The Recluse

[RiverNotch]

The Recluse


Bodiless powers enter frenzied revels
where contraries intermix. Where whirlwinds stir
wilderness dust, there genies pitch their tents
and transform the nearby cliffs into the walls
of an open bazaar---where fiery rays
shed by the summer sun shear through thick sheets
of falling water, there foxes or witches or ghoulish
hybrids of men and horses pledge their troth,
exchanging rings then receiving crowns of gold
from their presidents---and all who witness them
that better partake of this material world
learn how the blessing of flesh is in fact a curse
when confronted by such caprices. Only so fast
can the limbs fly, the colon or bladder void
their troublesome load, the veins and heart supply
blood to the bulk's extremes, the eyes and ears
absorb such sights and sounds, the doughy brain
cross its wires to comprehend both how
its vessel falls apart and how the surrounding
tempest beats and batters: only so gently
can devils display their sundry wares and haggle
in tongues beyond the merely hopeless to grasp
for those not of their race, the tigbàlang make
their solemn vows then purse their lips and kiss, 
by one way or the other spittle sweetened
with supernatural nectar being exchanged.
Beware the patch of light stippled with shadows,
the field of green specked red or blue specked gold.
Beware the silence broken by pulsing tones,
the drone that over and over stops and starts.
Beware the assembly that pledges to welcome all,
defining no outside group or force as other:
either it lies, or madness is its goal.

[matsunosuperfan]

This is borderline unreadable. The second sentence is an achievement in incomprehensibility. It really feels like the reader is an afterthought here and the speaker is just enjoying the sound of their own voice.

To be fair, I confess that is probably my reaction to these recent projects in general. I just don't get what you are going for. I have no reference point for the thing you are trying to do. Do you have any models? Where do you imagine these poems living? Who is reading them?

The first sentence feels like a cryptic crossword clue. You're being too coy with sensibility and pairing it with the purplest of prose. This is a bad combination and just poor technique. You can't be vague as heck and then smack us in the face with all these dense ass sentences. It's never going to work.

Even in something like Ashbery, we know we are in Popeye's kitchen and there's a dispute about the baby. I cannot even tell you what is happening at any point in this poem, or why I am meant to care.

Then we say a bunch of dramatic, universal sounding stuff all of a sudden. Beware this and that. It's a poem that badly needs to step outside itself and ask "what are we doing here?"