[Barbara Lee]

Geography on a Saturday Morning

………….Hic Sunt Dracones

You know when you have fallen off the map. The dog
down the lane howls and cars screech

through the intersection. At the same time, the eye
captures the moment a willow’s skirt turns so gold

that wanderers halt at the hem to gather its leaves.
Old cartographers knew we would come to this place,

and knew what we would see. Rubies and emeralds
lighting a lonesome beach, beasts with horns,

the fires—all truer than we knew before. I have felt hot

breath on my neck while washing my dishes. I can hear
unidentifiable creatures scratch outside the door.

Air, closed and thick, only moves when that dragon
fans its wings. I smell smoke

and wonder what else may come from beyond.
I don’t know where beyond is exactly. One thing

may be a tell— a wild gleaming in the yard. One thing
is gospel—this morning’s mark on the Hunt-Lenox Globe.

[James Midgley]

Hi Barbara,

I seem to be a poor reader lately, so take with a pinch of salt --

The poem feels assured tonally and in its motion -- but I find myself trying to puzzle out in what way these details -- which are quite mundane -- exemplify having 'fallen off the map'. Is it a sudden feeling of frightening and/or beautiful otherness amid the quotidian? If it is, I wonder if the language ought to register that more forcefully, strangely, and perhaps also account for what has precipitated the plunge into strangeness (emotionally, say, rather than via globe).

There isn't anything especially strange, fantastical or dangerous about a suburban dog howling or cars screeching through intersections, e.g., and I don't know how they indicate one's having fallen off the map, at least not here.

The gems and horns and fire -- a sense of a half-glimpsed demonic (horned) dragon on the beach -- is stranger, of course, and seems interestingly to marry up a colonialist's perspective of otherness with the dragon and what the dragon means on a map (danger and strangeness here). I think that's pretty neat and pleasingly compressed.

(That marries up retrospectively with the wanderers gathering the gold of the autumn tree. Maybe the poem is getting at a richness of strangeness that is always there, after all?)

Next to this, the domestic scene is anticlimactic -- surely purposefully in one sense, but I wonder about the line-ends 'I have felt hot' and 'I can hear' which might be overly anticlimactic in their pre-line-turn instances.

The poem is playing with familiarity and strangeness, but I don't know to what end yet.

I can't really parse what the ending is up to yet. The wild gleaming in the yard seems to be something like the possibility of seeing strangeness in the usual. This is further accounted for in the mark on the globe -- a sign that the speaker has been thinking about otherness via a kind of concretisation (familiarisation, too, and an especially aesthetic one) of otherness in the form of the globe.

So I'm a little puzzled -- but if I'm not way off the mark then I think many of the pieces are here but might need a little more pushing. I also feel as if there's an emotional element that hasn't quite come to the fore yet in this draft.

Anyway, I hope my fumbling around is of use. Thanks for the read.

[Hilary Biehl]

I don't know if I am reading it correctly, but my impression right now is that the poem is about a sense of strangeness or otherness that intrudes, perhaps inexplicably, in the midst of the familiar.

"I don't know where beyond is exactly" suggests to me that there isn't a concrete reason for this intrusion of the strange, or at least not one that the N can currently put her finger on. Although the fantastical elements help us to feel the otherness the N is feeling, it is precisely the ordinary things of life - a dog howling, tires screeching, the willow changing color, something gleaming in the yard, etc - that have suddenly become indicative of dislocation.

Maybe there is more to it than that, but I don't think there necessarily needs to be. It's difficult to capture a nebulous feeling (because it's, well, nebulous) and I think this poem does it.

[Roger Slater]

I'm not sure I know how to criticize this, so I'll just do a fly-by to say I think this is excellent. It's elusive, but the voice has authority and the mood it evokes is both familiar and hard to pin down.

[Nick McRae]

Originally Posted by Roger Slater

I'm not sure I know how to criticize this, so I'll just do a fly-by to say I think this is excellent. It's elusive, but the voice has authority and the mood it evokes is both familiar and hard to pin down.

