Post by louisa on Nov 1, 2008 6:48:12 GMT 2
Synchronous Chronology
by Alice Notley from Mysteries of Small Houses
submitted by Elizabeth Kate Switaj
In "Synchronous Chronology" Alice Notley presents a richly textured portrait of a mature woman meeting at least the specter of her teenage self. As a woman in her late 20s, I fall between the two in age and thus appreciate a poem that both allows me to appreciate my fading youth and look forward to a more fulfilled maturity. While the elder self attempts to impress her younger self (to "woo [her] own soul"), the poem does not focus on these efforts. Instead, the speaker shows
describes a significant reversal of expectations about protection. The older self does not attempt to safeguard or give sheltering advice to the younger self; instead, she asks her for protection and thanks her for one notable case thereof. Despite this reversal, Notley does not fall into the trap of exalting youthful intelligence at the expense of mature wisdom. Not only is the elder self shown to fulfill earlier hierophanic potential, but also, in contrast with the early (in life and in the poem) insistence on never changing (which in itself may be either a prediction or determination--or perhaps something in between), she tells her younger self to change. Because of the placement of the single word with which she does so, it seems that changing is part of the act of defending the future self. Indeed, had the barefoot sixteen-year old not changed, the later self could never have existed to write the poem.
Read Synchronous Chronology:
www.poetryfoundation.org/archive/print.html?id=177354
Read more about Alice Notley:
www.poets.org/poet.php/prmPID/767
Buy Mysteries of Small Houses:
us.penguingroup.com/nf/Book/BookDisplay/0,,9780140588965,00.html
by Alice Notley from Mysteries of Small Houses
submitted by Elizabeth Kate Switaj
In "Synchronous Chronology" Alice Notley presents a richly textured portrait of a mature woman meeting at least the specter of her teenage self. As a woman in her late 20s, I fall between the two in age and thus appreciate a poem that both allows me to appreciate my fading youth and look forward to a more fulfilled maturity. While the elder self attempts to impress her younger self (to "woo [her] own soul"), the poem does not focus on these efforts. Instead, the speaker shows
describes a significant reversal of expectations about protection. The older self does not attempt to safeguard or give sheltering advice to the younger self; instead, she asks her for protection and thanks her for one notable case thereof. Despite this reversal, Notley does not fall into the trap of exalting youthful intelligence at the expense of mature wisdom. Not only is the elder self shown to fulfill earlier hierophanic potential, but also, in contrast with the early (in life and in the poem) insistence on never changing (which in itself may be either a prediction or determination--or perhaps something in between), she tells her younger self to change. Because of the placement of the single word with which she does so, it seems that changing is part of the act of defending the future self. Indeed, had the barefoot sixteen-year old not changed, the later self could never have existed to write the poem.
Read Synchronous Chronology:
www.poetryfoundation.org/archive/print.html?id=177354
Read more about Alice Notley:
www.poets.org/poet.php/prmPID/767
Buy Mysteries of Small Houses:
us.penguingroup.com/nf/Book/BookDisplay/0,,9780140588965,00.html