Three Centos by Brian Edwards

Three Centos

Charles Olson

"He was already sliding along the wall of the night,
he who is not happy, who has been
pierced with angels, and with fire.

And down in the part of it where I met him
the horn of the nearest moon was truth.

No boy, but carefully carved,
made for difficulties, he talked
via stones, a stick, a hand of earth
— You must observe the drunkenness —
Water has again made sense out of things."

Denise Levertov 

"The ache of marriage
is a doubtful, doubting night gray.

Sea is turning its dark pages,
tide swings you away:
that almost painful movement restores
          the pull,
as if it were forever that we keep moving,
trying to get by on the verge.

Out of sleep, between my submerged fingers
          buttons of light
a piercing minor scale running across the flesh.

I feel my flesh of rock wearing down
so the mud of my hollow gleams."

Larry Eigner

     "why shouldn't life pass as in a dream
               you can't see it move

but you look back

          clouds from the past
               some damp childhood
          trees in wait for food
               and then the individual 
                                        identity

I break out with a man's cry

why not put the radio on—
     I am, finally, an incompetent, after all."

Lines taken from The Postmoderns: The New American poetry revised

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Comments

[jamesthomashoward]

yum.

Good anthology by the way; thanks for the recommendation.

james

[pete pick]

first i suppose these are not yours, so i wonder why you have posted them to critique? if they are yours they are even stranger than usual (;-)). can't say that i like them, actually, they seem very self-satisfied.

[Shari-Lyn McArthur]

I've never gotten around to getting my mind around centos.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cento_(poetry)

[pete pick]

thanks to shari's link i now know what is going on here, but if anything i like it less! i know you have words of your own, brian, this cut and paste job is beneath you.

[Brian Edwards]

Goodness Pete, considering the cento is a poetic tradition stretching back to the 4th century, to say it is "beneath me" is a most undeserving compliment.

Thanks for dropping by.

B.

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[Shari-Lyn McArthur]

I'm endeavouring to keep a (semi-)open mind, but I simply can't find a luring point in the Cento as a form.

Brian, (and/or others here who might practice this form) what draws you to this style? I am not being critical, it's that I just do not understand the appeal of working with someone else's words, unless they have specifically asked for an edit.

Shari