My comments on Leonard Cohen's line about poetry as ash the other day reminded me of this of mine - from the distant archives - another of my little exercises in extended metaphor, attempting to find some solace in the way that painful relationships often feed one's creativity.
Not one of my better efforts, I don't think. I've always felt the first line deserves something rather better, and long to find an opportunity to re-use it.
Here it is, anyway:
A Dark Flame
Ours was a dark flame indeed
A guttering candle
That covered everything
With a thick soot
Of fear and melancholy
Confusion and despair
But even the most faltering fire is warm
And we can use this soot to write with
3 comments:
Have you been introduced to the Indian musical game Antakshari? the idea is to start a new song using the last word of the song verse your opponent just sang. It requires a large repetoire of songs and some quick thinking. But it is a popular game, there and amongst some Indians in the US, who are tooned into Bollywood.
Well, the reason I thought of Antakshari is because the game can be modified to apply to poems or stories, published or created on the spot, and it can easily be played over the internet through blogs and emails.
You could further modify it and invite readers to come up with alternate applications for your first line: "Ours was a dark flame indeed"
Who are your other readers? You talk to them in your posts, so I assume they email you privately. Are they extremely shy people? They must not then be expats - as based on our mutual understanding of who becomes an expat(from our discussion thread in your other blog), expats tend not to be shy.
Though I'm sure there are plenty of other reasons for them not to comment directly onto your blog - crappy net service in **** not being the least of them!
Thus far, I am the 'shy' one - having been reticent about alerting many of my friends in ***** to the existence of the blogs (largely, in fact, for fear that they might comment too much - and blow the 'Where in the world am I?' game!).
I suppose my 'core readership' are the 60 or so friends in other parts of the world who are on my regular e-mailing list (and who receive - roughly weekly - an extended 'bulletin' about my life here, which is far more explicit about the country and the individuals I know here). I've "advertised" the blogs to that list a few times over the past couple of months, and I know that several of them, at least, are fairly regular readers.
I don't think their reticence about commenting is down to "shyness" - just a case of not being very Net-savvy, or not into the whole blogging thing.
My hope for developing a wider readership rests on people - like yourself - who casually happen upon the site(s).... and like it so much they TELL ALL THEIR FRIENDS.
I hope that's not too onerous a responsibility, Tulsa! Your mission, should you choose to accept it..... is to bring me some more readers>
LOL... I've totally misread my mission. For some reason I assumed you preferred the quiet private salon aspect of this blog.
So, I sneakily referred one friend to it, with specific instructions not to comment. Considering this blog is public - anyone can access it - I didn't feel too bad about referring the "one" friend. But I went no further than that for fear of being the "party-crasher" who invites along 20 friends. :)
- especially since you claim to know who I am and I offered to reveal my identity when I see you, next - I'd hate to offend! (not that I usually like to anonymously offend, either!)
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