One of my coworkers is a poet. Last week we assigned each other an assignment: to write a poem to be workshopped by the assigner on Monday. My assignment was to “write a muscular poem about masculinity.“
Cartography
A man is an old map
charted in sharp lines and lies;
where north is up and west is left
where puff-cheeked faces blow and fume
where grim Atlas crouches at the bottom;
bearing up his legend — the half-truth map
where mountains have no height
where water is not wet
and past its paper edges
there be monsters.
What follows is the text of the email I sent to her about what I was aiming for with this poem.
i don’t know if this is ‘muscular’ or not, since i’ve only heard that used in your mouth, but i tried for my own feeling of solidity.
Feel more than free to workshop or comment on this as much as possible. And give me your own assignments if you want. I feel that, at this stage, I write better when I’ve been assigned something.
v.2
Cartography
A Man is like an old map charted
in sharp lines; a plotted thing —
where north is up and west is left
where puff-cheek faces blow and fume
where Atlas bears his legend — a land
where mountains have no height
where water is not wet
and past its paper edges
there be monsters.
this might be my favorite thing that you’ve written, or at least it’s up there. i like the premise a whole lot and i think you communicate the premise well. i am wondering about the way you phrased the very last line. it feels stylistically different, like it’s in another language than the rest. i almost read it in a pirate’s voice (like “thar be monsters!”), which turns a powerful conclusion into a bit of a joke… but that’s probably just my problem.
have you heard Elvis Costello’s “Poor Fractured Atlas?” it’s a beautiful song. you can read the lyrics here, but beware this site may have popups and crap (no apparent problem in firefox though): http://elvis-costello.lyrics-songs.com/lyrics/8707/