A Dreaming Poet

a dedication for all poets on this site and elsewhere, especially for those using metaphors

Your words have an elusive body.

They walk on the palm’s lines,

over the silent waters between you and me,

emotions like waves are nestling stone eggs

inside a dream seashell.

 

White flamingoes

are mirroring themselves

in shards of tears.

 

Under your arm an angel is sleeping,

he knows by heart only the prayers

forgotten in childhood.

 

He won’t awake,

I won’t awake him.

Reviews

[xx]

I see a great deal of symbolism in this poem.

I don't know if you were already aware that the flamingo and the date palm (I'm going to assume that the "palm" in line two is a palm tree for now, but I'll circle back to this later) are both things that symbolized the Egyptian sun god Ra, the resurrection god, the one who triumphs over death every day and demonstrates the active intermingling of life, death, and rebirth. While Ra was meant to embody the victory over /death/, specifically, the flamingo and the palm can both represent victory in general, or transcendence. The stone often represents longevity, and the seashell, too, represents a kind of longevity as well - regeneration, specifically.

Of course, the "palm" you mentioned could also be the palm of a hand. In this case, the palm could represent the dominant forces in a person's (specifically, a writer's) life, as the lines of a palm can symbolize the heart, the life, and the state of the mind. I found this especially intriguing (though I don't see any merit in palm reading, honestly) as writers are known to use their /hands/ to practice their art.

I'm not sure if you meant for all these symbols to tie in together or if it's my symbol-mongering senses going on overdrive, but nevertheless, I'll continue my analysis now that I've laid out my cards on the table:

"Your words have an elusive body" - true, especially if you're referring specifically to the abstract and uncommon metaphors and figurative language that so many writers use. Not everyone will get every metaphor. The understanding of metaphors relies on a penetrating combination of personal experience, imagination, and empathy with the writer, and everyone has come across /some/ example of figurative language that is simply beyond their ken. Nevertheless, every metaphor is meaningful, even if a reader (or many readers, even) do not understand them all. The metaphors live on, transcend, whatever you call it, whether or not they are understood.

And the metaphors that readers /do/ understand - well, these metaphors forge a solid bridge between writer and reader, and they share a certain wavelength, empathize with each other, experience a distinct sense of simpatico that mere dictionary definitions and denotations cannot convey between the two: "They walk on the palm's lines/over the silent waters between you and me."

White symbolizes purity - and also transcendence. The white flamingo then represents balance, beauty, purity; perhaps this is also meant to symbolize the metaphor's beauty in literature, in communication.

The angel often represents protection, guardianship, guidance, and strength. Perhaps this is meant to reflect the qualities of the words a writer pens. The writer seeks strength in his work, and others seek strength in reading the fruits of these writers' pens. The writer writes to guard his inner strength, his inner spirit (not a spirit in the sense of an immortal being, but spirit as in an inner power, motivation, drive). And yet many writers are motivated by sadness, pain, the unhappy things in their lives as well - by their "shards of tears."

The sleeping angel under our arm guides us, but is it capable of guiding us in its sleep? So perhaps we seek merely the comfort and security of its presence, and from thence do we derive our words and metaphors.

I'm not very good at analysis, but there it is. I could go on, but that would be a great deal of mush for you to read, so I'll leave it at that. As for constructive criticism, I suggest you reword the last stanza just a tad. For example, perhaps you would like to say "I won't awaken him" in the last line? But do as you see fit; I am only a reviewer.

Lovely poem, and I hope you continue to share more of your work. Happy writing! :)

-Mina

[Cristina Moldoveanu]

Thank you Mina. You decrypted perfectly many symbols I used in this poem. I admit that this is not my usual way of writing, here I tried something different. Yes, I was aware of the symbolism of palm and many times I tried to use words with double meaning in order to create special effects. I also have two old poems with palm leaves.
I will think about your suggestion. Maybe I should have written I won't awaken him, but really I wanted so much to create a repetition there with the same verb. I know it has transitive and intransitive value. I am inclined to think that you are right about that.
Thank you very much for your wonderful insight into my poem !
Cristina

[DeliriousCerises]

So I am curious, but is English your first language? From your profile and the few poems I have read, I would guess not, but I'm unsure. I guess I mostly ask because in this poem at the end "he wont awake" would probably sound more natural as "he wont wake" the same goes for the use of "awake" in the next stanza. I overall like the flow of this, I especially like the images you evoke in the first paragraph. When I think of "walking on water" I think of a very graceful, almost dance like movement. lightly stepping, subtle. Metaphors are very elusive, and subtle, often too subtle for me to catch, or understand entirely. I seem to have this problem later in your poem as well. I have no idea what the flamingos are about, but I do enjoy the bit about the angel. Like innocence "he knows by heart only the prayers forgotten in childhood" the last two stanzas instill in me the idea that innocence is not lost, it merely becomes a dream in our adult lives.

[Cristina Moldoveanu]

of course English is not my native language.
I was very, very tired yesterday, i could barely keep my head up.
I wrote correctly flamingoes but this gooogle auto-correction made me do that mistake, because it became underlined with red, although flamingoes is correct and I was tricked.
About awake - I believed it is ok. I don't think it has to sound very natural in a poem, especially one like this in which I tried to create an elusive atmosphere, thanks a lot for your comment.

[Cristina Moldoveanu]

and right now I searched again in the dictionaries, everywhere both versions are correct - flamigoes and flamingos.

[DeliriousCerises]

Oh, I meant I just didn't understand what the metaphor behind flamingos was. I wasn't commenting on the spelling.

[Cristina Moldoveanu]

Thank you very much for your kindness, I understood that in fact you liked this poem.

[DeliriousCerises]

I did, it was well done. You're welcome.