Looking into the City Eclogue book, the first poem I looked at was from pages 22-25, titled "As it Crested the Hill".
Taking a look at the format of the poem can be a bit overwhelming. There are constantly (1) spaces between words for no reason. I think the reason for them is to allow the reader to read a bit slower, pause, and think about the last statement they just read before continuing with the rest of the thought. (2) The poem did not repeat any statements, but did emphasize some of the points/themes of gravity. (3) He only uses one indifferent capitalization of a word. Looking on page 25, at the very end of the poem he ends it as, "The Way Earth comes gliding in". He capitalizes "way" and "earth" to allow for a long understanding and greater meaning of the two words. (4) Looking at page 22, the exert,
"Filming a chase,
the crew's stuntmen
must aim the car's lift into the air
for the picture."
shows that the sentence break between words is separating two parts of his idea or image. If you re read the exert a second time with a long ponder pause it allows you to capture more of a sense of what he is trying to get at.
Now lets look at the content of this work. The author uses lots of descriptive words that refer to a type of line or shape. "Garden of curves" "it's season of arc." are both sentences that use specific words to describe the individual make up of a noun. Take a look on page 24 where he says a statement that is literally written flat-out in your face. "The best ride on gravity is walking." I think he is trying to summarize the first part of his work for us in order to understand the second half of it.
For the second half of the book, I chose the poem "Untitled" on page 117.
Don't read any of the words yet. Simply just look at the page. The poem's format is a bit different from the first one. (1)There is only one blank space that is for extra pause. (2) The poem is split into three sections. (3)Then has a page break, followed by an (4)italic poem that is very spaced out and is used for extra information and thoughts. (5)He specifically made a title for the poem, Untitled. I think he did this in order for us, the reader, to find out what it really should be called since the poem itself is a bit hard to break down. I myself had to read the poem numerous times in order to capture some of his thoughts.
Looking into the poem now, we see very different things. The first section give you a start at what type of poem we will be reading.
"Sky walls and white
neoclassical moulding cloud
wedgewood days room
after room of palace season."
Ed sets up a type of room and scene for the first image he puts into your head. To me, it made me think that we see the same type of thing everyday and become habit to us in each way but is different depending on the perspective of the person looking at it.
" Vacation a blue gown of ocean
a host September like her
not since anyone remembers
seen.
For the second section he shows that there was a change in the way that he looked at things. There was some type of break in what he was seeing or feeling. That is blue as far as he can see and couldn't remember the last time he saw something like this.
" Any fall of palaces seemed
shelved among the porcelain
exhibits of narrower centuries
from this beach."
Concluding the poem, he finishes with a sense of time has passed and it seems completely different. That the place has become still now with a new perspective of the room or palaces.
*
"A smoke dust empties the sky
of it's blue
as if emptying a building ----
a whole other
day clears
Under a shadowless cloud"
The last ending of the page give us a sense of closure and feeling of emptiness. That none of it really existed to him and instead just gave a sense of hope to a new thought. The imagery throughout his poem is unbearable and extremely vivid. He chose his words careful in order to give us a very strong image of his words. With that, it become easier to read his work and start to grasp what he is saying throughout his poem.
really great responses here, well done! Nice job thinking and articulating through great examples and discussion.
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