Poetry and Muses Part 3

It has long been observed that while the ego is helpful in making ordinary, everyday decisions in our lives, it is less effective when it comes to more important issues; it is competitive by nature and tends to subordinate the greater good for more immediate gain and self-gratification. We also know that the ego is driven largely by the left hemisphere of the brain, which is rational and analytical; Again, rationality and analysis are good, but taken to extremes, they have unfortunate side effects: namely, a craving for certainty, a rejection of ambiguity, a need to be right, a lack of openness, and an exclusion. of intuition and mysticism. dimension of the human being.

We learn from research in this regard that techniques such as meditation, for example, have a profoundly positive effect on the human psyche and even life span, and that one aspect of meditation is the rebalancing of the left and right brain hemispheres. right. So, as the left hemisphere is correlated with reason, logic, numbers, and more practical applications, the right hemisphere is more concerned with images, feelings, intuitions, and the mystical. In fact, as Lee Pulos says: “the right hemisphere is the decompression chamber of the subconscious.” It is important to say, however, that both are vital to the healthy functioning of the human being; but it is equally true to say that in the West, especially, an over-dependence on activity and dominance of the left side of the brain has developed.

What does this have to do with poetry? Everything! Because it was Maggie Ross who said, “The importance of poetry in restoring balance to the mind cannot be underestimated, as it draws on both aspects of knowledge simultaneously.” In other words, being in the ‘poetic’ state, that is the condition in which one can write poetry, listen to the Muse, it means that the left and right brains are becoming more balanced, more coherent. We could almost say, but probably wouldn’t, that writing poetry can be an alternative to practicing meditation. I would not say it myself, but I observe people for whom I think this is very true.

But whatever it is, the benefits are clear. Meditation and poetry (and some other disciplines as well) balance and coordinate the two brains, synchronize them, and thus provide a kind of harmony in which a deeper level of awareness, understanding, and expression is possible. In fact, if we consider some elementary examples of how writing helps us, we could begin to guess how powerful poetry is.

Most of us write shopping lists, for example; And it is remarkable, when we think about it, how powerful a simple shopping list is: it means that we stop worrying about whether we are going to remember everything, it allows us to shop in the most efficient way possible, and we also act from writing. It encourages us to have a broader vision, not only of what we need now, but of what we might need in the coming days. Even more powerful is when we begin to write our plans for the future: this ‘authorship’ means that we begin to manipulate our own future and to exert a kind of control that is generally impossible without the act of writing. But clearly, shopping lists and life or business plans are invariably left brain activities. But when we step forward to write poetry, we get that added benefit that comes from the activation of the right brain: how much more powerful when the words are not lists or just aide-memories, but active interpretations of our experiences and the meanings inherent in? them? In addition, these meanings may be those that you are fully aware of or, alternatively, that the writing process may discover or discover.

And this balance requires that we enter a peculiar mindset: one of relaxation, but with total clarity and concentration at the same time; And as I said before, the right hemisphere is the decompression chamber in our subconscious where we can access images and dreams, everything that drives all of our desires, which are, of course, the heart problems that poetry is and should be with. worry more. .

Once, then, the hemispheres are balanced, the magic begins. The magic of words. The power that God gave Adam and Eve to name the animals, all the beasts we meet, real and metaphorical. The magic? Ah, the magic of poetry, when poetry is truly intoxicating. Here’s a question: what is the most magical word in the English language? Think about it before answering! We will all have our own views, and for some of us it will be about personal association, and there is nothing wrong with that. Perhaps the word ‘rose’ is magic to you; or maybe the word ‘love’, or maybe even someone’s name: Linda, my wife’s name is magical to me, or maybe the name of a son or daughter always lights you up when you hear that sound.

But here is perhaps the most purely magical word in the English language: abracadabra! Truly a magical word, and truly magical as well in that it invokes the entire naming process of Adam through the (originally Hebrew) letters of the alphabet: ABC D. There is a point to understand about alphabets (note also A and B even in the word alphabet): and this is that in magic words the internal sound reflects the external reality: there is a coherence and there is no discordance. In poetic jargon, this is onomatopoeia, or what we might call mimesis. Words are ‘true’, which is why children love them, why they love nursery rhymes and all forms of word games, and when we are not corrupt, we love them as adults too. The sheer fun of it; the pure truth of it.

For me, the best example in the English language of a ‘magical’ poem, and one that perfectly exemplifies the full condition I have outlined of how poetry is written (albeit with an important caveat that I must mention shortly) is ‘Kubla’ of Coleridge. Khan’. The final part of this poem says:

A damsel with a dulcimer

In a vision I once saw:

It was an Abyssinian maiden,

And in his dulcimer he played

Ridge of Mount Abora.

