i slept in today.
i spent most of Sunday working on grad school papers, lesson plans and taking a test — after i was done teaching at church.
i doubt i will do much today.
and that is not a bad thing — some days.
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Anyone ever heard of Brian Turner?
He was a soldier in Iraq. He is a poet — an award winning poet actually.
I read an article this weekend about him and it raised an interesting perspective for me. Here is a quote by Turner:
“I was an occupier, an invader. Being a part of this mighty military apparatus imposes a power dynamic on the story. I believe that some child whose door I kicked in will have more to tell us about the war than anything I could say. We don’t yet have that witness.”
There is a political side of this, but I want to think about the perspective. Every poem is just one part of the picture — because there is always another side, another facet. Our role in the moment colors our perception.
It would be interesting to read the boys side of that story.
I want to read them together and see how different they are.
I wonder if we can ever understand his perspective?
Maybe if we practiced writing from someone else’s perspective we might learn something — or maybe we would just write our stereotypes of what we think they are feeling in the moment.
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We received over 300 poems as submissions to the new anthology. That’s a whole lotta reading.
Smiles.
If you submitted, we will be in touch.
Tell me, what is on your mind?
See you tomorrow, for Poetics we are writing to some of the artwork that is hanging here in the pub — chances you know who our artist is, she’s here just about all the time. Ha.
dVerse 
i will sit here and play tiddly winks on the countertop….
While I write my monologues.
write on… i wrote a monologue as well..ha
Ha.
oh you want to join? smiles.
I always try to write from other’s perspective.. sometimes I probably step in stereotypes, but I think that writing it in poetry make it easier to come under the skin… to some extent I think we have to do it.. all would be written in 3rd person otherwise, and I think the power of the words become so much stronger if I write with first and 2nd person.. (I think my very first MTB was about that…).. But I recon some authenticity might be lost.
i def like 1st person better….it puts you more in the moment, i think…i think there are def some perspectives that are more challenging to take on…i think i want to challenge myself in that direction a bit…
I know writing from a murderers perspective is not comforting at all… but it stretches you..
i agree completely…its a secret that a few of the pub members know…but i had a blog i did under a pseudonym for a bit…where i was not me…and i was free to explore things my normal readers might pale at…i wrote some pseudo horror short stories…and took the perspective of the abused in a few poems…it was freeing but def a scary line…
I got at least one very strong reaction from my prose poem where I wrote about being a murder.. (in first person).. Even though I wrote it was fiction,,, and I guess books like American Psycho would never be written…
dude….american psycho is a crazy book….easton ellis push boundaries…i first read it when i was like 16-17….the movie does it no justice…it is screwed up…but well done….not for the weak, for sure…its brutal
I have only seen the movie. Will definitely look for the book.
just be forewarned….
Hi Brian – back home after a long time as you know – and taking a break after a long time. I will probably have to travel again within the country now.
What you say here is a really difficult ask – to write for the other side, sometimes I tired that and then had afterthoughts – question how close to reality I actually was…..
Looking forward to tomorrow’s poetics – I missed quite a few good prompts.
smiles… welcome back abhra… and i’m envious about the indian food you’re getting now… smiles
Ha ha, that I am and it is rainy season now, when we specially get a fish in this season which comes to the river water from the sea for breeding, and to me – it’s the best dish in the world…my open invitation to you – if you come to India sometime 🙂
one day i’m gonna make it there…. smiles
mmm bet that fish is awesome….um, just a bit far for dinner tonight but…you never know…smiles.
hey abhra….glad to know you landed if only for a bit…and it is dangerous writing from anothers perspective…esp if we are not sure…it takes crossing some lines and getting to really know them…or try to….
