The leader detects
a foot,
the effects of succeeding
behind him—
his error.
One after another
repeat precisely the
units of
attacking evolutions.
There is rigid adherence
achieved; the last
round dash.
A scream ... men
follow faithfully
and meet
nothing with a
homogeneity
which undermines
the moral material
of lines
in formation.
Simple reflection
will reveal
the observer
specially
rendered
as machine,
beneath the same
panorama.
He must touch
to be positive and
judge.
At We Write Poems this week, Angie Werren asked us to experiment with found poetry and erasures. I played around with text taken from "Aeroplanes and Dirigibles of War" by Frederick Arthur Ambrose Talbot and produced this somewhat ambiguous poem. I added no extra words, and I tried to keep the line breaks as is. I did add punctuation for clarity. To see it in its purest form (and read the original text) you can go to the Wave Poetry site.
11 comments:
Good one, Francis. I enjoyed dabbling too.
Ah, an ambiguous piece, thank you, Francis, for giving voice to how I felt about mine. ;)
I like your piece. Maybe I'll tackle Frederick Arthur Ambrose Talbot's piece next. (such a moniker!)
It's fun to cruise the pieces this morning.
I worked on a fish processing boat in Alaska one summer. Your poem brought back the question that nagged me as I worked/slept/worked/slept/worked.
Man? Machine? Man? Machine?
I'd like to read the original piece now to see how you created this. Very intriguing! Thanks, Francis!
ha -- finally got you to try one!!
I read one of your comments somewhere; you said it was like sculpting. that's a perfect description of what it is. I think you have to remove a lot of ego from it, to let the words tell you what they want to say, like a piece of wood or marble "wants" to be what it wants to be.
I definitely get a feeling of soldiers-as-machines from this; timely and moving, esp. the final stanza.
I like what you found here. Now I'm going to have to go back and look at the text.
I was so looking forward to seeing what you would make of the dreadful piano recital, though.
I really liked "the / units of / attacking evolutions". It's got me thinking. I'm also intrigued how "touch" came into your poem, as it so often showed up in others, using the "Pointed Roofs" text.
yes... i do agree!
powerful work...
especially liked this part...
rendered
as machine,
beneath the same
panorama.
Rats! No piano. But, you did catch me off guard, so I was attentive...the first stanza reminded me of Sun Tzu (Art of War) and I fell in step with the rest of your words.
This is a good one Francis!
Pamela
@Derrick I think I'll go back and explore some other texts.
@Brenda His name (and the book title) drew me in right away. I'm guessing there have been (will be) a few poems based on that Alaskan experience? I think we're all very sophisticated machines.
@Footprints The original text isn't all that interesting, but I think that's the point of the exercise.
@Angie I would have tried it sooner had I known about the Wave Poetry site :). Ego removal is one of my strengths ;).
@Barb You shamed me into trying the recital piece, and I used the word dreadful in it :D.
@Mr.Walker There must be something about the word "touch" that speaks very strongly to us.
@hb The connection between man and machine is a recurring theme for me, so this fit perfectly.
@Linda I'll have to dig out my copy of "Art of War" and use that for an erasure :).
@Pamela Thanks!
Ambiguous...but an open door. I see armies of exactness marching, a cold, unfeeling machine of war, of death. Maybe I even see the Borg...been watching too much Star Trek lately. :) But you get my point. Nicely done.
-Nicole
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