4 Poems By William Bronk And One By Shelley
The four were selected from Bronk’s book Finding Losses,
which was published by Elizabeth Press in 1976
***
THE INABILITY
She wants me to say something
pretty to her because
we both know the unabettable
bleak of the world. Make believe,
she says,
what harm? It may be so. I can’t.
I don’t.
The inability, not able to - or,
the in-ability (the in-side of make believe)
She says, say something
beautiful. You can do it - you're a writer, and, significantly, a poet, a
craftsman of words
Both the woman and the speaker
agree. She wants an antidote to the 'unabettable / bleak', 'make believe / what
harm' (let's just pretend, it's harmless anyway) - but he 'can't' or won't
But is that an inability or a
decision? 'I can't' is inability, but 'I don't' may be a choice
(what you say) 'It may be so' -
the speaker is ambivalent in response to her request
Echoes of Samuel Beckett, only a
complete failure in Bronk, whereas Beckett ends, if somewhat grudgingly, confusedly,
on a positive –
You must go on. I can't go on.
I'll go on.
- from The Unnamable
Abated - made less
extreme, less serious. Unabettable (is such a word possible?) - nothing
can be done to lessen the bleakness of the world. Abated is a legal term
Able - to hold or handy,
inability - not holding. Ability is also a competency, a skill. The poet
writes with his hand - with the stroke of a pen, with the tap of a key – it’s
manual
Bleak related,
etymologically, to bleach - deprive of vitality or substance
***
ON BEING TOGETHER
I watch how beautifully two trees
stand together; one against one.
Not touching. Not awareness.
But we would try these. We are
always wrong.
Two trees, standing side by side,
rooted and fixed to the ground, unable to move, and yet in proximity to each
other - beauty in standing together, in their spatial relation, their proximity
Imagistic poem, observational at
first - how the image of the trees evoke a response in the speaker - this is
where the movement is (in the response, in writing the poem)
It's the observer who draws the
relation
But we also know, botanically
speaking, that the trees grow side by side, sustaining and supporting each
other. There's room enough for both
Most individual
trees of the same species growing in the same stand are connected to each other
through their root system … but why are trees such social beings … the reasons
are the same as for human communities: there are advantages to working together.
- from The
Hidden Life Of Trees (2015) by Peter Wohlleben
Is this the way in which the
speaker sees relationships (broadly) - between two people standing together -
figuratively, by extension or is it just literal? (I think not)
'Together' but also 'against'
each other, 'not touching', not even aware of each other. But below, a
rootedness unseen from above, felt rather than seen
In the game of relationships, we
'try (on) these' poses, these gestures and manoeuvres, a type of mimicry, and
yet, 'we are always wrong'
Plato’s
caution against poetry, the art of divine madness, where theatre (playing out)
is not sufficient to convey truth
Mimesis
for Aristotle was imitation of nature. We are mimetic beings, responding
to an insatiable urge to create texts (art) in response to ‘reality’
Mimesis
shows, whereas diegesis tells the story. Both operant in
Bronk’s poems
Again, as in the first poem,
there is failure in trying. The ambivalence is in thinking or acting otherwise,
as if there is truth in the stories we tell ourselves and others, like the
ideal of intimacy in 'Being Together'
There is also the failure and
futility of believing in something that isn't the case. Bronk is uncompromising
in his (version of) truth-telling. The speaker constructs another narrative in
the poem
***
THE RAPPORT
There’s a dead dog at Barber’s
Bridge
tied to a tree and two ugly
stories why.
Make your own choice; either
could be.
Hearing, seeing, I believe both
of them.
***
Rapport - harmony, connection, agreement.
Etymologically, to 'bring back'
'Rapport' sounds like 'report'. This poem is also a report
of an event - what and where it happened
(At least) two 'ugly stories' about the 'dead dog' 'tied to
a tree'
About death - death of the dog, speaker's relationship to
death
Also about belief and credulity - either story could be true
- the speaker allows for both without taking sides
How to make sense and meaning when one is confronted with
death? Why do we seek an explanation after the cessation of a life? Big
questions
Is coming to an understanding (rapport = agreement) is a
decision, a choice? Are we not believers first then explainers (problem of
confirmation bias)
2 modes of understanding – seeing (eye) and hearing (ear)
Unlike the first 2 poems, the speaker remains open to both
possibilities, whereas he takes a definite route (side) in the other 2
Poem is working duality, a mode (one of many) of thought and
distinction
***
NAMES LIKE BARNEY CAIN’S
Two locks on the Feeder are named
for him.
I have asked and nobody knows who
he is.
Alexander, Alfred, Quetzalcoatl,
nobody, nowhere, never, nothing.
***
About a particular place, about construction (cultural,
physical) and naming (the object)
Locks and feeder of canals - to manage the passage of water,
and water levels. Also an image for the undulating flow (slice and dice) of
history
We don't know who Barney Cane was? But he was important
enough to have this construction (locks and feeder) named in his honour. He is
named alongside the more recognisable historical figures of Alexander, Alfred
and Quetzalcoatl
But despite their great acts, they could not overcome death
- and therefore, they all became 'nobody, nowhere, never, nothing' - no-body
(transient corporeality), no-where (place), never (in time) and no-thing (no
materiality)
Memory depends on remembering (re-membering, putting back
together again), an act of will, in someone's mind (I remember …) or stored in
a text (paper, object, electronic), waiting to be read
Failure of memory, and in the other poems, futility of
action and belief. Beckett's aporia, as an irresolvable internal contradiction
[it is a] labyrinthine torment
that can’t be grasped, or limited, or felt, or suffered, no, not even suffered
Great names in historical sequence -
Alexander - King of the Hellenes (birth of the West)
Alfred the Great - founder of the Anglo-Saxons (who sailed
to America)
Quetzalcoatl - descent (linage) of the Mesoamerican peoples
(colonised by Europeans)
Consider Shelley - 'My name is Ozymandias, King of Kings ... nothing beside remains' -
I met a traveller from an antique
land,
Who said—“Two vast and trunkless
legs of stone
Stand in the desert. . . . Near
them, on the sand,
Half sunk a shattered visage
lies, whose frown,
And wrinkled lip, and sneer of
cold command,
Tell that its sculptor well those
passions read
Which yet survive, stamped on
these lifeless things,
The hand that mocked them, and
the heart that fed;
And on the pedestal, these words
appear:
My name is Ozymandias, King of
Kings;
Look on my Works, ye Mighty, and
despair!
Nothing beside remains. Round the
decay
Of that colossal Wreck, boundless
and bare
The lone and level sands stretch
far away.”
-- Ozymandias BY PERCY BYSSHE
SHELLEY
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