Jazz

I'm not sure how many of you own some of his books of poetry but I highly recommend you get some of them. They are really great.

Some samples:

Still unused,
the letter opener
she got on her birthday
has become tarnished.
It lies on the sill,
next to a seashell
she found in Flordia
before moving west.
Before becoming a writer.
Before becoming a mother.
Her son wants to use it
as a dagger,
to wield it savagely
against monsters and bad guys
that come streaming out
from the toy-cluttered corners
of his room,
but he can't reach it yet.

("Keepsake")

The rain is infected
with bacteria
from secret experiments
of lonely men
and women.
It is that time
between winter
and spring
that is dismal
and threatening,
when the city
is airing its sweat-
stained corridors,
opening its arms
and legs imperceptibly
for an hour each morning.
Calm voices give whispered
instructions and hands
flutter
in the streetlight
hiding animal faces
that glisten
with swollen
red tongues.
Quietly,
they devour
each other.
Grateful
spasms,
violent motion
of interlocking,
clawing,
taunting.

("Embrace")

- Sudy -

[img]smilies/eek.gif[/img] Oh my, he's very talented! Both are good, but I really liked "Embrace".

Jazz

So do I. It's one of my favourites. You should get his books, they are very good. I'm sure some of them are still in print. [img]smilies/biggrin.gif[/img]

- Sudy -

What is the title of the book? Maybe when I hit the bookstore, I can check to see if they have it.

Phee

You're not likely to find his books in bookstores. Some places may have them, but generally speaking you can just buy them directly from Perceval Press, which is the publishing company Viggo set up. [img]smilies/smile.gif[/img] He's got several books. His most recent ones are just photography, but his older ones have poetry and paintings, too (is there anything the man can't do?) If you go to this site and click the link for the "creativity" section, there's a list of all his books in there. [img]smilies/smile.gif[/img]

I love "Keepsake". He dedicated that one to his mum at one of his readings once. Bless him. [img]smilies/sigh.gif[/img]

I've gotta post "Communion", which would have to be one of my fave Viggo poems.

Communion
1.
We've left shore somehow
become the friends
of early theory
close enough to speak
desire and pain of absence
of mistakes we'd make
given the chance.

Each smile returned
makes harder avoiding
dreams that see us
lying in early evening
curtain shadows, skin
safe against skin.
Bloom of compassion
respect for moments
eyes lock turns
forever into one more
veil that falls away.

2.
This after seeing you
last night, first time
smelling you with
permission: shoulders to
wonder openly at
as carefully kissed
as those arms
waited impossibly on.
They've held me now
and your breath
down my back
sent away night air
that had me shaking
in the unlit anglican
doorway.

3.
Are we ruined for
finding our faces fit
and want to know more
about morning? Is
friendship cancelled
if we can't call
each other anymore
in amnesia, invite
ourselves to last glances
under suspicious clocks
telling us when we've
had enough?

4.
Your steady hands
cradling my grateful
skull: were you taking
in my face to
save an image
you've rarely allowed
yourself after leaving
that cold alcove?
Am I a photograph
you gaze at in
moments of weakness?

You ordered me
off my knees
into your arms.
Wasn't to beg
that I knelt; only
to see you once
from below.

Tried to say something
that filled my mouth
and longed to rest
in your ear.
Don't dare write
it down for fear it'll
become words, just
words.

Something about that poem, especially part 4 just captivates me everytime I read it.

[ 02-24-2004: Message edited Phee ]

rebelle

[img]smilies/cry.gif[/img] This last poem [img]smilies/love.gif[/img]

- Sudy -

Thanks for the link Phee.

I must agree on part 4, it just left me speechless. Reading his stuff just makes me admire him even more.

Jazz

Oh man Phee, reading that poem again makes me cry!!

Phee

It is sort of sad and helpless. Seems to me to be about forbidden love. I love the way it ends: "Don't dare write it down for fear it'll become words, just words." It's kind of like he's just written all these things he wanted to say to her, and then at end he's saying that he shouldn't have written it all down because it had more meaning when it was just left unspoken. Does that make any sense? [img]smilies/look.gif[/img]

The poem that really makes me wanna cry is "Second Opinion" because IMO it's about a pregnancy that had to be terminated for some medical reason, and if that is what it's about, then I can't help but wonder if he was writing from personal experience, because if he was, then knowing how much he loves being a dad, it just breaks my heart. [img]smilies/frown.gif[/img]


Second Opinion

The glow inside another red-crossed pelvis
will drain when they crush that little bulb.
Menstural minstrels drift in
from the weedless garden.
The immaculate blue flame
from the fake fireplace
burns the corner of my eye.
Can't stop staring at nothing.
A gloved hand opens the door,
and the man enters soothingly,
with an air of respect for the dead.
Encourages us to look on the bright side.
Black pants hide your pain afterwards,
and there's a cookie on a napkin
and a paper cup of red juice
to replace your strength.
We drive home without blinking
because the sun isn't real.