I have often found myself wondering about other perspectives, especially as I have got older. I’d love to be able to write a poem that depicts both sides but I don’t think I could do it justice. Hhhhmmmmm. As for what’s on my mind . . . a clay sculpture that I’ve been working on and what I’m going to do with myself for the week while my husband is travelling. That’s a whole load of entries for the anthology, good luck wading through them all.
oh very cool on the clay sculpture… love the feel of clay… always wanted to do some pottery…
I visited a craft store this weekend and bought way too much stuff. I found some clay that looks and feels like real clay but that air dries. Not sure how it’s going to turn out but sometimes you just have to try something different.
hopefully it does not dry too fast…do you have to keep it wet?
so what is your sculpture of?
at least that is one way to stay busy while he is gone eh?
when alone in the house i am usually camped in the living room
most nights…ha
It’s a female head and I want to attach a skeleton hand to the face. Not quite sure how it’s all going to come together, could be a total bust, but felt like trying something new. Hubby travels a lot with work so I’m often camped out in the living room each night with my furry companions.
that was a pun with ‘bust’ right…ha…
my cat keeps me safe as well…watching over….
cool i hope you share a pic eventually…
very interesting… so far i never tried to write from someone else’s perspective – i do try to look at things from different angles though – and i think i could write ten poems about the same event and depending on my mood and time of the day that would be ten completely different poems…
Sometimes I think we all include someone else’s persepective.. through projections and dialogues. so maybe it’s not as hard as one might think…
that might be a cool progression…to try to take one thing and look at it from all different perspectives….there is a thought…its kinda like when we do picture prompts…and so many different takes come out…
I can totally relate to the different moods.
Happy lazy Monday back to you, smiles ~ I haven’t heard about Brian Turner so I will check out his work. I agree with you on perspective, we all write from a certain vantage point. I think first hand experience is the best but listening and empathizing with another is also another way to get another perspective ~
I am happy to know that we got a lot of responses for the next anthology ~ This gave me a chance to look back at my work – some not so good, some okay, some needing fine tuning ~
What is on my mind is my schedule this year & how to balance everything together (work, home renovation, studies, etc) ~ Poetry is still in the mix, somehow ~ See you tomorrow ~
home renovation…oy…now that will throw everything akilter….what are you doing…i feel the juggle…i am taking 2 dlasses right now…another 6 weeks…then one at the holidays…and then not again til christmas…so getting toward the end of studies…thank goodness….
We are fixing the bathroom now…soon the bedrooms ~ I have signed up for an industry course and the on line test is around December ~ Good luck on your studies Brian ~
you have a second bathroom right?
because that would get dangerous…ha….
best wishes on the test…
got a few of those to go still…
Balance can be so hard to achieve but is often key. Glad to hear poetry is still in the mix.
Some nights it is a struggle but the weekly prompts keep me going, smiles ~
I like changing perspectives too. I write many ‘story poems’ in other character view points and perspectives – children, teen agers, old(er) people, lovers. I sometimes hinge off others in literature as I did in Left In Coole – which had something of Eleanor of Aquitaine and the drop phrase from Yeats’ Wild Swans at Coole. Maybe I’ll use this as a prompt with my “quarrel form” poem that I devised for my next MTB. It would allow two viewpoints.
I’ve been in an odd frame of mind last couple of days. Just getting around to Open Link Poems – please excuse my tardiness.
i think it’s cool to be able to write from different perspectives…. you need that if you want to write a novel and develop the different characters…
Agreed I wrote a novel once. Never did anything with it though.
what it is about gay…?
do tell….
huh, you have me intrigued on the quarrel form…wonder if i could blend a couple perspectives in one….might have to take this challenge up
right and it can be relatively short or as long as you want to make it…pretty easy form ..like an etheree but in iambs ..you can see it here:
ah i do remember it from the create your own form prompt…thanks for the heads up as well…will get busy on it…smiles.
You could left align one triangle and right align the other (maybe…up to wordpress I guess) but that would make the points of the stanzas look like arrow heads facing the other.
just read some of brian turner’s poems online… really good…
Me too…his voice is sharp as a bullet ~
I would not be able to write from his perspective.. there has to be a certain proximity.. and the world of war is fortunately to far away,
To write poems about war is to be in the thick of the action ~ He has an authentic voice because he has been there & back ~
def i think being in that moment…seeing all that is war…it def adds a level of uthenticity that you can not fake…oy….