I agree with this, although I wonder if the close could be a little stronger. Particularly this line:

this morning’s mark on the Hunt-Lenox Globe.

IMO, Hic Sunt Dracones is enough of a hint, while the close feels like it's trying too hard to make the theme clear. I'd prefer something slightly more ambiguous and vibrant in this spot.

[Matt Q]

Hi Barbara

I really enjoyed this. On a map, the notation "Here there be dragons" suggests a dangerous and remote/unexplored territory. Uncharted. Effectively "off the map". I like the idea, as I'm reading it, that we "fall off the map" and encounter such territory, not in literally distant and remote parts of the world, but in the midst of the everyday. That at times, in the everyday are glimpsed danger/beast and beauty/treasure (perhaps the dragon's hoard), seen as "truer than we knew before". A veil is lifted, the world becomes magical, uncanny and perhaps more vivid too. It is perhaps a sort of revelation ("truer than we knew before"), a seeing through.

I'm left to supply my own interpretation of what falling off the map might mean if I want to "map" this onto some deeper meaning, and I'm happy with that. That "the old cartographers knew we would come to this place" suggests an inevitability, that perhaps it's representative of a certain point in one's life, in life's journey, a certain set of circumstances, an unravelling, or a point of crisis, or maybe the dawning of some sort of (spiritual) wisdom -- there are spiritual "maps". It does strike me that death is one way of "falling off the map", and an uncharted territory, and a place we all must come to, "I don't know where beyond is" would certainly seem to fit with that, so I can maybe read the poem that way, as about death nearing. That said, it sounds like, at the beginning that the N has experienced this falling off, although later in the poem she only seems to describe coming close it, intimations, tells. Anyway, I don't need to impose a deeper meaning to enjoy the poem -- although rereading and wondering about possibilities adds to my enjoyment of it.

I wondered a little at the balance of the two poles (beast/danger, beauty/treasure) as the poem unfolds.

In S1-3 The dog howling and the car screech suggest danger, or a sense of it. At the same time the perception of an otherworldly beauty in the leaves turning gold in Autumn suggests the treasure. In S4, The treasure and danger/beast are reprised, the jewels replace the gold, and the danger/beast, is made more explicit: beasts with horns, potentially fire-breathing, are reprised. (I see an of the echo the cars here, which also have horns, issue smoke, and driven by combustion engines).

In S6-7 the N lists glimpses, intimations of falling off the map. The focus here seems be solely on the dragon/beast, though. The hot breath, the unidentifiable creatures, the air moved by dragons wings, the smell of smoke. It feels to me like the focus has shifted. I wonder if there might be scope for some glimpses/hints of the treasure, the beautiful, here too. I guess though the final stanza may be doing this, with the "wild gleaming" in the yard. Initially, I'd read "yard" in its British sense, but when I read it as "garden", the treasure/beauty reading seems more likely: beauty in nature, echoing the willow tree. So maybe the poem is saying, here are a list of tells: four dragon-related tells and one treasure/beauty related tell. And maybe the shift to a focus on the danger is intended.

A couple of other thoughts:

In S6-7 I wonder a little here at what seems to be the mix of general and specific case. "I have felt" gives us the past, but can indicate the general case. And "air moves only" also gives us the general case. But, in the middle of these two, "I can hear" seems to give us the present: this is happening now. I guess can mean "I can sometimes I hear"/"I may hear", but if so, maybe this could be worded less ambiguously?

Like others, I'm not 100% sure of the close. I'm reading it that the N has found "Hic Sunt Dracones" marked on her old globe (wasn't familiar with the name, but easy enough to google), a mark that wasn't there the day before. I'm not sure why I don't find this as satisfying as I could. Possibly I wonder where it's marked -- it could be anywhere in the world -- so why is particularly relevant to the N? Am I supposed to infer that the mark correlates with where she is located? Or just that such a place exists somewhere? (And is it relevant that a globe has no edges?). And possibly because it seems too obvious. But maybe that's the point? It's intended to undercut the speculation (here are various possible tells) with something definite?

