X
 

X

Illiteracy's scrawl, or learning's rune.
Marauders' crossbones, or St. Andrew's cross.
A promised cache of treasure, or the loss
of life-light from the eyes of a cartoon.

An unknown quantity. The standard scale
for clothing one more level large or small.
A player on the team that's lost the ball.
A rating given films beyond the pale.

The horizontal axis. V plus V.
The chromosome we all possess. A ray
our flesh is far too weak to turn away.
The crucial fragment of infinity.

A kiss goodbye. A rectified mistake.
And you. And I. Each other's, since our break.

In this virtuosic poem, the speaker simultaneously lists meanings of the super-significant letter “X” and hints at the reasons for a breakup (made explicit in the closing couplet). One of the challenges of a “list” poem is avoiding monotony, and this poem not only does so but achieves a rich variety of phrase and enjambment. The climactic shortening of phrases in the closing couplet is particularly powerful. Linked to the letter “X” with all its meanings, the breakup takes on cosmic significance.

Typo in line 11? Missing "to." I've seen this before, here presumably, but I can't remember the author. I like it.

Thank you, Mr. Hunt. I printed the poem as it was passed along to me. I have taken the liberty, however, of correcting what must certainly have been a typo.

Well, then, I hope I was right...

Wow! I don't usually embarrass myself by guessing, but this sounds like Elise Hempel to me. The piling up of images is ferocious, and the resolution turn at the end took my breath away. The lines with the least impact for me were 7 and 12, just because I don't fully understand them. I'm guessing L7 is the way they record something in baseball, but I thought it was strikes, which doesn't seem to tally with the team losing the ball. But I'm relatively happy to let sports metaphors wash over me misunderstood, whereas I feel like I ought to understand something about infinity. Can anyone help me?

Wow!

Actually, line 12 is the most inspired list item of all, and, if I understand correctly (limits approaching infinity = 2x), a brilliant segue into the final couplet.

This is on the level of Stallings. Bravo o Brava to whoever wrote it.

Editing back to say my initial enthusiasm is waning somewhat . . . still, it's one of the better ones posted so far.

I remember this poem and who wrote it. It is superb. It is memorable.

I xoxo this though I'd prefer if fewer lines were end stopped. Still...

Yes, this poem immediately reminds me of Stallings' Sine Qua Non; in that way, it is well-done and a joy to read. However, I don't see the variety of enjambment that the DG suggests (I agree with Orwn's comment), and I'd like to see more of a turn. But this one's in my top two so far.

Sorry to be boring, but I have to join the chorus--brilliant. Clever and poignant, and perfectly crafted. I haven't seen it, so I don't know who the author is, but thank you!

p.s. I hope no one minds the irreverence, but the poem did make me recall the joke about the student's answer to a question about the Pythagorean theorem: Here it is!

Wow, this is a delightful list poem, with a great turn at the end (which is a real accomplishment in a list poem)! I am impressed with how many different meanings of X the author managed to include, and with how many of them seem to bear added meaning once you reach the end.

Susan

Devastating poem. I would find this one hard to beat. The DG has upped his game.

Simply superb, killer close. The poet is totally in control of this Dakota reader.

I understand L12 because a draft of this was workshopped here before: the crux of the sign for infinity forms an 'x'. As for L7, chalkboard diagrams of football plays designate the defenders with X's and the offensive side with circles (a wild guess by a non-sports fan confirmed by googling).

Aha! Thanks Brian, that was bothering me.

Wow, this is breathtaking! I love it. Definitely my favorite, and as mentioned above, will be hard to beat. This takes us to the next level with its unusual insights and its killer close. Nit-free.

This is fantastic. Nobody has commented on how interestingly it takes the Shakespearean sonnet's basic outline, but grafts the enveloping rhyme of the Petrarchan (I assume because it's already been workshopped). Aside from being an interesting variation, it wonderfully adds to the meaning.

1. That the enveloping rhyme, like hands within one another, come unclasped in the couplet.
2. Even more so, the chiastic rhyme creates an X of it's own.

[quote=Catherine Chandler;380757Actually, line 12 is the most inspired list item of all, and, if I understand correctly (limits approaching infinity = 2x), a brilliant segue into the final couplet.[/QUOTE]

I'd read it that x is a part of the infinity symbol. It's clever either way.

