CACOPHONY OF LOZENGE ways to move the collective poetic voice

"CACOPHONY OF LOZENGE"

Christopher Parker's Poetry Workshop
 

© 2013 Christopher Parker

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PAGE CONTENTS:

BEGINING A POETRY WORKSHOP

METAPHORIC NAMES

GARDENS FOR EMOTIONAL HARVEST

TALKING TO THE WALL

CONTACT INFORMATION: Christopher Parker

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BEGINING A POETRY WORKSHOP

To begin a poetry workshop I like to form a community, a culture of people who have something in common.  I say here we are, we are unique in the world at this time. This is our time as a poetry culture right now.  No matter how different our talents and virtues, we are united in our unique sharing this moment and workshop.  So let us, for this time together in a workshop, create a name for our culture and even ourselves.

To form a community of inquiry, I suggest to the people present that we are, in fact, a culture, unique in this moment and workshop and interest type at this time and because all of this is about poetry I suggest a metaphoric name for our community.   The words for this metaphor come from my experience and observations of the group so far.   In Philosophy for Children in Mendham this spring I first mentioned the word lozenge in this metaphor exercise.  Before the session I had offered a cough drop to one of the participants, since she expressed having a slightly dry throat.  She replied, "no thanks I have had a lozenge."

What a great word, lozenge.  Just say it and fell it come out of your mouth as a lozenge might when it comes into your mouth.  So I wrote this on the board, lozenge had something to do with us a community, I suggested.  And it’s a word that came out of the experience of the community. 

Then I mentioned the word cacophony.  Earlier that day this word was mentioned by one of the participants as a description of the sounds of many birds, which seemed to disturb the morning sleep of many of the residents in Mendham.  What another great word: cacophony, cacophony. 

Cacophony, it seemed to me, also represented the Philosophy for Children sessions.  We formed a cacophony of ideas, a cacophony of philosophers, a cacophony of questions.  All of which refreshed us, stimulated our minds, and healed unresolved issues . . . much like a lozenge.  So this gathering of philosophers would be Cacophony of Lozenge.  Most people tended to recite this name in the plural, but I preferred the singular for the rhythm it fed, and for the additional idea of us all being a single refreshment.

On the board I wrote out Cacophony of Lozenge and marked each syllable.  We have seven syllables here; a seven is also a number with many possible literary implications.  As well the syllabic emphasis in the word cacophony seemed to be on the second syllable.  This syllable count and the emphasis on the second syllable, the -co-, suggested a rhythm, which we practiced reciting together as a group.  I brought a few percussion instruments with me, as I do to all my poetry workshops, in order to emphasis and experience the music in poetry.  With the rhythm we developed a melody which became our song during the workshop.  I am told that this song stayed with many people in the group beyond meeting time, in fact one participant sang it to himself first thing in the morning on subsequent days. 

This metaphoric composing helps to foster a unified group; we all have to sing together and the song identifies us as a community of inquiry.  For short intermittent breaks between exercises in the workshop we fall into song, this refreshes the mind and spirit . . . perhaps like the lozenge.

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METAPHORIC NAMES
Step 1:  The Meaning of Names

We move from our cultural metaphoric song into personal metaphoric names.  This lets each person have stronger identity within the community. So egocentrically with all groups I begin by asking individuals from whence came their name.  Adults and children often give the name denial answer: "I don't know".  Of course they know something about the reason for their name.  In fact, some precocious respondents will know the meaning and source and reason for their name.  This may be of use in Philosophy for Children to try to explore what their name means. 

To do this I'll explore the translation of some names and their meaning.  Then, I draw a little sketch of an embryo on the blackboard, with an umbilical chord.  I suggest that this is, say, Tanya.  Let’s imagine Tanya means warrior-queen.  Before she was born her mom and dad were looking into the sonogram that showed the baby while still in utero.  Children and adults do tend to appreciate this notion: there is me, at my beginning and how I used to be. 

Then I'll point out that your dad, if it turns out he came up with the name, may have said, “oh look Tanya means, warrior queen.   And my, oh my, doesn't this little child look like she will be a warrior, look at her strength and arms poised for battle." 

Of course, I'll point out your parents really didn't know you then. And now it's you who knows who you are and when you are at your best.  I'll interview Tanya and ask her what her preference are these days, what does she like to do and be?  Did your parents know these unique things about you, when you were named?  No, not likely. 

