual? There are two ways in which a poem could be married to someone. A poem might be considered married to a reader, and a poem might be considered married to its composer. Both of these scenarios raise interesting questions and conclusions. Both cases introduce plenty of potential for serial polygamy.

If a poem is married to its readers, then what happens when nobody is reading or contemplating the poem at a given moment? If nobody is any longer reading the poem and the poem is thus unmarried, this would imply that the poem is in fact not still married to someone. However, one might say that in order for a poem to truly be a poem, it must be perceived as a poem by an observer. As long as the observer is observing the poem, the observer satisfies the requirements for being a marriage partner of the poem. As a result, "a poem is always married to someone" when it is a poem, and so this statement is considered true.

Given that two human marriage partners are still married even when they don't think of one another, one might consider that a poem could remain married even when it is not perceived by its marriage partner. This would be the case for a poem that is married to its composer. Although the composer is not exclusively attached to any given poem, every poem certainly has a strong and obvious personal connection to its composer. 

Is the bond between poem and composer exist between the actual poem and the actual composer, or between the idea of the two in the mind of another? Given that marriage is generally considered a legal concept (society does not consider individuals married based solely on sexual consummation), the marriage is reasonably supposed to exist between the ideas of the two in the mind of third parties. Is a poem always married even if its composer dies? Ah, but just because a composer dies does not mean that the memory of the composer dies. If we can consider a poem to be part of a marriage, so can we consider the abstract concept of the composer an element of the marriage. But then what if the composer is forgotten? What happens to a poem considered to have been written by an anonymous author? These might constitute true cases of dissolution of marriage by death and divorce, respectively, between the poem and its author. The existence of such a situation would violate Rene Char's principle. 

Whether a poem is married to a someone who is a reader or a composer seems indeterminate. Perhaps the true answer is both.

The Road Trip

 "I want to see all the most beautiful overlooks and look at all the pretty flowers."
"Do you have a list of spots where you want to go?"
"No, I just want to experience what there is where we go, and go the places with experiences."
"Well, what about a quantitative approach... Can you think of some kind of standard, some factor we want to maximize?"
"I want to see a lot. I want to hear a lot. I want to feel the world."
"Hmm... it sounds like you want to optimize altitude, then. The higher you go, the more you can see, the more wind there is,"
"--the more world there is."
"Sure, sure. Now, it looks like the tallest point nearby is Mount Coleomegilla. However, Mount Coleomegilla is on top of a large plateau, the sixty-mile across Coccinella plateau, so even though it is objectively tall above sea level, you might not be able to see a lot."
"Okay, so where would be better?"
"Hmmm. Here's a list of potential destinations. The second-highest point is Xylocopa Ridge. That should be good, it's the biggest slope for our purposes."
"That sounds nice."
"What are we waiting for? Let's go!"
"Wait, can I drive?"
"I'm already sitting in the driver's seat. It'd be faster for me to just stay here. Also, I'm a more objective driver. I don't get distracted by nuances or philosophies."
"Yeah, but it's no fun when you drive. You always take the most direct route, like going on interstates instead of more scenic but less efficient highways. Anyway, you already drove from Santa Ceratina to our hotel in Los Anopheles."
"Let's just get there already."
"---"
"No! Let go of the steering wheel! If you have such a problem driving with me, you can get out of the car and walk!"
"Grumble."
"Ah, such a beautiful day. The pressure is about 90 kiloPascals, the temperature is about 30 degrees Centigrade. And there's not a cloud to be seen, 360 degrees around."
"You passive-aggressive maniac! Get us back on the road."
"I said no! Please let go of the steering wheel."
"WHAT IS WRONG WITH YOU!?"
"Are you alright? Why are you yelling? I can hear you just fine, you know."
"You drove us right off of the road? Are you out of your mind?"
"There's practically nothing growing here, the land is flat if we go around the rock mounds, and the car can handle it. This is the fastest way to get to Xylocopa Ridge."
"I guess this qualifies as a mind-opening experience."
"Glad to be of help. I expect we should be there in about an hour if we don't stop."
"Don't count on it."



"Wow, I love looking at these mesas everywhere."
"Table landforms exhibit an unusual geometry to be sure."
"Hey, stop the car! Check out that flower bush over there!"
"It hardly qualifies as a bush, I think, but here you go."
"Thanks for driving up to it so close! Do you want to come out and see?"
"No, I'm fine. Help yourself. I'll just open the window so that we can still communicate."
"This yellow, I proclaim, is more yellow than the most verdant green is green. This yellow excommunicates the mind, it makes one think that one hallucinates. This yellow dominates the landscape. It conquers my mental landscape, it rivals the sun which is not nearly so yellow. The magnificence of this aureate radiant yellow redeems the sins of humanity, the flaws in creation. Never has a man or woman seen such a yellow. By which god did the desert earth commit this larceny? Why, this yellow is yellow perfectly."
"Come on, that's hyperbole."




