My Twentieth Year - 25. not knowing

Number 52 surely asks a heartbreaking question. For if we cannot know or connect with beauty in some way...hold it an behold it...then what are we about? And is beauty there only to tantalize? torture? The postlude only adds another layer to these questions. Your poem provokes me, in a good way.

Number 53 had an arresting thought...stillness in a buttercup or a vagrant...what marvelous juxtaposition.

Hope your twenty year old self felt the air had cleared after these..

On 07/25/2016 12:38 PM, Parker Owens said:

Number 52 surely asks a heartbreaking question. For if we cannot know or connect with beauty in some way...hold it an behold it...then what are we about? And is beauty there only to tantalize? torture? The postlude only adds another layer to these questions. Your poem provokes me, in a good way.

 

Number 53 had an arresting thought...stillness in a buttercup or a vagrant...what marvelous juxtaposition.

 

Hope your twenty year old self felt the air had cleared after these..

You've left me a kind review, Parker. Thank you! The function/purpose of beauty is a common theme in my early poetry. Perhaps it was my closeted self looking around and wondering why what I felt was so 'bad' according to the het-centric indoctrination I was forced to endure. Oh well, thank goodness times have changed for the better.

No. 53 is a brief poem but I tried to question how form can coalesce around ideas seemingly unrelated and yet bound together on an invisible plane.

Thanks for your support. You're the best!

I've been reading these for a while now.

I'm not so clever as Parker, but the more I read 52, the more I've become convinced I was not reading about beauty as in looks. It's not a beautiful face or a beautiful painting or a beautiful Lamborghini. Because of the longing aspect of the poem, for me, it's the beauty of love, or more specifically, the love for a person. and that makes it a sad poem.

53 presents us with the poet's 'stillness' in his heart. And that, to me, is very heartbreaking. More sadness.

You - now, see beauty in so many places, in many things and in yourself. Is that what you were looking for then, at 20? The beauty inside of you? Or you with another? It's what i felt when i read 52.
Not sure about the second .. the line that stood out to me was 'for if i can't, how can you' what does that mean? Is it confusion, questioning your blindness perhaps ..

On 07/26/2016 08:01 AM, skinnydragon said:

I've been reading these for a while now.

 

I'm not so clever as Parker, but the more I read 52, the more I've become convinced I was not reading about beauty as in looks. It's not a beautiful face or a beautiful painting or a beautiful Lamborghini. Because of the longing aspect of the poem, for me, it's the beauty of love, or more specifically, the love for a person. and that makes it a sad poem.

 

53 presents us with the poet's 'stillness' in his heart. And that, to me, is very heartbreaking. More sadness.

Thank you, skinny. One thing I want to acknowledge and praise is how you give my work several reads, and let it soak in, so to speak.

Your comments on No. 52 ring true to me, I might also say the struggle for me at the time was about love of self.

In the same light, I suppose the same can be said about No. 53.

Thanks once again for your comments and support. I appreciate it.

On 07/26/2016 10:28 AM, Mikiesboy said:

You - now, see beauty in so many places, in many things and in yourself. Is that what you were looking for then, at 20? The beauty inside of you? Or you with another? It's what i felt when i read 52.

Not sure about the second .. the line that stood out to me was 'for if i can't, how can you' what does that mean? Is it confusion, questioning your blindness perhaps ..

Yes, Tim, I think you hit on it.

Concerning No. 53, the question I believe is about trying to funnel all the vast input of existing both physically and emotionally into such an imperfect medium as words. Words are tricky, for they liberate as much as they confine, and that's a struggle I still process all the time. Many of the Tony Sonnets follow lines of thought which they return to with frequency because some ideas nagged me and I did not feel I 'said it right.'

Thank you, as always, for your amazing reviews. Cheers!