Great final couplet
 

A very nice listing of all the meanings of X that one can think of, with a wonderful and unexpected punchline for the final couplet. (But I don't subscribe to the idea that the earlier meanings have anything to do with the personal relationship.)

Clever and skillful. The lines are nicely balanced, and each of the quatrains has one enjambement for variety. It's probably inevitable that this kind of list-poem will be mostly end-stopped.

I'll guess this is David Callin's fine, precise voice and thought. I love a poem with a lot of end-stopped lines. It makes the enjambments all the more moving.

I'm with Robin on this one. The poem is nice and neat, skillfully crafted, but I don't see it as something a real person would be thinking and saying after a breakup. I see it more as something a person wanting to write a sonnet about a breakup would say/think. There's no ache, no passion, no urgency. It's clever, and that's it. Also, I'm questioning whether a sonnet that was previously workshopped on Eratosphere, something several people are already familiar with and may have even helped create, should be in a supposedly anonymous contest.

This is the sort of thing that strikes me as more clever than moving. It gets somewhere by the end--and I like the end quite a bit--but the first 9 or 10 lines are just an exhibition of virtuosity for its own sake. I don't see that they're doing anything to set up or comment on the personal situation; they're just ringing variations on the theme until it's time for the turn. And the choppiness bugs me, even if it's hard to avoid with a list.

The turn of this poem punched me in the face, and that's what I like about poetry; I wait to be knocked out cold.

I love it because I'm reading this list and going "uh huh, yeah, okay these are things that X can be," and the listing makes me think I'm not going to be so satisfied with the end, but then I find myself moved by it.

This is the kind of poetry I seek to read.

Lovely list poem, and as the DG observes, does not have a monotonous tone to it.

It's a very good poem, but I'm another who feels that it's a bit too clever, that there isn't enough there beyond the cleverness, that the cleverness goes on a bit too long. Strangely (I hope this doesn't bring the wrath of the Sphere down on me) I think I would like it better as a ten-liner - eliminate the first or second stanza.

Oh dear, I'm going to be another rare voice of dissent on this one. Although I do think it's pretty clever, it strikes me as a language game that goes on for too long, something that could have been produced by two people throwing ideas at each other, so therefore lacks that sense of the careful working through of individual experience or argument that I want from a sonnet. You could do the same thing with, say, the word 'set' (the word with the most separate dictionary definitions fact-fans, or used to be): 'A place the humble badger makes his home/the thing a jelly does before you eat' etc.

I also think that after all the build up the 'twist' ending doesn't quite work. All the examples have been definitions of 'X', where the ending is clearly 'ex'. That's different isn't is?

I'm with Michael that this would work best as a clever 10 liner, with S2 being the one to go: the clothing image sounds prosy and the film image, while jokey, sounds silly and prudish.

Sorry.

I almost suggested making this shorter: 4 or 6 lines of set up, followed by the couplet.

But I think the larger problem is the mishmash quality of the list. If all the details contributed, subtly, to an atmosphere of curdled romance, disappointment, longing, self-blame, whatever--it would work at 6 lines, or it work as a sonnet.

As it is, we've got some stuff that I think does contribute to setting up the couplet (promised cache of treasure, unknown quantity, chromosome, infinity), but a bunch of other stuff mixed in that's off in terms of content and tone (skull and crossbones, ballplayers, clothing size). And some stuff that could go either way.

I could see having a more positive response to the ending, if I felt like the rest of the poem had (however subtly) set us up for the personal revelation.

Alright, that settles it, now Hallowed E'en readies for its annual fete, we mull broken relationships and calmly assess the vestiges of what was in the face of how it ended, as if that will more than satisfy the fact "we" are not but singularly now "you" and whew! "I."
Fascinating.
This pretty number contemplates a variety of definitions for said alphabet letter, the couplet deftly clinching that thought with wherefore.
Happily we traverse the stream sans a hitch, flow marching steadily down to the enlightening close leaving a rather smug sense of having pulled off something in that listing, and I contratulate the sonneteer in creatively handling modern love's dilemma.

The good thing about this sonnet is that I enjoyed it on a second and on subsequent readings. As sound, it is unforced and pleasing, and the accusation of 'list' isn't an issue for me in view of the thoughtful and entertaining unrolling of meanings. The end adds humanity to the musings of the identities of X.
For me, there isn't a stronger sonnet here, but on a slightly negative note, I read that the poem was submitted with a typo, and someone says it was workshopped here. I have no idea about this, but wonder (if this is indeed the case) how much of the poem is a result of collaboration.
Even so, taken as submitted, it is an impressive piece, and gets my vote.

