We who with songs beguile your pilgrimage / And swear that Beauty lives though lilies die, / We Poets of the proud old lineage / Who sing to find your hearts, we know not why ... (James Elroy Flecker)

7.4.25

On Not Being an Inuit Print

 

I am not an enchanted owl,

but I want to be. I want to, like you 

might want strong meat to chew on, 

or else at the opposite extreme 

rich thick creamy chocolate cake


that you might want or I …

but anyway, what I don’t want 

is to be a piece of canvas, or paper

or board, or anything flat, two-

dimensional as a blade of grass.


It’s not that I object to being

Inuit (an Inuit anything) 

because that would make me

racist, wouldn’t it? (Although I 

don’t live in Canada or Alaska


so would it even count?) It’s the 

print bit I don’t like to entertain, 

not when pertaining to me, in my 

good round flesh. But there’s this 

one print I saw just now, when taking


a virtual stroll through a part of 

the Canadian Museum of History.

The Enchanted Owl arrested me, with 

its unblinking gaze, its half-curved

claws caught mid-retraction, and


its wild, expansive, stripes of feathers –

its confronting feathers – paused

for take-off, while this creature (me)

is briefly examined. I want to be the real

alive owl. I want to expand my wings,


cry out in a voice that I – who didn’t paint 

this, or live  there – don’t know, and will 

never. I want to fill out that compact body 

with food and breath, rise up to brush the air 

with sweeps of those enchanting feathers.



NaPoWriMo Day Seven


Print by Kenojuak Ashevik (image)


(Fell madly in love with this image, then learned it's actually a famous 'Canadian icon'.)





20 comments:

  1. Strong imagery in this poem, Rosemary. I love that you wrote:
    ‘…what I don’t want
    is to be a piece of canvas, or paper
    or board, or anything flat, two-
    dimensional as a blade of grass.’
    An enchanted owl would arrest me too, I love your detailed description of it, although I went with Degas’ ballerina.

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  2. I am not but I want to be... now that's an amazing start that grabs at my heart strings. How did you do this? It's tremendously entertaining. Thanks for sharing Rosemary. Blessing you.

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    Replies
    1. Oh, thank you. You're so kind. I am finding this year's prompts astonishingly inspiring. I've never been keen on writing ekphrastics before, but perhaps it is because this time they are combined with other instructions, or perhaps it is that the art works used are so very wonderful.

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  3. I can see you wanting to be a bird, one with first class feathers. I'm seeing pretty white ones. Mine would be of many colors, like the adult male peacock.
    Not sure where I envisioned from but from, say age six to eleven I would think of me jumping from an open upper window flying away. Part of my vision was the landing because of course I couldn't fly and would come crashing to the ground. I would be dead. Generally I did this after my father was cruel to me.

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    Replies
    1. Did you click on the link to the image? I would want feathers just like that! (Not pretty white at all.) I can imagine you in the peacock colours.
      I can understand the wish to fly away when your father was cruel. And even the thought of crashing to the ground: one way to escape. I'm sorry you endured that cruelty, and very glad you survived.

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    2. Oops, Rosemary, my mistake but blame it on my cellphone. I don't have my computer, a hand-me-down, set up for poetry form a d writing. The cellphone is also hand-me-down but is set up for poetry because that's what I've used for a long time. When I was able and write again everything was there.
      One problem, our problem is that the cellphone is so very old that it becomes color blind only black and white after a period of use. . Then I assumed your bird was white. White birds are in my mind to be very good.
      Oh yes, I am not sure but what only google can reply to others. I f it were possible even so, i have no idea what my passwords would be.

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    3. Oh I see. The bird's feathers are black on the right, a goldy-brown on the left. The bird's head and body are black.

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  4. Replies
    1. Thank you! I feel very complimented, considering how wonderfully lyrical your own poems are.

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  5. I would love to have this print embossed on a piece of jewelry (a brooch) or hanging from a chain that matches its magnificence. I am at this very minute, visualizing you as an "Enchanted Owl." Cheers.

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  6. Some wonderfully observant observations but also delicious imagery - particularly that cake - Jae

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  7. I don't want to be that flat and one dimensional either!

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  8. What a beautiful image you've chosen, Rosemary! And your poem does it justice. I have a liking for owls too, it must be my glasses that make me look owl-like! :-)

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    Replies
    1. LOL I wear glasses too; maybe that is it!

      I'm glad you think my poem does the image justice. Always the fear with ekphrastics, that the poem might be far inferior to the artwork it references.

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  9. "its wild, expansive, stripes of feathers –

    its confronting feathers – paused

    for take-off, while this creature (me)

    is briefly examined. I want to be the real

    alive owl. I want to expand my wings,"

    You have definitely crept into the owl's skin. Wonderful imagery!

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