in filets of sounds: delivery
engines & ashy doors
clapping shut, vendors
knuckling fin & silhouette -
shaped words into salty
expectations. My daughter
& I walked down a couple
of slim-bricked blocks
that smelled like snapper
& afro sheen with no afros
in sight. On snaggletoothed
streets, we double-took the wet
alleys where things jumped
off the hook like smart seafood
before lunch. We parted
the perfect & abundantly wintered
streets. My daughter said, I know
these parts like a tired pianist
resting on her bench.
This is the second time I've posted a poem of Adrian Matejka's, and the second of his poems I've posted to be based on the titular Erik Satie piano piece. Much like my thoughts on this first poem, I cannot understand a connection between the content of the music and the poetic content. This isn't to say I don't enjoy the poem; on the contrary, I find the images fascinating, with a real feeling of life in both the city and the fish! I'm not sold on the final stanza, but I like the way Matejka explores father daughter relationships in his poems, because it treats the child with intellectual respect that adults so seldom give.
Again, I feel that the titular connection to a famous piece of music detracts from the poem itself. As a result, I keep trying to read things into the poem which are simply not supported by what is on the page. I can read the poem with that piece on as background music, but I find that it does nothing to enhance my understanding of either work.
Still, it's a lovely piece of music, and an intriguing poem, even if I do not feel I understand it fully.
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