Intro post from ariestess

[ariestess]

[Note :: I can't believe that I almost forgot to post this today! This is what I get for getting distracted by other things.]


He-ey there! I'm ariestess and I'll be your host this week on poetree.

I think I've been interested in poetry pretty much my entire life, but it wasn't until my first year of junior high school [circa 1982-1983 -- yes, I'll date myself] that I really got into poetry. I'd been reading a YA book about the "suicide poets" and got introduced to Sylvia Plath and Anne Sexton, plus a third female poet whose name is currently a blank, like the title and author. [And if this book sounds at all familiar to you, please let me know if you know the title or author, as I've been searching for it for YEARS now.]

The first poem I wrote that I still have a copy of was in 1985, I believe [the binder isn't with me currently], and it was an awfully cheesy thing about soap operas. Well, I suppose it might have been a bit clever, but still... I really got into writing freeform poetry in junior high and high school or, as I like to call it, the suicidal years. Plath's work really influenced me back then. Now, I'm influenced by a wide variety of poets and styles, but Plath is still at the top of my list.

In college, I took a couple of creative writing courses from a published author/poet, J.D. Whitney, and I got rehooked on poetry. Plus, being an English and theatre major, I kind of had poetry hammered into me, so it's probably a good thing that I enjoy it so much. There's a sense of both immediacy and permanence to poetry that is completely different from prose, which I also love.

For this week, I've decided to highlight a few of the more obscure poem forms that I like to use, with examples from my own poetry. But for today, I am going to offer up a poem that I wrote back in 1998. At the time, I was writing it as a spell for the beads that would be in my juju braid [or was it a bracelet or necklace? I forget now], a way for me to have a constant physical reminder of the wiccan/pagan path I was following. To this day, I still want to utilize this spell/poem somehow, but I just haven't decided how yet...


"Journey of Souls"
by A. Magiluna Stormwriter
26 September 1998


Red for the blood which flows in our veins
Orange for the flames in which Destruction & Creation are wrought
Yellow for the sun, the Father God Incarnate
Silver for the stars in the nighttime sky, mantle of the moon, the Mother Goddess Incarnate
Green for the Earth, symbol of life and all living things
Blue for the waters of the Earth, sustaining source of all life
Purple for the beauty & sanctity of life, all life
Black that surrounds them, symbolizing the darkness of the womb from which we emerge in birth & the darkness of the tomb to which we succumb and return in death to await rebirth

Thus the journey of souls always has been & always will be

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Comments

[lilmoka]

I love that you wrote a poem about a soap opera, that's so sweet!

I'm fascinated by your poem. I'm very fond of the colours you chose and I like the symbolism behind each of them, especially black. It's not one of my favourite colours, but I can totally see how it could represent both the beginning and the end of things.

[ariestess]

That first poem was actually written to incorporate the names of all of the soaps up to that point in it. That's where the cleverness comes into play. Otherwise, it was cheesy. If I can find the binder easily when I get home on Thursday, maybe I'll post it up somewhere before my week of hosting is over...

I remember that this poem here was something of a spell that I was coming up with. I think it was a variation on an affirmation [despite being WAY too long for one LOL] or like praying on a rosary of sorts. Eventually, I'll get the beads onto something that I can work with...

[lilmoka]

The soap idea is lovely. I'd love to read it, if you can find it :)

Were you thinking of a mantra like affirmation or something else?

[ariestess]

Mantra might be close. I think it was going to be something to based a pagan rosary off of eventually. Which now has me thinking along those lines again... LOL!

[jjhunter]

Dana Gioia wrote that poetry is "words charged with their utmost meaning". If there is any way that words can change the world that hears them, it makes sense to me that poetry would be the most effective way of going about it.

You mentioned theatre -- did you ever get involved in poetry readings or slam poetry? I don't know as much about poetry-as-performance as I would like, and I get the sense that there is performance or movement or ritual of some kind that yearns to go with the piece you shared here that I simply don't have the experience to make sense of.

[ariestess]

Oh, I like that quote!

never got into poetry readings or slam poetry, though I'm starting to want to. I'm just not sure my poems are quite the right vein for that sort of thing, since I always see that the poems used are longer and have a certain cadence...

[alee_grrl]

I find that poetry suits ritual quite nicely. Perhaps because both are a way of distilling and focusing ideas and thoughts?

The color imagery in this poem is lovely.

jjhunter, I've never had the chance to do slam poetry or dub poetry (a Jamaican poetry form similar to slam poetry). I do know that dub poetry has a ritual of movement, timing and performance. It's beautiful to hear and amazing to watch. Very powerful.

[jjhunter]

Oo...I'd never heard of dub poetry before you mentioned it here! Wikipedia tells me riddles about it:

In musical settings; the Dub Poet usually appears on stage with a band performing music specifically written to accompany each poem, rather than simply perform over the top of dub plates, or riddims, in the Dancehall fashion. Musicality is built into Dub poems, yet, Dub Poets generally perform without backing music, delivering chanted speech with pronounced rhythmic accentuation and dramatic stylization of gesture. [Emphasis added]

One is left wondering whether dub poetry is usually performed with music or without it! It sounds like you might have been to a performance or two yourself; is that the case? I'd love to hear more about it.

[alee_grrl]

The performances I witnessed were done without musical backing for the most part. I think I saw one of two where the performance was punctuated with a drum, but most were done with just the rhythm of the words and body language forming the musicality of the performance.

[jjhunter]

I hunger for your memory, for the sounds and smells and word-music suggested by what you've shared. Must find out if there's any of this happening within commuter rail distance of where I live.

[alee_grrl]

There are large Caribbean communities on the East Coast, so if that's where you are you should be able to find some events.

You can also find some good examples on youtube. I've got to run to class, but I'll try to find some really good youtube videos of dub poetry later and share them. :)

[ariestess]

Poetry does suit ritual quite nicely. I always balk at the use of rhyming in my rituals and poetry. It's some sort of ingrained disdain in me that I think came about because of so many teachers in the past saying that it's not poetry if it doesn't rhyme. And I really HATE having strictures on my creativity like that, so I now rarely do anything that rhymes.

And thank you. I had specific plastic pony beads in mind when I'd written the poem. Now, I want to see if I can find some nice glass beads to make something...

[untonuggan]

I love that you shared a wiccan/pagan poem first of all, especially this close to Ostara. It is lovely! Especially because so much of Gardnerian wiccan liturgy has evolved through the poetry of Doreen Valiente (such as the Charge of the Goddess). I don't know if you still follow a pagan path, I sort of wobble on and off of it myself due to a variety of circumstances. I'm sort of...pagan-Buddhist and such. But this was a really nice poem to wake up to.

I especially like the last line, it really resonates with me:
Thus the journey of souls always has been & always will be

[ariestess]

I actually follow an eclectic wiccan path [that's transforming to a more eclectic pagan path, incorporating faiths beyond just Wicca]. I really should frame more of my poetry in that vein, I just don't often think about it when I'm writing it. Maybe that'll have to be the theme for my April Free Poem Day. *considers*

And I love Valiente's "Charge of the Goddess".

The last line of this poem always gets me... I still have no idea where it came from, but it's just so perfect...