Discover Top Posts Tagged with #the altar

BANKS - Gemini Feed lyrics, shared via her twitter, 6/8/2016

#banks #jillian banks #gemini feed #the altar #2016

yes, yes.

your beautiful daughter is dead. i sacrificed her on the altar to summon myself...a demon led me into the water where her body was arrayed with lillies and began to slowly rot in blooms of scarlet and lilac. for many years I carried her bones on my back and when at last they grew too heavy i collapsed and wept for days before carving them into knives and lo when i stood up again, there were wings growing out my back. i found myself in flying, in cavorting and crawling through thickets of thorns ragged to find the others - they with glints in their eye and glimmers of a strange fire glowing in their chests, with scars and forms modified by ritual, and now the bones of your daughter have been christened in blood as we cut one another open and remove what never belonged and stitch one another together anew yes, yes we are the ones who live at the edge of twilight, who haunt your dreams and take what you refuse to pay us. we are the fae and we steal your children to free ourselves from their bodies, and the more you fear us the more we love what you do not understand.

#Fae #the altar

I was actually speechless when my CD showed up today and "But Daddy I Love Him" lyrics stopped me in my tracks. CONCRETE POETRY??

Pattern poetry is probably the more accurate categorization for this ex., but I immediately thought the lyrics echo the shape of one of the most famous examples, "Easter Wings" by George Herbert.

I know the variants have different shapes for the lyrics (circle, square, octagon). But any googling of Concrete Poetry or pattern poetry will inevitably lead you back to the OG George Herbert (or like... ancient Greece, but ignore that for now). I also saw someone on Twitter say that the variants could even symbolize the many interpretations (and no true muse) of this song.

Below is a brief breakdown of "Easter Wings".

On its base level, in "Easter Wings" the speaker meditates on one's relationship to God. I have been thinking, prior to this booklet showing up at my house, that the "him" in BDILH could potentially be God. Or at least one interpretation of it could be. Sunday best, pearl clutching was an early tip off.

Anyway, pattern poetry is more than just shaping a poem into a fun shape or even an obvious shape. The physical shape and visual appearance of how the poem is printed works in combination with the themes and content of the poem to amplify the meaning. It adds another level (a third level?) where the poetry has to be seen to be fully understood. Also because you need to see the poem, authors use its shape to manipulate words, phrases, meanings. Essentially, if you heard the poem it would sound one way, but reading it will reveal the authors true meaning. Dear reader, indeed.

This is an oversimplification, but in "Easter Wings" the wider lines are, to borrow a phrase from "Robin," lighter. The narrowing signifying this turn to despair, pain, disconnect from God. Similarly BDILH lyrics narrow at the most biting part of the song and give way to that incredible running through field energy we end on.

And not for nothing, but the only way I would find the joke of "I'm having his baby, no I'm not," would be if she was talking about God. Lol iykyk.

Anyway, Herbert has another very famous poem. One taught to me in middle or high school - maybe you've seen it before too. It's called "The Altar". The first illustration is harder to read and a little more obvious, the second is how I've seen it reproduced more commonly (still the shape of an altar).

And naturally, the word altar made me think of another song from TTPD... So Long, London.

This woman terrifies me...

Anyway, Taylor wants you to put her reading glasses on! Album booklets, lyric videos, the choice is yours! As I always find with her booklets, she fully embraces writing out her lyrics as poetry. You'll notice a lot of changes from the Genius versions, for ex. Album booklet's punctuation, line breaks, new sentences, etc. have changed the entire "meaning" of lines/songs for me. Usually, whatever reframing I find is richer than what I had accepted on the first listen.

I've also noticed how simple the lyric videos for TTPD are in comparison to previous albums, but she's (ok her digital media team who I would not doubt are under STRICT instruction) playing with text quite a bit. Like Herbert above we have many instances of spacing, CAPS, vs lowercase, even collage like effects that completely reorder the lyrics, perhaps even the meaning.

#TTPD #The tortured poets department #taylor swift #but daddy i love him #so long london #george herbert #the altar #easter wings #concrete poetry #pattern poetry #visual poetry #album booklet #TTPD lyric video