酷我-北美枫

[ericcoliu]

Morning Song of the Evolving Self: Review of Morning Song from Senlin

Poem of the Week

Morning Song from Senlin by Conrad Aiken

It is morning, Senlin says, and in the morning
When the light drips through the shutters like the dew,
I arise, I face the sunrise,
And do the things my fathers learned to do.
Stars in the purple dusk above the rooftops
Pale in a saffron mist and seem to die,
And I myself on swiftly tilting planet
Stand before a glass and tie my tie.

Vine-leaves tap my window,
Dew-drops sing to the garden stones,
The robin chirps in the chinaberry tree
Repeating three clear tones.

It is morning. I stand by the mirror
And tie my tie once more.
While waves far off in a pale rose twilight
Crash on a white sand shore.
I stand by a mirror and comb my hair:
How small and white my face!—
The green earth tilts through a sphere of air
And bathes in a flame of space.
There are houses hanging above the stars
And stars hung under a sea...
And a sun far off in a shell of silence
Dapples my walls for me....

It is morning, Senlin says, and in the morning
Should I not pause in the light to remember God?
Upright and firm I stand on a star unstable,
He is immense and lonely as a cloud.
I will dedicate this moment before my mirror
To him alone, for him I will comb my hair.
Accept these humble offerings, clouds of silence!
I will think of you as I descend the stair.

Vine-leaves tap my window,
The snail-track shines on the stones;
Dew-drops flash from the chinaberry tree
Repeating two clear tones.

It is morning, I awake from a bed of silence,
Shining I rise from the starless waters of sleep.
The walls are about me still as in the evening,
I am the same, and the same name still I keep.
The earth revolves with me, yet makes no motion,
The stars pale silently in a coral sky.
In a whistling void I stand before my mirror,
Unconcerned, and tie my tie.

There are horses neighing on far-off hills
Tossing their long white manes,
And mountains flash in the rose-white dusk,
Their shoulders black with rains....
It is morning, I stand by the mirror
And surprise my soul once more;
The blue air rushes above my ceiling,
There are suns beneath my floor....

...It is morning, Senlin says, I ascend from darkness
And depart on the winds of space for I know not where;
My watch is wound, a key is in my pocket,
And the sky is darkened as I descend the stair.
There are shadows across the windows, clouds in heaven,
And a god among the stars; and I will go
Thinking of him as I might think of daybreak
And humming a tune I know....

Vine-leaves tap at the window,
Dew-drops sing to the garden stones,
The robin chirps in the chinaberry tree
Repeating three dear tones.


Thematic Review:

The sun rises. Trees grow. Flowers blossom. Rivers flow. Oceans sing. Men are killing and being killed. Children have been starved. Who am I? Is or isn't it enough to be? “Who and what am I,” Morning Song of Senlin asks. This theme runs through much of Aiken's poetry.

This is one of the most intensely musical poems I've ever read, often mentiond alongside a poem of his Harvard classmate T.S. Eliot, The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock. The way Conrad Aiken keeps moving from the individual to the cosmic, from the outer world to the inner world and back again, gives its readers a wonderfully crystal clear feel while they are “on a swiftly tilting planet.”

"And I myself on a swiftly tilting planet
Stand before a glass and tie my tie."

What a thrilling sense of time and place, of "otherness" as well as I-ness these words evoke! He was a master of the juxtaposition of disparate narratives, and his craftsmanship expressed, not a nonsensical union of disparate parts, but a feeling of the relatedness of all things and all beings through psychoanalytic free associations.

In order to have a better understanding of this poem, I think we need to read it within the broad contexts of his life-long interests in the theories of Sigmund Freud and George Santayana and in the language and structures of music and of his work entitled Senlin: A Biography.

First of all, Conrad Aiken was fascinated with the inner workings of the conscious and unconscious mind, and with what he termed "that passionate sense of identity which has always been the most preciously guarded possession of the poet." His poetic writings that his life-long dedication to the exploration of human consciousness and its evolution informed and enriched demonstrated identity and poetry as a means of evolving consciousness. In a 1917 essay entitled The Mechanism of Poetic Inspiration, he claimed that mediocre poets "do not extend the field of our consciousness in any new direction" This statement clearly implies not only that poetry and consciousness are inextricably linked but also that the task of poetry is to extend, expand and evolve consciousness into thus far unattained and unexplored regions of mind and thought.

