Postcards from the Imagination

Since Reb asked in her comment below, I thought I'd elaborate on the statement I made below regarding sincerity and the use of myth. The old adage, "Show don't tell," is probably appropriate here. First then, an example of myth used insincerely (in my view!):

Cassandra
by Louise Bogan

To me, one silly task is like another.
I bare the shambling tricks of lust and pride.
This flesh will never give a child its mother,--
Song, like a wing, tears through my breast, my side,
And madness chooses out my voice again,
Again. I am the chosen no hand saves:
The shrieking heaven lifted over men,
Not the dumb earth, wherein they set their graves.

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Bogan's use of myth strikes me as evasive. She seems to want to talk about the role of the female poet, but not directly--and so she calls her poet Cassandra. But instead of talking about what it's like to be a flesh-and-blood, contemporary, female poet, Bogan simply repeats a feminized version of the old Romantic idea of the poet as prophet. I hear lots of melodrama, but no real emotion. Moreover, by couching her assertions in terms of a familiar myth, Bogan takes much of the edge off her boldest assertions, thereby minimizing the risk of her speech. On the flip side of the same coin, I think she sometimes overstates or exaggerates--for instance, "Song...tears through my breast.../And madness chooses out my voice..."--in order to maintain the Cassandra metaphor.

Better, in my opinion, is the following:

Helen
by H.D.

All Greece hates
the still eyes in the white face,
the lustre as of olives
where she stands,
and the white hands.

All Greece reviles
the wan face when she smiles,
hating it deeper still
when it grows wan and white,
remembering past enchantments
and past ills.

Greece sees unmoved,
God's daughter, born of love,
the beauty of cool feet
and slenderest knees,
could love indeed the maid,
only if she were laid,
white ash amid funereal cypresses.

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Here I detect a number of motives, but at least one of them seems to be a critique of myth itself. That is, rather than seeming to avoid the real issue, the myth itself is the issue. Why, asks H.D., is beauty only beauty when it no longer breathes? Why the lionization of mythological women, and the persistent disdain for real ones? Why, she might even be asking, why Helen and not Hilda? It's a complex poem, with a number of possible readings, but its emotions seem to flow directly from lived experience, whereas Bogan's seemed to be co-opted from the myth.

I hope that clarifies what I meant in my earlier post, but if not I'd be happy to continue discussing it.