Speaking my thoughts with you (Paterika Hengreaves)

Weaving Words that’s Poetry

Allegorically speaking, poetry is the poets’ backpack they trek with through the mountains, valleys, streams, plains and moor in a cognitive environment. These poetry chefs search for the right ingredients to clean and season the poetry they cook for their readers. Ever mindful that their poetry must have the right taste and texture for folks still growing baby teeth, those with all their natural adult teeth, those who must wear dentures and those who like gravy, hot peppers, salads and potpourri. Ever mindful of this, poets select the best spices and condiments to add flavor to their poetry dishes. In advance, they set the weight and measurement then blend them well into the stuffing that goes into the poetry. When completed the poetry is placed on the serving tray with the presentation pleasing to the eyes in a manner that complements the poetry being served.

 Poetry is the manifestation of literature written in meter or open form.

Literature is the body of works recognized for having merit artistically. Poetry is a branch of Literature.

Poetic Expression is the art of spinning words together with imagination, emotion, passion, dreams, hope and an uncontained energy calling out to people around, as they listen and join in with the various personas in the narratives.

The poem is the product (the egg as it were) that emerges out of poetry written in elevated and imaginative language and must be handled with care.

Poet creates poetry. Convention dictates that male and female versifiers are called poets; poetess for female versifiers is no longer in vogue. Poets create poetry through a method known as versification. Apart from being the writer of poems, the poet is the voice in poems speaking from a specific Point of View through the use of carefully selected pronouns such as I, me, my, we, us, our, you, your, thou, she, he, it, her, him, they, them. These pronouns tell what voice the poet is using when communicating to readers of the poems. Therefore, the poet is not only the writer; the poet is the Voice or Persona speaking in poems.

Versification is a weaving process of the poets’ thoughts they use to feed the senses of their readers. This process requires the use of versifier tools; with each tool performing a specific task but at the same time, these tools work in unison to produce the end product known as the poem which can either be structured or unstructured. The six versifier tools are content, elements, form, measurement, sound effects and style.

Content is made up of facts, ideas and impressions which poets creatively weave together into the words in poems. The arrangement of content is dictated by the particular form, style and genre which poets use.

Elements refer to density, form, tone, speaker, setting, character, imagery, point of view, rhythm, symbolism and sound (euphony).

Form in poetry refers to the poem’s physical structure and familiar pattern that give shape to a poem.

Physical structure point to length of the verses, the methods applied to rhymes and repetition.

Familiar pattern encompasses specific types of poems which can be straight forward, open-ended, complex system of rhymes, rhythms and repeated verses within a fixed number of verses.

Genre in the poetic world means the type of poems characterized by a specific form as seen in epic poems, narrative poems, romantic poems, dramatic poems, lyric poems and free verse. Poetic genre enhances imaginative and emotional power of those who read poetry.

Mono rhyme is a rhyme scheme in which each verse has an identical rhyme. The term mono rhyme describes the use of one mono type of repetitious sound (rhyme) usually at the end of each verse.

Point of View is the perspective from which the poem is told. This helps the audience to understand who those characters are speaking in the poem. The poet does this by staging various types of voices or personas to narrate the poem to the audience, and is forever mindful not to present situations whereby the audience is turned off because voices are too boring, preachy or reveal overwhelming traits of narcissism.

The Voice What must be borne in mind is that the poet is not only the writer but is the voice, who speaks to the audience in three different ways with the help of such pronouns  I, me, my, we, us, our, you, your, thou, she, he, it, her, him, they, them. These pronouns tell what voice the poet is using when communicating to readers of the poems. Therefore, the poet is not only the writer; the poet is the Voice as well as the persona speaking in poems from a specific Point of View. Another thing, Voice is imagery, tone, pattern of sound, rhythm and diction.

Persona is the Latin word for mask worn by poets. The poets wear this poetic mask as it were, to change roles in poems they create. The mask allows poets to speak directly or indirectly to the audience by manipulating such pronouns as mentioned before: I, me, my, we, us, our, you, your, thou, she, he, it, her, him, they, them.

In Section I, the poet has taken on the mask of First Person Persona by using these pronouns: I, me, my, we, us, our as required when speaking to the audience from what is known thus forging an intimate relationship with the audience. The poet through the voice of the persona speaks from what is known or seen an immediacy, intimacy and sympathy are more intense when poets mask the voice of the First Person Persona, thus offering a deeper connection with the audience. This connection allows the audience to travel directly inside the poets thoughts. It is important to note that First Person Persona is referred to by such terms as First Person Narrative, First Person Limited and First Person Point of View.