[ 02-25-2004: Message edited Phee ]

Jazz

I think alot of things are written from personal experiences or watching someone go through that experience. I'm not a poetry writer but my friends say when I do write poetry, it's extremely deep. The only time I write is when I have a very dark personal experience. The words just come. I figured it's the same for Viggo.

Starless Night 20

Jazz It's true. There have been times where I've written poems based on nothing I've actually felt in my life, but they turn out ridiculous and mundane. The ones that I write about real-life experiences are the ones that I find convey the best meaning, because you have a concrete foundation from which to write from. I love his poetry. It's just amazing.

Phee I hadn't even thought about that! I had read it several times, but nothing had ever really come to me as to what the poem was about. After I read what you stated, I re-read the poem and it all made sense to me. It's just amazing.

Imagine him writing something like this, for you, on your birthday:

STONES

MET BY A LAKE NEAR THE SUN.

YOUR MOUTH AND EYES, ARMS

AND LEGS, MELTED AS THOUGH

WE'D KNOWN EACH OTHER WELL

AND NEEDED ONLY REKINDLE

WARMTH OF THE FAMILIAR.

AS IF PATIENCE WERE REWARDED

AND NOW WE'D SHARE EVERYTHING.

And this one, I also loved, since I'm a very peace-loving person who sees the grievances and aggrivations of war, rather than the resolutions.

LETTER FROM NEBRASKA

THERE HASN'T BEEN A SUMMER LIKE THIS SINCE BEFORE THE WAR,

SO I'M TOLD. FLASH LIGHTNING FROM A CLEAR SKY WHEN EVERYONE

IS OUTSIDE. THE ANIMALS HAVE BEEN MULTIPLYING AT NIGHT.

THERE IS NEVER ENOUGH TO EAT. FORTY OR FIFTY MURDERS EVERY DAY,

AND GOD KNOWS HOW MUCH VIOLENCE PASSES FOR DISCIPLINE

BEHIND TORTURED WALLS. CHILDREN GO AROUND CLENCHING THEIR

FISTS AND STARING DOWN AT THEIR SHOES BEFORE THEY KNOW HOW

TO READ. THERE HAVE BEEN DROWNINGS. SOMEHOW WE HAVE

FORGOTTEN HOW TO SWIM. IT CAN NO LONGER BE TAUGHT. THE WATER IS

DANGEROUS. PEOPLE ARE AFRAID TO WATER THEIR LAWNS, THE BRIDGES

ARE UNUSED. IT NEVER RAINS. THE SUN IS LOSING ITS YELLOW AND THE

CLOUDS ARE CURLING UP AT THE EDGES. THE RADIO PLAYS TWENTY-YEAR-OLD SONGS

TWENTY-FOUR HOURS A DAY. I HAVEN'T SAID A WORD

SINCE APRIL.

Jazz

I agree. My last poem was written about my horse after she passed away. Except it was written from her point of view, not mine. I had just gone into her mind and thought about what she was thinking throughout her life and wrote it down based on what people told me they thought of our relationship.

I bet all of Viggo's poems have some kind of meaning for him.

Phee

I think you're right there Jazz.

In the book Recent Forgeries, the poem Second Opinion is on a page opposite a painting called Clinic. The background is black and white, and is a composition of several photos. There's a baby, there's a big light like you'd see in a doctor's surgery, there's a pair of hands, and there's a woman with her legs apart. Over the top of all that are red and white lines scribbled all over the place. Some are spirals, some are arrows. It all looks very confusing and harsh and kind of angry. The only colour in the whole work is red, the rest is just black and white, so it's a rather dark piece of work. It actually makes me a bit uneasy just looking at it. Anyway, seeing it on the page opposite Second Opinion, the two seem to fit together perfectly.

Stones is a beautiful poem. I even used that one in a wp I made ages ago (it's posted in the fanart thread).

