Emotional Intoxication

After an initial read, it’s obvious that Hafiz uses an interesting series of imagery and metaphors to craft his poem, “Ode 44”. Upon further examination, we see that he toys heavily with themes of love and sex, explaining them artistically through a medium of a very original, and well developed metaphor. In his poem “Ode 44”, Hafiz aims to illustrate that love- as well as words spoken with true love- is a wine, and the intimacy of sex which follows is the drunkneness achieved as a result of “drinking” just a little bit too much.  

Hafiz builds his narrative slowly, giving you the important bits of his metaphor little by little, as he describes the beauty he finds in his presences. Starting off, he gives his the initial building blocks of his artistic interpretation in line 3, “With tilted glass, and verses on her lips” and line 5, “Filled full of frolic to her wine red lips”. “Tilted glass” obviously referencing a wine glass, but also “verses on her lips” pointing to words, or phrases. Not only mere phrases, mind you, but verses. Excerpts of poetry or music. There is beauty in this choice of vocabulary, intending that the content of her words sends music through his mind and his heart. “Wine-red lips” then ties the two together, establishing the connection with wine and words, that being them both bestowed upon the lips. The first half of the metaphor is then finalized on line 12, where Hafiz explains he “drank whatever wine she poured for me”, after his lover calls for his attention in the middle of the night. She confides in him with whatever is burdening her, whether that be anger, fear, stress, or simply her overwhelming love for him, and he listens to her and accepts everything she is saying to him as if it were a fine wine. After engaging in excessive consumption of the wine that is the love shared between these two people, the narrator describes a sort of inebriation achieved as a result. On line 19, Hafiz explains his narrator and their partner as, “Drunkards we are by a divine decree”. Based on the seductive tone of the poem and connection to sexual behavior involved with nudity, it’s easy to assume that overconsumption of this wine has resulted in the intoxication of sexual desire. However this is no ordinary drunkenness, oh no. They’re not getting drunk off cheap liquor and 91% rubbing alcohol, they’re drinking fine wine. This is drunkenness to a divine decree. He’s pointing towards the kind of inebriation conjured not only by the simple the act of sex, but by something more meaningful, more spiritual, something more divine. An emotional intoxication only achievable through the consumption of the verses of love. 

One might say that this would be an anti religious way of viewing love and sex; through the medium of inebriation and substance abuse. And upon first glance I interpreted it this way as well, however I recognized some important things as I persisted dissecting the idea. As stated previously, the imagery of alcohol here takes the shape of fine wine, not hard spirits or foaming beers. Most religious texts which hold faith in Christ (referred to as Īsā in the Islamic faith) believe that regulated consumption of fine red wine is righteous and holy, and brings one closer to the spirit through the consumption of his holy blood, symbolized by such wine. Similarly, the depictions of sex here do not include adulatory or similar unholy sexual acts, and are instead meaningful and intimate, reflecting the love shared between two people. Any fair creator would smile upon this act of passion. 

That is, given I’m correct! The final stanza kind of threw me. Let me know if there’s anything I missed or might need further elaboration on.  I also think the rhyme scheme between “divine” and (fine)”wine” are cute, but they aren’t canon unless these phrases also rhyme in Farsi. It was worth mentioning in my opinion, but since this poem wasn’t translated by Hafiz himself in no way has right to act as evidence in my argument.

Hayden Namgostar

Cry Over Non-Spilled Milk

 

Robert Herrick’s Delight in Disorder is quite literally drawing from the title as there is delight to disorder for the speaker of the poem. Line four deserves specific attention as it is one of two lines to deviate from an otherwise strict meter. I find the use of the word distraction to be especially convenient in line for as it is a literal distraction in the poem that is otherwise strictly iambic tetrameter.

Lines thirteen and fourteen comment on the meta-narrative at work for art. In the poem itself, it is in reference to the disorder of the outfit, but I believe the meaning to be much greater. The word bewitch is used in line thirteen to express how disorder does indeed delight and captivate, then in line fourteen, how this method is much more suitable than something entirely precise. The meter in the poem is fairly consistent but does fail at perfection. Yet, based on what is implied in the poem, this imperfection makes the experience much more compelling leaves the reader spellbound.

I believe this theme of compelling imperfection carries over into the work of Ben Jonson’s poem Still to be Neat. Similar to Herrick’s piece, the poem is fairly strict being mostly iambic tetrameter, but does deviate on line eleven. The speaker indicates suspicion to the woman’s looks in the poem as stated by, “All is not sweet, all is not sound” (l.6). The first stanza presents a lady proper, but the second stanza presents a lady showing “…sweet neglect” (l.10). The real-ness of the lady is what enchants the speaker and not the imitation that art supplies. The disillusionment of the arts is seen in lines five and eleven. The use of then in line eleven is indicative of progression not comparison, meaning art is secondary to life. Then the final line indicates the speaker understands what he sees but does not truly feel what is not real. It is to suggest that art comes off too perfect, too neat, and that this is not truly beautiful enough to capture the speaker’s heart. Art which is too neat suppresses what is truly artistic: candid life.