The speaking mask the poet wears in Section Two is orchestrated by the use of such pronouns “you, your, thou”. In using these pronouns the poet evokes the voice of “Second Person Persona. Here the poet is no longer the protagonist. The poet’s role has shifted to the audience. Second Person Persona poems do create distance between the poet and the audience. The impression that always comes to mind is that the poet does not want to speak to the audience directly. It also conveys the notion of being too instructional thus making the audience average, idealizing or topical. These impressions could be the reasons why most poets tend to shy away from writing Second Person poems. Nevertheless, the use of Second Person Persona “you” is fairly common in poetry, and since poets do not want to wear the label of being “too aloof” the combination of the “you” and “I” is increasingly seen in poems. Examples of these Second Person Persona poems are displayed in Section II.

Poets from time to time write about their thoughts in third person so as not to be seen as always a First Person Persona character. What does the poet do in this regard? The poet wears the mask of the Third Person Persona in three disguises that of a Third Person Persona Limited Omniscient, Third Person Persona Objective or Third Person Persona Omniscient by using such pronouns as she, he, it, him, they and them. What is significant here is that there are various levels of cognitive understanding when poets choose to mask as these various personas as for examples:

When the mask of the Third Person Persona Limited Omniscient is worn the speaker knows all the happenings of the character, but not the character’s thoughts as depicted in those poems housed in Section III.

When the mask of the Third Person Persona Objective is worn the speaker speaks about what is seen as the picture unfolds before the eyes but the inner thoughts of characters are not divulged in the poems. Such poems provide an impartial report with no interpretation or dialogue provided. The advantage of this narrative point of view is that the persona gives an impartial response and offers more speed and action. The audience must interpret. The down-side of this though, the poet cannot use interpretive language on actors in the poem, but must rely heavily on stating the actions and dialogue of actors in scenarios as for example shown in William Wordsworth poem the “Incident”. This type of Third Person Persona Objective poems are shown in Section IV below but before going to Section IV read Wordsworth’s poem, “Incident”.

Incident

(William Wordsworth)

On his morning rounds the Master

Goes to learn how all things fare;

Searches pasture after pasture,

Sheep and cattle eyes with care;

And, for silence or for talk,

He hath comrades in his walk;

Four dogs, each pair of different breed,

Distinguished two for scent, and two for speed.

See a hare before him started!

--Off they fly in earnest chase;

Every dog is eager-hearted,

All the four are in the race:

And the hare whom they pursue,

Knows from instinct what to do;

Her hope is near: no turn she makes;

But, like and arrow, to the river takes.

Deep the river was, and crusted

Thinly by a one night’s frost;

But the nimble Hare hath trusted

To the ice, and safely crost;

She hath crost, and without heed

All are following at full speed,

When, lo! the ice, so thinly spread,

Breaks—and the greyhound, DART, is overhead!

Better fate have PRINCE and SWALLOW—

See them cleaving to the sport!

MUSIC has no heart to follow,

Little MUSIC, she stops short.

She hath neither wish nor heart,

Hers is now another part;

A loving creature she,and brave!

And fondly strives her struggling friend to save.

From the brink her paws she stretches,

Very hands as you would say!

And affliction moans she fetches,

As he breaks the ice away.

For herself she hath no fears,--

Him alone she sees and hears,--

Makes efforts with complaining; nor gives o’er

Until her fellow sinks to re-appear no more

Third Person Persona Omniscient in poetry analysis is a technique where in poems the persona knows the feelings, and thoughts of every character in the poem as shown in the poems in Section V.

 Section I – First Person Persona Poetry

Poem #1

Avian Christmas Dish

Three days before Christmas of twenty ten;

Strolling as usual under cherry tree;

I was on my wild hunting regimen;

Feline behavior really sets me free.

Killer instinct does dwell in feline mind;

Predatory drives hunting daily sport;

Regardless of how well fed, teeth must grind.

Domesticated in home at Bridgeport...

On boughs my four padded feet stood supreme;

Among wet leaves and rising of the sun;

Birds among the green; I plotted my scheme;

Poultry dish wish my fearless plot was spun.

Through cherry boughs I scaled through early morn,

With every climb my wish grew out of sight;

“Come down Ginger, you are no leprechaun”;

That voice in my head was stern and polite.

A Whisks cat I am: I love to prey;

But church bells bellowed time for midnight mass;

Trees sang ‘Silent Night” and I had no sway;

Those black-birds chirped cherry-berry Christmas (December 2010/Barbados)

Please wait for the continuation