08-01-2017, 12:01 AM
I don't think I got all the images/meaning here, lemme just do this and also let you know what I found difficult, if that helps
(07-31-2017, 10:58 AM)dukealien Wrote: UntanglingAll in all, a sublime description of the ineffability of this journey.
When I was young my father told me how
when working through a snarl of tangled rope // I get a seafarer vibe for no good reason
to find an end, then lead it through each knot
until its other end shows all is well.
He didn’t know he talked philosophy
just practical instruction for his son
and yet as guidance for the life of man
it leaves most other systems in the shade. //I really like the matter-of-fact nature of these first two stanzas
But I’m not him, with but one end to hold
in sight, the house of many mansions’ light. // a call to ancestry? I'm confused here
My life’s a tangle but its earthly ends // I really like this description of life
are fixed beyond a mind’s maneuvering.
This means according to topology
there are no tangles, knots are never real.
Yet when I pull, the blob of curling snarls // a very interesting image here, a blob of curling snarls - very menacing
drags on as one, inscrutable and tight.
My method - which can’t be original -
is finding loops, those teardrops out of which // teardrops - why teardrops?
the tangle’s complex knots are woven hard:
choose one loop, if it’s single pull it through.
But if it joins an interlocked design -
cross, trefoil, valentine, or swastika -
trace each lobe of its pattern ‘til you find
a simple circuit acting as an end. // is this about religion, love and politics? relationships as the agents of complexity?
Pull out this master loop, the figure’s gone; // out of the blue
repeat this cogitation and release.
In time a wending line emerges, straight
and purely obvious, no knots or doubts.
My father’s mansions being closed to me,
my goal is knowing, found simplicity. // these two lines hide some meaning that eludes me
The Chronicles of Lethargia