Two things:
Thing 1.) I’m reading McCarthy’s Blood Meridian currently. If you’ve read it, there’s not much more that need be done by way of explanation, but if you’ve not, let me attempt to speak to it in some way … in a way perhaps that might justify my being so completely swallowed up at present. The Independent said it “Reads like a conflation of the Inferno, the Iliad, and Moby-Dick.” I’d add that it likewise has the density and scope of the Old Testament book of Isaiah. The language is breathtaking. Heavy, but breathtaking, and I’m reading it as slowly as I possibly can, chewing long and mulling deeply on each laden phrase.
Art inspired by Blood Meridian, by Sean Lewis
Thing 2.) The Wily Pirate Queen, Grace, has issued another haiku challenge.
Art inspired by Blood Meridian, by John Mejias
While neo-biblical desert wars are not common haiku fodder, re it is nearly impossible to read McCarthy and NOT see the world weaving itself in a textile atmosphere threaded of poetry.
I was suddenly certain that I could find a haiku ready-made in the pages of Blood Meridian.
I started with the page I happened to be on, and then, curious, went on to the next page as well. I’m fairly certain there’s at least one hidden on every page of this book.
Blackout Haiku, Blood Meridian, Pages 64 & 65
In case that’s a little hard to read, here they are.
P. 64
stones of the faithful
fly in the fog of the streets
– terra damnata
and
P. 65
Dark basalt prophets
trembled and sleared through the world.
They saw the sun drop.
…one more reason to goggle at McCarthy.
Art inspired by Blood Meridian, by John Mejias
::
Finally, as it is unbecoming to enter a challenge with words you’ve pilfered from someone else — regardless of their obvious and irrefutable genius — here’s a collection of my own.
Four twelve-syllable haiku loosely joined into a larger poem that’s titled Into the Nameless Empty. Actually, I’m not sure haiku are meant to have titles… Grace?
Into the Nameless Empty
bones of the day lie in cinders
–these the howling hours.
craven-eyed hinterland wolves
become this rind of moon,
so, the steaming earth, the loping stars.
and we, then?
wayfarers of darkslaked lands
…what do we become?
::
and (because those didn’t exactly follow the rules)
blood and fear and slag
landscape of the moons of hell
redemption, violent.
I love your phrase ‘read it as slowly as possible.’. It’s just so different to how I read. I’m such a consumer of words; I tend to swallow unexamined the lie that the more we read, the better. I am going to change this, and read more patiently and mindfully.
It doesn’t help when you have too many books on the go at once, and more on the ‘to-buy’ list. So I will take more time before accepting a recommendation. But the one you give in this piece is so, well, tantalising.
i’m the same way with books. swallow them whole, sometimes. :] … but the value of this from the vantage point of simply learning the craft seems worthy of a slow (ssslllloooooowwww) intake.
i do recommend. … with a few caveats as to the detached narration of heinously gruesome violence.
I have read ‘Blood Meridian’ – it is at once the best and worst of Cormac McCarthy: the sheer magnificence of his poetry; the inconceivable magnitude of the grotesque.
I’m not in the least surprised he has inspired images of the harshest landscape of soul.
Brava!
the best and worst of books… so true. there is this painting that francis bacon did – pope innocent after velazquez’ (portrait http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Study_after_Vel%C3%A1zquez's_Portrait_of_Pope_Innocent_X) and can’t help feeling that mccarthy is doing something similar. that he’s somehow stripped history of its vestments and is showing all her rage and howl and animal bloodlust… yet with such skill and technique and raw honesty (imagined though it may be) that you can’t help feel the weight of it.
McCarthy seems to try to describe the things that get left out of history books. What I like best in this book is the presentation of a western life that doesn’t occur in Arizona or Colorado. This is New Mexico Territory, a whole different thing (the Texans who visit are not the heroes of the Alamo), not something easily represented by civilized conceptual categories. In addition, his language may seem a luxury, but is probably a necessity because the usual language and forms of rational exposition are too much associated with lies and fabrications about life in the west.
you’re so right, kevin. there is something wild and … mystic about the sonoran desert. The history of it defies categorization, as does the rationale (however dubious). the best comparison i’ve been able to come up with so far is that it’s like walking around in a goya painting.
yikes. yikes!
i love “rind of moon” and “darkslaked lands.”
thanks, Marian.
i am less than thrilled with my attempts. feel like i’m trespassing on unfriendly territory. you, however, have this down. :]
Your words always invite me into a deep cave, where I am free to meditate on all the bleak and scandal. There, I unpack sadness, write fire, bleed my ache and need. I am always able to scrape paradise from the dirt floor.
murderous tick, tock
vast, desert arms burn my lungs
many-breasted She.
beautiful!
the imagery is thick and i can feel the oppressive burning even in the vast.
say on, firewriter.
Even with haikus (which I must confess are not my favourites) you shine and retain that “epic” feel that your longer pieces have – the haiku built from the pages of McCarthy’s Blood Meridian is genius and I wonder how many other haikus are scattered throughout the pages of greats – these two lines completely shook me “stones of the faithful
fly in the fog of the streets” – wonderfully captured – and then your own, capturing that air – “blood and fear and slag
landscape of the moons of hell” – the harsh sounds reflecting a harsher, though brilliant image!
Thanks, sam! … apologies for the long delay. site issues. :/
we’ll see how that goes.
i have similar issues with form poetry of all kinds. i can’t seem to make it not feel contrived. in regards to mccarthy, i am plotting to do a kind of project.
it feels indulgent somehow, to play around in his words this way. like so much decadent language has to be bad for you.
i’d love to see an OT haiku… got any lying around?
“I’m fairly certain there’s at least one hidden on every page of this book.”
I agree. #secretmessages abound. And I love the ones you have found.
i was thinking of you, mandy, when i was delving for secret poems. :]
Your poetry is, as always, irreproachable…even when you submit unrelated work to a specific challenge.
The last haiku was perfect. I would have loved to see a set. The juxtaposition of violence and redemption is one of my favorite themes. Well done.
I think you’d do well with the super-strict, one line of twelve syllables format.
I just began reading Cormac McCarthy. I hope I will enjoy his books as much as everyone else I know…
There are formats that utilize borrowed pieces of other works, as well–I think you would enjoy those quite a lot. Perhaps cento verse, or “found poetry”. Perhaps you will see that in a future challenge! (cue evil laughter)
i appreciate your tolerance of the extraneous nonsense here. :]
are there any other specifications for the 12 syllable/one line form? it appeals to me, for reasons that i have yet to fathom.
now this is a crazy modern style!