Of Metaphorical Vanity and Actualised Nothingness
poem about so much. Inspiration? memorialisation? trepidation? Stagnation? You decide.
broadly I'd say
the heavy and unrefined brushstrokes of progress have forgotten my soiled and marred canvas
a long-held sense of longing
for anything but what is before me right now remains but viscosity prevents it from breathing freely without life support.
that phrase about two steps forward, half a mile back, feels apt right now, right here in my own cyclical existence
presumably I'd guess
I should keep drinking in the view of the fields being ploughed for harvest, and consider the metaphor
Consider the metaphor that stagnation, that atrophy can be bested through recognition and realisation
Regarding the inevitability
I could argue that any form of fighting against the unmovable force of my resignation for repetition of patterns past
makes entropy almost impossible, but then I should consider the metaphor and consider the wisdom in nothing impossible
nothing ventured, nothing gained, if you only do the same, you only get the same. cliché after cliché but cliché for reasons
cliches hurt because they are true, cliches irritate my gut, because they are based on well-trod in, embossed lines of old
dead men know the living better than the living know the living, it pains me to digress
this push and pull is boring me, this overplayed Shakespearean back-and-forth Tête-à-tête is getting me nowhere faster
it's very clever and verbose, but as my shoulders drop and my sanity falters, the weight of possibility
the weight of responsibility for potentiality holds me captive in the same spot, the same damn spot, it always has
I'll just be here with my Yorick and my soliloquy of wisdom, of indecisions and conflicts within, cliché within a cliché
a cliché a day keeps the sensible in disarray, is something I could say, for it is noble to analyse and to dissect
but pointless vanity that amounts to the stale old nothingness of an empty skull, if you don't learn and grow
from any of it
pointless vanity
stale old nothingness
empty skull
empty
*
Thank you for reading!
Author's Notes: Same as subtitle. Thank you, Shakespeare.
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Paul Stewart
Award-Winning Writer, Poet, Scottish-Italian, Subversive.
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Comments (8)
This is definitely one of your better, Poems, Paul. Thanks for drawing it to my attention. I do see in it the angst and indecision that permeates Hamlets to be or not to be speech which like every one of his soliloquy leads to the opposite of the action that obedience to his father’s ghost would have otherwise led to. Instead of the death only of Claudius, his inaction leads to the death of everyone he professes to care for other than his good friend Horatio. Hamlet is variously portrayed by actors when he delivers to be or not to be as cold and calculating or filled with restless passion. But calculation seems the better interpretstion to me. Oft times when we wrestle our demons we do so solely in the intellect. I’m happy to see in these verses evidence of your own broken-heartedness which increases the power of the poem and indicates that you are at a place where you can truly grapple with your demons. This should learn you to think before suggesting the reader decide! 🙄
I feel like you blended the feelings of being stuck and the commentary on cliches together really well. And really liked the dwindling lines at the close, felt very in line with the sense of dissatisfaction
I got a clear sense of stagnation and frustration, like being in quicksand with nowhere to go.
The very essence of my sense of evanescence. The meaningless, empty nihilism of wandering futility, pondering over nothing.
Yes, we're always afraid that we'll stagnate. Every writer's fear.
A bit off topic, but every time I read one of your works, I notice that you link some of your other works at the bottom. I always think this is brilliant and that I should do it. Unfortunately, I am less brilliant and always forget. Maybe next time . . .
Stagnation definitely rang through as a significant theme throughout this one for me, as was fear, which is surely powerful and very relatable. But I loved that glimmer of hope added at the end too :)
This is quite to me a story poem written as if in couplets to me. It is a poem that tells what a writer is thinking and feeling about what is being said in the writing. At least that is my interpretation of this one. Good job.