janem
New Member
Posts: 24 
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Post by janem on Jan 29, 2016 13:58:17 GMT -5
In the Fertility Clinic
We be locked in, not yet
syringed to womb, or born off
to die for science, nor
are we yet grieved,
we who incubate, stainless
and cold, not quite human, yet
here we genome -
hair brown or eyes salamander
blue, whatever our promise
in this tundra of cells,
we be the dividend of you,
your tined digits, your polliwog
torso, your brain well, your pleated
bowels,your heart wintering
in this petri pond, unbreathing
here we wait, your viscous smear,
here we almost be, yearning.
I tried to capture the subject through sound.
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Post by lildawnrae on Jan 30, 2016 12:30:28 GMT -5
Hello again, what an interesting approach to questions of ethics in the world of assisted conception. One technical point--when the meaning is carry you want "borne" with an "e." Jane, I honestly think (sometimes that my ink pen has feelings and wishes, so why not frozen embryos? I'm wondering if another character is needed, a potential parent or even a grandmother, but I'm not at all sure. I think the little tadpoles have enough grit all by themselves, really.
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Post by Gerry on Feb 1, 2016 20:04:59 GMT -5
Hi Jane, here's my response. I'd hoped the others would notice the new post this far back, but obviously not. Attachments:jane M 2.pdf (29.78 KB)
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linm
Junior Member
Posts: 92
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Post by linm on Feb 12, 2016 18:23:40 GMT -5
Jane,
I find this amazing, such a unique concept; I found the use of "we be" compelling, a short-cut way of speaking for the short-cut unimplanted, winkingly rooted in contemporary slang, an in-group of a new sort. Your verbs are also unique, and it's hard to imagine someof them ever used again, "we genome," for example, and "not yet syringed." It forms a kind of alien but recognizable language for this collective of not-people. "We be the dividend of you" -- for me, the poem has a kind of authenticity that is breathtaking.
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linm
Junior Member
Posts: 92
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Post by linm on Feb 12, 2016 18:41:56 GMT -5
I waited to read Gerry's comment until I wrote mine, and I can see his point that the "we be" construct could pull the poem toward an unwanted racial interpretation; while I did recognize that usage as I read it, I felt the form was doing something more than invoking that. Looking at it more closely, "we be" is actually a present subjunctive of "to be" -- it fits with the poem's speaker(s) beingu nreal, potential. But, this understanding of the construct may be too obscure, and admittedly the poem could be taken as a racial comment. (I now wonder about the relationship of the subjunctive form to the dialect use of "we be" . . . )
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