At this I'll suggest that in many cultures around the world, the young adults choose their own name, knowing better who they are.  So now we too should give ourselves, in the context of this poetry workshop, metaphoric names.  This as a part of what poetry is.  And the workshop to follow shows us what language is and reveals its real source.

All of our language comes from our culture.  It is few words that we have of our own creation.  As a poet, I explain, I listen to words and phrases all the time.  I study them, record them, and use them.  So the language is not mine, but how I place down the words is what makes it mine, like making a collage out of artifacts we find.
 
 

Step 2:  Collect the Language

Now I will tell you about collecting unique words for individuals to use as a starting off point for their metaphoric names.  I'll mention: where to get the words, how to absorb them from our culture and how to keep this time effective and well directed. 

I suggest that each person have one, loose piece of paper (that they can give away later) and a pen or pencil.  And that on that paper they choose and write a few words according to the suggestions that I will give them. 

For the purposes of this workshop I suggest that the group write down three nouns.  I do also give the game rules: Nouns are persons, places and things.  But the group is not permitted to record any persons by name, or, for that matter, any type of person.  Richard Nixon, King Tutt, cavewoman are not permissible nouns.  They are persons. 

Also I suggest that no place be listed, such as Bayonne, the Grand Canyon, or Shop Rite.  I mention that it's just the game rules and ask, sometimes, do we agree to these as a culture?  Trust me, I suggest, we have such little time together 

So we are left with things.  Some people in the group may have a difficult time completely separating from persons and places as nouns.  So I do put a game chart on the blackboard and give game board check marks each time persons or places are used. 

To foster the use of rich and uncommon words I strongly suggest we disregard the first encounter with language in our brains.  I might draw a picture of the brain on the blackboard and point out the lobes: the left temporal lobe from which language reportedly comes from in our heads, though some say it is available in other parts of the brain.  For instance in some Asian cultures it is thought, by some nueropsychologists, that language, for the most part, presides in the visual part of the brain which is thought to be in posterior of the brain. 

I'll point out that the little dot I draw on the brain diagram represents the brain-space we most often use for language: the regular, the expected, the cliche.  Whatever part of the brain we use, (and for the most part we never really know exactly from whence some thoughts come) we should access some place that will get us deeper into the amazing amount of words that we have in our heads.   These could be words that we are at first perhaps unaware because we do not commonly use them. So now is the time.
 
 

Step 3: Nouns are Living Things

The first type of a noun I suggest is a living thing.  This works well for metaphoric names as seen in the chosen names of several American Indian cultures.  I ask someone to raise their hand only when they are ready to tell me of three different living things.  The list of living things you hear may surprise you.  Still, in most cases I find in groups of all ages and ability, that the first thoughts are poured out of the cup that is full of words.  But the common words float to the top, like carbonation in a soft drink.  And these are the first words we get.  These will commonly be horse, dog and cat.  There may, in fact, be some other interesting nouns thrown in there.  But most commonly this is what I hear. 

I will thank the participant for giving us these words, and they are great words.  Normal words.  I'll mention that we are now to go to a different level, perhaps not as normal.  As part of the game I'll make the dog, cat and horse illegal words for the workshop to use.   In fact, I'll make it a rule that all words, spoken by the group are illegal words to use.  Even if you are the one who offers the word to the group it is now illegal for you to use on paper.   This may disappoint a few of the participants, so I say  "think of it, you are now blessed with an opportunity to think of something new!" 

"You don't have to thank me," I say. 

But specifically, the dog and cat and horse are illegal words because they are not specific.  There are several types of dogs, cats and horses.  Dobermans, German shepherds, Siamese, mustangs.   And while these types of four-legged mammals are now not permissible, you get the idea: get very specific and uncommon as you can.  Keep in mind that these should for this workshop be real living things, that excludes dinosaurs, unicorns and extinct things. 

Recall that there are many types of living thinks always keeping in mind that specificity is important.  A few categories of living things: trees, flowers, fungi, microbes, lichens, fish, birds, marsupials, insects, arachnids etc.
 
