Saturday, November 20, 2010

This Sunday, LC presents a proper ticket, if an older one

The Poetry Bus is being driven by Chris at Enchanted Oak this week. She has asked for:

Poems that address your existence on this earth. Good, bad, or indifferent, tell us something, anything, about your life here.

I am too beat right now to compose...I present as my bus ticket and for your reconsideration the very first "Sundays with LC" offering (Getting to know me):

The Desert, I
By Lemuel Crouse

The barren desert of my heart lies scorched
beneath a soulless sun. Now burnt, what love
grew there is dust, blown to and fro on winds,
once friends. By them I am now pushed away.
A famine dry and fierce once pierced my veins.
That drinker, dark and lusty in his thirst,
too deeply drank from teeming pools of life
and sucked away my future. I am dead
or dormant, which I may not learn ’til, ’wake,
I spring from sun-bleached bed or, dead, I rise
no more. If I but sleep, then why can I
not dream? If dead, can I not hope to be
reborn? I do not dream. I cannot hope.
Sous le soleil sans âme je suis, je reste...



Photo from http://www.usnews.com/science/articles/2009/11/05/mystery-of-the-mojave.html

14 comments:

The Bug said...

I do not dream. I cannot hope...

Beautiful despair...

Enchanted Oak said...

Bug, do you know this guy? You always leave such nice notes.

I was tickled to see the photo credit names the Mojave desert. I lived a while there, found some beauty, silence, and awful conditions.

Like Bug, you hit me in the heart with that final line. I don't mean the French one, of which I recognize only the sun and I am. I mean the other line. I've felt exactly that way and not known how to say it.

Carolina Linthead said...

"Under the sun without a soul I am, I remain…"

Thanks Chris!

Helen said...

I hear a plaintive cry for some kind of peace ........

Peter Goulding said...

Reminds me a bit of Hamlet, though the desert metaphor is beautifully realised. Well structured and condensed.

Carolina Linthead said...

Quite right, Peter! I often have bits of Shakespeare running around in my head...the curse of a liberal arts education, I fear.

Karen said...

Very sad, and I hope only one desert experience in your life. I guess we all have them at some time. I like the literary allusions.

Carolina Linthead said...

Just the one, Karen, but it was one hell of a desert experience.

Niamh B said...

pretty desolate, but like bug says there's a lot of beauty in there too

Kat Mortensen said...

Powerful stuff, LC, CL or whomever you are! This has a real "Hamlet" quality for me. (That's good, by they way.)

Kat

Tess Kincaid said...

This has a dark biblical/sci-fi feel to it. Nice. Now, excuse me, while I go get a nice tall glass of water...

Totalfeckineejit said...

Tis thirsty worl alright, but well done!

Anonymous said...

lingering piece.
lovely imagery.

Anonymous said...

http://jinglepoetry.blogspot.com/2010/11/poetry-potluck-nature-plants-creatures.html

Dear poet, welcome join Jingle Poetry Monday Potluck…
First time participants can link in 1 to 3 old poems, or poems unrelated to our theme…
We value your contribution and cherish your talent!
Hope to see you soon,
xxx