Today I bring the story of how I made a song from a poem and how none of them was intended.
It ends with a song, but it all began with picture of coffee grounds on Instagram. I got the typewriter — because I like imagery, realistically — and started typing a poem that had nothing to do with coffee. It came to me all at once and I barely used the correcting tape.
The whole story is told in the poem below.
On Not Knowing Quite What I’m Doing — The Lyrics to Music Advent
First, ambience: 1. Someone who read the poem Two Last Lines said I am one of those poets who know what they’re doing. That was my first inspiration for this log entry/poem; 2. The second is that I needed to poetise this process, which was poetic by itself; 3. Two Last Lines is to be published on my book Renaissance of Mistakes that will no longer be released before this one. Prelude — The Catalytic Imagery On the first 11 minutes of 5th September 2021, exactly a month and ten days ago, I saw a picture of coffee grounds on Instagram. I like coffee. And coffee cups. And ethereal poems based on daily imagery. Then, I took my Royal TQ620 Typewriter — that I myself costumed With a florid stamp — to my kitchen table while I watched over a vanilla cake on the oven And, with a new Prestige Elite Daisy Wheel installed — I love that font—, I began typing. Act I — The Violet Pursuit of Daisies TWO BEAMS FROM INTERCHANGEABLE SPHERES An untuned song I no longer know I'm both spheres, I wrote them until they spoke In a template I got from the Universe That knows about spheres more than I do That has been dreaming long before I became real Ordid I? Orchid, eye For so long I haven't made sense I think I'm someone's dream as miswritten Like the ones I script When I decide to fit text t books Difficult words to titles that I find beautiful Inferno in the Bible, just for imagery Because if there's the bad, the good is implied Oris it? Or-bit I was maid of honour to the marriage of heaven and hell But the best man is someone I can no longer call best But if the script is mine and only the template is from— I'm the bride, I've been heaven in hell All along Haven'I Revenant (the draft end) — — Interlude I — The Separation It all came to me without a blink. But I made some changes before I published it: • I changed beams in the title for lines, then it became the first line — I did so because I see existence as a page being written, but my original vision was two light beams dancing in the nothingness; • The title became TWO LAST LINES — because I wasn’t in the mood for sesquipedaling words to titles at that time; • I removed the third line, formerly the second line in the first stanza — Now I wonder why, had I changed spheres to lines, it should have made total sense; • I changed, in the third stanza, difficult to sesquipedal on the fifth line; — just think of the meaning of sesquipedal. Yes, that’s why; • I changed, in the penultimate stanza, the sentence But the best man is someone I can no longer call best for But the best man is someone I can call worst — gone / For good — out of sheer real event inspiration. I also drew some imagery:
the final poem version of this — let us call it — experiment, lies — above from — below: (changes italicised to death) Act II — The Decantation TWO LAST LINES Two last lines of interchangeable spheres The untuned song I no longer know In a template I got from the Universe That knows about spheres more than I do That had been dreaming long before I became real Ordid I? Orchid, eye For so long I haven’t made sense I think I’m someone’s dream as miswritten Like the ones I script When I decide to fit tex t books Sesquipedal words to titles that I find beautiful Inferno’s in the Bible, just for imagery Because if there’s the bad, the good is implied Oris it? Or-bit I was maid of honour to the marriage of heaven and hell But the best man is someone I can call worst — gone For good — But if the script is mine And only the pattern is from— I’m the bride, I’ve been heaven in hell All along Haven’I? Revenant (the poem end) — — Interlude II — The Shape of Sound Ten days later — the beginning of another fall —, I was feeling musical. So, I sat in front of the piano with no song in mind to play and started with a progression of my own: Am F G D I was very happy with how it sounded, and it came to my mind what someone once said about my poems having a natural rhythm. I had never thought of turning my poems into music. And adding music to lyrics would probably be harder than adding lyrics to music. But at that moment, on the piano, I thought of the perfect prompt lyrics to that progression — or the other way around. It was like both the progression and the poem were made in the same form. So, I got my draft of ‘Two Last Lines’ and sang seamlessly, with the following modifications: • I changed template to pattern on the former third line from, now fourth line from the first stanza — because it sounded better, stronger; • The last word in the third stanza: I replaced implied for allusive — for rhyming reasons; • I added this one more line in the third stanza: I know from in between, how sad loneliness is — When I added a bridge, there was a line missing, so, I had to stick something in there (not that I liked it very much), music is always mushier than poetry; • The caesura after from on the fourth line in the fifth stanza was replaced for never mind — Caesuras don’t seem to be a thing in music, which annoys me; • Lastly, I repeated an Outro version of the two first lines — talking about it, it’s somehow inspiring; • I didn’t want the poem and song to have the same title, so, I decided to call the song Revenant — it all began with a ghost talk anyway. Denouement — The Caesura Revenant REVENANT (Two Last Lines) Verse: Am F G D Two last lines of interchangeable spheres The untuned song I no longer know In a pattern I got from the Universe That knows about spheres more than I do Bridge: F D That had been dreaming long before I became real Chorus: Am D Ordid I? Orchid, eye (2x) Verse: Am F G D For so long I haven’t made sense I think I’m someone’s dream As miswritten as the ones I script When I decide to fit Tex t books Sesquipedal words to titles That I find beautiful, Inferno’s in the Bible, just for imagery Bridge: F E D Because if there’s the bad, the good is allusive I know from in between, how sad loneliness is Chorus: Am D Oris it? Or-bit (2x) Verse: Am F G D I was maid of honour to the marriage of heaven and hell But the best man is someone I can call worst - gone For good - But if the script is mine And the pattern is from — never mind I’m the bride, I’ve been heaven in hell All along Chorus: Am D Haven’I? Revenant (4x) Outro: Am F G D (let is sound) Two last lines of interchangeable spheres The untuned song I have known (the music end) — Outro — Give me back my soliloquy This song doesn’t have a chorus in lyrics, only in melody. The aim in no manner was a song, but it wanted to. Poems are breathing beings. It will never be recorded for real. And now that you know exactly how it was written and How unexceptionally it was written, It might not appeal as ethereal as I intended to. I own no exceptionality as well and I mask everything with sesquipedal words — it works, Until you get to get to know the story. (the end)
They say the melody needs to come first and that the lyric isn’t that important. I strongly disagree.
When poetry comes and goes and loops around you as if you were static and it were the only variable, it becomes the definition of itself that the world has forgotten: (I could define it right now, but I will leave it caesura to you).
Looking back right now, I don’t even know how everything happened. I never know. That’s the beauty of it.
This poem about the poem will be published on Grunting Etiquette in Autumn.
Poetry is, among other things, a criticism of language. - Adrienne Rich