AUTISM: A POEM

This blog has been created as an open experiment of poetry composition, perhaps a glimpse at an emerging manuscript as it matures. This working manuscript should not be considered as complete or published. Instead, this should be viewed as merely an early stage in the process of creation.

I have placed below some of the pages from an isolated venture in one of my typescript loose-leaf folders. The contents here represent portions of an ongoing personal project with a particularly narrow focus intended to eventually develop toward a book-length poetry sequence with the tentative working title of Autism.

The poem will grow as new sections are added. The individual posts are designed so that they may be viewed as independent items; however, I have consciously carried themes, images, and similar language through the extended sequence with the hope that connectivity and continuity will be preserved among numerous sections of the long poem.

Readers are asked to regard this piece as a work in progress, a partial or rough draft rather than a finished product (even if some selected segments previously may have appeared in print), and I request everyone realize various edits, emendations, or expansion may be made to the posts at any time in the future. Moreover, at some point the entire sequence will be removed to undergo a complete revision.

Therefore, I urge visitors to become followers of the blog by clicking the link in the sidebar, as well as to follow on Twitter for updates. Readers are also invited to browse my personal web site for additional information.

Indeed, a significant part of this experiment involves a certain amount of transparency that includes the possibility for readers to communicate responses and offer constructive suggestions, both of which I welcome through post comments or e-mail messages.

Also, I advise that the order of the numbered sections is not meant to be at all definitive since the long poem’s sequence will certainly be reorganized as the work in this temporary format starts to resemble a completed manuscript and begins to assume a more formal shape that might eventually be suitable for publication. In fact, I welcome interest from book publishers as well.

Thank you for taking the time to examine this trial stage, a test which I perceive as a preliminary process in the composition of a possible poetry manuscript. —Edward Byrne

Sunday, April 10, 2011

AUTISM: A POEM


. . . . . XXX. Still in Spring

My son tries to climb a steep dune
. . . . . rising high behind the beach, stopping

just a second after each awkward
. . . . . step to contemplate the next. As I lag

back a bit, snap a picture—capture
. . . . . one moment in a frozen pose, hoping

to halt the motion of time—I notice
. . . . . how bright daylight briefly fades away

from the camera’s frame. Narrow
. . . . . clouds slowly cross just above a bluff,

floating past as easily as those two
. . . . . offshore scows we once watched slip

into a distant mist. Although I am
. . . . . sure the shifting north breeze will not

be seen in this quick photograph,
. . . . . and though nobody needs to know how

a cold lake current suddenly carried
. . . . . its bitter wind in early spring weather,

I will never forget the chilled gust,
. . . . . the hurried air still ruffling Alex’s hair.
Posted by Edward Byrne at 12:17 AM

3 comments:

  1. MaureenApril 10, 2011 at 10:17 AM

    I read in this poem several meanings into that word "Still" in your title. How you convey those meanings throughout the poem is lovely.

    ReplyDelete
  2. PatApril 10, 2011 at 11:13 AM

    Ed, this is a beautiful poem. I love it.

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  3. Edward ByrneApril 10, 2011 at 11:22 AM

    Thank you, Maureen and Pat.

    Maureen: I appreciate your response, since I was hoping the implied multiple meanings of "still" would be detected by readers.

    Pat: I'm pleased by your use of the word "beautiful"; in this case, the "beauty" of the poem was intended to imitate the beauty of a formal "still life" painting as well as an informal candid portrait photograph.

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