Hi all, my partner, Zahra and I responded to the poem “The Earth Shakes” by Steve Stanfield. This post will include the poem we responded to, the film I made in response to the poem and and poem I made in response to Zahra’s film.
Initial Poem
[The earth shakes]
I stood,
I watch
slowly circling the
void upon the waters.
The eternal sea.
molten glass
seemed to meld
into blue night,
the sun a moist watercolour
freshly created and laden with
power
the sea
breathing gently on my lover’s chest
the atmosphere a curtain around
planet Ocean
my eye was a faint molten sea,
the surface like a suspended moment
backlit from another world.
The tear it left was
emerald and wild
plummeting
through
a watery jungle
we examine the surface
while the ocean may look
for millennia
I like this approach of a blackout poem – it symbolises that sense of a murky understanding of the original text; like how water can be murky. It’s a beautiful poem that responds to the importance of nature (including the ocean). You detail very well about the ocean and how it connects to you (or the reader) as it reminds us to be mindful of the oceans beauty, now ruined by things such as littering and pollution. It’s a subtle response to the last line of the original poem – ‘to remind us’, implying to be mindful of the earth AND the sea. You can tell I’m gushing over your poem fhkjdshflkhe :3
Oops I forgot to mention about your video. It’s an enriching response that serves as a reminder about the Earth’s own allure with blooming flowers, tall trees etc. and how individuals may damage it. As much as I find it aesthetically pleasing, I don’t understand how the glitch in the colour sequence plays a role – as a way that glitches our perspective of the dying world? Still, the melancholic music along with the video sequences do match Zahra’s poem AND is a different interpretation of Stanfield’s poem
There’s something really interesting happening in this video in terms of the ‘organic’ matter you’re recording, and the very ‘mediated’ representation of it. It’s an interesting, and troubling, tension.
The poem is beautiful, what a great idea to use this technique.
I love black out poetry. This was fantastic. Great job! The video was really interesting too, I appreciated how aesthetically pleasing it was.