All the best,

Matt

[Carl Copeland]

I enjoyed this too, Barbara, and wouldn’t presume to improve on the excellent criticism you’ve gotten. Just two trivial comments:

Originally Posted by Barbara Lee

Air, closed and thick,

I’ve heard of close air. Is “closed” intentional wordplay?

Originally Posted by Matt Q

So maybe the poem is saying, here are a list of tells …

Matt understood what you meant by “a tell,” but I had to stop and think. I’m more familiar with the archeological sense and have never played enough Poker to know that it can also be a telltale sign, a giveaway. Or maybe it’s gained popularity since I left the English-speaking world ...

[Jim Moonan]

.
So, it’s Saturday morning. Uneventful except in the mind of the N who is slipping into an out-of-body experience, teetering on the boundary of being out of her realm of knowing. The N knows the territory, is familiar with what she sees and hears, has been there before, but in this state it always presents itself as unknown. The mind’s boundaries are breached.

I like Hillary’s description of the poem being nebulous. I like Roger’s description of the poem being elusive. I think Matt is overthinking it. I agree with James that the poem is balanced between familiarity and strangeness. Unlike Carl, I knew exactly what the N means by “one thing / may be a tell”. I agree with Nick that I want the poem to end on a vibrant note. I absolutely love the line “I smell smoke” in the context of the poem.

I could quibble with a few word choices and maybe ask for a better ending. Perhaps you could re-order/re-work the last two couplets so that the poem ends on what I think is its zenith (nadir?) of the poem: “a wild gleaming in the yard.” It would arrest my thoughts.

.

[Barbara Lee]

Hello James,

Thank you so much for the great questions. I will consider them all. I am glad both you and Matt pointed out the “I have/I hear ect as line ends and tense change. Those lines were was certainly one of my concerns when posting. I had not thought of the issue of line end to what follows here. Thanks for that. I will think on it.


Hello Hilary Biehl,
I liked your reading of strangeness intruding on the familiar. I had some general inspiration from the idea of where poetry sits off maps [without all the dots connecting.] I wanted to leave room for the reader. Thanks so much for commenting.


Hello Roger Slater,
I am glad you liked the poem. If the poem is on the resistant side, I think I am happy with that.


Nick McRae, thank you.



And ditto. I am looking more closely at the close as several readers have wondered about that ending.

Matt, I am glad you enjoyed the poem.



I am very grateful for the time you took to say how you were reading. I especially am glad you said that “you were left to supply my own interpretation of what falling off the map might mean”. You make a good observation about the balance between dragons/treasure/beauty in the poem. A good thing to consider is balance in a poem and I will be considering what you said.



Hello Carl Copeland,

Please always presume away with comments. All feedback is welcome. I think that is a good call on close and I am going to change it to close. That tell bit—I was having a bit of fun with meaning. A tell can be a signal for a bluff….


Hello Jim Moonan,

Thanks for taking the time to read and comment. I appreciate your reading/experience of the poem. I am so happy you mentioned the “I smell smoke” line. Again I was having a little fun and am glad someone picked up on it however they may read it. I hear you on that close. Re-order may work. Especially on that wild gleaming line. Thanks again.

[Matt Q]

Hi Barbara,


Just coming back to say that I liked "closed". It's less expected that "close", and offers wordplay. "close" is still suggested: hot, unventilated, muggy, oppressive etc. But also a suggestion that something is "closed down", "closed off" or "closed in".

Perhaps the N's experience of the world when she experiences the air as closed is one of limited possibilities, in the mundane sense and/or the supramundane. Or perhaps the air is closed in the sense that she lacks of access to the uncanny -- the otherworldly is currently closed off from her.

That state of being closed is changed/moved by the dragon's proximity, the beating of its wings, hints at an opening -- of her life, or her perception.

best,

Matt