Free verse and the return key ~ Malinda Words

The return key is made for poetic architecture, I sometimes tell poets and sometimes tell myself. Take a paragraph, move the cursor and at appropriate places press the return key. There! You have a ‘poem’! In fact if the prose is lyrical, it might even read as a decent poem.

It’s a trick. We know what a poem is supposed to look like. We see words and lines. We don’t see the return key.

‘Free verse’ made this possible since it subverted, loosened or even totally eliminated the formal metrical structure associated with ‘the poem.’ The rhythm obtained through metric structures are replaced by the music of sounds, words, turns of phrase, and the elegant play of metaphors. The accurate (if you will) use of the return key can only work if these things are present in the composition. But there are times when it is hard to figure out if a piece of writing is verse or prose.

‘As she lay sleeping the word unsaid and the spoken word danced among pigeons, chased pollen and dialects, and at sunset sat across an oaken table, stirred weariness into coffee and violets, compared notes.

‘Meanwhile in an orphaned city where highways left byways and flew over rabbits and tortoises, the road not taken met the chosen path and in gravel tones smoothened by silences, talked of the lost maps of sanity where, where we were before, has forever been erased.

‘There were also lemons that had never heard of lemonade, pigs ignorant of bacon and sausage, lovers yet ignorant of heartache, delicate vases pouring scents that twirl in Dry Zone dust to gather the songs of the voiceless.

‘There is blood and despair, sunlight bested by cloud, trembling rain and grass, raw woodapple smiles that creep under elephant fear to flavor sambol and resurrections no one will ever record.

‘There’s news of an earthquake and a kidnapping, chips falling where they did, murder legal and otherwise percolating the gastric juices so necessary for the consumption of the unpalatable.

‘And it rained and it rains, gigantic turtles escaped from an evolutionist’s cage arrest eyes and time
and all things unregistered commerce in the black markets of defeat where the marrow of a city
lie amid scattered vegetables too dead for resurrection.

‘In the rear view mirror the road runs away and the competitive spirit brings closer the pursuer, people bend and swerve, up ante and give the V-sign only to be stopped by red light and pedestrian crossing, the accidental intersections, four letter words that coin new vocabularies in the consecration of impatience.

‘There’s a window pane and a tree, a curtain and an alarm clock conspiring to stop dream and nightmare, a blue balloon and a kite catching lightening and curse, watermelon pink splattered on a pavement where cats given up on love settle for wayside food.

‘There are hands that would hold, eyes that will not close, a bedside vigil in candle lit despair, a book with intoxicating ink, the music of turning pages and hearts so many times turned. inside out
that reverse works just as well.

‘There’s a foot step on a foot-fallen landing, abandoned keys and rust frayed knives that cannot cut or blunt, and words that return wearing unrecognizable vowels.

‘They gather at your feet, all these creatures of your making, they mean no harm, they dare not touch, they would not go had they the choice but will disappear with the first stirring and you in half-sleep stupor and fully awoken clarity without cry or smile will gather what’s left from pre-sleep memory, toss it all into the garbage can, return to bed and sleep.

‘Bless you, my child.’

Verse or prose? A poem or a paragraph? A paragraph that could be ‘returned’ into a poem? Let’s do cut-and-place selectively (for reasons of space):

As she lay sleeping
the word unsaid
and spoken word
danced among pigeons
chased pollen and dialects
and at sunset sat
across an oaken table
stirred weariness
into coffee and violets
compared notes.

There’s news of an earthquake
and a kidnapping
chips falling where they did
murder legal and otherwise
percolating the gastric juices
so necessary
for the consumption of the unpalatable.

There are hands that would hold
eyes that will not close
a bedside vigil
in candle lit despair
a book with intoxicating ink
the music of turning pages
and hearts
so many times turned
inside out
that reverse works just as well.

And you in half-sleep stupor
and fully awoken clarity
without cry or smile
will gather what’s left
from pre-sleep memory
toss it all into the garbage can
return to bed
and sleep.
Bless you, my child.

Verse or prose? A poem or a paragraph? A poem that could be ‘backspaced’ into prose?

For the record, she was awake and not asleep and I, in the intoxication of imagining slumber, manufacturing dreams and recording faithfully that which was already known, wandered along insomniac streets and was lost for ever in an irrecoverable poem that I wanted to but never could write.

['The Morning Inspection' is the title of a column I wrote for the Daily News from 2009 to 2011, one article a day, Monday through Saturday. This is a new series. Links to previous articles in this new series are given below]

20 May 2023

Free verse and the return key

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