[Carol Taylor]

Odysseus on Ogygia


There sits Odysseus, weeping, disconsolate, watching the ocean,
waiting for rescue he knows may not happen; is sure will not happen.
Why is he watching, and why is he waiting, for something impossible?
He watches because he knows she is watching the very same water.

Water before him and the water she watches are flowing together
blended forever; dividing the lovers, but never divorcing.
Thus the man sits by the ocean all day, to be near by the symbol
linking with Ithaca all of his longing for all that he loves.

Evening is calling his name and is drawing him back to the consort
owing Calypso, who saved him, her plaything now, almost a bond slave
obeying her whims and assenting to passions despite his decision,
sworn every night, and nightly re-sworn, but unsworn by dawn.

Nearing her forested, secretive place, he smells the split cedar
flaming with sweetwood and wafting like incense all over the island,
drawing him back to the cave where she sits, plying her shuttle,
singing and whispering spells that will make him hers until daybreak.

There lies her cave, all veiled by poplars and pungent with cypress
drawing the birds to a sleep they can't spurn, helplessly luring,
darkly consuming their vision of daytime in magical sleep.
He, like a wandering eagle, is drawn to his roost in her forest.

Dark is the mouth of her cave with the clusters of ripening grapes;
bubbling and sibilant rustle the fountains of sweetly sprung waters;
meadows are fading into the cool shadows perfumed with violets.
Even a god, he thought, would be seduced by such powerful beauties.

Waiting to greet him inside lay the goddess, lustrously, languidly
draped in her gown. Offering him to drink of the nectar
held in her golden cup, eat of ambrosia, warm by her fire.
Helpless as evening birds, drowning in darkness - soon he was sleeping.

Many the night Calypso has begged him -"Odysseus, please,
let me make you a god." Ever the same has come back his answer:
"Gods cannot love. Only we humans, who know we are dying
ever know Love is the daughter of Death." Thus spoke Odysseus.

Mark Allinson, Australia

[Richard Wilbur]

The six-foot line, as Pope said, is often like a wounded snake which drags its slow length along. It sometimes, in effect, breaks into two trimetrs; at other times it can hobble and fragment and cease to have any integrity as a line; the final foot can sometimes seem like the dropping of a third shoe in the bedroom overhead. In the first eight lins, however, this poet handles the meter beautifully, his phrasing energized by that splendid theme of the sharing of waters. There are good moments throughout the poem, but the first two stanzas take the cake. One wonders, by the way, why the poem slips into past tense in line 24.

~Richard Wilbur

[Henry Quince]

I think this is quite an achievement. But I start with a liking for this sort of hexameter, the accentual (largely dactylic) line which can be seen as approximating the classical model.

I do see a little drop-off of quality in S3 specifically. For example, consort/owing feels like it needs a comma in there, and I can imagine that the fourth line’s unsworn by dawn, which is just an internal rhyme for most Australians, might grate on some American ears.

I suppose there’s always a danger of metrical monotony with these longer meters. Mark, I’m not sure if this was mentioned before when A. D. Hope and others came up as exemplars in the discussion of your much longer and more ambitious Odyssey project, but you might take a look at A.H. Clough’s Amours de Voyage , which is written in a similar loose and varied hexameter.

Henry

[Mark Allinson]

Thanks, Henry.

I haven't seen any of the other authors post to their own threads yet, so I hope I am not breaking etiquette.

First I wanted to say what a thrill it is in the first place to have a poem chosen for this honor, with so many fine poems being posted on TDE every week.

And then the biggest thrill was to hear that Richard Wilbur (yes, THE Richard Wilbur) had not only read my poem, but thought well of it. To hear that "In the first eight lines ... this poet handles the meter beautifully", meant something extra-special for me, since those first eight lines were the first words I had ever strung together in this measure. This poem was only intended as a metrical exercise. And I remember on the night I started it, halfway through the first line came a knock on my door. I broke into a cold sweat. Luckily, I remembered Coleridge's "visitor from Porlock", so I told them I was temporarily indisposed and to take a seat in the garden - it was a warm night. Anyway, I managed to finish the first eight lines (about 20 mins) before I went out to greet them. So I blame them for the flaws in the remaining lines, composed later that evening after they left.

