Comments on: Lexicographic http://mindofwinter.org/2006/01/20/lexicographic/ A forum for discussing poems and poetry Mon, 01 Dec 2008 20:38:36 +0000 http://wordpress.org/?v=2.2.1 By: Michael http://mindofwinter.org/2006/01/20/lexicographic/#comment-693 Michael Sat, 21 Jan 2006 13:22:16 +0000 http://mindofwinter.org/2006/01/20/lexicographic/#comment-693 I think you were dead on with your <a href="http://mindofwinter.org/2005/11/20/though-it-is-not-spring/" rel="nofollow">previous comment</a> about MacNeice's mastery of sound. His poems just scream to be read aloud. He mixes marvelous rhythm and texture here ("Unravelling its complexity / Outrages its simplicity"), but the poem is not merely sound. He actually says something, and says it rather well. Dare an abstraction steal a kiss? It is the particular we value, not the abstraction, not the ideal. I stumbled to say something along these lines before; I am humbled to find the idea so clearly and artfully expressed. Thanks for posting this. [Also, apologies are in order for pushing your post one further down the page. It simply couldn't be helped. I didn't sleep a wink last night, and may never sleep again. The waking world is far too wonderful.] I think you were dead on with your previous comment about MacNeice’s mastery of sound. His poems just scream to be read aloud. He mixes marvelous rhythm and texture here (”Unravelling its complexity / Outrages its simplicity”), but the poem is not merely sound. He actually says something, and says it rather well. Dare an abstraction steal a kiss? It is the particular we value, not the abstraction, not the ideal. I stumbled to say something along these lines before; I am humbled to find the idea so clearly and artfully expressed. Thanks for posting this.

[Also, apologies are in order for pushing your post one further down the page. It simply couldn’t be helped. I didn’t sleep a wink last night, and may never sleep again. The waking world is far too wonderful.]

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