F.R. Scott - Bangkok
Oct. 23rd, 2013 10:45 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
highlyeccentricDeep in the brown bosom
Where all the temples rose
I wandered in a land
That I had never owned
With a million all around.
I had been here before
But never to this place
Which seemed so nearly home
Yet was so far away
I was not here at all.
There was a central mound
That took away my breath
So steep it was and round
So sudden by my side
So Asia all beyond.
And when I came inside
I had to walk barefoot
For this was holy ground
Where I was being taught
To worship on a mat.
A great white wind arose
And shakes of the temple bells
Descended from the eaves
To make this gold and brown
One continent of love.
And only my own lack
Of love within the core
Sealed up my temple door
Made it too hard to break
And forced me to turn back.
Today's poem is a return to the Oxford Book of Canadian Verse. This one interested me because it seemed unusual for a poem by a (presumably) white guy and devotee of Asian religion - the acknowledgement that he 'had never owned' the land in question, and the fact that the mystic experience he's looking for isn't there for him. I'm a bit uncomfortable with the language of the third verse, especially the 'So asia' part, but he doesn't seem to be going all the way with... well, the comparison point my mind is throwing up is 'The Quiet American', with the exoticising and similtaneous claiming of Vietnam.
Where all the temples rose
I wandered in a land
That I had never owned
With a million all around.
I had been here before
But never to this place
Which seemed so nearly home
Yet was so far away
I was not here at all.
There was a central mound
That took away my breath
So steep it was and round
So sudden by my side
So Asia all beyond.
And when I came inside
I had to walk barefoot
For this was holy ground
Where I was being taught
To worship on a mat.
A great white wind arose
And shakes of the temple bells
Descended from the eaves
To make this gold and brown
One continent of love.
And only my own lack
Of love within the core
Sealed up my temple door
Made it too hard to break
And forced me to turn back.
Today's poem is a return to the Oxford Book of Canadian Verse. This one interested me because it seemed unusual for a poem by a (presumably) white guy and devotee of Asian religion - the acknowledgement that he 'had never owned' the land in question, and the fact that the mystic experience he's looking for isn't there for him. I'm a bit uncomfortable with the language of the third verse, especially the 'So asia' part, but he doesn't seem to be going all the way with... well, the comparison point my mind is throwing up is 'The Quiet American', with the exoticising and similtaneous claiming of Vietnam.