The Swordsman

The Swordsman is my most popular poem, I think, at least judging from the responses I've gotten at readings and online. People have told me that they find it accessible because it tells a story in simple terms. What do you think of the story? Of the poem?

One hint: the thing that I describe in this poem happened to me. Do you know what it is? Has it happened to you?

The Swordsman
-
The cold katana cut my flesh today.
He gripped my pound of meat without a sound;
he ripped my chest and dropped it on the ground
in murmured worship, not a yard away.

I lingered, wavered with the evening breeze,
which once so fresh, now stole a copper tone.
My murderer was one whom I had known:
the swordsman bent to death upon his knees.

I mourned my heart a minute, and was done --
my enemy had taken what was his,
and I had let him take it, truth be told,
for I would not be his next bastard son,
and I need not that heart in me to live --
then my katana swung, and left him cold.
This text © 2004 John David Robinson, all rights reserved. Duplication prohibited without written consent.

Chesterton on Truth

I think this is worthy of pondering (courtesy of Andrew Sullivan):

"You can only find truth with logic if you have already found truth without it."
- G. K. Chesterton

Do you agree, or disagree? Why?

(Fall lit her eyes as she drove.)

10 points to anyone who knows (without being told) who this poem is about. (And welcome to anybody joining us through my Facebook news section.)

Fall lit her eyes as she drove.
Smiling, she dared me through the drifting leaves
to catch her
-- the ancience of autumn all around us --
she dared me, as the leaves fell.
This text © 2004 John David Robinson, all rights reserved. Duplication prohibited without written consent.

(Send for me and take me,)

I wrote this poem while I was still in college, possibly as early as freshman year (1998-99) in my junior year, like the copyright notice says. It's one of a very few of my poems that are really prayers, and since I found myself praying it tonight, it seemed like an apropos post.

Send for me and take me,
take my soul, it's crouching low
but it is calling you to take it,
and to bend it like a bow that will not break
unless you let it, 'less you make it --
make it so:
send for me and take me,
though I'm hiding, crouching low.
This text © 2002 John David Robinson, all rights reserved. Duplication prohibited without written consent.

Episode 18, in which our hero succumbs to an Internet meme

My Peculiar Aristocratic Title is: Duke John the Eldritch of Fishkill St Wednesday Get your Peculiar Aristocratic Title

Saw this on Berg's blog, and I just couldn't help myself. Interesting, too, how close my name is to an author I'm fond of.

(Left you down a dark street as)

Left you down a dark street as
the sunrise moved along,
carrying me with it in
an everlasting dawn.

All I left behind me was
the thing I left to find;
now I sit alone, beside
the sunset in my mind.
This text © 2005 John David Robinson, all rights reserved. Duplication prohibited without written consent.

(Chaos is a whirlwind in the snow)

This week's poem was selected by Kristy Harding, who has an awesome blog called "Border Episcopalian". Definitely check it out if you have any interest in intellectual conversations on the Christian faith, the current situation in the Episcopal church, generally awesome Quotes of the Day, or general profound thinking. I happened to be at her and her husband Leander's house (also with a blog) tonight, and thought I'd be lazy and give myself a chance to give them props.

Chaos is a whirlwind in the snow,
all I know a glitt'ring throw of
ice upon the wind,
madness in its beauty,
lit by fire to see it in,
and all upon the solid ground
which never moves, nor spins.
This text © 2006 John David Robinson, all rights reserved. Duplication prohibited without written consent.

I wrote this poem pretty recently, and for the time being, I'm going to let it stand on its own here. Please comment: criticism, likes and dislikes, general feelings or interpretations... I'd love any and all. After I have some (incentive, incentive) I'll update this post with some general illumination like the last one.

Also, a note on how I title my poems. A poem's title (or a photograph's, for that matter) is something like a boulder at the source of a river, directing the entire course of the work. If a wrong or inappropriate title is picked, it can redefine or totally ruin the work (from the perspective of the artist, at least). As a result, I only title a poem if its title is obvious, or if I find one that can give to the poem a character I like that it lacks without it. If nothing comes, the poem is titled after the first line (in parenthesis).