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capricorn- and the tragedy of adonis
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i.

aristotle couldnā€™t decipher

the comets leaping in your amber iris

the stars that lie there, very much awake

the stars that I swam below

tarot spread on the table

crystal balls deceive but Iā€™d known you weā€™re in my stars

star crossed lovers

i submit on my bed every night

shaking, opiod hands pressed

praying that you are the rosalind to my romeo,

that this affair was a deception

that Iā€™m a fraction away from Julietā€™s marble scaffold

steady these starving hands

and snuff out the stars I see in the ink

angels of porn

all of my moons without you now,

jostling caligula with what weā€™d done

you toppled all of rome on my head

the alexandrian library of your whispers

burning,

burning,

i want to press my wrist

to the cinder

so the letters that came from your

roses-

disfigure me

that sunspot above the lip

i even admired that small detail

gods signature on my adonis

a painting that would blind da vinci,

incinerate the louvre,

and make cupid grieve

van gogh is my martyr

I long to die silently in sunflower spread

dusted off eons from now

and make the republic weep at my fingertips

that I tribute and grovel at our wombish grave

your curls encompass the universe

breathing and contracting as

it grows, then shears

directing the cycle of life

id give my body to satan if

i could see the silvery strands

accumulate like a rolling wave over each strand

but the stars were facetious bulbs

in a emptiness science fails to introduce

the monkey paw is a closed fist

something in your depths broke

the camels back

you took rusty scissors and untethered

the red string,

the umbilical cord strangling me

ii

reincarnate me

virgilā€™s hell is a cycle of our apocalypse

maybe in my next life

youā€™ll still be adonis

but Iā€™m the one to send the boar forth like hounds

sniffing out your perfect blood like rich truffles

one third above,

one third below,

one third free, spent bolstering ridged

columns of hubris

my aphrodite summer

waves to me like the gliding of a kite

while your underworld winter

presses flowers into frost

while the queen of the underworld

plants her icy nails into your back

like a spinal tap

i wonder if I crossed

that imaginary line

will i feel the dead of the styx

crawling up my calves for salvation

the capricorn on a faded map

punctures your heart

the lovelorn she-god

failed the descent to the cold

hell of hades

oh, well

never mind.

in the memory of adonis

i will don a myrrh crown

like the treachery of judasā€™ gift

but yet the brittle limbs puncturing my temples

an homage to the penance of jesus christ

i will don a myrrh crown

to celebrate your woody womb

and dance with the nymphs of old

to spite the capricorn

inside my adonis.

feedback:

https://www.reddit.com/r/OCPoetry/comments/byad9v/treading_the_nostalgic/eqgqr6i/?utm_source=share&utm_medium=ios_app

https://www.reddit.com/r/OCPoetry/comments/byccys/the_sewage_comes_from_within/eqgrc22/?utm_source=share&utm_medium=ios_app

[AN: I usually donā€™t do this, but Iā€™d love to hear interpretations of this, as I added a lot of references that I wonder if people understand. It would really help with feedback, as I wanted this poem to be more comprehensible compared to my other poems!]

Comments
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No, no donā€™t feel like a dick- I wanted to write it down anyway in case anyone reading isnā€™t familiar with any of the references and could read through without having to research. Normally i wouldnā€™t really add context but it helps with feedback so.

But youā€™re actually right, I didnā€™t really want the reader to fall in love along with the speaker necessarily, but maybe feel some sense of pity as they have a melodramatic rant. This is all very pretentious and has a bit of self-loathing to it via how theatrical it is.

Your confusion makes sense now that you explain it to me with the role-switching.

And youā€™re probably right, I think I should give this poem like a week or two and then really break into it and revise it. But it was a good little vent at least :)

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Okay I guess Iā€™ll give some insight on my allusions here in the hope that itā€™ll improve the poem for ya. Iā€™ve left a lot of references to stories, legends and takes that really left an impact on me and compare to the situation the speaker laments about.

Romeo and Juliet: People often forget that, before meeting Juliet, Romeo was depressed from losing a girl named Rosalind. Nothing, not even his buddies could take his mind off of her. Until Juliet showed up. The speaker wishes that their failed love follows the same formula, and that the speaker too will find the one theyā€™re ā€œtrulyā€ meant to be with and take the pain away from a lost love.

Adonis: The most important allusion in this thing. The key points here is that adonis, an extremely beautiful man born from a Myrhh tree (that his mother turned into) made two goddesses fall in love with him. The queen of the underworld (Persephone), and the goddess of love (Aphrodite). It was decided amongst the gods that Adonis would spend one third of each year with Aphrodite, one third with Persephone, and the other third doing whatever he wanted. As revenge on Aphrodite, he was killed by a boar that was sent by Artemis, his beauty wasted. The connection to the take here is that the ā€œAdonisā€ spoken about was torn between two places, two completely different worlds. In this poem specifically, it depicts the underworld (with Persephone) as a cold, winters place, where, with Aphrodite, it was a warm summer. This can be taken both to emphasize how different these places are, but the time of energy they give off. The speaker wishes to be the one, Artemis, to slay Adonis in a hypothetical reincarnation, so that they donā€™t have to experience the grief of losing him but rather indifference.

Biblical: Throughout the poem, the speaker talks about youth- wombs, Adonis himself (he was prized for his youthful appearance) etc. The speaker compares themselves to Judas who betrayed Jesus after offering him Myhrr at the last supper (again, pointing back to adonis), and Jesus, depicting the same kind of wood puncturing his head with the thorn crown he wore. Becoming a martyr while being adorned with the same thing used to betray him.

Other allusions:

Caligula- One of the most tyrannical rulers in the history of Rome. To ā€œjostle Caligulaā€ would be no small feat.

Library of Alexandria: In Ancient Rome held almost all of the worlds knowledge, and when Rome fell it was destroyed/burnt in Egypt.

Virgilā€™s Hell: A reference to Danteā€™s inferno where every circle of hell is methodical and designed to punish sinners in a way that correlated to their crime. Also a Master of epic poetry, the writer is pointing at themselves to hint that what theyā€™re writing is similar to that of an epic (PSSST THAT MEANS ME)

Capricorn: A small detail that I wished more people would think about because itā€™s the one Iā€™m most proud of. This is a double meaning, folks. It both refers to a location (that is highly specific, like- scarily highly specific if you read enough into it, but I doubt people will figure it out haha) and just being capricious.

Anyway, youā€™re right in a lot of ways. I guess the cohesion is off a bit but I guess what I intended was to frame this story as a massive picture. Itā€™s bigger than Greek mythology, itā€™s bigger than Roman history, itā€™s bigger than religion itself. This was meant to be a super hyperbolic look at a lost love that I have been going through.

As for the last little bit about the gender-blurring in this, Iā€™ll explain the best I can without making myself sound dumb. This poem is more about the story and arboreal thought of a person rather than who they actually were, save one or two moments in the poem, meant to remind you that this IS in fact about a specific person. Other than that, I fundamentally believe that all humans have both feminine and masculine qualities, and love really brings out everything about a person unconditionally. Thereā€™s no masculine and feminine label for people to sit behind when youā€™re truly, seriously in love with someone. All you know is that theyā€™re this-being, this soul in front of you that you care about more than anything.

Each word- literally have meaning to me, and some way more specific to my situation than people could even detect. Iā€™m so damn proud of this poem that I think I might not write like this again haha.

Thank you so much for your feedback. Iā€™m so glad that people have enjoyed this and taken their time to read through my lunacy.

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5 years ago