Grex Poetry Conference

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Grex Poetry Item 304: Unsure about the title.
Entered by morwen on Tue Apr 23 18:36:07 UTC 2002:

THE SHOES

It starts, easily enough,
In daylight
When I begin my enchanted dance
Into the black spiral path.

One, two, and three steps,
Swirling and twirling,
Picking up speed,
Like a ship in a black hole
Or a whirlpool.
Frantic,
I struggle to free myself
To stop this dark dancing,
To find the light of laughter,
To be free.
A cold voice whispers of impossibility
Amid the funereal music
That moves my feet
In the dance of darkness
That plunges me into the well.
~22 April 2002

8 responses total.

#1 of 8 by morwen on Tue Apr 23 18:40:10 2002:

When I wrote this, I was attempting to put down my feelings relating 
to the subject of depression (in a kind of theraputic sense).  Then, 
when I tried to come up with a title, the poem reminded me of the 
fairytale about the enchanted shoes that, when you wore them, would 
dance you to death.

In poetry class, they said that the title can lend a new perspective 
to a poem.  So, I'm not sure if "the Shoes" is appropriate, but "Black 
Spiral Dancing" is too obvious.

#2 of 8 by jaklumen on Tue Apr 23 22:33:34 2002:

I like the latter title.

btw, Julie, I find it much more fun to wait for the audience's 
perspectives before I tell them the intended meaning.  But your 
mileage may vary.

Practice is doing you well.

#3 of 8 by morwen on Wed Apr 24 17:20:41 2002:

Any others?

#4 of 8 by flem on Wed Apr 24 20:06:13 2002:

Definitely "the Shoes".  

I found "funereal" to be off-putting; it's a little awkward in that phrase
for some reason.  Good work otherwise, though.

#5 of 8 by morwen on Thu Apr 25 01:18:26 2002:

Got a suggestion that I could use instead of "funereal", flem?

#6 of 8 by jaklumen on Thu Apr 25 07:24:05 2002:

resp:4  I take it you're not familiar with the "Black Spiral Dancer" 
reference

#7 of 8 by flem on Thu Apr 25 18:54:01 2002:

No, I'm familiar with it, but it's just not a good title.  "The Shoes" is much
better.  

As for something besides funereal...  hang on, let me reread #0

#8 of 8 by flem on Thu Apr 25 19:07:01 2002:

Hmm, what I'm coming up with goes along the lines of 

...
A cold voice whispers of impossibility
Funereal music moves my feet
In the dance of darkness
...

Other possible words for "moves": swirls, whisks, animates, writhes, ...
Other possibilities for "funereal":  silent, whispering, somber, scaffhold, ...

I dunno.  :)

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