S12-DES8
Redeeming Clichés
Copyright © by Dan Schneider, 10/5/02
Recently my This
Old Poem essay series has been generating quite an Internet buzz. As
Cosmoetica is a fairly well-connected site every time I do an essay on a poetic
‘name’ the essay is usually in the 1st 1-5 pages of a Google
search. Therefore a lot of the fans of this or that poetaster indignantly decry my dissection of their fave’s tripe. Recently I have been treated to
the moronic & childish ravings of an Australian Hayden Carruth fan who
steadfastly refused to divulge their name to me, although I suspect it may have
been several of my down under contacts pranking me. This tool tried to take me
to task for ‘saying nothing of substance’ against HC. I countered that I
manifestly detailed the poem in question’s flaws. The Aussie snootily retorted
‘No.’ Of course, the HC fan offered nothing to defend the indefensible poem.
His/her argument basically was I was not specific enough with my criticisms.
Granted, not being 1 to condescend, I am loath to take a paragraph to explain
why a line such as ‘a black rain fell’ is indeed a cliché, lest I be
accused of redundancy- which the disingenuous Aussie did, redundantly &
wrongly, accuse me of. Having written a few dozen TOPs already, I saw no reason
to reiterate the same points over & again. If I did I would inevitably be
accused of belaboring the same points. Even so, my HC essay
was
far more specific than any essay you can point to from any other poetry critic.
Yet, that’s the conundrum bad poetry puts a good critic in- be accused of
nitpicking condescension, meanness, arrogance, or of vagueness. Of course, I hit
the sweet spot in the middle- yet, not to the defenders of doggerel!
I have found
this to be a truism- folk who take poetry seriously (usually layfolk in awe, or
good poets) tend to love TOP, for they see the accuracy of my points &/or
are treated to genuinely understanding points they intuited, but could not
express. The people who hate TOP are the non-serious types: bad poets, wannabes,
apparatchiks, etc. My initial reaction to the craven Aussie’s jeremiad was to
go out & totally devastate the next poetaster that comes in to TOP’s
purview. But- been there, done that. Let me, instead do a laser-like dissection
of a very good poem that might appear bad to an uninformed mind. So, this essay
will be positive, uplifting, yet detailed while not being condescending. But the
poem will be that of a virtual unknown- the Uptown Poetry Group’s own Bruce
Ario. Now, I’ve already done an essay on Bruce detailing his
mastery of his eponymous form, the ario. But, now I will go into greater depth
over a type of ario Bruce has brought to the UPG on a # of occasions- the
‘apparent clichéfest’. I will show, via this ario, that a cliché is not
just a phrase that is overworn & trite, but a phrase overused in conjunction with other familiarities. That said, let’s
look at the poem:
Why’d you do That?
Grace walked down the sidewalk and
swallowed
My heart like a Nabisco cracker. It
wasn’t until
Years later I was able to look up at
what happened.
My time had come. The day was done.
Either get it or get out.
Why don’t you grow up?
But it put trouble on the run
And bounce in my step to think
Everything was at stake
And nothing was lost…like a sunset.
Okay, a 10 line poem with at least 8½ seeming clichés. Let me underline them all. I WILL NOT explain why these phrases are clichés, by themselves. If I need to do that just go click on a porno site!
Why’d you do That?
Grace walked down the sidewalk and
swallowed
My heart like a Nabisco cracker. It
wasn’t until
Years later I was able to look up at
what happened.
My time had come. The day
was done.
Either get it or get out.
Why don’t you grow up?
But it put trouble on the run
And bounce in my step to
think
Everything was at stake
And nothing was lost…like a sunset.
The 1st
8 underlined phrases would be definite clichés, while ‘like a sunset’ is
clichéd in idea, more than phrasing. But let’s go chronologically, see why
the poem works so well, & why the ‘apparent’ clichés are not clichés-
& throw a shrimp on the fuckin’ barby for the Big Down Under!
Title- a
damned good 1. Note that ‘That’ is capitalized- this stresses that something
VERY unusual has occurred. Also, the query is rhetorical, yet connects well with
the last ½ of stanza 1- ‘what happened’ must be ‘That’. What it is is a
mystery- or is it? Does not the 1st ½ of the stanza answer that?
Probably- but not definitely. But the title sets the whole drama of the poem- as
well the tone- humorous, yet genuine.
