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Sunday, November 8, 2009

A hard struggle -but finally: my modeled poem



Expostulation and Reply
by William Wordsworth

"Why, William, on that old grey stone,
Thus for the length of half a day,
Why, William, sit you thus alone,
and dream your time away?

"Where are your books? - that light bequeathed
To Beings else forlorn and blind!
Up! and drink the spirit breathed
From dead men to their kind.

"You look round on your Mother Earth,
As if she for no purpose bore you;
As if you were her first-born birth,
And none had lived before you!"

One morning thus, by Esthwaite lake,
When life was sweet, I knew not why,
To me my good friend Matthew spake,
And thus I made reply.

"The eye - it cannot choose but see;
We cannot bid the ear be still;
Our bodies feel, where'er they be,
Against or with our will.

"Nor less I deem that there are Powers
Which of themselves our minds impress;
That we can find this mind of ours
In a wise passiveness.

"Think you, 'mid all this mighty sum
Of things for ever speaking,
That nothing of itself will come,
But we must still be seeking?

" - Then as not wherefore, here, alone,
Conversing as I may,
I sit upon this old grey stone,
And dream my time away."



So, this is the original - and here comes my modeled version.

Questions and Answers
by me :-)

"Why, Poet, do you think so much
About the world outside,
Why, Poet, do you have to touch
The stones and trees so wide?

"Why don't you work? and try to to change
The circumstances as they are?
Stand up! and - though for you it's strange
Do something real, don't gaze at the star.

"You're always thinking, meditating,
Forlorn in self-selected solitude;
Is this not boring, nor frustrating
To never laugh, enjoy? What pitiable qietude!"

A lot of times I want to ask these questions
But as these poets are - for quite long time now- dead
I have to find my very own suggestions
I'm searching, still, and hope I will not be misled.

My answers can be wrong
Or all in all not specified enough.
I do not care - as long
this is a progress. This I love.

The poet finds his utmost joy
In even this demeanor;
He sees himself as an envoy,
as someone much more keener.

Keener than the rest of men
And therefore it's his duty
To wander 'round, again, again,
describing nature's beauty.

The poet, yes, he has to touch
The stones and trees so wide,
To be well taught and thus can watch
Change of the world inside.

3 comments:

  1. This was hard, hard work! I can't think of a more difficult task ever. The modeled poem drove me totally crazy. Now I know why the Romantic poets always seem to be so serious - because writing poems is HARD WORK! I'm not kidding!
    (btw: I am aware of the fact that this is not a grade-comment as I comment my own blog- entry. But I am so, so, so happy that this work is done!) :-)

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  2. Sorry that this was such "hard, hard work." But it is hard work that paid off extremely well! Your modeled poem is lovely, taking as it does Wordsworth's literal structure of "questions and answers." The idea that the Poet is an envoy is excellent. In fact, I think this is a very productive way--perhaps more productive than the poets themselves would recognize--to envision why the Poet "think[s] so much." As envoy, might not the Poet be that which connects expostulation to reply? Questions to answers? And what I gained from your poem was a realization that the Poet has neither questions nor answers; he merely puts the process into play. Intriguing!

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  3. Thank you for this comment! It really gives me the chance to consider the meaning of the poem even more and I like the idea of the poet as a connection not only between the divine and the human but also between expostulation and reply.
    After a couple of weeks I am glad that I had to do this assignment b/c it 'forced' me to think of my very own interpretation and understanding of the Romantics. Although I was struggling during the process of writing the poem (especially finding the right rhyming words) I now see it as part of the process, so you're right in saying that it payed off. It payed off for my understanding of Romanticism.

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