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By NathanRoberts
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30 April 2008 |
The sixteen line death sentence
'Stalin Epigram',
compares a moustache to a cockroach
which led to a poet's imprisonment
and death in Siberia,
nineteen thirty eight.
On the mourning of Acmeism,
I wonder what half-man
holds back in fear of negative review;
at worst,
one step from cool silence,
two thousand and eight.
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Written by mia_ms_kim (976 comments posted) 1st May 2008 | Phew! It took a little research to understand this poem. I really like what you are saying here, Nathan, (or at least what I think you are saying.) I guess you are calling for boldness and courage for today's poets to speak their mind clearly and unflinchingly regardless of praise or rejection. (Hopefully they have intelligent and perceptive things to say!) And they are the half-men for not doing so? Powerful stuff - if I got it correctly.
Mia  | Phew too!
Written by Katanga (1163 comments posted) 1st May 2008 | Like Mia, I needed to google 'Acmeism' and 'Stalin epigram', but with fascinating results.
Mia's interpretation looks good to me! Could you confirm?
Great stuff, anyway!
Cheers! John | Thanks guys!
Written by NathanRoberts (277 comments posted) 1st May 2008 | No need to be too overawed...I only learnt about Acmeism etc. about an hour before writing the poem!
I could have given some details in an intro, to save people researching, but it was such a short poem a long intro would have overshadowed it. Also, info on just about everything is just a few clicks away.
John: To confirm, yes Mia's got the main gist, I think.
Though - I hope I'm not a judgemental person, so for me, it was mainly aimed in my own direction, not a broad attack. Despite that, I am of course, all-man. 
The word 'review' makes you think of GW, but I suppose it could be taken to mean , any opinion and not just referring to poetry.
I guess it also calls into question the old idea of an artist really suffering for their work. As a bit of a romantic, and idealist, I quite like the concept of that...
On the other hand:
strength and courage exist in such a variety of guises, but we do, as a culture, tend to latch onto a great story, or a martyr, whilst the day to day bravery of so many goes unnoticed, but that is a topic for another poem...
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