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Dec 03, 2019
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The Fulcrum.
Turning to the weather.
How easy an evasion from awkwardness
Once was this
Talk of the elemental?
What ticks the downpipe brings,
Inundated with flaring rain
And the trick of glass shuddering winds
This is the mourned at,
Longed for,
Tasmanian Spring.
In matters of fact
Summer: as here described,
Is envied by eyes, in that ash fulcrum:
Across the dark straight divide
Where firestorms fight fear,
Fragments of home
disappear
How, how they would long
For rain such as this, and yet,
The howling at the wind here,
And the lack of shear heat
Persists.
All I know is all that has changed,
Look with me at the normal sea
One day my counterpart will,
Long after it’s gone,
Maybe sing its song..
What will this stretch of water be
for our supposed young?
What new age will steal their youth
In an era, where we’d begun,
And our efforts at that fulcrum
Of reason, all things being unequal,
Became undone.
About This Poem
Last Few Words: I'm only just back, the fires in Australia are beyond horrific. Where else to begin? Our PMs "prayers and thoughts" were not worth much for those calling for real action. i know someone who lost their house, twice. Yay, happy days! Just had to say something. Hope to write something more meaningful soon, but had to post something on this awful situation.
Style/Type: Free verse
Review Request Intensity: I want the raw truth, feel free to knock me on my back
Editing Stage: Editing - rough draft
Comments
Scatterhatter
5 years 7 months ago
Awkward weather
I particularly like how your first lines made me think how much talking about the weather in my lifetime has changed.
"How easy an evasion from awkwardness
Once was this
Talk of the elemental?"
It seems in all avenues of seemingly ordinary 'passing the time' conversation has now got an edge of fear or blame. I've even had a conversation today with a stranger on how they feel the Pacific Islands are sinking not that the sea levels are rising.
You said you want to write something more meaningful in the future, well I think what you wrote here is meaningful, deeply. Our changing pace, and the strength of stride we need to keep up with these changes.
And I write this as I've heard the siren's of 4 emergency vehicles rush past my building in the last ten minutes.
Eumolpus
5 years 7 months ago
Chris, a good poem
A very hard subject to write about and create a poem out of (that's not cliche, propaganda, or hyperbole) We all have to write poems like this. Yours is a success in that it is so honest and personal. I feel your voice in the poem. Maybe because its the simple language and ideas.
The poem is welcoming us to share your frustration and nostalgia.
But whereas all the great ant-war poems since WWI have not slowed down the pace of war, our poems about this catastrophe may not change much...but slowly (if not too late) it all adds us to something to be salvaged. So i don't think what you wrote meaningless.
I had a problem with the title and the idea of the fulcrum...i googled, and all I could find was it's part of a lever; I couldn't put it together from there. It is a great sounding word though.
nice to hear from you here again. May the internet signal be strong in your spot in Taz.
..
vandiemenspeak
5 years 7 months ago
Archimedes
Give me a lever long enough and a fulcrum on which to place it, and I shall move the world.
Archimedes
The fulcrum, being the world and our reason.
More to follow!