On to stanza 1. Is Grace a female name, or an emotional demeanor? Either
way, look how Grace has captured the speaker: ‘swallowed/My heart like a
Nabisco cracker’. How easily Bruce could have gone cliché. Instead, even the
nonspecificity of the cracker type- save the brand name- serves to give a quirky
feel to the poem. You wanna read on. It is the very oddity, yet simplicity, of
stanza 1 which sets up the rest of the poem. This stanza’s tone makes the
seeming clichés that later appear just ‘seeming’ clichés. Also, stanza 1
has no clichés- seeming or real. & the sentence ‘It wasn’t until/Years
later I was able to look up at what happened.’ is the emotional ground for the
whole poem. This stanza rocks, both in its wording & in the purpose it
serves for the whole success of the poem. & look at line 1’s end- is that a gasser,
or what? Funny faux melodrama, in tune with the rest of the poem, yet the 1st
word of the next line removes the humor & recontexts it into a serious mode.
Talk about turning on an emotional dime!
Stanza 2 seems to have 4 clichés in 3 lines. Look again. They are NOT
clichés because they buffet each other & the usual setups & outcomes
that make the 4 seeming clichés clichés are not present. ‘My time had
come’ has no fatalism attached to it, no resolute acceptance. ‘The day was
done’ comes on its heels & seems a nonsequitur. That both phrases are full
sentences & ½ of the line only emphasizes how unusual the line is.
Unusuality is antithetical to triteness. It may not be good of itself, but
triteness is not its weakness. The 2nd line that follows would be a
cliché in some political poem, or a poem on a relationship- but not in a
bizarre interior monologue which leads up to another rhetorical question/reproval:
‘Why don’t you grow up?’ Yet, this line ties directly back to the question
of the title. They almost bookend the incident they reference- that of Grace’s
capture of the speaker’s heart.
But the poem does not stop there. Stanza 3 begins by subverting the ‘on
the run’ cliché by making trouble the subject. At 1st blush
this seems a nonsequitur too. But, we see it’s perfectly in line with ‘That’,
Grace’s capture, & ‘what happened’. We later realize trouble’s run
is companion to a bouncy step, which prelude the speaker’s melodramatic
statement that ‘Everything was at stake’- presumably his/her heart.
That leads directly to the last stanza/line. The ‘nothing was lost’
comes right after, & contributes to, the melodrama of the preceding 2
stanzas, which played off the wonderful setup of the title & 1st
stanza. We are on this wonderful rollercoaster that screeches to an ellipsis,
which acts like a pregnant pause in a Borscht Belt comedian’s routine: bada-boom.
We then ease in to the familiar scene of a sunset ending (serenity). Yet, coming
here it is totally unexpected. & what would seem like a cheesy attempt at
emotion rings genuine, because it is not lost, sunsets happen every day. This
ties back to the end of stanza 1, which tied back to the title. We get this
hidden continuity in the poem’s seeming jaggered tale. This poem succeeds so
well because of its dramatic cadence, the odd order of events, their seemingly
banal recitation, & devastating timing. The emotional depth is heightened
precisely because the poem’s quirky, humorous feel lowers the reader’s
emotional guard.
Now, compare this to many a bad poem that will have clichés littered
across it. Those poems will fail because they lack the redeeming qualities
aforementioned: cadence, order, & timing. Stanza 1 is long-lined &
contemplative. Then the poem’s images are punctuated by periods or line
breaks. The seeming clichés are thrown so quickly at you that they blur, until
the ellipsis….then exhalation. This is a marvelously constructed poem. Its
music is not so much in the use of rime, assonance, or alliteration, but in its
delicate & intricate construction. How many poems, laden with clichés, are
leaden in music? Either they overcompensate & force alliteration, or they
are bits of chopped up prose.
This poem
has it just right. It’s a shame that this poet, & his wonderful form- the
ario- are virtual unknowns while so many of the poets I’ve done TOPs on are
published, & feted! So, I am at a precipice. To further explicate this poem
would be to condescend to the minority of intelligent poetry readers out there.
To not do so would invite jeers from the ignorants. But they’ll jeer anyway.
I’ll end here. If you don’t get what I’ve said, or if you think this is
not an excellent poem, please leave Cosmoetica & read the tripe posted on
any of the 100s of poetry chat rooms- there you can be condescended to your
heart’s content. Damn, a cliché! Ah, no sense in redeeming that 1!
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