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Mount Improbable; Sarcasm!
Topic Started: Tuesday, 11. January 2011, 15:27 (204 Views)
Warrior Poet
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If you lead me, I will go.
[rant]
So this isn't really about what it seems to be about. I'm not hating on anybody, in fact, I love all of you and most other people. This is just a story. A true story. I'm not sure who it's about, but this has happened many times in many places, and it almost happened to me. If I had gotten a different set of parents, I'm sure it would have. This is a story of pain and loneliness and separation, some of which I've felt. But you should know this isn't written from my point of view. I think it's what my point of view would have been, if I had never learned formal logic. This may come as a shock to some of you, but logic and truth go hand-in-hand - thing is, they're not quite what you've been told they are.[/rant]

BTW, meymay, can we have custom [rant][/rant] tags?

KK, time for the poem.

The steepest slope won't crumble
Though it withstands the breath of time
Defiant through the ages
And impossible to climb
Slow death creeps from the bottom up
A barren rock of solid lines

The adventurers have never found it
Eagles hide away in fright
The wingspan of an angel withers
Before its awesome might
And from a silver sea of carelessness
Comes the ocean's gentle breeze

There's something in the air that smells like salt
Refreshing winds that smell of sins
And a world that's been set free
And it's known there's nothing more than this
Not anything at all
This is life; not meant to be

These solid lines don't match, don't bleed
Can't afford to just make sense
An immoveable object, an incredible will
It's not almost destroyed
Waves never relent
It will be gone when the last thinker dies

He grieves like the one who has no hope
Through true beauty can be seen
The necessity of longing for escape
If-then, commonly accepted
Then-if and his life is a dream
The laws of logic aren't cold like they seem

The mountain so vast in its pretention
So improbable as to be false
But give him time, for time will heal
Infinite deadline for an impossible task
Still the world cannot fathom
The world of men is too far gone

Beyond the dry barren rocks
Gray with dust and blood of the ages
A shining city that cannot exist
Such beauty cannot be made
Death is nothing but invention
But the beauty is here
Denied, still true, the air still smells of salt
It exists, unlike he
Rolling plains and yawning caverns
Entire worlds within one tree
A woman's smile, the amazing canvas
And the cosmos, far to see

Here lies the world around it
Dead like a thousand waning suns
Therefore, in selfsame existence
This rock cannot cry out
There is room for only one
He who would choose to pass away

If he could reach the summit he would transcend the sky
Though he's reached the top, the land's still living
Mount Improbable has rent the earth in two
The world, contained within but one man's thoughts
So much suffering fulfilled
But there's nothing more to say or do

For at the peak stands one lonely atheist
And he can finally smell the sea







So please, my atheist/nontheist friends, I'm not talking about you. I'm talking about me.

C&C?
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Jessie
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Very, very nice. This poem reminds me of the time my family and I were at the beach and I decided to climb a really huge dune without taking a break, just to prove that it was possible. Improbable? Thoroughly. Possible? Apparently so, even though my legs hurt for several days afterward. In any case, that isn't exactly what the poem seems to be about but it's sure what it reminded me of.

From a composition standpoint, this thing is unbelievable. I don't say that very often, and only when it's true. Initially, it appeared to be another somewhat repetitive (read: dull), stanza-only format, but you took off into a longer verse at the perfect time. The poem starts out with a nice hook and builds into a climax, giving it a story-telling quality that makes for a lot of emotional power. The rhyme scheme is very interesting. The first stanza is a pretty simple ABCBDB, but you obviously didn't tie yourself down to that at all, and by the fourth stanza you're just about completely in free verse. A six-line stanza makes experimentation very accessible - six is divisible by three AND two - and you utilized this tool very effectively The rhythm of your words lets everything flow very easily, for the most part, but the lines don't tie together as well conceptually in some places as they do in others. In any case it's a pretty easy flaw to ignore. More like a smudge than a coffee stain, really. :P

It would have been clear to me that this wasn't biographical even if you hadn't mentioned it explicitly. To me, it doesn't seem that you as the writer are relating as well to the "lonely atheist" as well as you are to whatever is beyond Mount Improbable. This doesn't necessarily take away the poem's power, but I could definitely see an atheist perceiving you as setting yourself up to be patriarchal and omniscient, though your rant prior to the poem makes it clear that's not your intention at all.

The main concept that I STRONGLY AGREE WITH (surprised?) is the idea that Logic and Truth are actually supposed to be used in conjunction with each other. I would rant about just why and how I think that but this is a poem topic, not a religion topic. Suffice it to say that just because something is not Factual doesn't mean it's not True.

Anyway, I totally dig the poem! You obviously know what you're doing.
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Cow!
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Maybe I'm just dumb, but I didn't get the pain/loneliness/separation thing. Like, at all. For me it was a story of triumph, start to finish, told with the perspective of someone who knows what the ending is.