 

Step 4:  Nouns of Every Day Use

Then perhaps another noun out of the three suggested nouns can be something you use every day.  Now this leads to some critical thinking in that as with living things this question raises the commonly said words first.  One of the goals in this metaphoric workshop is to learn the thinking that goes into good poetry.  So exclude from the list of something-you-use-every-day toothbrushes, pencils, pens.  This because they are three of the most commonly stated words in this exercise.  Secondly, suggest that participants give a very specific answer here, as they did with living things.  For instance it is not uncommon for someone to say clothes.  Now this is a good example because there are so many types of clothes with various names.  (No brand names are permitted in this game.)  If someone is having a difficult time coming up with a specific particle such as clothing I might suggest offering the Macmillan Visual Dictionary or similar reference tool.  Or else go to a different noun category; remember no persons or places.  But anyone may want to expand their vocabulary in this milieu and many people do not use their own vocabulary potential as adults.  This workshop demonstrates that and encourages growth in that facility helps us to navigate the linguistic neural networking.

Also, even when the type of clothing is suggested I may encourage even further focus on a named part of the clothing.  For instance on certain types of shoes there are grommets through which the shoe lace travels.  I may use grommets every day.  Grommets like cacophony and lozenge is a more enjoyable and interesting word than clothes. 

Food is something we use every day and also one of the common answers.  Encourage specificity here as well.  There are types of pasta and types of breads; also we have vegetables, fruits meats, dairies.   Just access these words through the four food groups.  Over the years I have tried to collect menus from restaurants that have interesting descriptions of the food on them.  Cook books, maybe even the visual dictionary of pasta may be implemented if you desire. 

When you encourage specific focusing it is amazing how many words very young children and adults will come up with when encouraged in a group setting.  Also this demonstrates a collective effort and makes it clear from whence our language comes: from our culture around us, through our milieu.

A third noun type may vary.  Indulge yourself.  Some suggestions:

• Something that is or uses energy
• Something ancient (remember no people and discourage the common answers like dinosaurs  from the museum though specific artifacts may work)
• Something architectural, specifically named parts of house construction since, say Victorian architecture, visual dictionary sources are available here as well.

Step 5:  Verbs:
Run, Skip, Jump to Amble, Canter, and Scurry

We haven’ t gotten to verbs yet.  For this I ask the group to raise their hand only when they have three verbs in mind and are ready to state them to the group and me.  More often than not the three words are "run, skip and jump".   Pre-K's to Ph.D.'s tend to give these words first.  I point to that small spot on the brain and sketch a map to other brain locations.  Even with younger people I believe this linguistic comfort zone comes from the baby-boomers experience with Dick and Jane reading books in the late nineteen fifties, early sixties.

So I ask for suggests of other words for run such as trot and canter.  Then I ask the group for more.  We will collectively assemble many exciting variations on many common verbs.  This list will of course be unavailable to each person’s list.  Their opportunity is to think of even more exciting verbs and to come up with at least three of them for the list. 

Allow members to share their lists as they travel through this process.  All ages love to do this, to share their discoveries in words.  This is important to do in a poetry workshop because it begins the genre with almost everyone’s excitement over just a list of words.  This experience is a first and powerful step into a poetry community and to becoming motivated to write more; maybe even sentences next.

Once each person in the group has selected their nouns and verbs, now that ownership and pride of the papers has been established its time to give our papers to our community.  I suggest that this is a service to your community.  This is where our language comes from, our culture.  As well, this demonstrates the cultural power of words to effect change within a community as we see in the next exercise.
 
 

Step 6:  Stranger-Language

The group is told to select, in their minds only at this time, one person in the group who they determine they know the least.  Then, given the go ahead, the members are to rise, if necessary, and walk over to the person they have chosen.  Then you hand them your chosen person your paper.  The person you have picked must give you back the paper that they are holding at this time.  I say this because it may be that several others as “least known” chose this person. Still you may only choose one person though several different people may choose you.  Understand?  Then go.  In the end you must have a different paper than your own and no one may be without a paper. 

All people are instructed to consider the list of words that they created now as gone from their possession and a part of the community.  The paper in front of you, well, you're stuck with it.  You may use only the words listed there.  This points out the limitations of language and the art of using the right word (and there are too few) for the right subject. 

