Sunday, July 17, 2011

Can I get some feedback on this poem?

This poem is, I would say, a fascinatingly `new world gothic' reinterpretation of what is in skeleton the narrative of the prodigal son, ending, as does the original, in the `elder son's' jealousy over the `father's' love for the returned wayward. The conception of sin is significantly less capacious, here, than in Luke, being viewed symbolically and having a slightly ludicrous appearance. Indeed, one of this poem's more original innovations is the transmogrification of the traditional icon of the crucifixion into a symbol for temptation. The choice of narrative is reflective of several species of protestantism with influences in the nineteenth century awakening movements that considered redemption as much a personal and individual event as a doctrine of theology. You need not be worried that the moralistic third stanza lacks imagery. The punning in this stanza (lines 1 and 6) is introspectively strange enough that it perfectly substitutes for the simian preoccupations of the previous two. The poem is reminiscent of R. Browning's dramatical monologues in how the self becomes revealed in the individual interpretation of action, and the idiosyncratic way in which this poem captures the ending of the Koine story, in emotional terms, is, I must say, an enviable coup, whether or not you intended consciously the parallel.

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