4. Poetry Workshop


July 15, 1997

(2) "Slice"

The next thing that Margo produced, like a magician, was a set of photographs. She gave us one to each. There was no choice of our own. When she finished distributing the photographs automatically, she told us to write a poem based on the one we received. She allowed us to use any words form the lists we already had. She added requirements, which were listed on the handout entitled "Guided Picture Writing."

In fact the photograph that I received was showing two young lovers passionately hugging each other in a garden. It was a monochrome picture. At first I could think nothing about the youthful lovers. They looked too far away from my taste. Everybody around me was grumbling of the pictures s/he got. But Margo didn't pay any attention to the noise. She just encouraged us to follow the directions in the handout. We could not help but start writing somehow. Then another miracle! Here is the poem I wrote based on and inspired by the picture.


Slice

No one is here but two of us.
Blue bright brilliant sky looks down on us.

Like wild beasts we tackle to each other.
Our breasts meet again and again.

In the green shade we become a chain
which swings in slow motion, swaying and clicking;
blown easily in the slightest breeze soft and sweet.

You stare at me piercing to the core.
An arrow it was, deep in me.

I won't call you a faithful lion; you are a bird
flying far away, forgetting me so soon.

Believe me, or not, I caught you once.

Rotten apples, ripen grapes or squashed peach called you.
In a slice of life, I crystallize you, at least now.


I wonder if anybody who reads this poem can picture the photograph in his/her mind. Margo said the procedure matters more than the products in writing poetry at the workshop. So do I hope! I was glad this poem-looking pice was not an object of any criticism. The principle was that we would learn how to handle with words in time. It is almost like the process that children learn their mother tongue.


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