You and all participants are to circle ONE thing only, only one noun on the paper.  And what you choose must somehow be the noun that has the most to do with their personal life.  Maybe you have always loved this thing, maybe you have always hated it, maybe your grandmother has thirty five of these things in her garage, perhaps you don’t know much about this thing but would like the learn and experience more.  Circle the one that fits into any of these on your life.  There are always a few people who insist there is nothing that represents them in any way on their list.  And I congratulate them on having more of a great opportunity to find a metaphor for them.  They must inquire which one of the nouns represents some even small part life.   Like in many games we sometimes choose a card that does not seem to work for us. 

So we go around the room and let people share what word they have chosen and why.  This period is interesting and people of all ages tend to want to share their chosen word, as much as they enjoyed sharing their list of words.  Also, this excitement over picking a word is an affirmation to the person who actually created that list that what they said in words is of cultural value right now. 

Next step: circle one verb.  The only rule is that it in the list of three or so and that the verb has something to do with your life.  Spend no time finding verbs that seem to work with the noun you have picked.  This is not part of the job.  The goal here is to have two words that have something to do with your life only.  They do not have to seem to work together. 

Then I will call one participant up to the front of the room and ask his/her name.  I observe his paper and ask why he picked the noun, say, gladiola.  He may tell us that he lived next to his grandmother in Pennsylvania.   He'll add that she always had gladiolas growing in her garden.  This is a strong part of his childhood; in fact, he grows gladiolas himself on the roof of his apartment complex.  Then I'll ask why he chose the verb summarizing.  Note that the verbs work best when they are used with the -ing ending.  If these do not exist on your list you can of course change the tense of the verb.  Sometimes you can successfully convert a noun into a verb, if you must.  Well Mike might say something like he is always summarizing history for his students and that's what he spends much of his time doing.  Now that we have gone over the volunteers chosen words I'll announcement that we have know this person as, say Mike, as Mike for a day or a few hours.  I'll give body language that indicates preparing for applause.  Then I'll say "please prepare to join me in welcoming into our culture Cacophony of Lozenge . . . Summarizing Gladiola!"

The group then falls into applause while I say, "Thanks for joining us, it's great to have you in our culture, hope you'll come back again soon."  Now Mike is known as Summarizing Gladiola, an interesting name, and Mike will no doubt enjoy his new metaphor as will the rest of the class.  Names will vary dramatically among people based on their life interests and the limitations their lists. 

This last event brings a celebratory aspect to the presentation of metaphor names and stimulates open behavioral response to the celebration of metaphor.  In small groups everyone may be briefly interviewed and applauded.  In large groups perhaps a few volunteers can be put before the group.  Either way an entertaining ritualistic approach may be taken with each person’s name. 

Point out the community response and involvement in the celebration of just a few words.  Think of where we can go from here if we work so well with a list of words.
 

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GARDENS FOR EMOTIONAL HARVEST:
Writing Emotional Compensation

    SAMURAI SONG

When I had no roof I made
Audacity my roof. When I had
No supper my eyes dined.

When I had no eyes I listened.
When I had no ears I thought.
When I had no thought I waited.

When I had no father I made
Care my father.  When I had no
Mother I embraced order.

When I had no friend I made
Quiet my friend.  When I had no
Enemy I opposed my body.

When I had no temple I made
My voice my temple.  I have
No priest, my tongue is my choir.

When I have no means fortune
Is my means.  When I have
Nothing, death will be my fortune.

Need is my tactic, detachment
Is my strategy.  When I had
No lover I courted my sleep.

   -ROBERT PINSKY
 

I read this poem in The New Yorker a little while ago and it struck me for its ability to demonstrate the discipline of facing loss.  Perhaps the poem expresses in some way the joy of the survivor's battle.  That is a battle not with swords or warriors but the battle of using strategies for compensation.  The Samurai warriors of Japan, some time ago, were highly accomplished masters of various disciplines including the arts as well as defense.  Women were included in that milieu in various ways as well.

It seems that in this poem, by Robert Pinsky, current poet laureate of the United States through the Library of Congress, replaces the physical presence of something important to us with a sort of emotional element of that item.  For instance,

When I had no eyes I listened.
When I had no ears I thought.
When I had no thought I waited.

When I had no father I made
Care my father.

These lines perhaps imply that care is what the Samurai warrior felt when his father was around.  But now that his father is gone the Samurai says, "When I had no father I made/Care my father."