Secondly, drawing upon the language and structures of music, Aiken strived to invent a new musically poetic language, which achieved the contrapuntal effects of music by juxtaposing patterns of narrative repetition and variation.

Thirdly, the title character Senlin in Senlin: A Biography represents a fluid, all-encompassing consciousness, seeking its own form. He incorporates the particulars of his own world--in such physical manifestations as a forest, a desert, a city, and a house--and at the same time he exists self-consciously independent of them.

Finally, through juxtaposing four patterns of narrative repetition and variation (“It is morning, Senlin says, and in the morning …/ It is morning. I stand by the mirror … / It is morning, Senlin says, and in the morning … / ...It is morning, Senlin says, I ascend from darkness”) on descriptions of various outward events and inner free associations, Senlin in Morning Song of Senlin is whatever he imagines himself to be, and he is also the expression of very human imperatives.

"It is morning, Senlin says, and in the morning

When the light drips through the shutters like the dew,

I arise, I face the sunrise,

And do the things my fathers learned to do.

Stars in the purple dusk above the rooftops

Pale in a saffron mist and seem to die,

And I myself on a swiftly tilting planet

Stand before a glass and tie my tie."

"Who and what am I," Morning Song of Senlin asks. How can I move in my own way with my own balance, when the planet is tilting? How can I be firm and upright and independent, while "on a star unstable?" Questions remain unanswered yet necessary.
_________________
Time is nothing but a disquiet of the soul

[[ericcoliu]]

Morning Song of the Evolving Self: Review of Morning Song from Senlin

Poem of the Week

Morning Song from Senlin by Conrad Aiken

It is morning, Senlin says, and in the morning
When the light drips through the shutters like the dew,
I arise, I face the sunrise,
And do the things my fathers learned to do.
Stars in the purple dusk above the rooftops
Pale in a saffron mist and seem to die,
And I myself on swiftly tilting planet
Stand before a glass and tie my tie.

Vine-leaves tap my window,
Dew-drops sing to the garden stones,
The robin chirps in the chinaberry tree
Repeating three clear tones.

It is morning. I stand by the mirror
And tie my tie once more.
While waves far off in a pale rose twilight
Crash on a white sand shore.
I stand by a mirror and comb my hair:
How small and white my face!—
The green earth tilts through a sphere of air
And bathes in a flame of space.
There are houses hanging above the stars
And stars hung under a sea...
And a sun far off in a shell of silence
Dapples my walls for me....

It is morning, Senlin says, and in the morning
Should I not pause in the light to remember God?
Upright and firm I stand on a star unstable,
He is immense and lonely as a cloud.
I will dedicate this moment before my mirror
To him alone, for him I will comb my hair.
Accept these humble offerings, clouds of silence!
I will think of you as I descend the stair.

Vine-leaves tap my window,
The snail-track shines on the stones;
Dew-drops flash from the chinaberry tree
Repeating two clear tones.

It is morning, I awake from a bed of silence,
Shining I rise from the starless waters of sleep.
The walls are about me still as in the evening,
I am the same, and the same name still I keep.
The earth revolves with me, yet makes no motion,
The stars pale silently in a coral sky.
In a whistling void I stand before my mirror,
Unconcerned, and tie my tie.

There are horses neighing on far-off hills
Tossing their long white manes,
And mountains flash in the rose-white dusk,
Their shoulders black with rains....
It is morning, I stand by the mirror
And surprise my soul once more;
The blue air rushes above my ceiling,
There are suns beneath my floor....

...It is morning, Senlin says, I ascend from darkness
And depart on the winds of space for I know not where;
My watch is wound, a key is in my pocket,
And the sky is darkened as I descend the stair.
There are shadows across the windows, clouds in heaven,
And a god among the stars; and I will go
Thinking of him as I might think of daybreak
And humming a tune I know....

