Day 9 - "Anamnesis"

Hello everyone!

It's been quite a long absence, I realize, but not without good reason. My 800 mile move to a new state combined with laptop failure and lack of internet access brought my poetry blogging to a literal standstill for quite some time. I still don't have regular internet access, but I am able to update intermittently at least.

As far as a poem per day goes, I don't know if I'll be able to continue my marathon in that fashion for a while, but while we wait to see if I'll be able to post anywhere near regularly here in the near future, here's a poem for you all to chew on for a bit.

I wrote this one just recently, after watching an interesting DVD my friend lent me years ago called "Ergo Proxy." Very entertaining, and extremely thought provoking.

And this is what it provoked in me:



"Anamnesis"

“The bow is called life, but its work is death.”
- HERACLITUS OF EPHESUS


What was the start of all this?

When did the cogs of fate begin to turn?

This brief flutter of heartbeats,
Culminating in a sterilized hospital bed.

We have arrived,
But was the journey ever the destination
If we had never been truly conscious until now?

Plato believed that knowledge was the recovery
Of memory existent from the beginning of time,
Forgotten with each new human’s cathartic first breath.
All of it erased, in the postnatal shock of rebirth.

To have seen this prophecy come true, so neatly arranged:
Playing.
Learning.
Wondering.
Asking.
Discovering.
Hurting.
Struggling.
Striving.
Suffering.
Sighing.
Knowing.
And then, with that final breath,
Dying.

Have we come all this way once again to find
That the truth behind the lies
does not always bring happiness?
And how many times before have we known
That we would be here again;
That all of us, together, would be here again?

If there ever was a start to all this
It began with a click
And a whirr
And a maniacal laugh
That infinitely echoes
Until the day arrives when there is no one left to hear it.


- Joshua Clarke

sorry about the lull, everyone

Hello again to all you people out there in blog land.

If any of you are being super dedicated to this 'month of poetry marathon' that I'm hosting and are wondering why I haven't posted anything in the last few days, it's because my laptop officially went on the fritz and is being fixed right now by our computer-competent friends at the local Best Buy.

However, when I get it back - and my poems along with it - I'll be posting a lot to make up for the time that I've missed. Needless to say, I know it's been substantial.

I'll see you all in a few days hopefully, with more poems!

- Josh

Day 7 - "If to see such again"

For today's poem - in light of all the tensions and emotions running high concerning people that I am close to in my family and other relationships because of personal heartbreak, tragedy, or whatever might be the case - I decided to post a work that speaks of those moments in life that take us back to a better place where things were once wonderful and that we never believed would come to an end. And how now, after all things have seemingly changed, we still have the photographs - still moments - of those times left over to haunt us. 'Haunt' might seem an eerie term, but at times I think they really do - not always in a bad way, but they are always there, and they always produce in us a powerful, profound feeling of unachievable distance, yet at the same time we also feel an irremovable, unforgettable familiarity when we are exposed to them once more.

This poem was written when Brittany had been gone for a week for an acting competition and I was left alone and spent much of the time she was away at work or by myself, and all the while somehow drawn to stare at a photograph I have of my parents when they were still together. Most of the photos with both of them together were either destroyed or lost, but I kept this one because, in my heart, it's how I'd always prefer to remember things. My mother, when she saw that I had the photo, said she was "glad" that I had it, in a slightly saddened, solemn tone.

I'll never forget that. And I can never forget those moments, and those times of our lives - like anyone else I'm sure, who has been through similar events. In short, here is my poetic nod to those feelings of ours that beg us to consider the pictures of our lives that will always remain in the albums of our memory.



"If to see such again"


An existence retired, interred in a frame
Without any true form, without any real name
What could one but do, if to see such again
In the flesh, firm and fresh, at that time, all arranged?

Moments true now called false
So remote, reappraised
That old camera’s a felon
Telling lies of that ‘phase’

Though one looks on the thing
And considers its fate
To carry the emotions
Such burdensome weight
Of the ones who have seen it,
And who know what it means,
And who know what’s since happened,
And have lived in-between,
And who’ve loosed all their anger,
And have shed all their tears,
And have wrenched out their story
To whoever might hear.

‘Tis too much for a picture
For one knows such things bear
These lost sights through the years
As we tend here and there
A dear Atlas, bent over
Made to shoulder our pain

Through damp eyes, in dim light
We wonder in vain

Could never
We ever
Smile on such lies again?


- Joshua Clarke

Day 6 - "Train wreck of Thought"

For today's poem, I thought I'd post something a little out of the ordinary. It's a very super-modern/postmodernistic work for me - a style that I don't try out very often in my poetic ventures, but at the time it seemed appropriate for what I was trying to relate. The formatting might look a bit strange on this blog (since it's really formatted the way I like it in Word) but, regardless, I think the idea of the piece will still come through in some form. This is one of those poems that has come to me during dark and dreary times where I can't help but consider things in lights that others may call pessimistic or overly gloomy - in response, maybe I can't say that they're totally wrong, but I do think to look at the world without the 'rose-colored glasses' on sometimes is a healthy activity and really puts things in perspective once the sugar-coating has worn off and we see things for how they really are.