This is a type of replication of an emotional source.  In other words, the primary source of that emotional response is missing (in this case the father is the source of feeling care).  So replication, replacement, compensation seems to me useful when considering the losses that life experiences can impose.  To acknowledge the emotion that what is missing used to evoke seems like a valuable and important thing to do.  That is not to say that this is the only way we can use this poem.   There are losses and there are things that are not losses. . . yet or ever.  But I do feel even if we should at least imagine a loss.  When we vigilantly consider something that could, at some point, be missing from our life experience, it gives us the discipline of the samurai survivor warrior: compensation. 

For instance, let’s consider the sport skiing.  Imagine that with physical or neurological challenges you can no longer ski and you used to enjoy it.  Or perhaps you still can ski.  Either way lets look at that important element in our life.  Now, consider how you feel when skiing.  You may feel excited, to be soon sliding down a hill, handsome in your ski attire.  This is a start at getting at what you may hold as the emotional value of skiing.  To move even deeper, it may be exhilaration that you feel when you ski.  It is exhilaration that gives this physical sport its emotional value. 

Now, let’s write in a way inspired by the poem.  The goal of this kind of writing is to exercise the strategies of developing emotional compensation for loss. Now of course, there will be several people who insist that certain things could never be replaced or compensated for.  And that would be true for many things in our lives.  But consider only that a stated emotion could be at least sampled occasionally in other ways.  In other words even with loss that brings grieving, we still need our moments of joy, happiness and pleasure, not to mention exhilaration. Of course you can also take this guide in other directions as well; but for now let us look at what else could provide for us the emotional value of exhilaration.

Exhilaration.  Perhaps it comes from:

A morning walk in the woods in fall;
Making an angel in the snow with children;
Hearing a Mozart sonata;
The house is quiet and there is no pressure to accomplish some task.

Notice the details that I am suggesting with these, shall we say emotional conversions of exhilaration.   I think it is important to get very specific in very few words, as suggested in these examples.
 

Strategy One: Get Specific

List three to five very specific physical, behavioral, cognitive elements that you have valued in your life.  I do suggest that these become very specific.  Specificity can make them more interesting to the reader and more accessible to us in our own emotional discoveries.

For instance, we may like sports.  But lets get more specific; how about soccer.  Still, there is a position or a movement we really personally value in that sport.  Maybe that is goalie.  OK, here we go with an example:
 

Strategy Two: Introspection

Introspectively examine the feeling that this life element evokes in you.  Perhaps a list of emotion words would come in handy or discussions of emotions with groups, or metaphors for what the feeling is like.  As mentioned above, as a goalie we feel loved, heroic.

No longer being a goalie I felt
Loved as a hero protecting
Seniors from falling in therapy session.

  or

Without blocking the soccer ball
I stop danger with the respect
Of the people I care for.
 

Strategy Three: Identifying Possible Loss

Following Robert Pinsky's poetry form for "Samurai Song," begin with what you are missing, as shown above.  Then, consider life elements that in even the slightest possibility could be missing at some point from your life.  Once having identified a possible loss, state them and their situation clearly.  To make this poem even more your own I suggest that instead of beginning the opening line of each stanza with when I had no . . . just like Mr. Pinsky did, consider the possible the variations on that phrase.

Here are a few examples of variations on the When I had no theme:

If I was missing . . .
Without a . . ..
If ever the . . .
What if I was . . .
Missing a . . .
With the loss of a . . .
Should there no longer . . .
No more . . .
Not quite the same . . .
When a deficit . . .

Get the idea? OK, here's a summary of instructions: after beginning the line with what you are or could be missing, then mention the feeling this element of life evokes.  Finally, add an item or experience that could also create this emotion in you.

I might also suggest ending each line with a powerful word.   That can pause the reader for a nanosecond of subconscious reflection.  In other words, dump the ands and buts from the last word in the line and use the powerful words.  Here are two examples:

Should there no longer be clear spoken
Words from my lips, gestures will express
My heart.

Without the taste of pepperoni pizza
The sound of sponge cake and its pillow
On my tongue would give me culinary delight.

This can work for children as well:

If I had no brown teddy bear
Grandmother cheeks against mine
Would soothe me at night.

Take a look at how the last words in each line work together, not so much with rhyme, but with a congealing of strength of ideas:  pizza/pillow/delight;  bear/mine/delight.

