Vibe: hopeful, animalistic, musical
Rejections: 3
Hands over my eyes / like a girl wishing to be invisible / I told the world I was ready / to leave it / and the world answered in serenade / Listen. Look. / Pawsteps on the damp jungle ground, radar ears and / oval eyes, golden fur and rosettes / of ebony, the swish of an ivory- / tipped tail. A collective of leopards / is a leap.
Read more at Half Mystic: Presto.
A few summers ago, I went to see Bon Iver play live. That night, their opening act, Bonny Light Horseman, became one of my very favorite bands. I'll say no more about the experience here because my piece in Half Mystic (hopefully!) says it all. However, I will encourage you to check out their song referenced in the title, "Deep in Love."
Even in my own private journal the following day, I struggled to put my emotions into words. The performance moved me, but it was too complicated to capture with simple language. Poetry time!
Instinctively, I wanted to try an ode. Problem: I had never written an ode before. Reading and annotating time!
To get a sense of what the ode is all about, I consulted the entry in A Little Book on Form by Robert Hass, and the introduction to a collection of Pablo Neruda’s poetry, All The Odes, edited by Ilan Stavans. From there, I went to the library, chose 5 poems, and wrote myself some study questions.
The poems:
Pablo Neruda, “Ode to the Dog” from All the Odes
Yusef Komunyakaa, “Ode to Shakuhachi” from The Chameleon Couch
Adrienne Rich, “Toward the Solstice” from The Dream of a Common Language
Carrie Etter, “Ode to My Leopard Print Coat” from Zócalo Public Square
Robyn Schiff, “House of Schiaparelli” from Revolver
The questions*:
Is this ode formal/public, or informal/private?
Is this ode a poem of praise, or an emotional outburst?
How does the poet use form and line breaks; does this correspond to the praise/emotional quality of the poem?
What distance is the speaker from the object?
How does the speaker’s longing move the poem?
Where does the ode begin?
a. Is the poem initiated by desire or dissent?
b. Is this poem grounded by a specific place?
c. How does the poet describe the scene?
What is the inner journey of the poem?
a. Is this journey internal or external or both?
b. Does the middle of the poem proceed by narrative, argument, association, elaboration of metaphor, or a mix of these?
c. How does transformation occur?
Where does the ode end?
a. Does the poem return to the beginning?
b. How does the speaker engage with the object?
c. Does the speaker ask for something, or is there another way in which their longing transforms and/or creates closure?
*If you do this exercise yourself, please contact me to let me know your thoughts!
The shape of "A Leopard Leaps" was inspired by the Greek ode, in which the chorus moved left to right (strophe), right to left (antistrophe), and stood still (epode). That said, I loved the interpretation by a member of my writing group, who said that it felt like a leopard leaping back and forth across the page!
Despite the fact that "Deep in Love" was the catalyst for this piece, I had a hard time writing that particular ode, and had to throw out many drafts before I landed on the version that I kept for submissions. See an email to my writing group:
Good morning literary rockstars,
I was going to begin by pleading for an emergency poetry meeting (I've long thought there should be a hotline for writers on deadline), because I have been dreadfully stuck, for mooonths, on one part of my odes piece.
However, this morning my husband's bus didn't arrive (again!!) so I drove him to work, and afterward—knowing that I really should go home and clean up in anticipation of visiting family—I went instead to a bakery (I got a pain aux chocolat aux amandes, thank you for asking) and then to sit by the river.
This was just the magic I needed, because at last I got unstuck and wrote the central poem!
As soon as I finished this poem, I felt that it was one of my strongest pieces to date. Don't you love that feeling?!
I find it hard to describe how thrilled I was when Half Mystic accepted this piece, and the positive experience I had revising my work with the team. Maybe I owe them an ode?
Prompt
Write a poem, story or essay inspired by a song, band or live show.