"Good for you, you've done your thing, can we go now?"
"I'm just getting started. Why, look at that large black carpenter bee?"
"I see it. I also hear it. It's wings create a vibration that's audible to the ear of fictionally-embodied metaphysical constructs."
"Hello, bee. You're a carpenter bee, you have your tools and you seem happy. Were you perchance ever in Illinoyeez? I hear that Mr. Sutton used to build cabinets. But no, the carpenter bees in Illinoyeez have a yellow pronotum, and a yellow first tergite, while you, my friend, come now, are not colored so light. Why are you flying closer to me, carpenter bee? Do you think that I might be a tree? Perhaps you would have fun making cabinets out of a mesquite, perhaps, or out of the petrified wood one hears about around here. I don't see any of these around--did you take me for a tree because you're desperate? Either way, it's clear to me, that you, my friend, you need a tree, or else, what kind of carpenter bee would you be? I will go with you now. Together we will find a tree. This is my vow."
"And how?"
"The bee will walk and I will fly. For though the bee has wings and I the longer legs,"
"--you can soar and create afresh in a dimension perpendicular to that to which the bee is confined! I see what you're getting at. You and I are a fictionally-embodied metaphysical constructs that were created by Even when he wrote this vignette, and although we may be fictional, you mean to suggest that your metaphysical aspect would allow you to manipulate reality, and possibly even intercede with Even to alter the plot of this story."
"I would indeed. I would create a grove of trees, with wood just right, for the carpenter bees, I surely might."
"I suppose this means that we won't be going to Xylocopa Ridge anytime soon. You can set off with the bee for the right spot, and I'll follow you in the car, if you're ready to go."
"Actually, I think Xylocopa Ridge would be the perfect spot! You just have to consider the name's origin."



Poetry and the carpenter bee travel in the direction of the afternoon sun. Mathematics follows in their car, which makes no sound due to the fact that it is a hybrid and is currently using the electric motor.

A Poem Without "e" and Commentary Without "s"

Crys To My Only Sun

Makayla Dorsey

By an arid dawn,

I watch your light through

this window pain.

Rays on display

to show you hold all

that I know, my sun.

Canvas our rooms

that hold shadows

of your manor.

Pass through our halls

with ghosts of you,

tightly pact away.

Swirl up our stairs,

find this forgiving altar,

not your cold, stiff body, my sun.

To write the poem, I would type out a word or two and if one of them had the letter “e”, then I would reword it, with a different verb or noun. Although, I couldn’t reword everything and I often relied on a homonym to replace a word that contained the letter “e”. Overall, it didn’t prove to be terribly difficult to write the poem but I didn’t have a clear idea of what I wanted to write about when I began and the content of the poem may not be entirely clear to the reader. Other than that, it proved to be a fun challenge and I now recognize how often I write with the letter “e” (and the letter “s” for this commentary).

Box Poetry

Poetry Cannot Be Contained 

By Serena Cai

Poetry cannot be contained. 

The word "box" brings something, 

a feeling or emotion, to mind.

I know the meaning: it's to shut something 

up in a tight space. To hold something against 

its will. 

That something is poetry.

I was on the Internet just the other day, 
eyes almost glazing over when I 
stumbled upon Reginald Dwayne Betts. 
This man, sentenced to life in a metal box, 
became a life boat in the ocean. 

Lost. 
Adrift. 
Questions spiraled in his head like endless
daggers? Where to go? What to do? 
What to feel? 

IT came like a blinding light, 
a secret angel come in the night. 
IT carried him along like the breeze
and made liberty beat under his 
ragged pulse. 

Words of weavers of words, magicians 
of time, danced on his lips like a child's feet. 
His soul began to beat and his feet began 
to tap. And so did the souls in the box 
next to his. 

It would be ninety six months later 
when he would be released from this cage.
He would become a prison advocate but 
more importantly: he would serve as 
a conduit for words. 

That ragged box of steel lines and broken 
dreams was no barrier to IT. 
Poetry could not be contained. 
It passed along the lips of each prisoner 
and rolled in their minds. 

Poetry will not be contained.

~~~~~~~~~

The poem above is one that I wrote and have constantly edited for the past week. It relates to the story of Reginald Dwayne Betts, a former prisoner and current poet. Betts was arrested for carjacking years ago and in his prison time, he and his fellow prisoners found hope and inspiration in the poems they read. Later, when Betts left prison, he would become a prison advocate and fervent poet. 

His story is connected to my answer to the Box Problem because Betts is proof that poetry goes beyond even that of the metal bars of a prisoner's cell. 
It cannot be contained. 
As hard as you try, no matter how thoroughly and enthusiastically you figuratively stuff that poem into that box, it will never go in. No matter how many ways you twist it and crumble it, some part of that poem will slip out and influence the life of someone near you like it did for Betts and his fellow inmates. Art cannot be contained. 

To understand a poem, I suggest that you never box it up. Boxing something implies holding it against its will. It implies forcing it into a small space not meant for it. 

Instead, if you want to understand a poem, hold it lightly in your mind. Hold it like a question, a query, a gentle inquiry. Lure it out, coax it to reveal its hidden secrets. 

As Billy Collins so gracefully put it, don't "tie the poem to a chair with rope and torture a confession out of it." 

Be gentle with the poem. 

Let it unveil itself to you slowly. 

Peel back each heavy layer of meaning and hope that maybe one day,

you can get to the core. 

~Serena