So the value here is to acknowledge, in words, what is important in our deepest heart. Then we state the feeling it brings to us.  Finally, we find, by personal reflection, the other areas of life from which this emotion could be harvested.  This, I believe, can further mature us as adults, and children.   I believe it also aids us in creating strategies for facing loss no matter how small or overwhelming.

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Talking to the Wall May not be as
Crazy as it Sounds:
Objects of Self-Personification

Tree at my window, window tree,
My sash is lowered when night comes on;
But let there never be curtain drawn
Between you and me.

Vague dream-head lifted out of ground,
And thing next most diffuse to cloud,
Not all your light tongues talking aloud
Could be profound.

But tree, I have seen you taken and tossed,
And if you have seen me when I slept,
You have seen me when I was taken and swept
And all but lost.

That day she put our heads together,
Fate had her imagination about here,
Your head so much concerned with outer,
Mine with inner, weather.

    --Robert Frost
 

So far we’ve helped to form a poetry culture, a community of inquiry if you will.  We can see how poetry and its writing does work with the inner self as well as the community which is something outside ourselves, though we are a part of it.  So let’s move over to Robert Frost’s poem used in Suki and find a way to work on this with children in the classroom.  To do so, this spring, I directed the Mendham class to experience hits exercise first.
 

Step 1: The Personal Possession

In this poem we see a person who observes the object outside his/her window, it seem every day, in light and dark.  It’s just a tree outside the window.  And it is the tree that this person looks at and watches changing with the weather.  It becomes a private object that this person treasures.  There is a relationship here, and identity shared; a living together. 

Don’t you possess an object that you have, as vague as it might be, some relationship with?  Don’t you have something you keep with you in your home or work area that is yours, which you have placed there?  That you do not want to be without?  It means nothing really to almost everyone else; it’s just a thing.  But to you it has some meaning in you life, though that may not be easy to define.  Nonetheless, it is close to you.  It may represent a part of your past, and because of that no doubt, your present. 

I brought along to Mendham a kind of three-D collage that I made in a plexi-box or shadow box with a frame with a glass window.  The box included several objects that I saved from my childhood.  I told my class that I had made this box perhaps twenty-five years ago.   I said it represents my leaving childhood (which I confess never really happened).  In this box I wanted to assemble a few fragments of that: what was important to me then, and though to a less extent, now. 

I displayed these items, because to create a poem in the spirit Frost might have had in mind we need something of our own, though not necessarily a tree. 

Here is one of my own objects:  a creamer from a diner. . . You know, like the little plastic peel-off tops of half and half that are handed to you in the saucer of you coffee cup.  This creamer, however, was made of glass, and in diners a few years ago. They could be reused by returning them to the dairy company.  These glass creamers would be cleaned, filled and recapped with a pull-off top.  This creamer came from a nearby dairy company that we visited when my father was setting up his first and only a restaurant business.

That was an important part of my life and the planning and design is where I fit in along with my father.  My other brothers were better at working at the counter top; I was not.  So this creamer, a little object, means something to me. 

 It seems to me we all have little, or big objects that mean something to US, and not necessarily to anybody else, (though they can).  I suggest you choose something from your windowsill, tabletop, desk, cabinet, and jewelry set, garden outside, which means something to you.  Maybe even select the color or design of your wall.  Choose something that you regularly enough observe, an item that means something to you in ways you may not really even understand or may never have thought about.  So now is the time.
 

Step 2: Where Are You?

It seems to me that in the first stanza of this poem the poet first mentions where his object is, in this case tree.  The poet also emphasizes that the object is his by being affiliated with a place that is his as well:

Tree at my window, window tree,

By putting the object in a place, he then gives the object a name to identify it by, to make it personal:  window tree.  This phrase could almost be hyphenated.

So in giving directions for the writing of this kind of poem I may suggest that we place then name our own object:

Sapphire ring on my pointer, pointing sapphire

Star Trek model on my mouse pad, rodent ship

Struggling orchid on my bay window sill, orchid still.

      Or bay orchid
      Or orchid bay

There are several different ways to use the language of the object and its place to name your object.  By using a method not quite what Frost used, but your own, makes this a poem that is your own.  In a way, we are naming our preferred object similar to our metaphoric naming of self.  And in naming your object you can work with that metaphoric discipline if you would like to. And this would take you even further from the precise form of the Frost poem, which may in fact, be preferred by you.
 

