Catching Light

[australis]

I have a collection of stories coming out, and I wanted to express an idea in 2 ways.

I wanted to incorporate a line from Clive James: "All I can do, is turn a phrase, until it catches the light". And as well, what light means to humanity, from the first fire, until we can catch it and pass it, somewhere deep in space. And then I thought, instead of putting it in a story, it would be a good idea for a poem (and how many books have a title poem?)

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Catching Light

Civilisation only lives in the light,
Desperate to see the unseen.
Deeper searching, when knowledge hides,
Using a time-adapted eye.

Firelit faces seek patterns in flames,
Turning aside the wilder claw,
Bringing to food a better taste,
And holding off the ever-cold.
Animals dance with the burning branch,
Daubed on walls in the deepest caves,
Old Prometheus freely brought his gift,
Fully knowing its two smiles.

The guttering torch in a warrior fort,
Brightens sentries along the wall.
Blades in the forge, glowing red,
Hammered to the finest edge,
Giving way to the power of powder,
All hot orange flame and fury.
A city burns, to light the roads
To razing all the world.

But beacons march across the hills,
Send warning, send pleas for aid.
Flares soar high beyond the horizon,
A turning lighthouse points the way.
New towns alight in darker lands,
Cities become bright drowning pools -
A dazzled gaze can’t turn away,
Falls into them forever.

And the spoken word across the air
Gains thirty two frames a second
And flickering light fills the night
With stories from other days.
Talking heads try to shape a message,
Deception shading meaning,
But lamps glare down on sweating faces,
Illuminate deeper truths.

Messengers to the greater stars
Pushed up into the greater black,
And radio images back to us
Of the fringes of the beginning.
Sunjammers with the thinnest sails
Ride storms to the edge of elsewhere.
And a million distant galaxies unfold,
In the longest slow reveal.

And finally catching light -
And racing up to tag it,
And racing past and racing fast,
Warping deeper into space and time,
Reflections of our lives and times,
Revealing just where we are.

Always striving,
Always driving,
Ever rising, ever reaching,
Ever catching light.


Oct-Nov 2018

[RJDiogenes]

Oops. I just noticed this thread right now.

This is a great poem and having a title poem for the book is a really nice idea that I might steal. In the past, I've used surreal mini monologues for my introductions, but I like the idea of using a poem.

[australis]

By all means!

[huggle]

I love that poem
In German literature of the 19th century (plus minus a few decades) it was quite the thing to start with a poem but the custom has grown a little out of fashion. Personally, I am very fond of it since it tunes the reader to the book's general mood. It's a bit like marinating our feelings if you pardon the culinary simile.

(off-topic: instead of using "culinary", I was originally looking for a word relating to cooking in the same way "sartorial" relates to tayloring but couldn't find any. Is there really none or did I just not find it? I have a vague impression that I once came across such a word, possibly in a butler's speech in some novel.)

[RJDiogenes]

Culinary is pretty much the equivalent of sartorial in that sense. Gastronomical also springs to mind.

[huggle]

very close to the mark but not hitting the bull's eye. I was looking for an extremely posh word, derived from Latin or Greek such as would be used by Jeeves, for example. Or by any exceedingly formal British butler in an early 20est century novel.
But maybe there is no such word nd I am just imagining things. Lately, my memory plays lots of tricks on me.

[RJDiogenes]

Haute cuisine? But that's French, and I don't think it can be turned into an adjective. I'll keep thinking.

[australis]

I love that poem

Glad you like it.

[australis]

very close to the mark but not hitting the bull's eye. I was looking for an extremely posh word, derived from Latin or Greek such as would be used by Jeeves, for example. Or by any exceedingly formal British butler in an early 20est century novel.
But maybe there is no such word nd I am just imagining things. Lately, my memory plays lots of tricks on me.

Gustatorial?

[RJDiogenes]

Yes, that sounds perfect.