This is a pretty common theme for me, and I hope you enjoy this one. Even if you don't, I can understand - It's pretty strange, but for what it's worth, I really like it myself.


"Train wreck of Thought"


I have compiled the nomenclatures generated
by numerous academic sources:

Divine Chaos
A nervous Tick
A whirling dervish on an Axis
A space-lost bulb

LITTERED WITH:

A burgeoning multitude spawned
By television Static

Tutored by the whine of an air-raid siren
ushering the droves into classroom shelters

They imitate the blaring well, knowing nothing of its knell

In a little old place where
All life is consumed
By an urge to RAGE against the DYING of the LIGHT
A
Light
Which
It
Continues to Douse
With overflowing quaffs of disenchantment

Our elbows are on the table
‘Cause we still don’t know any better
and we’re all still waiting for the check
or the kireji

one or the ‘utha...

I ordered my morals and values
On a bumper sticker, miss
with a side dish of refrigerator magnet –

and i’ve been waiting patiently for the grim reaper to come 4 me
in his knock-knock joke.

...some service, eh?


- Joshua Clarke

Day 5 - "There's love, and then there's love"

Good morning, all. So I wasn't able to post a poem yesterday on account of spending the whole day with my fiancee because it was our two year anniversary. :) Therefore, I'm following up with a double whammy today and I thought it best to post this poem for yesterday - a poem that I wrote for my fiancee; always reminded of the many different ways in which she makes me so happy, and keeping me mindful of the very mutable nature of love in general.


"There's love, and then there's love"


There’s love, and then there’s love
The second’s different from the first
The first will wait for your first date
The second, when things are worst

This doesn’t mean the second love
Is something that’s to dread
Or that the first is nothing more
Than sweet words that we’ve said

And never has it been the truth
That the first in time shall fade
The fact is that it stays intact and
Molds the second to be made, but

To say the second is much stronger
Is a debate one might avoid
For the first is what has held us
Through those moments we enjoyed

Where the first would say, “You’re beautiful”
The second would gaze and smile
The first would take you in their arms
The second would hold you awhile

The first will hand you a ring and a rose
And the second will make you tea
The first will love you till the end
And the second will be there to see

For when the second’s full matured
The first will take rest in the mind
And hold those moments dear to us
Both the first and second entwined

And here and again, they both remind
That there’s love, and then there’s love
The first that sowed the sweetest dream
And the second that grew thereof


- Joshua Clarke

Day 4 - "Micro-omniscience"

For today's poem, I decided to post this poem in particular for two reasons. One, because the weather and general mood of the day is very much like the day when I originally composed this poem and this atmosphere figures heavily with the themes in the poem itself. Two, because this is one of two poems of mine that were recently published in UVM's annual Vantage Point student art & literary compiliation which was just released to the public today. I received my copy a few hours ago and, I have to say, the front cover is pretty badass. And yeah, I guess the stuff inside the cover is pretty neat too. :) Pick up a copy if you're able, and if you're here at UVM in Burlington, VT tonight, don't miss out on the naked bike ride. You just might see a naked poet running around, if you're lucky!


"Micro-omniscience"


Even wrappers that flitter in the dull wind
hath more life and color
Than this field of martyred grass, browned and gaunt
in profound and ageless lamentation
that can recall
a thousand other deaths
like hooded monks forced to meditate
on how horrid they are for daring to exist
in this tyrants’ land, where 99¢ will always accede the throne
and we shall sit and watch the fireworks’ finale in delight
upon their trampled heads.


- Joshua Clarke

Day 3 - "Through Amber Seams"

Today I've decided to post a poem that I wrote some time ago - probably about 2 years ago to be exact - for a college poetry class. It's a Petrarchan sonnet following an 'ABBA ABBA CDE DCE' rhyme scheme in meter. It might seem a bit archaic in its diction and pretty obviously Romantic in its expressed themes, but hey - that's one of my favorite poetic periods, so I can't really deny what I love and still be totally truthful, can I? :) Hope you enjoy the little trip back to the age of wonder, spirit, and exquisite verbiage.


"Through Amber Seams"


In light of what that summer brought, to us now bold and lost
A foreign sun now rests upon the form once dressed in dew and dreams
In distant years we leapt through fields; wandered free through amber seams
Before the angels wafted low, with rivers dark to cross
The sails we tended ripped us loose, towards our tempests toss’d
Where virgin vales hid lovely snares that knew no mercies in their teem
The echoes in the splendoured coves are all that linger still to keen
While sleepless eyes invade the nights as bitter days exhaust
Oh fie, oh fie, by grace divine, what song shall now be sung
Of fortune’s joy that hears the voice that spouts so bright in youth?
What tales be told ‘neath pitch’s boughs where fires slouch and wait?
Only those that the weary child bears, now weighted down with truth
So crimson wings may shriek the sins to knaves, amassed and strung
With amber seams like summer’s beams whose sheen conceals the bait

- Joshua Clarke