Step 3: Your Aren’t There, Now
 

My sash is lowered when night comes on;

Here’s the second line in the poem.  It seems to me that his represents the inevitable separation we experience from our objects.  We are not always at our desks, can’t always wear a ring, in the winter we cannot always see all parts of our garden.  I believe this exercise is good for all kinds of philosophical health.  We will always experience a separation or the loss of that which is personally close to us (which we experienced in "Samurai Song").  To acknowledge that separation, that loss at times is the goal here in this line.

So perhaps in the next line of the poem we may want to casually, (that seems to be the way) mention the separation from the object.

    Struggling orchid on my bay window sill, orchid still
    I am not always in the kitchen day and night

Note that this line does not only include the 'separative' mechanism, if you will, but also includes the time of separation:

           . . . when night comes on;

We will see just a bit later in Frost’s poem that this separation is never really quite true.  We may be apart form our loved ones or our parents may be out of our lives now, but still the legacies they have instilled in us live on.  And so too, for the tree for Frost. He mentions watching and seeing the other, even in imagination, even in sleep.
 

Step 4: Never Part from the Whole

But let there never be curtain drawn
Between you and me.

This part of the poem expresses the desire never to be really apart from our treasure.  And we can make our own form of this desire present in our own poem.
 

Step 5: That-Chat

Vague dream-head lifted out of ground,
And thing next most diffuse to cloud,
Not all your light tongues talking aloud
Could be profound.

Now that we have acknowledged, in the simple realities of life, how close we may actually be to our preferred object, (or at least forming this position for the poem), we have a different perspective from which to mention what is special in that objects personality of sorts.  And Frost does that in the above stanza.  As well, the poet mentions the profundity of the object, in this case the tree, and how it may tell him things of life and self somewhat metaphorically.

So in this part of the poem perhaps you want to mention how your object does in fact, use its personified voice to reach you.  Because we use a material object this takes some imagination. With living things perhaps their ability or method of talk is a bit simpler for us to identify.

You may choose to use the poetry form suggested by the poet or write in your own form.
 

Step 6: In Good Times and Bad
 

But tree, I have seen you taken and tossed,
And if you have seen me when I slept,
You have seen me when I was taken and swept
And all but lost.

 No doubt you have been in the presence of you chosen object at all kinds of emotional times.  Frost mentions sleep but we are taken and swept by so many other life challenges and you may want to consider: In which parts of your life peripheral struggles your object may have observed you?  Mention how in the same weather, noise, movement, temperature, pressure, your chosen object did look and behave in the physics of the surrounding environment. Like the tree taken and tossed.  Of course our own inner weather can vary from season to season, day to day.   So recall your own personal inner, weather to help you finish the above-suggested stanza.

Step 7: Summarizing Gladiola
 

That day she put our heads together,
Fate had her imagination about here,
Your head so much concerned with outer,
Mine with inner, weather.

Finally summarize your poem, bringing it to closure in its language form.  (Though, there may be no closure to the philosophical exploration here.)  Like putting your arm over your buddies’ shoulder make a statement that says what you two are together.
 

Summary of Steps:

1. Identify a thing that you keep in a place so its presence is always known to you.

2. Mention the place this thing finds itself and then rename the item in accordance with its surroundings.

3. Describe briefly that which can and which does separate you from your object, and the time of day this takes place.

4. Tell in creative language how your object looks, personifying if necessary

5. Talk about why your object is important to you: what it says to you and what it cannot say.

6. Somehow tell us of one or more of the emotional moment, challenges, struggles you have experienced in the presence of the object and how you may have responded.  Add how your object may have, considering the physics of your object and its surrounding at that time, responded.

7. Bring closure to the poem perhaps suggesting how, in fact, you two things do work together.

The value here is to harvest the notions from the language of Frost.  The above are, of course, general suggestions for the inner weather of this poem.  But weather does change, as do our reactions to it.  So create your poem lead by your own meteorology.
 
 
 

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Contact information for Christopher Parker

Mailing Addresses:

Classics and General Humanities
Dickson Hall,

Montclair State University
Upper Montclair, NJ 07043

Tel: (973) 509-0523

Email:  parkerc@mail.montclair.edu