The poem she posted today, raises some fundamental questions
about the nature of our relationship (if that’s what it is or was, or could
have been), asking me in some many words, what exactly I mean by love – if it
actually exists, and whether or not it is something contrived in my head, instead
of my heart.
I am assuming that I am meant to be the first character in
this two-character drama, and that she is meant to be the second, the object of
my affection.
And the poem asks me what I mean by love, is it the kind of
love poets are always singing about, high and pure, or is it something ugly, if
it exists at all.
Again, one of her more crafted poems, it has a very skeptical
tone, grilling me as to what has brought to think of this thing as love.
Although she names her two characters “Men and Women,” and “Women
and Men,” it might more simply be understood as he and she.
The structure is progressive, launching from when they meet,
to a period of suspicion, questioning and finally conflict.
What does love to mean to him when he is full of suspicion and
hateful, and he is doing everything to destroy it, if indeed it was ever love.
The poem raises fundamental questions about his perception
of love. What does he mean by it? How can he define it?
Is it a product of lust, loneliness or insecurity?
Why is he so angry at her – jealousy perhaps, hatefulness?
Why is he dragging it through “mud and blood,” draining what
she needs to sustain herself?
There is a fundamental question about her, too, why she
allowed him to get in so close as to do this to her, blood running in her veins
that was never meant to.
She asks if his perception of love is pure in the Shakespearian
sense (using the word nunnery as if to ask does the male character expect her
to be chase or virginal).
Or is love to him some kind of trench warfare?
If so, where are the front lines and is the real object of
his aggression control of her soul?
Does he see her as an object of affection or someone to be
possessed (obsessively)? Is love something that is in his head, rather than in
his heart, suggesting this kind of love is something to be fearful of, and
notes that the further from the heart the more likely it is that love dies,
killing it off – if it ever existed.
Oddly, enough, she leaves as caveat, a two-word after
thought, saying “and yet…”
The poem is full of her usual word play, allusions, and her
shifts in style, going from free verse at the beginning to intense internal
rhyming as emphasis at the end.
There is no candy or flowers in this poem of love, only suspicion,
obsession, warfare, bloodshed on his bar and terror on the part of the object
of his love.
There is not an ounce of tenderness in his side of this love
story, but a lot of suspicion, lust, dragging through mud and blood and trench
warfare, open combat, not for her heart but for control of her being.
This is the core of this poem, questioning what he really
wants when he says love, and she seems to come down to the idea that he is out
to dominate her, and not interested in love as Shakespeare would have it.
A brilliant poem, but painful to read considering some of
the essential truths she seems to have highlighted. There are probably arguments
to be made on his side, yet fundamentally, she seems to have defined the turf
with unerring accuracy.
A lesson to be learned, if – unfortunately – learned too late.
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