Monday, October 26, 2009

memento mori



The following poem is written as part of the TFE Poetry Bus Tour, a Monday poetry challenge that this week is a response to Krzystof Penderecki's Threnody for the Victims (of Hiroshima).

The challenge was to write as we listened to the music without knowing anything about the piece. In the spirit of the challenge, I did not even look at the title of the composition as I wrote the following poem, which I think has a strange synchronicity with the inspiration for the music:




Memento Mori

Moving, moving,

Roundabout,


We’re in, we’re in,

We can’t get out;


We’re held too long

Inside the song.


Hidden passage,

Many doors,


Stairs to nowhere,

Many floors,


Boarded windows

To the world,


Hiding, dodging

In a whirl;


Sliding slowly

Down the wall,


Head in hands,

We hear the call


To take up arms

Or else we fall.


The train we’re on,

The train is gone.


Looking back,

Grey and black,


Crowds of people

On the track.


Doors not opened.

Empty chairs.


Empty rooms

Inviting stares;


All is loss.

Lost is all.


We’re going,

We are gone.


31 comments:

  1. I like that graffito/stencil/ mural on the brick wall.I like this poem too that again reflects the theme of the musical piece, without any clues which shows the skill of the composer.Not art imitating art but art inspiring art.I like the staccatto rhythm of this (musical terms i realise)A great poem with empathy and resonance. Well done and tanksxz ye!

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  2. ps remember you will die ? apposite title!

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  3. Hi Karen, and wow! Completely different set of images, and I really liked was the progression that the words make - it steps on, and on, and that brought the original music to my mind.
    Began to get very painful, and powerful, for me at
    "The train we're on,
    The train is gone."
    which made me think of the journeys to the concentration camps, and this vision then amplified as the poem stepped to its end.
    Moved me.

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  4. Exactly.(What Titus said) Your poem moved me as well, and I also flashed on the concentration camp trains. Great rhythm to this poem, and a sense of confinement, imprisonment, and hopelessness. Good work.

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  5. Karen-it read like an accelerating heartbeat. Like a foiled escape. fun to read. Good job~rick

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  6. TFE - I wrote this just as it appears here, with the exceptions of a couple of punctuation changes (I don't do semicolons in stream-of-consciousness!). What excrutiating music! This was my first attempt at writing to music, and it was an interesting experiment. Thanks for the prompt.

    TFE - The title just seemed to fit the music. I titled it even before I knew the name of the music itself.

    Titus - I, too, thought of the concentration camps and of people hiding from capture. I guess I had the right war, wrong side of the world. I knew I felt annihilation in this music, though.

    Sandra - Had you ever tried this before -- writing to music? I had not, but I might try it again if my muse deserts me, as she seems to do on a regular basis. Thanks.

    Rick - This music was painful to listen to, and your description - like an accelerating heartbeat - fits it quite well. Thanks. (By the way, I've missed you!)

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  7. So sorry Karen for failing to link your poemWas pretty ragged by the end of the night.
    Yes and I meant to say i saw concentration camp trains in this too.It's interesting how a musical response to one atrocity can invoke images of another in a writers response to the music.Does that make sense? You've got something here Karen.Mucho tanxzs ye!

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  8. Karen, I saw yor response to Weaver in the Grass, which resonated with my own response and then I discovered the title of yor blog - wonderful.

    I love the idea of keeping secrets. we all have them.

    Your poem here also resonates for me, the impact of my memories of war, which I never lived through but experienced in that 'post memory' sort of way through my parents.

    Thanks for sharing it.

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  9. Wow, you've got couplets right through and how well they work as they take the reader on a journey - a very sinister and creepy journey. It works wonderfully.

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  10. Fascinating photo. I like the poem, with its rhythmic couplets and stark imagery.

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  11. Karen, I started listening to the music but I just couldn't take it long... it was opressing, painful, the torment of the souls lost at Hiroshima... I think your poem captures the essence of it with your great talent, and of that eerie mural...
    Very well done.

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  12. Karen...I turned the music on before I read your work so I could try and feel the words as you felt them. It is interesting for a prompt this discord in the music and how you brought accord in the couplets to a very unique image.

    I like this very much.

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  13. This is a great poem - lots of startling images in it. I particularly liked

    Empty rooms

    Inviting stares;

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  14. Hey, Karen, how did I miss you?

    I really like the rhythm here, it moves down the track very much like a train. Nice.

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  15. This reminds me so much of the Swedish film, "Songs From the Second Floor". You must see it!
    There was a real pace to this piece, Karen—very compelling!

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  16. It feels like the words are running away. Like the world is getting out of our hands. A mad rush. The structure complements the meaning so well.

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  17. wow - i love the dips and echos in the rhythm and the severed feeling of the last two lines - reminds me of emily dickinson - and how you render such powere in such short lines - "Hidden passage, / Many doors, / Stairs to nowhere, / Many floors," - a kind of hide & seek take on mortality, with a bite - with a lilting gravity. amazing.

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  18. Karen - from the haunting image, to the music, to your arresting words...separate, each is fascinating...together - stunning!

    The train we’re on,
    The train is gone.
    Looking back,
    Grey and black, .....chilling

    A most poignant piece that will linger in my mind.

