Poetry / "Limbo"

This poem surely tugged at my heartstrings.  I’ve recently isolated myself from the bitterness and exhaustion of my former, perhaps more exhilerating life.  Its much different than withdrawing from depression, because I don’t necessarily feel sad, and I’ve gathered despondency is not whats constructed your fortress either.  Its more that you feel the general population’s aspirations and desires are trivial or materialistic. You won’t “play” that game.  Still, it seems no matter which route you choose its a lose-lose situation.

Anyways, in the first stanza, I might consider taking out “the last days of winter” or “just before spring,” having both seems redundant and unecessary.  If it were my poem I’d dispose of “the last days of winter.”  I like the contrast of spring’s vitality with your death.  Also, you change verb tenses throughout this stanza.  Another thing I may consider changing is “shroud of icy and snow” to simply “icy shroud.”  I think its mroe phonetically pleasing.  I’d also almost suggest ridding of the last three lines of this stanza.  They seem repetitive and I think what you’re attempting is achieved in the following stanza.  L1 in S2 would be more powerful if you eliminated those lines.

S2 is nice has some analogies. The only thing I would suggest here is pulling “anesthetized” up next to “living.”  I don’t think it needs its own line.

I get a bit lost at S3. I understand you won’t play their game.  Its kind of cliche standing alone.  Perhaps create a more elaborate analogy?  What tiles are you scattering?  And what board?  These are obviously components of flooring, but I guess I don’t understand what you’re getting at.

S4 is nice.  I like that you’re alluding rather than telling.  I’d consider taking off “of” before “oblivion” as well as the “and” preceding “peace.”  I think these words would be more impactful standing alone.  I think changing the next few lines to…

“I warned him I no longer played
the game, no longer participanted.”

would be more engaging.  I also think “A mere voyeur, That I simply passed the hours as” seems unecessary, as that image is conveyed in the previous lines.  If it were my poem I’d probably remove those lines altogether.  But if not, I’d maybe suggest a bit of rewording.

In the last stanza you’ve already used (a variation of) “participate.”  Maybe something like “partake” would suffice.  I really like the comparison to Lot’s wife.  I’m kind of confused here as well though. Which are you turning back to view, the love or your withdrawal?  And if you turned, why does Charon row away? It’s incongruous.  Perhaps “unlike Lot’s wife, I would not turn back and stare” would deter “Charon.”

Anyways, like I stated in the beginning.  I really enjoyed this and I think with a bit of revision it will be golden.  These were all mere suggestions and opinions, but I’m hoping they’ve helped some.  I look forward to reading a revision (if you so choose0.

hey!  i liked your poem a lot, although i wonder, would it stand out on its own, without having the previous explanation? perhaps it would, but not as much. that aside, and being aware of the background, i thinf it’s full of very clear images and deep meanings..

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July 31, 2008

by hinahina

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Your point is well taken…  because most of my poetry is extremely personal and my background is a little esoteric ….  I think a lot of my work would be difficult to appreciate without some background.  Which is a limitation I have to consider …. Thanks

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This is brilliant poetry: not a word of emotion forced on the reader. More like saying ‘here is a way to understand something different from yourself’. Rhetorically, you approach the subject of self-withdrawal with what sounds like regret. Whether or not this is regret for yourself at taking such a path, or regret for the rest of the westernised world who you’ve left behind. Though i imagine it is probably both and neither, it is a credit to yourself that the reader is given the freedom to ponder such things.
Cheers
Josh

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July 31, 2008

by hinahina

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This is probably the best response I’ve had to any of my poems here on Urbis.  You have zeroed in on the hert of my dilemma …. mixed regrets for what I’ve left behind and what is now my life in another world.  Oddly enough i was born in the West but twenty years spent in India have rendered me, on a bad day …. an alien.  However on a good day, I feel I’m a world citizen, part of a new age of understanding.  But I swing madly fro side to side.  You understood my poem perfectly.  

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I really love the 2nd half of this poem.  The image created with Charon waiting to pull you off, the feeling that your life is over, only to realize that it’s not and you are merely giving up a part of yourself.  As for the structure itself, I am bothered by the speed of the poem.  It feels like it should be slower (more punctuated) than it is.

If you were trying to capture the idea of “limbo,” i think you did an excellent job. this piece shows loss and despair in a certain idea/concept, in it’s highest state, though this piece is complicated to understand, especially if a person do not read, and reread it. Beautiful work. I hope i understood what i read as i have responded to what i thought i understood from this beautifully rhythmic and darkly lyrical piece.

I simply love this poem. The images are so powerful and moving. I loved every minute of it from the opening stanza of being dead to the last stanza about Lots’ wife, and being stranded again. This is one of the best I have read in a while. Powerful.

I like the idea behind the poem and some of the imagery, particularly Charon rowing away. But was “limbo” a Greek idea or did it originate in Christianity? I don’t remember but you might want to look it up…also, I didn’t quite follow these lines:
Fragile shafts of green…
will never offer a bud
to blossom…

You’re “dead”...so the fragile shafts of green are…what?...and why will they “never” offer a bud to blossom?
Your notes indicate you did participate in the love affair, but your poem suggests you are a lost cause forever in limbo…that was confusing.

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July 31, 2008

by hinahina

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Good sleuthing here …. yes “limbo” is a Christian … Roman Catholic concept.  Charon and the riveer Styx are Greek. I used the term “limbo” in the more secular context … referencing the writer’s state of emotional detachment in the physical world.

The “shafts of green” are a little borrowing from Dtlan Thomas and his “the force that through the green fusee, drives the flower” ... an image I love.  My shafts of green are the little green spikes of the spring crocus which miraculously  produce the blossom, which pops out quite unexpectedly.

I mourn my loss … my voluntary limbo and the fact that there will be no more “blossoms” .... I’m not dead, but “stranded on the shore” as Charon rows away.

I am stranded again …. not only by the lover …. but by Charon who refuses to carry me away into the other world.

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