cold reason-
why do you accuse me
of meagre strategy, your eyes
staring pitifully at me?
by your psychoanalysis;
willing and hoping
for you to be kinder-
to humanity at the expense
of sciences which are
destroying this world.
how you mock me so.
finally I look back at you,
uncaring of what you think.
................................................................................
This has not come up the way I intended it too. I posted it here becos I know I will never get around editing it and posting it if I don't do it now. All my poet (and non-poet!) friends are welcome to critique it. I will appreciate it very much.
19 comments:
I like the tension between hard scientific and the more subjective humanities... The poem leaves me with tension as their seems to be an impasse between the two.
i tried to post earlier, but don't know what happened, so I recreated my thoughts.
well I think it's great!
I came to check on ya...how r u coping today?
Keshi.
sage: welcome! Keep dropping by. I intended that. humanity vs sciences but somehow I feel it is weak in that context. Hence I want this to be critiqued.
keshi: you are biased, sweetie! I am ok.
I agree with Sage, you created thought provoking questions in the tension between "science" (which is always changing) and the softer humaness in all of us (which also always changes. And, ultimately we have to decide ourselves what is "Reason and logic".
i like this, gautami, and think you did well in creating the tension between the scientific and human aspect (but i've never been a good critic:)).
had problems with posting, too
I think you did well in showing the "feel" of it.
The eyes of the woman in the photo are beautiful!
Thought provoking.
Enjoyed.
Love the picture.
i would say raw. The way most people discriminate the positives and negatives of a person. Is it more towards why we give out everything and still the world doesnt understand us?
Sweet Gautami, I cannot find anything to critique about the poem even though I try! I will say your poem made me think, I especially like the strong note you ended it on.
I’m not speaking as a poet, so ‘finally I look back at you, uncaring of what you think’ seems a good strategy to me.!:) But I really don’t know, so let me quote once more Sir Richard Burton (translator and adapter of Vikram and the Vampire, Tales of Hindu Devilry) who in his Kasidah (1860) described Omar Khayyam, the famous classical Persian poet, practical teacher of mysticism and scientist as one ‘who would divorce old barren Reason from his bed / And wed the Vine-maid in her stead’.
In a book on the history of coffee I remember reading a funny story about an encounter between a 19th century intellectual from Austria and a very Oriental-looking man from the Balkans area, which had been ruled by Turks for several centuries. The Austrian saw the man standing by the riverside, seemingly immersed in deep thought. He came closer and asked him: ‘Excuse me, sir, can I ask you a question? What are you thinking about?!’ The man looked somewhat perplexed, but finally answered: ‘Nothing at all, my friend, nothing at all.’
The only way the we can understand WHY we do/act/think/behave is through science. Once we establish that we aren't pseudo mystical beings and that we are in fact products of a 3.5 billion year process then, and only then, can we step back and accurately gauge and counter balance our inadequacies (which are severe).
We may be members of the lucky sperm club (in evolutionary terms) but we simply must learn to control our primordial urges to vanquish competitors for territory and mates...then we can really make some progress.
Until then the My God is bigger than your God competition will bring us all to the brink...which we are seriously approaching at this point in time.
Art elevates us and teases us with what we are truly capable of...it lifts us above the fray and that is why we adore it..and rightly so.
pat: thanks. I wanted it to be critiqued. I felt it is incomplete somehow. I thought it is too raw. It seems that this needed to written like this. Cold reason, hard logic never work when humanity is involved.
polona: I tried to show humanity vs sciences. I suppose I succeeded in doing just that by the responses.
BTW, I have shifted to beta, hence problem in logging in. Sorry for the inconvience.
Thanks andrew, natalie and ghost. I know it is very raw. But now after reading the responses, I will not soften it in anyway.
borut: I like this. Interesting!
That's how it is. We interepret differently.
homo: Rightly said. We need the sciences to understand this world, our minds and to understand the humanities too. But sciences and the arts have to co-exist so as to make this world a beautiful place.
What you say here so delicately, reminds me of the book I just read--
"Angels and Demons", by Dan Brown
(the "prequel" to the DaVinci Code)
The theme of the book,(which is a terrific thriller, by the way) is science versus religion, and how they could work together...if humans did not divide the two into enemy camps!
I think you would enjoy reading it!
Firebird: Thanks! I have already read that.
HM.... This one's written well. But do make the poem little more long.. It stops at some place abruptly though. Well, thats my reading; (and am not a poetess or someone to comment on your poem, but I do read lot of poems.. :P)
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