Tocqueville Part 1

This week, we discussed Toqueville by Khaled Mattawa. This book is a collection of highly political poems that Mattawa wrote. I like how his style is and the images he uses to get his point across, when there are points. Sometimes there are different interpretations, and that is what poetry is, your own interpretation of the poem themselves. So, I will pick two that I really like.

The first one is called "Terrorist", where the poem is filled with some grotesque imagery. For example, "I have cleansed my body with the soap of his fat.", and "Rubbing the ashes of his bones unto my face I become his blue screams at birth." Both have not pleasing imagery to the eye, but at the same time they're strong images. I can imagine him rubbing his brother's ashes, and at the same time, washing himself with his fat (how is that possible though? Do you cut out his fat and then use it as soap? Did I miss something?), and continuing on the legacy of his brother. As I continued to read this poem a few times over, it started making more sense.

I made the connections of this poem to post 9/11 terrorist attacks until present. Racial profile is where  I mainly connected it. Within in the text of the poem, Mattawa mentions this: "Will I be a victim again? And again a murderer?" This line here made me think about the racial profiling that has been occurring (if I remember correctly a bit before then) since the attacks, until now. The "victim" could mean the narrator who has been victimized into being profiled as a terrorist by the way he looks, or it could be someone who themselves were a victim of an attack. "Murderer" has the same meaning, just based on how he looks, does that mean he "looks" like a terrorist, ready to blow something up? This misidentifying is still happening today.

Another two that I really liked, but I'm combining them, "Power Point I" and "Power Point II", but the reason is not for imagery or for the language but simply the style of how they are done. Within both, there are aspects of what you expect there to be within an actual power points. In "Power Point I" though, there are "flashbacks" and "cut to's" that really put your own imagination into it. You're getting a back story within the poem itself and it is really interesting to see. For "Power Point II" there are those "insert images here" which in a power point, you insert the image that you want to enhance what you are trying to say. Just these types of things keep you really looking for the next poem to have this type of depth within it.

Writing the Bones

While reading Writing Down the Bones, I started to think about all the parts that I was doing wrong when starting to sit down and write. Within the rules, I was ignoring some of them quite badly. The major one was not to think logically while writing. Seems something that you can not turn off, right? I understand what it means, just write, don't think about how something is spelled and if the word fits completely into place. Just write to write, do not stop to think more than what your initial thought was (or as Natalie Goldberg put it placing thoughts on top of thoughts).

There is a part of the book where Ms. Goldberg goes into what to write about, and mentions that you should jot down ideas as they come to you. This, as I've done it in my own life for years, is true. Whenever I go to sit down and write I have something to say, but I'm unsure of how to say it. In a way it reminds me of what I'm doing now to compose this blog. I'm writing when I have ideas and then going back and perfecting them. In a way I'm writing down its own bone. A term for the structure that I am currently building up. I'm writing down a part of the book that jolts my mind into a frenzy. It is a good way to write out a blog as the week goes on. You've already done writing down some sort of structure of a writing piece and went to enhance the parts that needed enhancing and subtracting the others. 

So, in short, the first part of the book is a foundation on which you will be writing. It talks about some of the moments you could use to illustrate what happens inside of your mind. So far, this novel is becoming more and more interesting and provoking thought. 

A Look into Poetry Language

This week we were discussing poetry. To start though, it is completely not my thing. It is not like I dislike poetry as a whole, it is the whole part of the figuring out the imagery and what the author is presenting within the text. Speaking of imagery, though, how language is used is really important. We discussed some in class, for example from Where It Passes: Untouchable the line: "Blood powdered my fingers, speckled my cuffs" send chills down my spine when I read it. I imagine that, the blood on the fingers like powder, and it being on the person's cuff as well. You see that language is important when trying to bring a whole new meaning to it.

Language is how we speak and interact, however, in poetry there are words that are overused (or cliche. These are the words that appear the most within most poems. Things like love, sky, rain, my broken heart, appear a lot when reading. Though, the words stated above (and there are more), can still be used in a different way of describing it. With the use of other language, then we can indirectly say these words, and still have the same meaning.

This is where poetry becomes not my thing. Interpreting what the author is meaning For instance I will talk about Where It Passes: Untouchable (because it is one of my favorites from the Poetry packet). At first when I read it, I thought that whoever was the person was trying to obtain a certain level that their friend was on. Afterwards, I thought about how it could mean that they were trying to tear them down. It did not cross my mind that the narrator was betrayed by someone because I was thinking that the narrator was the one trying to do the betraying.

Another example was with Geology of Water, at one point it starts talking about someone drowning and I was just so thrown off (though lovely imagery)! It took a few (or more) times to figure out that in a way the author was trying to personify the water. Making it move, like the water drowning itself with waves, and so on. I'm still not entirely sure about the whole meaning, though I hope that it is close. Or with In the Tree, a classmate of mine mentioned that the person could be an actual tree and I just kind of stared blankly off into the distance for a moment. Then it clicked. The title was about a tree, even if it did not mention a tree per se. We never see the tree, we are just assuming that it is there.

Now, we are at a point where we write our own poetry, our own imagery. Analysis is not over forever, it'll continue even in our own writing. As someone mentioned before to me (I think it was my mom), write to write and keep going. Don't let anything like some sort of imagery hold you back. I think there was also a mention of people will understand to! Like the author(s) of Geology of Water, Where It Passes: Untouchable, and In the Tree I will have some examples to go back to when making my own imagery.

Intro

Hey, I'm Haylee and this blog was created as part of an assignment in my creative writing class! This will be filled with my thoughts about what we have been reading.

I am from Belleville, and I am 20 years old. I attend Eastern Michigan University. I will fill more up later.