No way…
a really funny thing about perspective that happened to me when i was in oxford…. it was an exercise… we had to sketch each other… two minutes and i was sketching the lady opposite of me and was done before the two minutes were over – BUT – i forgot to draw her glasses – they were huge and red-rimmed – and i just didn’t see them…
i think we tend to focus on certain things and forget others – maybe things like that only happen to me? i don’t know… it worried me a bit and i have no problems with my eyes – just with seeing things as they are sometimes….
oh i agree with you…on focusing on the things that we see or that are important to us…it is interesting the things that we leave out as well….ha. i would not worry so much…i think we would all fall into that…..
I notice this when I’m out with my husband, I’m 5ft 1″ while he’s closer to 6ft. We can be looking at the same thing but the height gives us an entirely different perspective. Had to giggle that you didn’t see the red glasses, I bet you were in the zone.
You probably see the world with poetic eyes.
hey thats what i said to her when she emailed me about it…smiles.
I guess we are into something!
I think you got your perspective correct in the time frame!you looked through the glass 🙂
But don’t we all fight battles each day? Not as dramatic or politically charged as being in a war, but we have read each others poems about loss, fear, death-there is always the ‘other’ lurking – the other side of the doorway- in each of our poems.
so very true…that was my dramatic thought after reading his quote…as i thought back over a few of my own poems…and what the other perspective might have been on them….it can be challenging to think of…for instance the one brian turner talks about…what about the boy whose door just got kicked in…what does he think of the man with the gun….
I think of one of your latest poems – the kid whose T was missing (don’t know why that particular line struck me, but a name is so personal and not to spell that correctly …anyway) what would his answer be to your poem – how would he articulate that frustration, rage, abandonment
that is def one of them that i thought of…and would be interesting…i dont know if it is because of my own experiences but i would sense a feel of trapped-ness in that frustration….
Sometimes I write in a third person perspective. So someone once told me. Trying to recapture that style. But, I have not been in the midst of a war. Do know some soldiers who were not combatants but computer personnel and they watched TET battle trapped on roof tops with snipers shooting at them knowing they were not armed. One bullet hit one guys empty chair that he was not sitting in.Then mortars landing all around them. I have not talked to children of wars. I would imagine it would be a traumatic event. Similar to assault and death of parents in front of them. Imagine is all I could do in all fairness. I read 3 of his write posted on Poetry Foundation and they are very dramatic.
i imagine it would be rather traumatic…to have innocence ripped away in way…or loss of a parent brutally…so much of what you know is ripped away so fast in it….
Well I gave it a try IDK still 3rd person?
Sometimes these “different perspectives” are just another aspect of ourselves; places that we “visit” but don’t necessarily dwell in or don’t often share. I have written poetry from a darker side—a place of frustration , anger, sadness, hatred. And though I don’t dwell there I’ve certainly skirted that edge of that abyss. And I frequently write from the perspective of the elderly, those that I observe on an almost daily basis. It may sound cliche, but I think it is all of the aspects of our own experiences that give us a certain sensitivity and empathy towards the people and events that touch our lives—that allows us to see from their perspective, that allows us to write what we do.
I so agree with you – it is sometimes too raw to write from that ‘other’ perspective- and we can empathize from our own experiences to a certain point – not sure that I would have the soldiers view or the child behind the door.
From what I have researched and the documentaries I watched before. It is really gut wrenching I think it would be an emotional roller coaster to get candid.
oh good point on it being different parts of ourselves that we dont always let out….and all the influences as well in our lives…yeah….
