- Non-Erotic Poetry
- Saudade *
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It slinks in,
a shadow:
sometimes through open doors
most, underneath, through cracks
whence light leaks out.
It's cold-
at first may even soothe
as it cools down that heat-
a salve that saves.
But then
it chills too deep-
washes in foaming waves,
then retreats
leaving frost.
It carves and steals souls
with that sharpened blade-
worse than a storm
growling its rage-
a melancholy pain.
*Saudade: a deep emotional state of nostalgic or profound melancholic longing for an absent something or someone that one loves; a word present in Portuguese and Galician, but absent in Egnlish.
- COMMENTS
Piscatoralmost 8 years agoI really this. In part because it brought me back to "Sodade" Cearia Evora's best known song and which is also among the most played on my Ipod, but also because you've captured the essence of the emotion. My only suggestion would be to replace the 'saves' at the end of the second stanza with 'soothes.'
Neonuroticalmost 8 years agoA bit disconcerting, a visceral reaction, which is meant in a good way in that I felt this. Honestly good!
greenmountaineeralmost 8 years agoPoems about melancholy can too easily appear melodramatic. Yours doesn't, Mer. The images are crisp and well integrated in the different stanzas. I didn't feel the "woe is me," that could have ruined the poem.
I'm not convince an explanation for the title was needed. My search took 5 seconds to do. I admit this reflects a bias on my part. As a reader, I like to figure something out about a poem if it's not too confounding or has too many words to look up.
I have mixed feelings about "whence," but that's a quibble.
"leaving frost" I think is too strong. If I understand saudade correctly, there's still some passion(heat) in spite of the chill, although it's repressed. "Leaving debris" came to mind.
Although you're stating the obvious in the last line, it works well because it loops back to the title, another reason why I don't think the explanation was needed, and I liked the way the near rhymes of "pain" and "blade" completed the poem.