Could it revive inside of me?

His symphony and song,

For such deep delight, I would win

That with loud and long music,

I’d build that dome in the air

That sunny dome! those ice caves!

And all who heard should see them there,

And everyone should cry: Watch out! Beware!

Her sparkling eyes, her flowing hair!

Weave a circle around it three times,

And close your eyes in holy dread

Because he fed on honey dew,

And I drank the milk of paradise.

This verse is intoxicating; almost childish, the almost too emphatic damsel / dulcimer alliteration, but sublime. What is he singing about? Mount Abora – A and B again, the alphabet – and she is’ Abyssinian ‘(A and B again!) And she is the Muse, of course, because Mount Helikon was sacred to the Muses, and a proposed etymology of’ muse ‘is from a Proto-Indo-European root meaning “to think” or “tower / mountain”. All the important cult centers of the Muses were in mountains or hills: in other words, a height, somewhere above, heavenly, where the gods, the Muses, dwell.

But she is elusive. ‘Could it revive within me …’ How in those simple words one feels the agony of wanting to return to her, to the good life, to ‘such a deep delight’ (those delicious Gs again, taken up as a chorus) – and how difficult it is. But, hey, it’s not good to complain; immediately Coleridge suddenly evokes the methodology to get there, and the verb has the force of an imperative:

‘Weave a circle around him three times,

And close your eyes in holy dread

The poet is a prophet (molasses): the outer eyes are closed (as often in prayer or meditation) so that the inner faculty can be harnessed, and there is a deep reverence – ‘holy’ – that allows magic to overwhelm to the poet. And in that state we experience the ‘milk of paradise’. The word ‘drunk’ here has a double connotation: in the first case, it means that one has literally drunk milk, but with the added suggestion that one is ‘drunk’ with this milk. In other words, that the mind itself changes, it transforms. We really are somewhere else.

Now my caveat about Coleridge’s experience stems from the fact that he was taking opium when he wrote the poem, and that opium served him creatively (picking up my note on debauchery in Part 1 of this article) . In almost all romantics there is the danger of “excess,” but admitting that point and the danger, the larger one remains true: that romantics explored sources of inspiration and creativity more thoroughly than ever before.

One poem I like to place alongside Kubla Khan is the opening lines of John Keats’ revised Hyperion poem: The Fall of Hyperion.

Fans have their dreams, what to knit with?

A paradise for a cult; the wild one too?

In the highest form of your dream?

Guess in the sky; too bad they haven’t done it?

Traced on vellum or on wild Indian leaves?

The shadows of a melodious expression. ?

But naked with laurel they live, dream and die; ?

Because only Poesy can tell his dreams,?

With the fine spell of words can only be saved?

Saber charm imagination?

And silent enchantment. Who alive can tell?

Are you not a poet? Can’t you count your dreams? ?

Since every man whose soul is not a lump?

Do you have visions and would you speak if you had loved?

And well mannered in his mother tongue. ?

Was he now trying to rehearse the dream?

Will he be a poet or a fan will he be known?

When this warm write my hand is in the grave.

The genius of this unfinished epic, and epic that it is, is inexhaustible, but for now, just look at four words in this short excerpt: dreams, tissue, paradise and enchantment. Ring a bell? Coleridge speaks of “vision”, but here Keats has “dreams”; But then the “tissue,” the deep metaphor that I see combining the left and written sides of the brain, leads to “paradise.” It is a false paradise in Keats’s opening, but nonetheless, the images are instructive, since poetry alone can make the real leap across the abyss that is the “ silent enchantment ”: our muteness in the face of existence, or our astonishment at seeing each other. freeze before the time gap.

Poetry, then, comes from the Muses, and it is a form of enchantment; we must be in a ‘holy’ state of mind to receive and process it. If we do, the result is transformative; we find our way back (and onward), albeit briefly, to paradise: a living harmony of mind where the “milk” of life nourishes us. We can enter that state artificially through narcotics and other means, but these approaches ultimately desecrate the temple of the Muses (and by the way, temple refers to their sacred edifice, which are also the two sides of our brain) , and there are consequences, as Coleridge discovered.

In Part 4 of this series of articles we will consider the language of poetry and enchantment, the language before the Fall of Humanity or in the Golden Age, what it means to be a ‘living soul’ and how this relates to writing. poetry. Finally, I will explore what this means for our contemporary poetic scene.