Just spent a few minutes reading some of Brian Turner’s poetry, think in this case it would be very difficult to write from his perspective, unless we were there among the bombs, the bullets and the blood. There’s an such an intensity and raw honesty in his words, like being punched in the gut and having the wind knocked out of you. We may empathize with the loss, but the perspective of being smack in the middle of a war zone is best left to someone who has been there, has earned the right to write about such things.
def on earning the right to write about things…
you can def tell when one has not been there in situations like his…
I just read a beautiful piece by Brian Turner called “R & R”. It really made me appreciate how unbelievably difficult it would be to separate yourself, even for a moment, from the realities of war when you are directly in it.
I really am stuck in my “1st person” skin when I write….it just flows for me, but it would be interesting to challenge myself with another perspective.
I sometimes need the third person. It gives me distance to the emotions or the light or darkness in the words that fill my head. Sometimes first person is all I have. Sometimes nothing seems to work!
nothing like a war zone…but when i did intense residential counseling it was hard to separate…knowing they could attack me at any moment…that carried over to times i was home…just a bit….
What’s on my mind? I am tired! I also overslept this morning but I underslept last night.
Somebody told me that the only way to know your environment is by changing the perspective, by seeing it from the outside. Maybe there is some true to it, and playing with perspectives can give us a taste of our own world.
its role in informing us on our own world is interesting…i had not thought of a third person poem looking at ourselves…..
hope you get some rest tonight…
Thanks! This is my last interaction with the keyboard today. Night!
sleep well…
http://www.ipsnews.net/2014/08/burning-the-future-of-gazas-children/
The children of Gaza: Blinded, or not wishing to see. Who can speak for any one of them. How will we answer the question “What did we do wrong?” in any way that makes sense to children who used to know who was love and now cannot find them (because they are dead) or trust them because hell doesn’t stop.?
I wrote this to my Very pro-Israel cousin: Compromise needs to occur about boundaries–both sides have to give a lot for this peace and future. There must be a way to find benefits for all sides in this present–a better option than simple compromise. Imagine Israelis and Palestinians hold a delicate vase together–both have to hold it or it will break. The vase is the children’s future.
nice metaphor on the vase….there is usually a third way, its a more difficulty way because it means each has to decide what they are willing to give up….for the sake of something greater…
Yes, thank you Brian and Akila. Brian, you inspired 2 poems this week–the silly one with the sexy music “Just Saying” and the one you found on my site–War//Faith-inspired by this conversation. This summer found me experiencing the way the two “things?” both require surrender. There is much more to explore in the idea of surrender, though, that might not be surrender at all.
nice. when I preached sunday it was on creating community…and we went through several of the “one another” statements in the Bible…and we had a very similar conversation…around submission…and surrender….it is a very challenging concept…and even more so to live out…particularly in war/battles/arguments when we have something at stake there…if nothing else our pride.
very well said Susan!
The approach of autumn, much too soon.
>
ah but i love autumn….
What am I doing today? I am enjoying the last bit of summer as it seems to disappear rather quickly after labor day. I am not feeling well as I woke up with some sort of cold . So, a lazy day here for me but, I really need to finish some projects. I hope everyone is having a good day. Peace and Light as I like to say.
oh i hope you feel better…that stinks not feeling good….i did not sleep the best last night so it will probably be an early night tonight….
peace and light.
I hope you get some needed rest Brian..it will be an early night for me as well but, dreamland can be a nice place to go at the end of the day. May all your dreams be good ones.
sweet dreams to you too…
I do sometimes like to try to write from a different perspective, but sometimes when I do this people will assume anyway that I am writing from my own perspective. I think sometimes we all have to be careful not to make the assumption that every poem is really about the poet. Smiles. I suppose, though, if I wrote from the perspective of a 10-year-old boy or something people would know it was not me. Smiles.
ha. i think at times people question me too if things really happened the way i tell it…funny its usually on the real ones….
you mean you are not a 10 year old boy mary? smiles.
LOL, Brian!
smiles.
Great to hear that there was such a good response to the anthology! Really looking forward to it. We definitely have a lot of good poets over at dVerse!
yep…will take a bit of wading through….verifying the first poems are from prompts…and then determining how many people get and all…and then the editting….
