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3.14 AVERAGE
3.14 AVERAGE
"Too slight a thing for comment; slight, and usual, / A shot in the dark, fired by a hand unseen / At a life unknown; finding, or missing, the mark? / Bringing death? Bringing hurt? Teaching, perhaps / escape... / Since the shot was not at our hearts, since the mark / was not / Your heart or mine, not this time, my companion" (30, Sometimes When Night).
I had no idea what to expect when approaching this text, but I was eager to gain a glimpse into the mind that so captivated Virginia Woolf. While I felt Vita shone cleverly at a line-level (i.e. "every bee becomes a drunken lover") with instances of really nice diction, the collection as a whole, and often entire poems, felt meandering and lackluster. There is potential here, but it doesn't feel channeled. At times, the style and rhyme scheme appear to be formal and constrained, but then there are interruptions like "Dig-dog! Dig-dog! Dig-dog! like bells it chimes" and the reader is lost. Maybe it's all ultimately a jumble fitting for Vita's infamously wild personality; even Woolf critiqued her and felt she wrote too quickly and often without refinement. Even so, the poignancy of the line above will haunt me: "since the mark / was not / Your heart or mine, not this time."
"And know then how the heart can ache / With pining for the woods and clouds of home. / If I could take my England, and could wring / One living moment from her simple year, / One moment only, whether of place or time, / —One winter coppice feathery with rime, / One shred of dawn in spring— / Then should my voice find echo in English ear; / Then might I say, 'That which I love, I am'" (69, Summer).
I had no idea what to expect when approaching this text, but I was eager to gain a glimpse into the mind that so captivated Virginia Woolf. While I felt Vita shone cleverly at a line-level (i.e. "every bee becomes a drunken lover") with instances of really nice diction, the collection as a whole, and often entire poems, felt meandering and lackluster. There is potential here, but it doesn't feel channeled. At times, the style and rhyme scheme appear to be formal and constrained, but then there are interruptions like "Dig-dog! Dig-dog! Dig-dog! like bells it chimes" and the reader is lost. Maybe it's all ultimately a jumble fitting for Vita's infamously wild personality; even Woolf critiqued her and felt she wrote too quickly and often without refinement. Even so, the poignancy of the line above will haunt me: "since the mark / was not / Your heart or mine, not this time."
"And know then how the heart can ache / With pining for the woods and clouds of home. / If I could take my England, and could wring / One living moment from her simple year, / One moment only, whether of place or time, / —One winter coppice feathery with rime, / One shred of dawn in spring— / Then should my voice find echo in English ear; / Then might I say, 'That which I love, I am'" (69, Summer).
An odd mix of striking seasonal poetry and mundane gardening advice in iambic pentameter. Somewhat unfocused, but there are some gems in here.