Photo by Emily Isaacson
The signs of spring are appearing, although today was the first sunny day this week. I am going on a weiner roast down by the river this evening. What kind of weiner would a nutritionist eat you might ask? Well definitely something with turkey or chicken I would answer. Hopefully one that is not made of by-products. I also happen to be highly allergic to pork.
I have been studying Miranda from The Tempest as well as Shakespeare's Juliet and Ophelia. My studies of Ophelia resulted in a seven stanza poem that I made into a YouTube movie. My studies of Miranda resulted in a long requiem-style poem that is based on the plot of The Tempest with a few modifications. Making that work in sonnet form was a challenge, since it had to rhyme, but I could not even cover it in less than 10 stanzas.
I finally submitted "Da Capo Aria of Miranda" for the ekphrastic poetry contest hosted by Frontier literary journal. According to the Poetry Foundation, "ekphrastic means 'Description' in Greek. An ekphrastic poem is a vivid description of a scene or, more commonly, a work of art." I have written ekphrastic poems before, but in relation to paintings in Europe or musical compositions.
Since I requested editorial feedback from Frontier, and since the poem is in no way like most of what they publish, we'll have to wait and see the results. Of course they did say they were open to all styles. The ekphrastic part was that it was a response to The Tempest by Shakespeare and inspired by the painting "Miranda and the Tempest" by J. W Waterhouse (below).
What I learned about Miranda included that she was young--only about 15 years old; innocent, as she grew up on a desert island; and represented compassion. I tried to weave these ideas into the text. Here I read online the notes for the Shakespeare play, and the play itself, for about four hours prior to beginning the poem several days later, and it took me about a week and a half to write and perfect, which is about the norm right now. The polishing consists of playing the poem, like I would play the piano, where I count out the syllables for every line, and check that it rhymes or agree to an acceptable slant rhyme. I do this a few times before publication.
Since I couldn't use the Miranda poem for this month since it is tied up with the contest, I ended up writing another poem on the word "Ithaca". This word is also the title of a poem written in 2011 by a Greek journalist and is about a Greek isle in the Mediterranean. The word holds over a hundred years of symbolism that largely goes along with the early poem. It later became so well-known, word-worn, and famous, partly for having been read so many times, including one YouTube reading online by Sean Connery.
I wrote a modern poem in sonnet form on the same theme, that was seven stanzas, only the original poem was free verse, using repetition, whereas mine was a rhyming, syllabic poem with a rhyme scheme. I made the YouTube video for the month with that poem and sourced literally all the images except nine from AI with the help of Adobe Stock. It is amazing what you can find now with AI, and my only criteria was that each image required you to suspend your disbelief.
The result was 30 minutes long, but it really teaches the poem, not just portrays it, on a scholarly way. That was the poem for February, titled, "Jouney to Ithaca."
I wrote under the movie: Journey to Ithaca is a re-telling of a century-old favourite. The island of Ithaca, is a Greek island in the Mediterranean. It is also the mythic location where Homer's Odyssey took place. In the early 1900's a Greek poet and journalist by the name of Constantine Cavafy wrote the poem "Ithaka" that spanned a century of interest in the symbolism of the poem. The idea that the journey could mean more than the destination caught hold of its readers. The poem was read at the funeral of Jackie Kennedy Onassis.
According to the website Greeka: "Since Homer's
Odyssey, Ithaca symbolizes the destination of a long journey, the supreme aim
that every man tries to fulfill all his life long, the sweet homeland, the
eternal calmness, and satisfaction.
Many artists and literary people have been inspired by this
interpretation of Homer's poem and have given to this small island of the
Ionian Sea a special sense. Famous poets have been inspired by Ithaca and have
used its name metaphorically on their works.
"The most famous poem about Ithaca has been written by the renowned Greek poet Constantine Cavafy and is entitled "Ithaka". There he makes an allusion of the legendary journey of Ulysses to the journey of every man through life and suggests that each person is looking for his own Ithaca, his personal supreme goal. However, in the end, it is not the goal but the journey that matters, because this journey makes us wise and gives people the richest good: experience, knowledge, and maturity." (Source: https://www.greeka.com/ionian/ithaca/about/poem)
Even the main soundtrack on the video was titled Ithaka. This is a inspiring and well-used concept for artists to go back to. The keys in the poem and the video were symbolic as well I learned on a key website that a key symbolizes all forces that open and close, bind and release and stand for liberation and incarceration. . . keys to the city were symbols of the residents’ right to self-determination. This is particularly relevant in the journeying theme; it is our right to reach our eventual destination and decide what that is.
