Awww thanks so much Pleasant - I really really appreciate your comment. 🖤 Those lines are very special to me. Wrote them in a txt to someone who means a lot to me - and then finished the poem off later.
What a stunning group of poems, Dick. Each one turns on a different idea or feeling. I think my favorite might be “Beset,” but all are quite fine, as is you homage at the end,
Interesting, and I probably agree about overused new tech in poetry. To be honest, though, my concern wasn’t so much with the train as with the kind of expressed emotions. This may well result from ignorance on my part about the author’s life. But the emotions seemed to me a bit generic, or “poetic”. I struggle to forget that line from Wilde: about sentiment being the emotion you don’t have to pay for. But as I say, this may all be wide of the mark, arising from my lack of knowledge of this poet. I enjoyed the post. As always, it was stimulating, and I value that. 🙂
Okay yeah, I get it. I mean, invariably some emotions land for each of us, and some don't. But ya can't help the way it lands - it either does or doesn't. And sometimes more context might change this, but sometimes not. And I can totally see how this one could feel that way. And cheers - totally understood! I really appreciate your takes on things Thomas - always thoughtful and interesting. Hope you're doing well. x
Thanks, Dick. Yes, I’m pretty well. I hope you are too. (Though I wish these last few weeks I’d had more time for Substack - and wonderful ‘stacks like your own! 🙂)
“versatility of thought and technique” - yes, that’s very much the impression one gets here. I like it, even while I feel (as I often do with poets of this generation) that the new (for example, the strange, mechanical experience of a train journey) never quite escapes a kind of pre-Raphaelite lassitude, a self-conscious exhaustion. Thanks as always for a fascinating read.
Always a pleasure Thomas! Hmmm interesting. I find the train poem quite fresh - doesn't feel laboured or like the train is being used for its "newness" so much as it just happens to be where she is while exploring those emotions? But I do know what you mean, there is a lot of "modern" work which overuses "new" technological images. Tbh - I find a lot of recent poems about the internet and computers and the like very much of this ilk. It's interesting how new technologies impact poetry - and the stages they must go through in this process, from something "new" to something "commonplace" to the metaphorical realm, and all the associations they invariably build up over time, etc. Fascinating stuff!
Yeah, I know what you mean Hasse. Such a stunner of a poem. Love the way you put it here. If you do - you should upload a video of you reciting it some time! That's be pretty great. Aw thanks - it's a special one for me. Might return to it, and develop it into something longer at some point. But who knows haha.
Maybe I will record it at one point. I've struggled a bit with how I'd best prefer to recite poetry. Lately, I've gotten a better idea of it (basically to lose myself in it completely and go buck wild), but it's still not quite there. Maybe someday!
Hehe - definitely. Love it! Yeah - go wild with it. :-) If you ever need someone to give it a quick EQ and mix, let me know. I got pretty good with audio engineering for a bit, and doing voice work is pretty easy.
Love your 'found tanka' Dick, and your poem. It is magical the way Eunice can be so fiercely honest and playful in one breath. I so admire the art of language in these poems.
Thanks for mentioning Microseasons--super-kind of you! 💛
Aw thanks Ann. That's such a lovely way of putting it - fiercely honest and playful. So true! And thanks for the kind words about my work as always - means heaps. Half wrote mine in a txt to someone very special to me, and then finished it off later, so it's one that means a lot to me. And so happy to plug Microseasons! I've got some issues to catch up on - and really looking forward to it. Have a train ride tomorrow - might read them then. Hope you're well.
The denseness of Eunice Tietjens' work is astonishing. Every line is filled to the rim of preserved emotion. What a talent.
Wow - what a comment Kim! Absolutely agree.
"also bodies are wild / & / a kind of wilderness:"
I think these lines capture a very beautiful thought.
Amazing writing, Whyte.👌🏾
Awww thanks so much Pleasant - I really really appreciate your comment. 🖤 Those lines are very special to me. Wrote them in a txt to someone who means a lot to me - and then finished the poem off later.