Have you read Back to Babylon? Viggo submitted it to the site Poets Against The War. I know he's changed it slightly since this original version he submitted to the site, but I'm not sure if the amended version is online anywhere. Anyway, here's the original....


Back To Babylon

Accept and forget difference or desire that separates and leaves us longing or repelled. Why briefly return to play in broken places, to mock the ground, to collect infant shards, coins, fossils, or the familiar empty canisters and casings that glint from poisoned roots in the blackened dust? We make bad ghosts, and are last to know or believe we too will fade, just as our acrid smoke and those strange flakes of skin and strands of hair will, into largely undocumented extinction. Lie down, lie down; sleep is the best thing for being awake. Do as we've always been told and done, no backward glances or second thoughts, leaving sad markers buried in the sand. Sleep now, dream of children with their heads still on, of grandmothers unburdening clotheslines at twilight, of full kettles slow-ticking over twig embers. Ignore boneless, nameless victims that venture out on bitter gravel to claim remains while we rest.

Pay at the window for re-heated, prejudiced incantations. Take them home and enjoy with wide-screen, half-digested, replayed previews of solemn national celebration. Then sleep, by all means; we'll need all the energy we can muster for compiling this generation's abridged anthology of official war stories, highlights of heedless slaughter, to burnish our long and proud imperial tradition. At some point, by virtue of accidentally seeing and listening, we may find ourselves participating in our own rendering. Few of our prey will be left alive enough to water the sun with their modest, time-rubbed repetitions, to rephrase their particular, unifying laws. Our version of events has already made its money back in foreign distribution and pre-sales; all victory deadlines must be met.

It can get so quiet, with or without the dead watching our constant deployments. From our tilted promontory we may see one last woman scuffle away across cracked parchment of dry wash beneath us, muttering to herself—or is she singing at us?—as she rounds the sheared granite face and disappears into a grove of spindly, trembling tamarisk shadows lining the main road. We'll soon hear little other than our breathing, as shale cools and bats rise to feed, taking over from sated swallows. Night anywhere is home, darkness a cue for turning inward, quiet an invitation to review our expensive successes before morning extraction from the twin rivers of our common cradle.

February, 2003


He read this one at the poetry reading I went to in Wellington at the end of last year, and it was just unbelieveable to hear him read it. Something in his voice changed when he read this particular piece. He read it with such conviction. You could tell just how strong his feelings are concerning war and the innocent people who become the victims of it. You could tell that he felt it was one of the most important things he'd ever written. He damn near made me cry!!!

I had to read Back to Babylon several times before I could even start to wrap my head around it, but there are some images that just jump out and hit you in the face, like the last part of the first stanza where he doesn't beat around the bush, he just hits you with phrases like:"Sleep now, dream of children with their heads still on". [img]smilies/frown.gif[/img] Powerful stuff!! I can see how Viggo would be proud of that piece of writing.

- Sudy -

...I'm just awed and speechless. Those are some amazing and powerful words and he used them so well to get the point across.

And wow, you're right Phee, that line is very strong. "Sleep now, dream of children with their heads still on" If you read this line alone without the rest of the poem, it would sound morbid and kinda frightening at the mental picture you get but I guess it should be that way to cause an impact to those who read it. And you're very lucky to have had the chance to hear him read this himself.

Starless Night 20

Phee Wow. I'm just caught speechless. I don't know what to say in response to that powerful, moving essay he wrote. Everything he said (what I could fully understand) is how I feel about this war America is involved in. The imagery that he uses, such as the woman who is muttering or singing and then to hear the silence, with only our breathing echoing. It's just haunting. Beautiful.

Why briefly return to play in broken places, to mock the ground, to collect infant shards, coins, fossils, or the familiar empty canisters and casings that glint from poisoned roots in the blackened dust? This line reminds me very much of Nagasaki and Hiroshima. I visited the UN because my cousins and their friends were in from Massachusetts and wanted to see it, so my dad and I went with them. They had artifacts from those two sites, and it just broke the heart. And burned the soul. To see a stone statue, completely contorted and melted due to the radiation. And then just various coins and other metal objects that were melded together because of the heat. Viggo has a way with words that is so rare.

Jazz That's a very difficult thing to do! But I admire you for doing that, of course. I've written a few things, myself. They're on the Poetry thread on the FanFiction board, if you'd like to read them.