leonardcohenforum.com

From a School Room

She skewers a Little Mermaid
pencil through her tight packed black
ponytail -- erases with self-
disgusted intensity
and blows rubber dust into
the traffic rattled morning air.

On Eager St. a ghetto
blaster raps shush-be-doo-dum
shush-shush-be-doo-dum... “That Avay
Maria, she in jail now...”
Is that a deal going down,
or has the sun’s sweet mercy rolled

out upon the just? On a steel desk the
little mermaid swims a crayon blue sea.

Hi Jimmy~

I appreciate the attention you gave to meter.

There are things here that I do not understand. For instance:

She skewers

indicates to me it was placed into something. But in the rest of the stanza it seems she pulled the pencil 'out' (unskewered?).

The visuals in the stanza are really good, it is just that one word that confuses me. I especially like: "...traffic rattled morning air."

Your line break in stanza two is great, ending with "ghetto," but then I end up confused again and I don't understand what your question means or where it is leading to.

I see the switch in meter in your final couplet, and keep thinking this must be a 'set' formula, but I do not know what it is. Care to explain? I am heading back to a university english class shortly after a 10 year absence and could use all the clues I can get...

It seems I am missing what you are saying and blame myself and not your poem. I would appreciate you filling in the blanks for me.

regards,
Laurie

Very sharp Laurie. It is syllabic 7 7 8 7 7 8 with final couplet 10 10...

The poem was inspired by my time in Baltimore as a School Counsellor. The girl actually had two pencils, one "skewered" into her hair and was using the other to draw.

The question raised at the end of the poem is tied to the movement on the street which could be interpreted as a drug deal "going down", or just a few guys innocently meeting and having a friendly chat. I counterplay the innocence of the girl in the classroom drawing with Little Mairmaid crayons and the possible innocence of a chance meeting, and I'm posing the question that maybe the sun is indeed shining not on evil but "on the just"... it's a biblical reference (Isaiah I think...)

The decasyllabic couplet ending is meant to echo the "normal" line length in most conventional syllabic poetry, thus ending the poem on a positive note but still the doubt about what is really going on. The little girl being my image of innocence in a world where innocence is lost so easily.

The reference to Avay Maria is made by the class teacher who was reminiscing on a pupil she had a few years previously... who actually was called Avay Maria... and nicely tied in with the theme of innocence, and the fragility of justice and innocence.

Dear Jimmy,
Did you intend to write "That Avay Maria", or " That Ave Maria" ?

Ave Maria is, of course, Latin for Hail Mary.....I just wondered if you were making a pun i.e. "away".

Andrew.

Hi Jimmy~

Thanks so much for taking the time to explain.

About the "Avay," I thought it was sort of dialectic for Ave and didn't question it. I also thought (quite wrongly) it was part of what was playing on the ghetto blaster; as in rap lyrics.

The "Little Mermaid" references work well for portraying the age range and the innocence that you are looking for. But, after reading your explanation, there is too much information that you have that you are not sharing with your readers. Like the two pencils and the "Avay Maria..." comment. You have done really well at hinting at what you are getting at and it has great atmosphere already. But I think you need to approach it as your readers would and see where things are missing that need to be filled in or clarified to make it more accessible. IMHO.

thanks again,
Laurie

Okay, well... I'm not attuned enough about meter to consciously look for and count it. However, I read with great interest your constructive feedback, offered in a positive way, to Jimmy, Laurie.

I was confused by the Avay and took it to be an intentional misspelling, done to make a point I wasn't getting. I also took it to be rap lyrics on a ghetto blaster. I presumed Jimmy to have been a teacher, given his observations in a classroom setting. I also thought there was only one pencil, with Little Mermaid encapsulating the innocence theme.

When I read Jimmy's explanation, I had the same reaction of feeling that more of what he was saying needed to be included in the poem itself, for greater clarity, without having to go outside the poem to 'get it.' I couldn't possibly have ended up where you intended, Jimmy, given the poem as originally presented. It seems the constructive feedback should prove helpful for the final version .


~ Lizzy

Thank you for the reactions.
I don't like "explaining" poems. A poem,I believe, has its own life, and it takes on another life as each reader reads it. I will explain further my poem, though I am uncomfortable doing so, but I see it as a useful exercise.
The poem is fourteen lines long therefore can be read as a sonnet, but it is not a sonnet in the strict sense. So I undermine the reader. I want the reader to see that it is sorta/kinda a sonnet but not really, this forces the reader to take a closer look at the underlying themes and nuances.

The first stanza sets the scene. I don't, deliberately, want to give the reader too much detail because I want the reader to fill in the blanks him/herself and read it out of his/her experiences.

The second stanza is deliberately vague and impressionistic. The line "That Avay / Maria she in jail now..." is meant to fulfil a number of roles within the poem. It raises questions about what is actually happening in the classroom and outside on the street, and it is a device to link both environments. One innocent/safe/healthy etc... (you fill in the blanks) the other threatening/dangerous/destructive. So the line could be coming from the ghetto blaster, and also from within the classroom. The spelling, again, is deliberately ambiguous. Ave = Virgin Mary, health, wholeness, spirituality. Avay = the way a particular family decide to spell their childs name, and the flip side of "Ave Maria" and yet Avay Maria, the name of the girl in jail is both Ave Maria and Avay Maria, and ALL that that implies in the reader's mind, poetic consciousness.

The final stanza is linked deliberately on the page to combine and link the Street with The Classroom and all that that implies. The quote or/and misquote is again deliberate. I am demanding that the reader be able to link the Biblical with the non-biblical, the notion that God/sun shines on the just and the unjust alike, just as the rain does in Isaiah.
The fact that the sun is shining down on a drug deal "going down" or a harmless conversation is not for me , nor by implication, the reader,to judge. Only the sun/God can judge. Only God can judge what is truly just and unjust. Only God can judge Avay Maria, or maybe in the future only God can judge the girl drawing with her Little Mairmaid pencil, and what she becomes. All I can do is hope that the little girl will continue in her life to "swim in a crayon blue sea" of love/respect/ protection/ health and wholeness. That maybe if she can hold onto her innocence that it will be a strength for her and she will not end up in jail like Avay Maria. Not that I can judge Avay Maria and her life. God knows what she went through that she lost something strengthening to get her through the Street life. The Classroom offers hope and a better life.

Now, if I wrote all that in the poem it would not be a poem, it would be something else. That, I believe is the power of poetry. It leads you along streets and rooms that you did not expect, but it won't bring you to these realms if you are not reading poetry as poetry. Poetry is not prose. That is why I'm reluctant to "explain" poetry. I fear it might be "explained away" but if my explanation enhances the reading of the poem I am delighted.

Hi Jimmy~

I saw the meter and stanza selection and looked around to see if there was a sonnet form that did not rely on a rhyme scheme and could not find one. That is why I asked if it was a particular form such as a: sonnet, villanelle, sesitina, etc. Of course I knew it was none of the above. So that is what that question was about.

I also understood your word choice was to convey certain things. And it was further understood by your first explanation.

It is one thing to have a poem go over one's head due to the readers' inadequacy. And another to have the poem not be crafted in a way that is fully conceived. It is okay, if readers interepret a poem other than what is expected by the writer. It is another thing to leave too many holes and unanswered questions within the body of the poem. You are trying to convey a very complex thing here in a very short space. Substance got sacrificed for form, because it is not self explanatory, even taking all the 'clues' you have left in the poem into account.

Thanks again for further explanation. I too "hate" having to explain things like this.

regards,
Laurie