representing absence

Representing Absence is a tough read for me. ‘Is,’ because I’m still in the thick of it and have only read up to Chapter 10. Unlike other poetry, I found myself taking a slow journey along each line, inserting punctuations, rests, and breaths where they are nonexistent (er, absent) in an effort to grasp some semblance of meaning. What was particularly difficult for me in reading these particular poems was dealing with the rhythm. As I read, the words seemed to sound as an unsteady, discomforting staccato, jarring at times like a rattling gunfire of words expressing almost a complete thought or image but before I have time to take it in, is lost, sucked under by an unseen current. (Thankfully, the written word allows me to re-read until I’m blue in the face.) Yet, interspersed throughout the poems are languid instances of smooth terrain, where vital images and ideas peer through murky clouds as in Chapter 8, pg. 28 when “There floated the shed thing, / a beam of light shone forth / from an angel’s face on something.” For me, these instances of revelation or understanding express a kind of underlying socio-political commentary of ‘self’ and ideas about the ‘nature’ of ‘self’ as in Chapter 6, pg. 23, “…in this land whose condition is more than ever / opulent for grand givers of dowries that / even horse chestnut trees show “candles” just / for those few powerful men for / whom all creation must be cut / down, boiled, rendered to a distillate / of consolidated selfness,” or in Chapter 9, pg. 30, “The Captain in any of us can travel with paupers yet at the same time seek gold.” Hmm. Very thought provoking indeed.

Overall, despite the initial unnerving feelings brought on by what reads as a cacophony of words assembled on the page, I forced myself to let go of attempting interpretation and instead, allowed myself to appreciate the dissonance of sound, the seemingly ‘un-deliberate’ choice of words. Upon doing so, I realized that what matters for me in experiencing these poems, is the idea of creating new from old, a sort of ‘recycling.’ Actually, I think Ken summed it up nicely when he wrote about process and the deliberate use of words in that writing poetry “is also…. participating in an archive of language and sounds…orchestrating a new version that is part of the symphony…rather than the notion of inventing an entirely new song.” I am amused at the idea of dipping one’s pen into the inkwell of already existent texts or pieces of Literature, and will definitely try my hand at it in the near future.