NOTE: To watch me read Nocturne: CLICK HERE
in the damp night sky
bulbous moist pearl
rolling
in a cold chromium fog
wet slivers of cloud
smear themselves
across its face
irregular
like translucent sacks
of moonbeams
breathing
glassine billowing pillows
oozing
soaked with midnight
stars float and spark
glinting
dripping
shivering
frozen splintered crystal tips
diamond chips
pinprick rips
in blackened space
they wink and wane
and flutter
shattered bits of silvered light
snapping here then not
behind the ghostly white vapor
that slithers
through the firmament
the world
devoid of color
aglow in sterling grey
a negative of day
thick and chilled
filled with the sound
of stalking after-dark things
nocturne
the sorrowing hour
to lay bare your soul
in pale introspection
in grief of secrets
You have a voice meant for reading poetry, love that deep timbre which gives such richness to the despair of the atmosphere you’ve conjured here. Perfect poem for the Halloween time of year, when souls wander and spirits weep.
…and a perfect face for radio… ba-dum-bump! 🙂 Thank you Lisa. This is an upgrade of a poem I wrote 11 years ago. Felt right for the prompt and for the seadon.
Thanks Rob, a great reading – with a wonderful basso you have -and it adds so much to your spooky piece. If I were a child I’d be well under the covers trembling by now (if not howling for my mum). Great soundings, thanks for sharing with us.
Thank you Peter. It was a pleasure recording spoken word again. It had been longer than I realized since my last one. I appreciate the nudge to do it again, as sparked by your prompt… 🙂
So much to love here especially; “in a cold chromium fogwet slivers of cloud smear themselves.” 🙂
Thank you Sanaa… 🙂
This is wonderful, both the poem and the video. I just love the darkness of this poem and I love these lines:
“frozen splintered crystal tips
diamond chips
pinprick rips
in blackened space”
You sound like you could be a professional voice actor or announcer. Excellent writing here and a fantastic performance with reading your poem. It’s such a different experience reading the words and then hearing them intended by the author. Wonderful work here, Rob.
Thank you Lucy… 🙂 I have always felt the real power of poetry is in the spoken word of the poet. I was a professional singer for 25 years, and also did voice-over for commercials. My biggest client for a number of years was Honda Motorcycles — but that was years ago.
A wonderful video reading Rob. I love the sounds you made with your words. I really liked this… glassine billowing pillows
oozing
Thank you Dwight… 🙂
Big thumbs-up, RK. I read it. Then I read it aloud. Then I clicked your vid.
You win.
Thank you sincerely — I’m just more familiar with the material Ron… 🙂
Sadly. Rob, I couldn’t get the video to work on my laptop – I’ve been having a few problems lately – but I enjoyed reading it aloud, letting the ‘bulbous moist pearl’ roll on my tongue and imagining ‘translucent sacks of moonbeams’. I also enjoyed the sound of the lines:
‘frozen splintered crystal tips
diamond chips
pinprick rips’
Thank you Kim, but I am sad you didn’t get to hear”Nocturne” read. It is like a spoken song, deep and rich and resonant — I wrote it to be enjoyed viscerally, sight & sound. Maybe you will try it again, and it will work? Now that I am back in the groove of doing video poems again,I plan to do many more going forward… for as long as I can. As my arthritis takes my fingers more and more, video poems can be a wonderful creative ouglet.
“Nocturne … the sorrowing hour” — Pure poetry. Enjoyed the video reading, so good to put a face and voice to the words 🙂
Thank you Dora… 🙂
Very effective reading, Rob. Your voice lends to the darkness that evolves in your poem.
I like the near-rhyme and alliteration in “glassine billowing pillows.”
Thank you Ken, appreciate the kind words… 🙂
Just right for the prompt and for the season: I enjoyed your song of night time, Rob!
I am glad you did Ingrid. The very first version of this poem I wrote 16 years ago. This is my 4th revision of it. I frlt it fit well with Peter’s prompt.
Oh dark night–stars and stalking things, and secrets. . .perfect for this time of year. Your reading is spectacular. I can imagine listening to this on the radio. I didn’t remember your voice being so deep when we did our last dVerse live. (My husband has a bass voice, too.)
Thank you Kim… 🙂 …my reading voice is a bit more resonant than my casual voice.
It was a pleasure to hear you read this Rob, really wonderful sounds and darkness that becomes even stronger with your voice…. You should really have a youtube channel to share poetry.
Thank you Bjorn… 🙂 …for several years, in my younger healthier days, I had a blog, on which I exclusively presented me reading my poetry — as well as a short-lived YouTube channel which quickly became inactive after my second heart attack. I think the channel still exists, though I fon’t immediately remember how I log in? Now that I have had mt 3rd heart attack, resulting in a Pacemaker, I am again considering creating more spoken word video presentations. I am feeling well enough, and as the arthritis worsens in my hands, spoken word presentations are promising themselves as possibly more desirable. Typing is really getting difficult for me.I zm beginning to do my comments via Siri’s voice transcriber — although she doesn’t get it perfect, she gets damned close. Some of the typos she creates require I go back and edit, which takes time, but does help me manage with the pain in my fingers a bit by lessening my amount of typing. Fun journey getting old znd beginning to malfunction… 😉