I guess what I'm saying was I never really doubted he'd get to the top. It's a poem about gaining hope, but if he had no hope to begin with, he'd still be at the bottom rolling around in the grass and singing about how starfish loves him.

If that makes any sense, which it doesn't.


Why does everybody misspell my name like that? :P

rant tags...
Edited by Cow!, Tuesday, 11. January 2011, 17:56.
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Warrior Poet
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If you lead me, I will go.
So Boxter I guess I owe you an explanation too ;P Also it's cool reading what you and mew thought of when you read it, because it really shows the differences in how we think. I really appreciate it.

XD I didn't even realize I misspelled it! Sorry mewmay. Also, thanks for the rant tags demonstration. I'll be sure to use that! Also, you're not really dumb. You're one of the smartest people I've met.

Quote:
 
If that makes any sense, which it doesn't.

Exactly. He's trying to find the truth by denouncing what he knows in his very nature. But what is inherently good about truth? Why can't two contradictory ideas both be true? It's heavy stuff, but so far I've only found one adequate reason. He had hope, taught himself that hope did not exist, and then only out of hope did he try and understand.

The pain of separation is something i think about and go through a lot. It's a separation from others as well as from God, from doing and being and knowing and ultimately loving what we were meant to do and be and know and ultimately love.

Mount Improbable represents naturalist/humanist philosophy in general. Remember, "it will be gone when the last thinker dies." Mount Improbable isn't real, but millions and millions struggle with it throughout their lives.

"Improbable as to be impossible." Improbable doesn't mean a challenge or a path to knowedge but something that is so incredibly improbable it's simply impossible - in fact, it goes the wrong direction. There's no life on the mountain, aside from the speaker himself.

@Boxter - thx. That's a cool story too. I love climbing big rocks.

And unbelievable? You don't seem like someone who would overuse that word. Thanks even more :) I would tell you that the rhyme scheme represented the unraveling of his mind in his search to find meaning, but honestly I just ran out of rhymes for the ideas I wanted to use :P

With the six-line thing, I agree. I'm a rhythm freak, ask about anyone who's ever posted a poem here. I actually didn't touch it on yours though, which also had perfect rhythm. Four-line stanzas can get pretty repetitive I agree, but sometimes they can actually be really powerful too. I wrote a four-stanza one called The Song of One Embrace that's still on the poem page. It's shorter, though, and the rhythm does vary.

I guess I really could come across patriarchal or omniscient, but if I knew everything, I wouldn't have to use so much logic haha. Anyway I'm glad that I didn't.

And I'm glad you dig it too. I'm looking forward to more of your stuff, because it's pretty thought provoking so far. About knowing what I'm doing - well, I love reading, and I love writing, and usually I like to write things that I would want to read. And I'm a nerd, which imbues me with vast stores of nerd knowledge.

The nature of logic itself is something heady for sure, but I think it deserves to be explored :)
Also, I'm not sure if you guys noticed this or not, but I did use some Christian imagery in this poem to reinforce the nature of Mount Improbable. One example is "this rock cannot cry out," which is an allusion to the events of Luke 19. It's commonly referenced in Christian art and music, so it's a little cliche, but I felt it was powerful here.

http://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Luke+19&version=NIV

The actual quote is from verse 19:40 but it's better to read the whole thing, if you care to.

With that I take my leave ;)
Edited by Warrior Poet, Tuesday, 11. January 2011, 23:10.
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JuJuBee
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The first four lines were all I needed for this thing to captivate me!! Okay, now I'm gonna finish the poem...

"And from a silver sea of carelessness; Comes the ocean's gentle breeze" I think this would do better with flow without the "and" there - it just threw me off.

"There's something in the air that smells like salt
Refreshing winds that smell of sins
And a world that's been set free
And it's known there's nothing more than this" Again with the "and"... The first and is fine - it looks and feels good whit the poem, but the second, again, threw me off. It's a syllable, a beat in the song of poetry, that didn't need to be there.

"An immoveable object, an incredible will
It's not almost destroyed
Waves never relent
It will be gone when the last thinker dies" ...I have no idea what you meant by "when the last thinker dies". It confused me.

"He grieves like the one who has no hope
Through true beauty can be seen" Not sure if you meant "through" or "though" there.

"It exists, unlike he" unlike who?

Overall, the poem is elegant - if a bit confusing. There were extra words here and there, and missing syllables in one or two places. Love the poem - but still think it could use work.

Keep writing ;)
--JuJu
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Warrior Poet
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If you lead me, I will go.
Hmm, maybe I could get rid of some of the ands, but the rest is staying how it is :P Thanks for the feedback, btw

I think it would be better if you figured it out for yourself what I meant by "when the last thinker dies," but basically
basically


That true beauty thing may have been slightly confusing on my part. It was meant to be read like this
Quote:
 
Through true beauty can be seen
The necessity of longing for escape


Unlike the thinker, or possible unlike God (in his mind). Either way works.

I totally will :)
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