Song of Unself
by Bill Yarrow
I cerebrate myself and singe myself
and what you illume, I refuse
for every good Adam betrothed to you will to me betray
I chafe and incite my soul
I bake and chafe in my disease
my speech, every item of tongue foams in this soil-
free dust
earth's parents … whose parents …
arrrrggghhh … I now sixty-seven
sixty-eight, sixty-nine years
chagrin besmears me, increases
till death, old shoals in obeisance
nothing suffices as harbor
but a permit to claw at every yawing chasm
exuberance is beauty … lesion of enthusiasm
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Author's Note
This poem was published in Treehouse.
It is one of my "Translations from the English."
"exuberance is beauty"--William Blake
"lesion of enthusiasm"--F. Scott Fitzgerald
This poem appears in Incompetent Translations and Inept Haiku (Cervena Barva Press 2013).
This poem appears in "Against Prompts."
https://www.amazon.com/Against-Prompts-Bill-Yarrow/dp/1943170282
"lesion of enthusiasm",
like so much else in this, is wonderful
Perfect harmonies, Bill. Strong piece. Favorite lines:
"nothing suffices as harbor
but a permit to claw at every yawing chasm"
Yes. *
The ending packs a punch. Love the notion of the permit to claw. Keep clawing away. *
I like how the poem seems to change/transform personas with each new stanza, with increasingly rich alliteration toward the end.
I love the whole thing.
Thanks for great comments, Gary, Sam, Jake, Miranda, and Amanda.
I know I shouldn't have, but I laughed. *
Joani: I should hope so! Glad you did. Thanks!
That's a brave poem. I keep going back to the lines:
"I bake and chafe in my disease
my speech, every item of tongue foams in this soil-/
free dust." I laughed, cringed, and laughed again.
"chagrin besmears me." Yes.*
Thanks, Emily and Gary.