.
Forecast One to Two Inches
Within the snow’s approach I sense a hope
Connected more to memory than truth.
It fails to fall within the narrow scope
Of solid message; seems instead a trope
For something bright and clear and lost:
A Midwest morning; backyard winter-tossed;
A world made sharp by glistening light and youth.
.
Psalm
My life is slowly turning to a psalm,
__To something old and calm,
Its cadences remote but self-assured.
__The rhythm is a balm
That so delights, that so my soul prefers,
__I’ve quite forgot the words.
.
.
Jeffrey Essmann is an essayist and poet living in New York. His poetry has appeared in numerous magazines and literary journals, among them Agape Review, America Magazine, Dappled Things, the St. Austin Review, U.S. Catholic, Grand Little Things, Heart of Flesh Literary Journal, and various venues of the Benedictine monastery with which he is an oblate. He is editor of the Catholic Poetry Room page on the Integrated Catholic Life website.
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These are lovely thoughts, beautifully expressed, Jeffrey. I love it when a poem, like your memories of snow in your youth, “fails to fall into the narrow scope of solid message”, but instead evokes the sense the poet is trying to portray. Your comparison of this period of your life to a psalm evokes the chanting rhythm of spoken or sung psalms by a worshipping community, in which the delightful cadence of life says as much as, or more than, the sometimes- forgotten words.
Thanks so much, Cynthia. I hope the new year is being good to you and look forward to seeing where it takes your wonderful work.
These are terse yet rich musings nestled deep inside the heart. I don’t know why but I strangely relate to your feelings expressed in “Psalm.” It’s visceral but inexplicable all the while. Also, you came up with a clever title for the first poem. Short and serene. Thanks for your beautiful work, Mr. Essmann.
Growing up in the Midwest, I can feel the scope of your poem reflected in my own memories of youth when snow was “glistening and sharp.” Your Psalm of life with the rhythm of calm is a soothing poem.
Both poems are very relatable and enjoyable to read. I love that while they are very short, each one relates a deep thought on which I can think for a long time afterward. Great work!
“Forecast…” is a lyric that explicitly avoids the pitfalls of “truth” and “message.” It expresses the speaker’s response to a memory evoked by the “trope” of a snowfall. When I read it, I was immediately reminded of something in George Orwell’s “1984,” when the main character expresses despair over the fact that memories can be lost, and that the only thing an old man might remember was the way the winds blew the leaves on some afternoon, seventy years in the past.
The same sentiment comes out in a more complex way in “Psalm,” where the speaker thinks of “cadences” and “rhythm” as something preferable to “words,” and more delightful.
Jeffrey, your “Forecast” is full of double meanings, reflecting the interplay of message and memory. The emphatic center of the piece is the word “trope,” referring to the assignment of a word or syllable to each note of an elaborate melody itself conveying only a few words. Somewhere I have a troped Kyrie for Gregorian Mass II. This was supposedly done to help singers become familiar with the melody, so that they would not fail to sound each apparently unnecessary note.
You begin a corresponding practice by entitling your poem “Forecast.” The hope expressed is not a response to any real snowfall, only to the forecasted snow’s approach! Impossible to say more now, except that tropes were bright and clear and are now mostly lost, since singing them at Mass is forbidden, and we use other means of teaching melody.
The rhyme scheme of “Psalm” reflects forgetting words, as the “a” rhymes in aababb are all perfect, while all the “b” rhymes imperfectly jumble the sound “ur” with other sounds. It suggests what must have happened to many elderly Benedictines over the centuries. And indeed, when we are talking about lives rather that psalms, quite a lot of the words are forgotten!
Many, many thanks, Margaret, for your ever-generous appreciation and ever-astute parsing of my work. I’m particularly grateful for your teasing out of the deeper layerings of “trope”. I’d no idea, and especially love its intimate connection to musicality/chant. Your comments always give me wonderful homework to do. So thank you again and again and again. God bless, Jeffrey
I love the second, short poem. Words forgotten, but the feeling remains, is really an interesting idea. Emily Dickinson energy, too.
Jeffrey, you have managed to capture my recent mood perfectly in “Forecast One to Two Inches” – those on the coastal plains of Texas have just experienced a recent and rare dusting of snow, and my wonder at this white sprinkling was but “… a trope / For something bright and clear and lost”… a sparkling Christmas-card scene of my sledding, snowballing, snowman-building youth! Oh, how fleeting those moments are! The poems pair beautifully and say so much in their brevity. Thank you!
Susan, I’m so happy the poem evoked your own snow-memory. And you’re right: it only takes a dusting, which is what the one to two inches of the title turned out to be, to make my Wisconsin DNA kick into full drive. (I think my vowels even start flattening…) I’m also happy that the brevity worked for you. Part of this has simply been necessity. I’m working on a large project, and my “other poetry” has tended to be shorter as a result. But it’s been a good exercise for me to have to get to the point quicker than I usually would, and it’s nice to see that brevity seems to be working in my–and, more importantly, the reader’s–favor. I too found the juxtaposition of the two poems effective, for which total credit must go to Evan’s extraordinary editorial eye. Thank you, Evan! And thank you again, Susan. I hope this finds you well. God bless, Jeffrey
Thank you, everyone, for your very kind appreciation of my work. I’m sorry it’s taken me so long to extend this gratitude, but it’s been a busy past few days. But one of the things I love about this “room” (as I think of it) is the amazing range of readings a poem can receive, all of them well-considered, all of them distinct, all of them generous–and all of them helpful. As a good many of you know, I am a person of prayer, so please know how gratefully I hold all of you in prayer–every day. God bless, Jeffrey