Boll Moon
poetry by
egail
15 March 2002
4 comments
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Take the boll weevil, waking far south of us
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at the seams of Carolina cotton lands:
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she waits the weather out, numb
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under leaf duff and weeds.
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A fierce, dull bug.
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mwirth:
Four words that are very evocative- of a whole "character" of a species of bug, or a person- and a beautiful end line to a stanza. |
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j_moody:
i found this line very effective, too. |
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Crawl slow when you want to force a home.
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Suckle the nearest teat of sap rising.
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Worry a snarled tangle of dreams,
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licked tight with sugar and spit. Make it
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orbed, blunt, and close to red clay: a knit of trouble
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that calls to you. Be selfish.
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Stay. Feed. Between the pointed bracts,
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sneak in your own pearled seeds.
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Watch those weevil babies. Mamas
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clear the cauls and husks. Larval crescents
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curl and feed -- a blight, but free.
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Take this boll moon tonight--
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see it: threads set to burst
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with your lunar weevil light.
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j_moody:
i found this last stanza less satisfying. the previous lines seemed to be gesturing towards a metaphorical description of a "way of living" that is illustrated by the use of this bug. conforming our nature to a certain way of being. the last stanza just seems like a rhyme with no precise thrust... but it is good imagery & many poems do end that way. |
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mwirth:
Very juicy sound of language in this. It's just fun to hear the words in your mind. The rhyme and even beat in the last stanza (standing out slightly from the looser rhythm in the rest of the poem) works well to bring it to a close.
The meanings I read into this: 1.) motherhood, the stubborn and diligent blind strength of getting the things done so one's children will live. Fierce, dull. (Moon image also evokes pregnancy, etc.) 2.) survival in general, the brute strength that is required of (us). Boll weevils, as you've described them here, remind me of cockroaches, how they are ugly and stupid but they would survive nuclear holocaust. But the boll weevil is a creature of the fields, of rural areas, unlike the urban cockroach. So there is a message I pick up here about the work necessary to survive in rural life. Dunno if any of that is on target. |
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Content © copyright 2002 by Emily Gail Kushner. All rights reserved.