Book review entries

Sucked in!

I was searching some poetry by Gwyneth Lewis to understand her poetics for a presentation I have to do for Practice of Poetry. The first poem I read was in Staying Alive: real poems for unreal times and it was a small section from her sequence poetry book: Zero Gravity. Although I appreciated it for its poetical and linguistic qualities, I could not easily figure out what the underlying meaning was (I understood the whole astronaut bit though). Then I read some things in her website: www.gwynethlewis.com that I didn't really like that much, partly because they seemed to be assigned poem about special Welsh National occasions. But then, (!) I found this! and I was blown away. The language is powerful and tight, very vibrant, with strong images. He uses the Spanish extremely effectively, in a way that I could only dream of doing…at least til I have a go at imitating her! I just wish there was more information available about her, and more poems online and in the library.

Enjoy the poem in the meantime, hopefully as much as I did.

Happy Flamenco

Don’t tell me when to be happy.
I’m losing my mind. No loss,
you say, because outside
oranges ripen in the cold,
to make bitter marmalade. I pray
I’ll be put back together in a larger way.

Now that you’re with me, back from the dead,
(I didn’t turn round! I didn’t
turn round!) my heart’s
gone missing. It beats like the band
that meets to rehearse by Delícias Bridge
for fiesta or carnival. The bugles are loud
but, for all their practice, they’re getting worse.
This is as well as my heart will ever be.

I thought you were gone. But the Guadalquivir
swells each day with a fifty-mile tide
that brought low galleons of New-World gold
to the quays, then didn’t. This time round
I’ll remember everything and lock it all
in the Toro de Oro of my inner eye.
My body’s an empire importing only you.

I saw you drifting on the evening ebb
in a tiny dinghy, no engine, no oars,
under dark eucalyptus. I called
until the herons flew
but you didn’t hear me. Don’t you know
how strong is the current, how the greedy sea
takes everything to it – dead horses, old shoes,
tree trunks and you, and it won’t let go
no, not even when you might have reached
Sanlúcar de Barrameda and the wrecking bar?

Mist covers the river’s body like a ghost. Our life
goes through us. You are the bull
I dance with. I no longer know
who leads, who follows but I flick the cloak
as though – Olé, olé –
love weren’t the ultimate lack of style,
the skill of ensuring that the other survives
in the wet sand, panting to the bullring’s roar.
A crimson switch in the back of my eye
and I charge at the lights, at a swordpoint’s star.

You say you can’t dance, but your blood cells can.
Lymphoma flamenco, full of passionate verve,
technique and duende. Deep in the bone
you need a different rhythm now
uno, dos, tres, quatro, cinquo, seis,
no tarantella, but the writhe of a snake
tuning the mesh of your DNA,
a Sevillana, with viper hands,
stamping on cancer.
Now’s the fiesta. Eso es. Ole.

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Gwyneth Lewis has published six books of poetry in Welsh and English. Two in a Boat: A Marital Voyage was published in May by Fourth Estate. She is Wales's first National Poet since April 2005.

: 25 Feb 2006 00:00 |  Tags: Practice Of Poetry Ratings And Things |  Comments (0) |  Close comments |  Report a problem

Listening to a wrist–slitting classic

The hairs on my forearm spike up when I hear the chorus from this song. The way Bon Jovi stops at that first time…how he takes his own time to say that it is he who will love the other always and that he is the one that will be there always….

I want that sense of security forever too.

(Ok, something needs to be done about the first stanza and the first line of the second. But come on! He will love you until the words stop rhyming! That's something!)

Always

This romeo is bleeding
But you can't see his blood
It's nothing but some feelings
That this old dog kicked up

It's been raining since you left me
Now I'm drowning in the flood
You see I've always been a fighter
But without you I give up

I can't sing a love song
Like the way it's meant to be
Well, I guess I'm not that good anymore
But baby, that's just me

And I will love you, baby – Always
And I'll be there forever and a day – Always
I'll be there till the stars don't shine
Till the heavens burst and
The words don't rhyme
And I know when I die, you'll be on my mind
And I'll love you – Always

Now your pictures that you left behind
Are just memories of a different life
Some that made us laugh, some that made us cry
One that made you have to say goodbye
What I'd give to run my fingers through your hair
To touch your lips, to hold you near
When you say your prayers try to understand
I've made mistakes, I'm just a man

When he holds you close, when he pulls you near
When he says the words you've been needing to hear
I'll wish I was him 'cause those words are mine
To say to you till the end of time

Yeah, I will love you baby – Always
And I'll be there forever and a day – Always

If you told me to cry for you
I could
If you told me to die for you
I would
Take a look at my face
There's no price I won't pay
To say these words to you

Well, there ain't no luck
In these loaded dice
But baby if you give me just one more try
We can pack up our old dreams
And our old lives
We'll find a place where the sun still shines

And I will love you, baby – Always
And I'll be there forever and a day – Always
I'll be there till the stars don't shine
Till the heavens burst and
The words don't rhyme
And I know when I die, you'll be on my mind
And I'll love you – Always

: 21 Dec 2005 01:25 |  Tags: Ratings And Things |  Comments (3) |  Close comments |  Report a problem

Read Just William for the first time

Last night, I read Just William to some friends as a bedtime story. One of the friends had been talking about how great the stories were for most of the night, and I just couldn't resist and my maternal - pffff! riiiiiight - instincts told me, I should read a bit out to them. So I read William goes to the picture . My first impresssion of the reading, was 'this is not a kid's book'! I mean, the story was, of course, but the language was so elaborated that I thought to myself, that I would never had read a book like that when I was a little girl. But then, as I continued to read in my very latinized american accent, I began to identify the Rishmal Crompton's genius at writing. The language was all part of it. It was the way he wanted his audience to understand William's character: a mixture of innocence, ignorance and cockiness. Absolute genius. Then I thought – without interrupting the reading – that perhaps at that age I would never have deducted the idea that the author was using a linguistic device. But you get the feel of it. You always do, even if you cant explain it. And that is the power of writing, and that is the power that writers have. I want to work on that. I want to be that.

Will I?

(As a side note, I must apologize….Richmal Crompton as it appears, was actually a woman! oh silly me)

: 24 May 2005 10:14 |  Tags: Ratings And Things |  Comments (3) |  Close comments |  Report a problem