Michelle Kwasny swims around this issue in her poem, “My Heart Like an Upside-Down Flame”:
One walks, or wants to walk, with the glow
cupped by two hands. As if light were water.
As if lemon verbena,
a blossom around the solid figure of the wick.
But look what can happen.
The heart has been looted of its small valuables:
music, of course, and the dancing couple
from childhood, secure in their velvet-lined box.
What is it that so captivates us in the old cliché?
I am thinking of the light cast from the pines
or the first green shoots of onion.
Bird in the palm if only we were patient enough.
We who lay the fragile thing beating in the yard,
then trust the stray cat won’t find it.
Here is the pile of gray feathers and grit.
Who was it who told us courage was a virtue?
A candle burns at solstice on a simple yellow plate.
After work hours, after the bills are paid.
The safe heart then, burrowed into its winter cave?
Fish bones and behind them, swimming.
What is it that I expected the heart to do?
Follow me? A handmaid, arranging the bouquets?
Or this tree, then that one, a row of grayer birch
as the flame steps out from the shadow of its house.
I would say my heart has “small valuables,” and I think all of us can admit that our hearts have been looted here and there by various people and circumstances.
In an Anthropology class I took my sophomore year, we learned in class about this tribe of people who considered the throat to be the center of all life (much like our culture would consider the heart to be). If a person lost their voice or ability to speak, the individual was considered dead. Something in each of us wants a central object to base all feeling and happenstance upon.
When I think about writing, I think of how we are each making collages of words that reflect the planes of our souls. We each have a hundred or a thousand facets to our beings, and its no wonder as we were created with glory and beauty shaping us on all sides. This is something I want to explore more deeply as I write poems this semester - what is the heart, and why is it our center?
It's so interesting that different cultures have thought different body parts to be the center of who we are. I've often felt that just the acts of writing and reading connect me more to who I am and to others than nearly any other activity. I don't read much poetry, but surprisingly, I've read Kwasny for fun, outside an assignment. Even more surprising, I really enjoyed it. Something about her language pulled me in where most poetry doesn't. I also really like your description that we are each making "collages" that reflect our souls. But it's so true. That's why sharing your writing can sometimes be so difficult, because it's like putting your innermost being on display. I think that's why reading has also made me feel connected to others: I'm reading something that someone has put themselves into and is brave enough to share with me. It only seems natural to explore the idea of our center through writing.
ReplyDeleteThese are some really interesting thoughts, and I liked the Quasny poem you put in here! The heart plays such a unique and special role in our culture that it's amazing no one pays it more thought, but lately I've been wondering about similar things. It's hard to put your deepest feelings into words, and I think that one of poetry's greatest challenges is probably finding ways to make it sound new and sincere every time. It's so beautiful when it works!
ReplyDeleteI knew this post was yours, Lo, because of the pretty picture. :) This is some deep subject matter. I can't decide if it would be easier or more difficult to express in poetry vs. prose. It sounds like you have a theme you are threading your pieces on? Interesting about the throats. You could probably write a lot about organs with this concept.
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ReplyDeleteOops. First post didn't go as planned. Here's another go!
ReplyDeleteDefinitely an interesting subject, Lauren. It’s always fun to think of the heart in both literal and not-so-literal terms. On the one hand, it’s the main organ that keeps us alive, so that could be why it’s the center of our being. Then again, God always talks about the heart as something that we need to guard, so it’s obviously important to Him.
It’s so interesting that a tribe thought the heart was the center of us. Hmm, I don’t know what would bring them to that conclusion, but it’s an intriguing one. Good luck with your exploration of the heart!
The heart. Why is it our center? It deceives and yet directs. It's rhythm is a personal pendulum. It beats quickly and roughly against our chest with fear and stirring and later heaves relief in the recess of sleep. Figuratively, this organ breaks and heals. Literally, the organ is able to be transferred into another as a new battery.
ReplyDeleteThis is a beautiful post."What is it that I expected the heart to do? Follow me? A handmaid, arranging the bouquets?" Michelle Kwansy seeks the same answers you are looking for. I do not understand the heart but I understand how different each one has been made, like intricate snowflakes. I found a quote today by Francis Chan - "God's definition of what matters is pretty straightforward. He measures our lives by how we love." We are measured by what our hearts produce. I strongly encourage you to explore the truth of the heart through your Capstone Writing. Keep it up, Lauren!
Wow. Lovely. I have nothing to say here that hasn't been said. This is beautiful.
ReplyDelete(the poem and the post and the comments.)
I also like the line, "Fish bones, and behind them, swimming."
Wow, that is a gorgeous poem, one that kind of makes me despair of my own attempts at poetry.
ReplyDeleteOn another note, thinking of the heart as the center of being is a really interesting topic. While it can break and heal metaphorically, it's almost scary to think of how fragile it is in reality as well. It honestly doesn't take much for a heart to give out. While it is one of the strongest muscles in our body (if not the strongest), it will stop beating if it is pierced or pulled away from its ties. I do wonder why we have a physical reaction to emotional subjects, usually centered around the heart, though.
Good thoughts about writing portraying our hearts too. Now it makes perfect sense why I don't like sharing my writing with people, even those closest to me sometimes. Do you think that because our writing is so attached to our hearts, that we're afraid what people will think of our hearts after we show it off?
Really interesting stuff. Love it all.
I think you have some really interesting thoughts about the heart going on here. It's hard, I think, to write poetry about the heart because it can so easily become cliche or sentimental. I like that you're taking it at a different line than heart=love or heart=passion.
ReplyDeleteI think that was a beautiful post, Lauren. People do want to find a place within themselves where they can identify the origin of their feelings, or place the sense of pain. I really loved the lines from the poem: "One walks, or wants to walk, with the glow cupped by two hands" as if it were a flame, and then the idea of trusting a little fragile bird to be okay on the ground, not expecting it to get caught by a wandering cat ...so that later you find a "pile of gray feathers and grit." It was beautiful language, and you had a good, reflective post.
ReplyDeleteThat is a beautiful poem, and I am definitely taking note of it to read again later. It reminds me of all those things we have as children, and later grow out of as we learn what the "real world" is supposedly like. This world teaches us that the darkness is all we can rely on as true and normal, yet didn't Jesus say that you must become like a child to reach the Kingdom? Oh, fragile hearts that we have... as you explore your heart through the words of your poetry, may you find that childlike trust in God, and in goodness--and then share it with the rest of us, because most of us let it go too easily. Let's all recenter our lives from our hearts, trusting in the good gifts of the One who created us.
ReplyDeleteThe Old Testament culture viewed the kidney as the organ of the soul. i'm also interested by why we have "chosen" the heart.
ReplyDeletei don't fully understand where this poem is taking me. i like your shorthand for writing, though, and i think this poem fits it—a "collage of words."
"What is it that I expected the heart to do?
Follow me? A handmaid, arranging the bouquets?"
i like these two lines. They fascinate me with how much emotion they convey, how little they say and how much they mean, and how clearly they communicate without saying it outright.