Eireann Lorsung

Eireann Lorsung

Lorsung, E. (2007). Music for Landing Planes By. Minneapolis: Milkweed Editions.

http://www.caffeinedestiny.com/poetry/lorsung.html

In half daylight my sisters and I went out to harvest the bodies of men

those fragile things

their skin the color of paper cinnamon polished light

and dark wood marks

on their shoulders from vaccinations

marks in their hearts where children

grew or girls they loved lived

once

Like other crops we cultivated

many varieties

the hair of some was golden-orange as corn silk

All the bodies of the men were crying out

in silence to be touched

there in the grey fog of morning

slender knuckles

and hair on the instep of the feet

the fields of the world are a cathedral

of love waiting to happen

1.) The overall structure of "Harvest" (along with some of the other poems on this page) is very unique. How is structure working in "Harvest"? How does the structure influence the readers' interpretation of the poem?

"'Harvest' uses a free-verse structure that I began developing while I

was working on poems for MfLPB which employs spaces within lines and

indented lines to generate meaning in the place of punctuation. I

started using spaces in the lines and the pattern of indentation when

I felt too confined by typical punctuation and wanted to find a way of

showing pauses or disjunction without actually physically breaking the

line or the breath."

"Some of this for me had to do with writing poems that felt very

personal and very bodily. I can't comment on whether this comes

through for any other reader, but for me the structures I build like

this feel very organic. Being the author of the poem means I don't

feel able to guess how anyone else interprets it--but I suppose that

the white space makes the poem feel airy and light. You might think

about the way the 'holes' on the page are like the kinds of light from

the windows in the poem's 'cathedral', or the colors that break

through from time to time in the poem itself."

"Breaking the line inside itself also makes each piece of the line

important and it allows different readings, depending on where the

reader's eye goes first--across or down."

2.) What sort of concrete details / symbols are being utilized throughout "Harvest"? How are these concrete details / symbols being used? What sort of abstract emotions, concepts, and / or contexts (historical, social, and so on) might these symbols be representing / standing in for?

"Concrete details: daylight, sisters, harvest, bodies, fragile, things,

skin, paper, cinnamon, polished wood, vaccination marks,

children/other women [past tense], crops and cultivation,

golden-orange hair, corn silk, grey fog, moring, slender knuckles,

hair on instep, fields, cathedral."

"The speaker and her 'sisters' go out into 'the fields of the world'

(which are sanctified by the 'love waiting to happen' in them) to

harvest men's bodies. The bodies of men are 'fragile'; several lines

are spent describing the marks on them, their papery skin. These

bodies are only one crop among the 'other crops [the women]

cultivated', and there are 'many varieties'. The speaker is tender and

uses language that comes from agriculture (cultivate, crops, harvest,

corn, fields, the early morning which also speaks to farmers, who rise

early to work) as well as a more medical or anatomical tone (words

like skin, vaccinations, marks, shoulders, hearts, bodies, knuckles,

hair, instep, feet, grew). Both of these lexica speak to an

attentiveness to and care for the world, and both place the speaker in

a position of authority (and even creation) over the 'harvest' of men.

This inverts the typical gender role in Western poetry, where the

Pygmalion-styled male voice, gaze, or actor 'creates' or constitutes

the female beloved."

3.) Would you characterize the last two lines of "Harvest" as an "epiphany" / "turn"? If so, how does the use of structure, symbolism, and / or metaphor help establish and support this "epiphany" / "turn"?

"I don't think they are a turn; maybe they are the culmination of the

other tender language in the poem? They are an imagistic turn, yes--we

go away from the agricultural and anatomical language and the metaphor

is holy or religious instead. But religion is another way of

sanctifying what is in the world and thus the image does have

continuity with those before it. In terms of 'epiphany', the last two

lines certainly add to the knowledge the reader has. It becomes clear

then that the women 'harvesting' the men's bodies are not doing so

violently, and they are not appropriating those bodies; instead, they

are going to love them (and this is sanctified/sanctifies the place in

which it happens)."

Former UofM M.F.A. student

Online Examples of Eireanne's work:

Harvest