“I see them, and I see them not.”
What a stunning group of poems, Dick. Each one turns on a different idea or feeling. I think my favorite might be “Beset,” but all are quite fine, as is you homage at the end,
Let’s go!
Aw cheers Paul - yeah, agreed. She wrote some bangers. Ya, Beset is pretty special - love the impact of that one too. Let's go, indeed! 🖤
Interesting, and I probably agree about overused new tech in poetry. To be honest, though, my concern wasn’t so much with the train as with the kind of expressed emotions. This may well result from ignorance on my part about the author’s life. But the emotions seemed to me a bit generic, or “poetic”. I struggle to forget that line from Wilde: about sentiment being the emotion you don’t have to pay for. But as I say, this may all be wide of the mark, arising from my lack of knowledge of this poet. I enjoyed the post. As always, it was stimulating, and I value that. 🙂
Okay yeah, I get it. I mean, invariably some emotions land for each of us, and some don't. But ya can't help the way it lands - it either does or doesn't. And sometimes more context might change this, but sometimes not. And I can totally see how this one could feel that way. And cheers - totally understood! I really appreciate your takes on things Thomas - always thoughtful and interesting. Hope you're doing well. x
Thanks, Dick. Yes, I’m pretty well. I hope you are too. (Though I wish these last few weeks I’d had more time for Substack - and wonderful ‘stacks like your own! 🙂)
“versatility of thought and technique” - yes, that’s very much the impression one gets here. I like it, even while I feel (as I often do with poets of this generation) that the new (for example, the strange, mechanical experience of a train journey) never quite escapes a kind of pre-Raphaelite lassitude, a self-conscious exhaustion. Thanks as always for a fascinating read.
Always a pleasure Thomas! Hmmm interesting. I find the train poem quite fresh - doesn't feel laboured or like the train is being used for its "newness" so much as it just happens to be where she is while exploring those emotions? But I do know what you mean, there is a lot of "modern" work which overuses "new" technological images. Tbh - I find a lot of recent poems about the internet and computers and the like very much of this ilk. It's interesting how new technologies impact poetry - and the stages they must go through in this process, from something "new" to something "commonplace" to the metaphorical realm, and all the associations they invariably build up over time, etc. Fascinating stuff!
I think I just might go ahead and commit Beset to memory. A beautifully contained summation of modern existence, or something like that.
Your poem felt like a call to sink into myself: feelings, warts and all. Nice as usual!
Yeah, I know what you mean Hasse. Such a stunner of a poem. Love the way you put it here. If you do - you should upload a video of you reciting it some time! That's be pretty great. Aw thanks - it's a special one for me. Might return to it, and develop it into something longer at some point. But who knows haha.
Let the poetry go where it takes ya, hehe.
Maybe I will record it at one point. I've struggled a bit with how I'd best prefer to recite poetry. Lately, I've gotten a better idea of it (basically to lose myself in it completely and go buck wild), but it's still not quite there. Maybe someday!
Hehe - definitely. Love it! Yeah - go wild with it. :-) If you ever need someone to give it a quick EQ and mix, let me know. I got pretty good with audio engineering for a bit, and doing voice work is pretty easy.
That's kind of you, Dick. Thanks for the offer!
Love your 'found tanka' Dick, and your poem. It is magical the way Eunice can be so fiercely honest and playful in one breath. I so admire the art of language in these poems.
Thanks for mentioning Microseasons--super-kind of you! 💛
Aw thanks Ann. That's such a lovely way of putting it - fiercely honest and playful. So true! And thanks for the kind words about my work as always - means heaps. Half wrote mine in a txt to someone very special to me, and then finished it off later, so it's one that means a lot to me. And so happy to plug Microseasons! I've got some issues to catch up on - and really looking forward to it. Have a train ride tomorrow - might read them then. Hope you're well.
mmm the poetic life . . .reading on trains and texting poems to loved ones. That sounds so good Dick--enjoy, enjoy, enjoy it all!
Yeah - absolutely. Enjoying it a lot! You too x