Sta.sh
You will notice first, the bone jutting
from my meat, it is called teeth,
These are my lips;
This, like so, is called a smile.
And then there are the fabrications that I wear
The layers of silk, of wool,
of iron air
(indeed there is an air that I am not quite there)
- And feathers I have wrapped into my hair
And Afghan pearls, and finally
My hands, hare-fleet, and meeting
yours.
| Deviant Login | Shop | Join deviantART for FREE  |
Take the Tour  |
'the fabrications that I wear' - a reminder of the meanings of the word 'fabric' - that it is not necessarily just a substance, but a construct, just as much as social interaction is a construct. The smile is formed on the face, the fabric is formed into clothes. I like the fact that the materials you mention are natural, sourced from animals, just like the 'meat' of the previous verse.
'iron air' - I don't know if I read the correct meaning into this or not, but it gives me a thought of blood inside meeting the air outside, connecting the person to the world around. The air is another layer about the body, and you have expanded the tight focus on the meat of a person to encompass the wider world. It also makes me think of one of those days where the air is cold and heavy and you can really feel it around you just as much as you feel cold iron against your hand.
'an air that I am not quite there' - love the rhyme inside this line, and the repetition of the word 'air' from the previous line, the rhyme with 'wear' drawing the stanza together. You work so well with repeating sounds all through this poem. If I picked out every instance I would be here all day - but I particularly like that the harder sounds of the first stanza have changed to far softer sounds in the second. I could spend a long time thinking of meanings for that line about not being quite there, but my first instinct is that having moved out from the blood and bone to the constructions of decorative cloth, the eye is dazzled into ceasing to see the human inside.
The 'feathers I have wrapped into my hair / And Afghan pearls' - I immediately think of something exotic, of that portrait of an Afghan girl on the cover of the National Geographic so long ago. There's something special about the term 'Afghan pearls' that brings in a vista of exotic possibilities. There seems to be a thread of something connected to anthropology through this (I use this term warily since I have a friend who has a PhD in the subject, and I am probably using it wrongly). The social construct of the smile, so intimately connected to the meat and bones of our being, the silk and wool and feathers and pearls that humans use to decorate their bodies, all sourced naturally from other creatures. Is it intentional that all these substances are sourced from animals rather than plants or man made?
The final stanza - 'My hands, hare-fleet, and meeting / yours' - I love the way you have finally drawn a real animal into the poem after the allusions to animal-sourced fabrics. There is a link to the meat and bone of the first stanza, the hare's teeth jutting from its jaw. There is an archaic feel to 'hare-fleet' - an animal that has largely been overshadowed by the rabbit, and the word 'fleet' that has largely dropped from our language in this context. It continues the feeling of the descriptions in the poem being linked to our deep past. And such a brief contact with the person being met. The whole poem is over in the blink of an eye. I like that you have put 'yours' on the final line, alone, separated from the deep description of the subject of the poem.
If I were to pick out any problems - the only thing I can see is 'the bone jutting / from my meat, it is called teeth' - I would be inclined to put '...meat. It is called...' But that's it - and that's only personal opinion. You can read things in a multitude of ways.
Thank you for writing this poem, and congratulations on the DD
I always used to be find it amusing, doing literary criticism, thinking what the writer may have thought of all the assertions about the meaning of their work. I know when I write things half the things people pick out are things I never thought about at all