question re 'the solar mass' (1 Viewer)

d gray

tried to do his best but could not
Founding member
hi guys - does anyone know who bukowski is talking about in that crazy poem? and is it published? he reads it on 'king of poets' cd but i couldn't find it in the database. thanx
 
the only similarly titled poem in my database is "THE SOLAR MASS: SOUL: GENESIS AND GEOTROPISM:", which is at UCSB's Special Collections Department.
 
thanks c - that's it. are you familiar with the poem and do you have any idea who he's talking about? he mentions a name that sounds something like 'veechy linux' and visiting someone in italy on 'all fools day' - he never was in italy, right? very strange and intriguing poem (to me).
 
d gray
i've been meaning to 'replay' "king of poets" simply for enjoyment...now i have a definite purpose as well -
cannot say i recall the poem but will zero in on it...
if i am unable to 'ID' the person i'll make up one (smiles)...

rrat
 
Solar Mass...Fincklestein!

hi guys - does anyone know who bukowski is talking about in that crazy poem? and is it published? he reads it on 'king of poets' cd but i couldn't find it in the database. thanx

It's a guess on my part, but it sounds to me that Bukowski came across some kind of a science article by accident, maybe in a magazine by happenstance in some dental office, the library, the bank or wherever, and simply fell in love with the sounds of the words"”considering that he was more a poet than astronomer... This, I'll call it, musical tendency of his I might attribute to the influence of listening to classical music on his art, the pure sound of the sibilant words to his ears beyond whatever the hell some of them actually meant. I think that's what the great poets do, because great poems have a way of being interesting to the ears as an end unto themselves when read aloud. (Another poet is E.E. Cummings)... There's another poem (sorry I forget which one) where he talks about "picking up his watch from Fincklestein's." Well, to me there's something enjoyable, odd and peculiar about working the relatively uncommon name of "Fincklestein" into a poem; but he mentions it more than once, it seems to me, out of sheer pleasure, and I think he just liked the particular sound of that name as it lodged inside the grey matter of his brain... he fell in love with it as he repeated it to himself, and it became part of the genesis of that poem and held it together... in addition to whatever else he happened to be saying there. Anything can set off a poet, and "Solar Mass" may be another example of his ability to make use of whatever sounds came his way, and this is how I view such unusual poems.

Yours truly,
Irving J. Fincklestein,
watchmaker
 
Last edited by a moderator:
i think The Solar Mass is a bukowski example (and criticism?) of what has been called "sound poetry." (the sound is more important than the meaning.) buk cldn't allow himself to write or, more importantly, read it without irony, without distancing himself. he breaks off the poem with, "ow! i'm gonna have to stop reading this literary criticism, this academic verse, very destructive american hamburger..." he might have had his tongue firmly implanted in his cheek, but it was native to him, he was serious...at least, that's my belief.

he wld rather have been, "a swineherd at Amagerbro
and be understood by the swine than a poet
and misunderstood by people."
 
Poetisa, What's that about "a swineherd at Amagerbro..." ? Is it a danish poet who said that? (H.C. Andersen?) Because Amagerbro is a danish location...
 
Last edited by a moderator:
Second take...

Listened to S M again, and hadn't in awhile before I first posted... Yes, the poem sounds like a satire on academic literary criticism, and Bukowski is using a mouthful of academic words he exchanged with another writer, or read, and perhaps working in a few science terms as well...I'm just guess here... He's taking those twenty-five cent, tongue-twister words and playing with the sound of them as his satire unfolds... This was the kind of highfalutin' exchanges B was evidently willing to engage in with some of his literary colleagues, at the same time he talks about avoiding these kinds of discussions"”perhaps a bit of a love/hate relationship with verse and those who like to analyze it along those academic lines. Just my "qwin-qwagular" take on it. ;-)

And yes, the Fincklestein poem is "The Weather Is Hot." Didn't quote it properly other than to recount his references to Fincklestein... Buk's love of word-play is something I think he enjoyed, and I think he'd worked in the ones he became enamored of whenever he could, like the true master he was. "”Fincklestein
 
Last edited by a moderator:
Poetisa, What's that about "a swineherd at Amagerbro..." ? Is it a danish poet who said that? (H.C. Andersen?) Because Amagerbro is a danish location...


hi bukfan,
it's Soren Kierkegaard. is he well-known in his homeland? he was a figure of ridicule and scorn at the end of his life.
 
Last edited by a moderator:
He is extremely well known! The internationally most famous danish filosopher and one of the founders of existensialism.
Yes, a satirist paper called "Corsaren" ridiculed him a lot. It had to do with his attack on the church for merely preaching christianity but not living it, which he saw as hypocrisy.
I used to live next to the cemetary where he is buried, so I've seen his gravesite many times...
 
Last edited by a moderator:
is there any kind soul out there who would be willing to transcribe the poem here? I just listened to it and didn't get half of the words B. was saying...
 
i'll give it a shot. i'll italicize words i'm not sure of.

now let me attenuate veechy's linux greatness
for what man at a time could have said
spooks sparks spindles
stern strapsun
gold oosphore from the opine olphite
stithy
and this was before pound, olson, williams, john muir
plan planifolius planimpters
he once wrote to me
"by the beard of the quinquagular rock"
i rejoined him:
"you've struck it"
i visited him in italy on all fools day
and his mastery of the punctate polvilly
never left me in drear doubt
"trepan" he said
"ode wist aptare astrigals
it was the last i saw of him
veechy had him blaze on embrosures
cryptonyms drosometers
let the favos favour of him
bring through the rock
rubefacient
and give to
russel and the rutabaga

wow. my brain hurts after that.
 
Ah, another story-poem by Buk, easily understood by people who normally don't read poetry...:D
 
Last edited by a moderator:

Users who are viewing this thread

Back
Top