espiritista

tula! tula!

this is a lovely poem i found in a friend's blog. medyo accessible naman siya, as long as the reader can get its allusive style. the key is treating it as a dream poem, precisely why its title is like that. i particularly like the last line. it is very much atwood's style to deliver coup de grace lines at the end, sort of summing up the entire poem in several words.

i also like the play in the phrasing. notice how several phrases have been cut awkwardly to jolt the reader into accepting two or more possible readings of every line. ambiguity is a real dream!

i find the first stanza stuttering, though. parang hirap mag take off.

otherwise, it's a lovely poem of achetypal effects. enjoy dear friends!

variations on the word sleep
margaret atwood


i would like to watch you sleeping,
which may not happen.
i would like to watch you,
sleeping. i would like to sleep
with you, to enter
your sleep as its smooth dark wave
slides over my head

and walk with you through that lucent
wavering forest of bluegreen leaves
with its watery sun & three moons
towards the cave where you must descend,
towards your worst fear
i would like to give you the silver
branch, the small white flower, the one
word that will protect you
from the grief at the center
of your dream, from the grief
at the center. i would like to follow
you up the long stairway
again & become
the boat that would row you back
carefully, a flame
in two cupped hands
to where your body lies
beside me, and you enter
it as easily as breathing in

i would like to be the air
that inhabits you for a moment
only. i would like to be that unnoticed
& that necessary.

posted by dyeproks @ 11:49 PM