glass doors

[eclipse]

I left my body in my fortieth year
and encountered three glass doors
divided by water-passing through
the first door I saw forty incarnations
of myself-going through the second door
I saw twenty earths without a moon-
through the third door I saw representations
of myself from birth to death for each day
I spent on earth linking hands from the earth
to the moon being turned like the hands of a clock.
powered by the lunar orbit.

[Gatekeeper]

Oh, but why stop there? This seems like it should go on.

Enjoying the imagination of it.

[dedalus]

Then ... suddenly ... a fourth door, made not of glass but wood. It is closed but unlocked.

[eclipse]

Then suddenly he had nothing constructive to say...

[dr_con]

I like your surreal voice in this (and other things). My only criticism of this is that it feels, not only open to interpretation, as my favorite poems do, but lacks the cohesive thematic structure you are well known for. A little too much like: I had a dream last night' and not enough 'And the key (although it may not be legible) is the 'fish in glycerine' as an example.

 

Solid images, yet it left me wanting.

 

 

Many Thanks!

 

Juris

[badger11]

The imagination is hooked by the doors, clock, and has an appetite for more. Maybe ending the poem on 'clock' would define a closure.

 

badge

[David W. Parsley]

Hi Barry, I had let this one sit for a while, did not want to rush in where the site's angels were treading. I think the sense of incompleteness derives from the final run-on sentence. And I think that is symptomatic of the poem not yet being through a purging cycle of craft and polish. Another symptom of this is the excess use of unnecessary words (such as some of the "the"s [but not "a", thank goodness!]) and reemergence of vain repetitions (i.e. "door"). A poem of this brevity is particularly sensitive to excess baggage slowing down the sprint. And a concluding run-on sentence actually saps that energy, too, giving a sense of breathlessness rather than immediacy.

 

So what do I like? Well, everything else! Highly original and irresistably Symbolist. The shift in perspective between the doors, and what is that water between them? Cool!

 

Thanks,

- Dave