A Black and White: On The Jeffrey Pine by Ansel Adams

An ekphrastic poem on Ansel Adam's "The Jeffrey Pine". I adore his photography. It's lithe, organic, tenuous, and delightfully free of pretense.

A Black and White: On The Jeffrey Pine by Ansel Adams

It is this contradiction:

shaken, unshaken pine

stemming from bone of earth to bend of sky.

How it signifies

beyond itself to the whiteness,

the invariable caps un-breached by shadow.

How it signifies

that which is never it,

peaked with nothingness, ringed by wilderness

and white.

We know the tree,

 the brittle needles and tumorous knots,

not by what it frames

but by what it frames is not.

Is not of color.

Is not of cracks and age.

Is not of shadows

inside it and around it and through it.

Is nothing more

than abstract/neverlandish/unalive

with the precariousness of not living.

We know the tree

because we are jagged

with betrayal,

with love and having lied.

We are bone

on top of vein and sinews.

We feel our fall

and the rocks that hold

our shadows.

Most of all, we know this

tree because we want to look beyond

ourselves. To frame

that specious who we should be and make it who we are.

Author's Note

I'm looking for criticism. Kind words are always nice, but tough words are sometimes nicer.

Reviews

[kmartell]

read it twice will read it again.

"bone of earth, bend of sky" very good, good placement in the beginning of the poem....that photograph i recall i think. the tree is there , so there, with the presence of minutia (in all of his photographs)

also good: beyond itself to the whiteness... watch for the words such as "invariable". use them to hitch but not as a signifier. keep as many nouns, they are powerful. yes i love "bend of sky" ...

its good they way you earn the right by using those good metaphors in the opening of the poem and so now say "how it signifies that which is never "it"". if you reversed these two points of the poem it wouldn't be as strong. You somehow know this naturally as you write.

i think a lot of poetry is like that. i notice when i write that it is like that. things can come out of the"air"
and a natural rythme comes ( i should listen to my own criticism, ha) you have that ability.

i am thinking you could try to shorten this poem just a little, and see what happens. It is already one of the better ones you have written, so don't take this as me being overly critical. i liked this. it shows who you are as a poet. and you are Aa very good poet. so keep on writing. and by the way, i am only a "beginner" myself, i keep on learning etc. bye

[Bree Potter]

Thanks so much for your comments. Funny, this was initially a shorter poem, and I broke it apart to (hopefully) better express the jagged form of the tree. I will definitely see how it looks in shorter form, though!

[Kawaiikitty96]

Astounding figurative language! I can't think of anything critical to say!

[Bree Potter]

Wow, thanks for the uplifting words!