Not me, Mary! (As we all now know.) But I am immensely flattered that you should think so. (Julie will, I am sure, be - understandably - somewhat less flattered by the comparison.)

Stupidly, I've come late to all of these - I thought we had much longer to comment and vote (note to self: RTFR, stupid) - but I too think this is terrific, and I didn't think the cleverness, which is undeniable, detracts from the power or emotional effect of the close.

I haven't read the others yet - although I do see that Desilu, which I love, has reappeared here - but if there is a better sonnet than this my flabber will be well and truly gasted.

Well done, Julie!

David

David, I considered it a compliment to be mistaken for you (and for Elise earlier). I'm sorry that the random-hodgepodge-slowly-giving-way-to-narrative didn't work for you, but if it didn't, it didn't. Thanks for your honesty.

Alan, I wholeheartedly agree with your point about the typo. I had been away from the Sphere for a few days by the time I saw that Simon had identified it and the TSDG fixed it, or I would have emailed Alex and asked for the typo to be restored, so that people could encounter it as it was submitted, and deduct points accordingly. But it seemed too late for that to do any good by the time I was aware of it.

Not that the following is an excuse, but I feel the need to explain why workshopping hadn't eliminated the typo. Whenever I cut and paste word-processed poems into Gmail, the hard returns at line-ends translate into paragraph breaks, so I always re-type them into the email message; in this case, I accidentally omitted a word, long after workshopping the poem.

As for how much of the poem was assembled by committee during the workshop process, here's my first draft of "X", if you want to compare:

X

Illiteracy’s mark, or wisdom’s rune.
Marauders’ crossbones, or a martyr’s cross.
A tempting cache of treasure, or the loss
of life-light from the eyes of a cartoon.

A player on the team that’s lost the ball.
A quantity unknown, or off the scale:
a rating given films beyond the pale,
or sizes very large or very small.

At Xmas, chi for Christ. The sum of V
and V, in Roman numerals. A ray
that tenderness can’t hinder on its way.
A crucial fragment of infinity.

A kiss goodbye. A rectified mistake.
And you. And I. Each other’s, since our break.

The only change I remember making in direct response to workshop comments was replacing "a martyr's cross" with "St. Andrew's cross." I did this after it became apparent that many readers were utterly flummoxed by "a martyr's cross", because they were picturing a Latin cross. I guess many people who know that the symbol on the flag of Scotland features St. Andrew's Cross don't know why that diagonal type of cross is associated with St. Andrew. (Legend says he was crucified on one.)

I'm still sorry to have lost the chime between "Marauders'" and "martyr's", though. Maybe

Marauders' crossbones; martyred Andrew's cross.

would be a good compromise. (I've never been comfortable with the metrical promotion of "or" in that line, anyway.)

I re-arranged Q2 on my own, after workshopping, because I decided that ending that stanza with the X-rated movies line could set up oblique (clearly too oblique for a lot of folks' liking) connotations of coupling or sexual desire in Q3. And I got rid of Xmas because as my drafts of Q3 became increasingly possibly-sexual, the religious reference seemed more and more out of place there.

Thanks for all the Bake-off comments on this, which I found very valuable.

Julie,

I think I prefer your original, and see your point about the relation of maurader and martyr.
It thoroughly deserved to win in my view, whichever version was judged, and regardless of the typo.

What an interesting point about sexuality and acceptance. The sonnet I submitted was uncompromisingly X-rated, so I suppose it would not find favour with most judges on the US side of the pond. (Maybe I'm being presumptuous here). But I have had experience of parochial rejection before.

Again, X is a worthy winner.

Hi Julie,

Congrats on your win!

Yes, this is pain. I do this: copy and paste the poem from Word into notepad, which won't add paragraph breaks. Then freshly select the whole poem in notepad, copy it and paste into gmail. One downside of this process is that you'll lose formatting, such as italics. If you don't have a PC, I'm guessing that macs have a basic text editor you can use.

-Matt

You can also paste into Gmail, then select the whole thing and click on the "remove formatting" button, then re-format as you like.