emotions

Animosity

Animosity

No curse more worse than animosity.
Hateful envy, a pox of bilious bile,
jealous anger, savage ferocity,
pity gone putrid, ugly and vile.
Desires become cravings; converted
wants become needs; crudely, love becomes lust;
good things strangled, hopelessly perverted…
so steel turns to rust, and diamonds to dust.
Animosity will foul its own nest:
over-paint a masterpiece, self-corrupt
the elegance of beauty crudely dressed.
The curse of animosity – one-upped!
. The success of others (not yours to own)
. If not resolved, will turn a heart to stone.

© Tim Grace, 22 December 2012

To the reader: Animosity is a stifling energy. Characteristically, it’s an emotional state that directs spiteful anger at a rival who has gained a perceived ‘unfair advantage’ in the relationship. From small issues problems fester and spiral out of all proportion. Resolution is unlikely to occur without some helpful intervention that manages to recalibrate the tension. Animosity is more often quelled than it is quashed.

To the poet: A sonnet that taps into raw-emotion needs to anchor its rancour hard and fast. There’s little room to escalate slowly. The first line: “no curse more worse than animosity” unravels the expose; and the avalanche torrents forth. In a poem like this, the rush of verbiage is propelled on the back of poetic ploys that are easily translated into expected rhythms and solid rhymes; given a liberal dose of assonance, consonance and alliteration.

Animosity

Animosity
Picture Source:
http://youtu.be/sTxBOzjxDn4

love & art

Love and Art

It’s all about connecting the connections.
It’s making sense of senses; aligning
touch to a feeling, heart with affections.
It’s the dance of life; all things combining.
It’s rhythms giving meaning to a twist.
It’s the whisper appealing to a wish.
It’s the invitation too tempting to resist.
It’s the meal shared, prepared as though a dish.
It’s all about the partnership of play,
making time to pay attention, closing
doors, opening minds, as moments melt away;
it’s harmony: love and art composing.
. The art of love is appreciation.
. The love of art is its imitation.

© Tim Grace, 3 January 2012

To the reader: Love is an artful relationship. By mutual agreement love reveals its simple beauty. Interpretation of love is a critique of responsiveness. Shakespeare’s measure was “fair, kind and true” (s105). The mutual creation of love is organic; full of context and meaning – adding pleasure to mere survival and existence. We fall in love to fully appreciate the art of life; to make life an art.

To the poet: Sometimes we write of love as a subject, about which characters and events revolve and intermingle. Other times, we write of love as an object, about which we describe its parts and possibilities. The ‘art of love and love of art’ is a neat palindromic phrase that finds itself interpreted in the final couplet of this sonnet… art for art sake, love for love sake; together bound.

 

love & art

love & art:
picture source: http://youtu.be/KbmHMCA4lNI

 

dark lady?

Dark Lady?

Is she the dark lady that last night claimed
she knew the provenance of broken dreams?
Is she the same woman who last night aimed
her demons in my direction? It seems
she holds a deep quarry of dredged-up digs;
a deep pit of misery; a pack of black cards
that she plays to her advantage; reneges
at will… cheats … and then with honour guards
her dignity; a thin veil of powder;
a dusting, a coating, sheer nonsense;
more transparent as the voice gets louder:
more desperate, more dismal, more dark and dense.
. Who is this lady that delights in black?
. What shady memories does she welcome back?

Tim Grace, 23 December 2011

To the reader: Temper fuelled rage is an ugly and primitive demeanour that rises from the brain’s deeper recesses. For most of us we learn to control that ‘cantankerous monster’ as we outgrow the deployment of two-year old tantrums. For some, that taming was not so complete; producing an unpredictable and cranky adult temperament. In the grown-up world, there’s a social contract that demands a rational mind. Keeping an ‘even keel’ through stormy weather is not easy. Managing frustration and torment without resorting to anger is a prized habit of mind; well worth the effort in the preservation of long-lasting relationships.

To the poet: The angry tirade, often delivered in a single passage of free-flowing vitriol, is intended to over-ride the calm response. Throughout an angry exchange the tarry is designed to be quick and the verbal blows are short and sharp. The aggressor in an angry exchange will escalate the intensity… their ploy is to attack not defend. Any attempt to de-escalate will meet with hostility. This sonnet is bookmarked by two sets of questions… the answer lies within.

 

dark lady? dark lady?

Picture Source: http://youtu.be/0sqMBOjrUeg