Anyway, I am so pleased to have a poem here, accorded this high honor.

And thanks for the link, Henry. I am reading every hex I can find at present.




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Mark Allinson

[Tim Murphy]

Henry, you are not breaking any etiquette, and in fact I should be very disappointed if each author doesn't respond to Dick. I've looked carefully at the distinction between the first eight lines and the rest. From 9 on, you get a little more sing-songy, a flaw I don't hear in the first 95 lines of your Odyssey. There are mesmerizing substitutions, halts, and pauses in the first eight. Keep that rhythm in your head. Again, I think the best model for you is Hope's Western Elegies. I'm going to tell Dick about your enormous project, and I am sure he'll be cheering for you.

[Kevin Andrew Murphy]

Mark,

I don't think you're breaking protocol per se, but it's like an art gallery showing where it's kind of fun to hang back in the crowd and hear what everyone has to say before launching in with your own explanation of your work. Also, because like an art gallery showing, everyone's going and giving their interpretation before the artist takes the fore and the place of honor.

But as with a gallery showing, I can always pretend I walked around this side of the panel late and didn't hear.



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I agree with Mr. Wilbur about the troubles typical with the long dactyllic line, and how skillfully Mark has navigated its perils, especially for the first two stanzas here, which indeed have a wonderful metaphor of Odysseus and Penelope joined by the ocean. Waterhouse or one of the other artists of that era could have done a lovely set of paintings showing the joining of the two, the water washing on past the edges of the frames. Another subtle thing not mentioned yet is the poem begins with Odysseus weeping--not a common image for a hero--but it is stated in obvious subtext that the saltwater of his tears will roll down to join the ocean, which in turn flows to Penelope.

I think, with some long, careful meditation -- and constant repitition of the first two lines, to hear their music -- the poet can raise the rest of the poem to their level. The melifluous liquid "l" sounds of the first two stanzas, while carried throughout the rest of the poem, are not carried in the same measure, and small things that grated were ones such as Calypso's line in the final stanza "Odysseus, please,/let me make you a god." and not just because of the number of trochees subbed for dactyls in that line, but how easily the "l" of "please" and "let" could be concluded with "me make you immortal" instead, which would also continue the "m" sounds as well.

Even so, the poem is a pleasure to read as it stands.

[Mark Allinson]

Tim,

thank you for that. Yes, as I say, I put down the loss of rhythm in that piece to the unexpected visit.

Still, with 12, 109 lines of practice ahead of me, I hope to be able to get back to that flow.

Please convey my sincere thanks to Richard for his pains. I am very grateful, and to you too, for selecting this one.

Kevin,

thanks for dropping by.

Kevin, I might not be Left, but I am certainly gauche.

But in a way, these pieces have already been on the gallery wall at TDE, so we know pretty well what everyone has had to say about them. So I don't think I am preempting any opinions.

Yes, the long reviled hex line. I find it such a refreshing challenge - an invigorating stretch - after keeping everything pent up for so long. Or feeling tetchy. Or tri-ing too hard. Or di-ing a terrible death. (Sorry).

The idea in the first two stanzas (the link by water) came by way of this couplet from the the Zenrin Kushu, a 15th C Japanese text:

The water before, and the water after,
Now and forever flowing, follow each other.

It is meant as an image of the movent of reality - only broken up into pieces by our minds, but really flows in undivided union. It came into my head while I was imagining Odysseus (who is easily my favourite character in all literature) weeping by the sea. So I just wove it in. Yes, he weeps quite a bit for a hero, as you point out, but it is this side of his nature I love - he is not a "hard man" who will not give and thus snaps. He bends and weaves and twists. There is a feminine side to his nature, which I think is the key to his true strength.
He goes to the underworld and meets Tiresias - the famous seer of Thebes who spent many years as a woman - anatomically, and not just in drag. I think O learned something from Tiresias that Homer didn't mention.

Thanks for the suggestions, which I have noted, and for the kind words.



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Mark Allinson

[Janet Kenny]

Mark,
I greatly admire this as you know. I was surprised that I hadn't noticed the past tense in line 24. "Thinks" is more in keeping. A thing of beauty.
Janet