War, aggression–so unthinkable in this day and age. A friend sent me a video of the assassination (martydom) of about a dozen Iraqi Christians. It has haunted me since Saturday. I wonder if I would have that kind of courage to stand up for what I believe in. That’s what has been muddling my mind. I wonder if there’s not a poem in that. From the perspective of….
Yes, that takes true courage, Victoria, to die for what one believes. I posted a haibun on the subject of martyrdom recently.
We celebrated work on Labor Day…guys preg checked cattle, I picked /processed rhubarb, baked banana bars, did laundry (every day)…as homeschool and harvest begin, i may not be at the pub often but am looking forward to the anthology…thanks for your work on it, Brian!
ha. i had to think about what preg checked cattle meant for a moment…smiles…banana bars…yum…i did laundry today too…and we went to the skatepark for a few hours….
oh i am sure there is…martyrdom has always fascinated me…i used to read a lot of the persecuted church materials…its so different than our culture where religeon has been accepted…probably to it detriment actually as there is so little faith required….
Astute observation, Brian. I wonder if that acceptance is eroding, or will. And what is preg checking??? I know when I lived in France they artificially inseminated the cows and had their due dates posted. I assume it has something to do with that.
maybe the soldier who’s a poet has a chance to heal, to analyze and expunge the horror of what war is.
maybe…poetry can be therapeutic indeed…i would hope…some horror is just hard to let go of…
the poet warrior goes back to Gilgamesh and David – I think there is a connection – maybe our time’s total warfare breaks the bond
Interesting thoughts! I do try to write perspectives and for that it helps when when written in first person…off late though i am thinking of experimenting with the second person…opens up some self-imposed shackles while putting down other’s perspectives! Now 300!! is quite a lot of number….i really need some tips from you guys…juggling this bar, poetry and well the rest of life!
ha. it is not easy at times….i have a job, a family, work full time, go to grad school…and…
let me know if you do try writing the other perspective, would like to read it….
We cannot write from any perspective we have not experienced and if we seek to write from the perspective of another, all we do is write from our perspective of what their perspective might be….
I did plan to submit but travelling made I hard and I have another week ahead and since I can’t remember when submissions closed may well miss it altogether. Next time.
I am sure we will be putting out another in the future, so will look for you then ros…
it is an interesting conundrum trying to truly capture another’s perspective…
what a thought provoking post… i imagine the fear on the other side of the door for the little kid must be inexplicable… a life , a rather long life hanging on the threshold of uncertainty~
for sure…it challenges your feeling of safety on so many levels….
Breaks the bubble of comfort and homeliness we live in…
Although I have a lot of ‘I’ poems and write what might be described as confessional poetry quite a lot of the time (but is not really about me), I am fascinated by other points of view. In fact, I don’t know if it’s a result of my anthropological training, butI find it very easy to slip into other people’s points of view and find myself listening first to one perspective, then the other, then yet another and I find all of them equally interesting and sometimes persuasive.
But recently I was starting to wonder if this just denotes a wishy-washy lack of ideology and strong opinions in myself, that I am so easily swayed by others. I sometimes envy people who have a very firm opinion and are not open to changing that opinion. It must be nice to have such certainty – although perhaps that is the root of all conflict in our society…
I am fascinated by other perspectives as well…I think it makes you challenge your set of values and norms to really try to understand another perspective…I think we are constantly reforming our own ideals….sometimes when they become so stuck, that is what scares me a bit
Every story is made of up many different perspectives. Our view is only one.
Hello, dVerse 🙂 While you, Brian, slept in on Monday – I was in your “neighborhood” and climbing McAfee’s Knob. THAT is a killer of a hike – not sure I would have attempted it if I had KNOWN how difficult it was. I AM sitting around today – rather soar … 🙂
I agree, it would be very interesting to see a poem that takes on another viewpoint of a very sensitive topic… I bet it would be very difficult to read as well – but that is good for us, I think.
Hey, I was able to comment today. (it is hit & miss)…