Commission (Sapling)
 

Commission to Paint a Sapling in the Park

I’ll have to go to Edvard Munch on this.
And Henrik Ibsen, channeling the North,
its atmospheric gestures, stony words
with adamant varietals for God
and Hell. I’ll have to lie down in the grass
and hide the sky behind a linden row
and dig it out and find a place for such
a tiny stalk, its yellow leaves turned down.
A daughter’s tree exulting in a time
before experience. A hidden lamp,
an April field that trails into the mist.
I must consult the masters, find the way
to render something chained to memories
that map upon a strange imagination.

__
Line 7--"dig it out" was "dig it up"
.

How could I not like a poem that pairs Munch with Ibsen. I would prefer Strindberg perhaps because he was at least as unstable as Munch. That’s conversation. I do like it. It has a mystery inherent. Maybe I like the first half a little more. It starts with a strong pace. But I’m picking out favorites in a fine poem.

I like this, Rick. It does feel strongly northern, although referencing Munch and Ibsen is going to do that, of course. And the linden tree always makes me think of Schubert, for obvious reasons, but that also - in a way - is sort of northern.

I particularly like the "adamant varietals". I only wonder, probably wrongly, whether you really need the last three lines.

A quick word from pedants' corner: Edvard, I think.

Cheers

David

I was all set with praise for “adamant varietals” and pedantry for “Edvard,” but David beat me to it. He and I are telepathizing again. “Hide the sky behind a linden row” is a delightful change of perspective, but I wasn’t quite sure what had to be dug up. First I thought you were planting a sapling and had to dig the grass up to find a place for it. Then it occurred to me you were digging the sapling up to take home as a model. I did get a bit tangled in the abstraction of the last three lines, though I don’t know how I’d feel about an 11-line sonnet.

Thanks folks.

I made a few nips and tucks--the d that was missing in Edvard is now there. My lay/lie problem has been pointed out on the sidelines and fixed. Thanks for those catches.

The narrator is painting a picture of the tree. I may need to change the parenthetical or shift to an epigraph. Or maybe keep it all as is. I'll be back for fuller response to comments.

RM

I like the breathlessness of the strong pentameter beat and enjambed lines.
I also like the strong evocation of Northern climes and cultures.
Two questions:
1. What is the antecedent of “it” in line 7? the sapling? the lindens? the grass?
2. In line 9, did you mean “exult” (intransitive verb) instead of “exalt” (transitive verb)?
Nice work.

Thanks folks.

I've written out the entire premise in the title. It was orginally "Commission (Sapling)


Thanks John and David. I can see how the shift in energy after the "volta" may cause a problem. I'm considering how "I must consult the masters" plays--it may be a bit pompous, but I mean for it to tie back to the opening.

Thanks Glen and Carl. It's the sky that has to be dug up after its burial. I think it works grammatically, but there is a lot going on in the sentence, and the sense of digging up the sky is a little strange. I'm hoping that clarifying the premise of the poem, a painter making a picture, might help here.

RM

The new title eliminates my planting scenario, but I think I’d still have to conclude you were digging the sapling up to take home as a live model—odd, perhaps, and probably illegal, but much easier to process than digging up the sky. At a minimum, I think you’ll have to replace “and hide” with “bury” to clue us in. (I thought “hiding the sky behind a linden row” meant finding a shady spot to lie down where the sky wasn’t visible.)

Hi Carl,

I'm thinking the sapling (stalk) isn't mentioned in the sentence until after "dig it up", so digging up the sapling wouldn't make as much sense as digging up the sky. If it were hide the ball and find it, "it" would clearly refer to the ball. On the other hand, I'm not sure I mind the ambiguity in that sentence.

Rick, for me it’s less a matter of grammar than of logic, of hunting around for an “it” that could be dug up. The sky is by far the least likely candidate (though for that reason the most interesting). If you don’t mind the ambiguity, you got it!