It is clear that both poets value disorder over perfection. It is unrealistic to write poetry that is strict and predictable as it does not directly capture what the essence of life truly is. Life does not follow strict rules and will indeed choose to deviate from a compact, compressed, neat line. This to me explains the inconsistencies in meter in the two poems as it is used to simultaneously distract and call attention to the importance of spontaneity of art.

—Joseph Rojas

The Nature of Art

Diane Tarabay-Rodriguez

Poetry is such a divine art that makes it possible to capture melodies, harmonies and rhythms through it’s syllables. Such things cause a person to not only get meaning from the words but also the sound of a poem. Ben Johnson and Robert Hendrick do a very good job in using such rhythms to convey a powerful tone in their poems “Still to be Neat” and “Delight in Disorder”. 

In Johnson’s “Still to be Neat”, by simply looking at the poem, we are able to tell that the lines are roughly the same length, which means there is a possibility of a rhythm that can be detected. As one begins to read the poem, one can immediately hear the rhythm in each line. We can see that there is a rising meter. The poem seems to be iambic. Through this poem, Johnson talks about how women hide behind makeup in order to present themselves as beautiful. He states: “Still to be powdered, still presumed; Lady it is to be presumed, Though art’s hid causes are not found, All is not sweet, all is not sound” (Johnson 2-4). This reveals that women hide their identity behind all their makeup. He reacts to that in a negative way. He then goes on to say that those women only attract his eyes in a lustful way. 

In Hendick’s “Delight in Disorder”, It is clear that he praises disorderliness. He talks about how clothes that is worn in disorder captivates him more than clothes that are worn in perfection and precision. He shows us that he finds beauty in the disorder of little things because it is unusual to the eye and it can be seen as a form of art. He uses a lot of oxymorons to get his point through. We can instantly see it in the title “ Delight in Disorder”. He mentions: “fine distraction”, “sweet disorder”, “wild civility”, etc.  The rhyme in the poem are paired as monosyllabic and polysyllabic. You can see this pattern in the ending word of each line. For example, dress, wantonness, thrown, distraction, there, stomacher, thereby, confusedly, note, petticoat, tie, and civility. You can see that the words go from one syllable into two. In the end, he decides to make a rhyme with art and part. His technique allows us to find a rhythm to the poem. 

The two poems talked about art in very distinct ways. Johnson focus on physical beauty and talked about how one is able to use art to hide their true selves. Hendick brought attention to the beauty in the disorderliness of the small things and showed a more positive perspective towards it.

under the skin.

Jocelyn Lemus

When we read poetry, the poem becomes a melody for the ear. It attracts the movement of the mouth and the feelings of the person. As reading both poems, “Still to be Neat” by Ben Jonson and “Delight in Disorder” by Robert Herrick, I felt a shiver on my spine because of the way they both used their abilities to manipulate words.

To begin with, the way Jonson uses his words in his poem becomes realistic as one thinks of art and nature. In his poem, Jonson sees art as something that comes from natural beauty. Natural, meaning a naked face and a pure soul. Something that is free like the wind, something simple. According to Jonson, when a lady wears any type of make-up, “powdered”(Jonson 3) as he mentions, that only demonstrates the formulation of lust and not an attraction to the heart. As he also mentions, “all is not sweet, all is not sound”(Jonson 6) he prefers naturalness, something that he is able to see. Jonson wants to be able to see the person, and see them as a whole. As you can follow the patterns he gives in his poem, it is mostly emphasized as an iambic tetra meter. One can see it because the rhythm of the poem starts slows but eventually speeds up. Jonson describes that the nature of beauty comes from the art that has simplicity in all shapes and sizes.

To continue, on the other poem “Delight in Disorder” by Herrick he mentions how beauty comes from all sorts of things. From a “crimson stomacher” (Herrick 6) to “tempestuous petticoat” (Herrick 10). He brings those objects into life as he describes them. Beauty for him is also the simplicity of an object, maybe even a person. The clothing worn by the person brings out a charm for the naked eye. Something so appealing that does not change no matter how much one glances at it. For him art is the nature that becomes “too precise in every part”(Herrick 14). For Herrick’s poem it is emphasized that there is an iambic trimeter. The reason I kind of believe this is the prosody is because the rhythm of this poem becomes mellow as the poet describes the beauty of clothing women wear. His types of beauty is the one that is brought by nature.

To compare these two poems from each poet, it seems like nature and art are both kind of similar. Both poets give the ability to describe nature and art as something simple and pure. It is something that can appeal the affection of the eye. The tone these two poems have is that they are both being mellow and soft as I read it. It’s as if they were describing the way through a path full of beauty. After all, they are both describing their ideas about art and nature.