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  19. Hi, Karen,
    Beautiful work in that poem. My favorite lines:

    Sliding slowly

    Down the wall,

    Head in hands,

    We hear the call

    To take up arms

    Or else we fall.

    I really love the image and the bravery in these lines.
    Also wanted to let you know I'm back and blogging again after time out in the hospital. It was a good, healing experience. Come and visit me again. Thank you for your prayers and good thoughts.

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  20. TFE - No problem! I'm just happy to be on the bus!

    Elizabeth - Welcome! It sounds as if we share some experiences. I'll be over to visit your blog as soon as I can get a chance. The work world has been intruding on my blogtime! How inconsiderate! Thanks for your comment. :-)

    Wigeon - Thanks! This is exactly as it was written in response to the music except for some of the punctuation. I think that haunting music formed the beat here, too.

    NanU - Thank you! That photo is called "Swoon Woman," and it's from somewhere in the South (US). I thought it felt just creepy enough for this.

    Vesper - Thanks. I would never have listened to all of that piece if I hadn't been doing this exercise. I truly got lost in running those hallways (in my mind). It was a very odd experience, and I recommend it for when we're searching for the muse. You are right, though. The images evoked by that piece are devastating.

    TWM - Thank you. I didn't think of the couplets as a sort of accord, but I suppose they are, in a way. Thanks for taking the time to listen. That is a hard piece to tolerate, I think. Very disturbing. Thanks for your comments, as always.

    Niamh B - Thank you. This bus tour is a good thing; don't you think?

    Willow - Thanks, but I prefer your magical poem, for certain!

    Kat - Thanks. I don't know that film. I kept thinking Anne Frank in my mind as I listened.

    Jason - Did you listen to that music? Just the beginning is enough to make me feel exactly as you described.

    Rachel - So true. :-(

    joaquin - Oh, my dear, dear Emily! I'm swooning!! Thank you for your always-appreciated and anticipated comments.

    Kaye - Thank you. The whole episode was haunting to me because of the images and times it evoked. Unbelievable what man can do to man.

    Chris - Yay! I'm go glad you're back and doing okay!! I'll be by as soon as I can get a chance. Thanks for your comments, but I'm concentrating on your saying, "a good, healing experience." *Gratitude*

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  21. Wow, such intensity, angst, panic. Compelling and so haunting. Music and words. I read first then listened while reading....

    You interpreted this music so dead on!

    hugs my friend~
    ~Calli

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  22. I echo everyone else with the "wow" response. That's what I feel as I read your poem, Karen. The power behind your words is hard to even describe.

    I listened to the music without looking at the title. Then I read your poem. You are so right about the synchronicity. It is astounding. I kept thinking of Dante's inferno when I first heard the music.

    Your second couplet just about broke my heart to pieces (but that's intended as a compliment). The power behind those eight words brought tears to my eyes. I like when I have a visceral response to writing. Yes, it's hard. But it teaches me something. Another place where I had that reaction was "All is loss./Lost is all." It's like I can hear the echo of the voices. I also like that you use the word "loss" instead of "lost" in the first line of that couplet. It makes for a wonderfully interesting (and powerful) inversion.

    Egad, I always try not to overanalyze your poems, Karen. But I can't help myself. What an awesome interpretation.

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  23. Calli - Thank you for taking the time to listen. I think the words make so much more sense when paired with the music, but the nightmare remains, either way.

    Julie - You can never overanalyze! I love your comments because you do give me so much to think about. I truly appreciate your supportive words. You really can't know how needy I am for response! I can only thank you.

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  24. Karen my dear, I want to come back and listen to the music so I can get the full effect of your poem. When I read it, I see the sad hopelessness of the dreadful truth of what happened. I also see a very Asian sense of impermanence as the natural order bleeding through the words.

    I'm so sorry I've been scarce. I've missed you! And I am so grateful for your friendship, thanks for your constant presence Karen, you are a world of support.

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  25. The more I read it the more I liked it. I like the mixture of movement and claustraphobia, which I think is probably there in the music (I'll have to listen again).

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  26. Cat - It is good to hear from you. I know how busy you are with your work. Isn't that the most devastating music? Unbelievably frightening and sad.

    Dominic - Claustrophobia is a very good description of my feelings on hearing that piece. Being trapped was the predominant feeling. Trapped and doomed. I understand your connections to the music, which must make it even more horrific for you. Thanks for the introduction, albeit painful, to the music.

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  27. I too couldn't bear to listen to the track. Its haunting and too painful to just imagine. Your words have done justice to the thoughts the music brings up.

    Keep experimenting - keep inspiring!

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  28. I liked the staccato rhythm of the poem - I don't know much about this piece of music of Penderecki, but I have a faint image in my head about his style. It a kind of music that is painful to listen to.

    writing to music can help you reach out to things otherwise hidden without you, but also, it may lead you to where you didn't intend to go.

    also, at first I thought the stencil art on the wall was a reflection to nuclear war - that is, the theme of the project. was it?

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  29. Thanks,Ani - I wouldn't have finished that music, either, had I not been living it through the writing.

    SzelsoFa - This was my first experience with writing to music, and I think you are right - it took me somewhere I didn't want to be! The stencil art was chosen because it reminded me of that, too. Thanks for stopping by.

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  30. it steps on, and on, and that brought the original music to my mind.


    Work from home India

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