Monday, November 15, 2010

"Waits For Sleep" Dream Theater

Standing by the window
Eyes upon the moon
Hoping that the memory will leave her spirit soon.
She shuts the doors and lights
And lays her body on the bed
Where images and words are running deep.
She has too much pride to pull the sheets above her head
So quietly she lays and waits for sleep.

She stares at the ceiling
And tries not to think
And pictures the chain
She's been trying to link again,
But the feeling is gone.

And water can't cover her memory,
And ashes can't answer her pain.
God give me the power to take breath from a breeze
And call life from a cold metal frame.

In with the ashes
Or up with the smoke from the fire.
With wings up in heaven
Or here, lying in bed,
Palm of her hand to my head.
Now and forever curled in my heart
And the heart of the world.

            These lyrics by Dream Theater, when read without the music and having not heard the song before—although my word may not be quite accurate because  I have heard this song before and therefore can’t then unhear it—seems to almost have no rhythm at all, or, it is at least difficult to decipher any kind of such from just reading. This in fact works well for the feeling of the song which James Labrie takes to his advantage in the singing, and the rest of the band in the music.
            The song has seems to flow through itself, which works well when heard but not as well when seen. This is because the words in the middle of the lines draw themselves out longer, and by nature make the rest of the words seem shorter and rushed, creating an almost give and take, a rise and fall which happens throughout the song. For example, the line early on in the song, “hoping that the memory will leave her body soon,” shows this. Both hoping and memory are longer drawn out words. The only other two syllable word in the line is body, which is a word consisting of two short syllables as opposed to the longer syllables of hoping and memory. This creates a long beginning of the line, “hoping that the memory,” and the faster last half, “will leave her body soon.”
            Because this is a slower song, especially for the band in consideration, this rise and fall of the words and lines throughout add interest and texture over the music, and that is something Dream Theater does quite well. The music itself rises and falls, and with the words doing the same the ebb and flow the song is like water, peaceful and consistent, but still unpredictable. The lack of any fixed kind of rhythm or predictable stressing allows the singer to play with the words and work with the music, which is basically what the band does.

Wednesday, November 10, 2010

Embrace: Billy Collins

At first it seems like the reader is stepping into a lighthearted, almost jokey poem. The kind that steps out of parlor rooms where guests and hosts drink and laugh together, but that isn’t the case, you realize as you read through it and realize that there’s no guests here, no joking or laughter. Only loneliness. The narrator is embracing themselves, longing for the company of another. The embrace isn’t real, it’s a façade. “And from the back it looks like someone is embracing you…from the front it is another story. You never looked so alone.”
                The image you get from reading the piece is one which is comically painful. The image of a man standing alone in a room, arms crossed around himself with a “screwy grin”. The image of a man condemned by madness. You can picture him alone, or with a group laughing people, but either way the same feeling is accomplished. No matter how many people are there, he is ultimately alone and trapped in his own embrace, not the embrace he longs for.
There is only one main image presented by the author of the poem, but even with that one image he manages to transition it from lighthearted and funny—what we traditionally think of when we envision that motion of kissing oneself—to the image of a man in a straightjacket, locked up and smiling with his arms wrapped around himself. This transition flows with the emotions of the ‘character’ in the poem, the one who’s holding himself tight. At first it’s a joke, a motion to make people laugh and to be entertaining. Then it transitions to that view of the front, the absurd motions and face, the comparison to being crazy, to the need of a straightjacket and the whole mood shifts in just a single extra line break, a new camera angle which changes the entire perspective of both reader and writer.
The images set the lonely tone, and the change from lighthearted to a more disturbing one creates a juxtaposition which strengthens both sides. The man embracing seems happy; the man in the straightjacket is crazy with longing. The images offset and work with each other at the same time in a way that works with the entire feeling of the poem and the author and what they are trying to say about the ways in which people mask how they are really feeling. When you fake an embrace it is to make people laugh, to seem careless as though you couldn’t care either way, but turn the camera and you’ll see another story; that of the man who must embrace only himself.

Sonnet

My dearest Anna Leigh, don’t go to sleep tonight
when the sun inside those tealight eyes does fall
and stars come out to tempt the light.
I offered you forever, and though all
the world may crash and burn and fight
to us those petty lives and lies will be null
 and void, and we’re the ones who got it right.
But we didn’t, did we? And now I crawl.
And long for love which burned so bright.
Anna Leigh, don’t go to sleep tonight.

*This is a male point of view. Not mine. Just felt I should clarify that.

Tuesday, November 2, 2010

As You Like It

I sent a section of "As You Like It" by William Shakespeare to my boyfriend. He has a Carpe Diem tattoo, and when I saw it in the themes I knew that sending him something from it would be perfect. However, when he read the poem he had no idea what it was about. Of course. He's always making fun of me for the crazy things I read. But this time I made him read it again, and again and still he had no idea what it was about.

"Life?" He guessed. "It's unavoidable?"

Finally, he was getting closer. His previous guesses had been things like, "a dude," and "I have no idea, I didn't read the play." But now he was on the right track.

In the end he gave up trying to decipher the poem and showed me a song on youtube instead. Musicians--they're so easily distracted. The best part of whole thing was when he turned to me, toward the end of the song and said, "This movement is my favorite, it's Carpe Diem."

And he still doesn't know why I thought that was so fantastic.