Vine-leaves tap at the window,
Dew-drops sing to the garden stones,
The robin chirps in the chinaberry tree
Repeating three dear tones.


Thematic Review:

The sun rises. Trees grow. Flowers blossom. Rivers flow. Oceans sing. Men are killing and being killed. Children have been starved. Who am I? Is or isn't it enough to be? “Who and what am I,” Morning Song of Senlin asks. This theme runs through much of Aiken's poetry.

This is one of the most intensely musical poems I've ever read, often mentiond alongside a poem of his Harvard classmate T.S. Eliot, The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock. The way Conrad Aiken keeps moving from the individual to the cosmic, from the outer world to the inner world and back again, gives its readers a wonderfully crystal clear feel while they are “on a swiftly tilting planet.”

"And I myself on a swiftly tilting planet
Stand before a glass and tie my tie."

What a thrilling sense of time and place, of "otherness" as well as I-ness these words evoke! He was a master of the juxtaposition of disparate narratives, and his craftsmanship expressed, not a nonsensical union of disparate parts, but a feeling of the relatedness of all things and all beings through psychoanalytic free associations.

In order to have a better understanding of this poem, I think we need to read it within the broad contexts of his life-long interests in the theories of Sigmund Freud and George Santayana and in the language and structures of music and of his work entitled Senlin: A Biography.

First of all, Conrad Aiken was fascinated with the inner workings of the conscious and unconscious mind, and with what he termed "that passionate sense of identity which has always been the most preciously guarded possession of the poet." His poetic writings that his life-long dedication to the exploration of human consciousness and its evolution informed and enriched demonstrated identity and poetry as a means of evolving consciousness. In a 1917 essay entitled The Mechanism of Poetic Inspiration, he claimed that mediocre poets "do not extend the field of our consciousness in any new direction" This statement clearly implies not only that poetry and consciousness are inextricably linked but also that the task of poetry is to extend, expand and evolve consciousness into thus far unattained and unexplored regions of mind and thought.

Secondly, drawing upon the language and structures of music, Aiken strived to invent a new musically poetic language, which achieved the contrapuntal effects of music by juxtaposing patterns of narrative repetition and variation.

Thirdly, the title character Senlin in Senlin: A Biography represents a fluid, all-encompassing consciousness, seeking its own form. He incorporates the particulars of his own world--in such physical manifestations as a forest, a desert, a city, and a house--and at the same time he exists self-consciously independent of them.

Finally, through juxtaposing four patterns of narrative repetition and variation (“It is morning, Senlin says, and in the morning …/ It is morning. I stand by the mirror … / It is morning, Senlin says, and in the morning … / ...It is morning, Senlin says, I ascend from darkness”) on descriptions of various outward events and inner free associations, Senlin in Morning Song of Senlin is whatever he imagines himself to be, and he is also the expression of very human imperatives.

"It is morning, Senlin says, and in the morning

When the light drips through the shutters like the dew,

I arise, I face the sunrise,

And do the things my fathers learned to do.

Stars in the purple dusk above the rooftops

Pale in a saffron mist and seem to die,

And I myself on a swiftly tilting planet

Stand before a glass and tie my tie."

"Who and what am I," Morning Song of Senlin asks. How can I move in my own way with my own balance, when the planet is tilting? How can I be firm and upright and independent, while "on a star unstable?" Questions remain unanswered yet necessary.
_________________
Time is nothing but a disquiet of the soul

[ericcoliu]

I have revised my previous review of Morning Song of Senlin.

For those who are interested in reading the Chinese translation, please read 非马的先林的晨歌, which ia posted at http://coviews.com/viewtopic.php?t=32875&highlight=senlin
_________________
Time is nothing but a disquiet of the soul

[[ericcoliu]]

I have revised my previous review of Morning Song of Senlin.

For those who are interested in reading the Chinese translation, please read 非马的先林的晨歌, which ia posted at http://coviews.com/viewtopic.php?t=32875&highlight=senlin
_________________
Time is nothing but a disquiet of the soul

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