Light Song of Light

by Kei Miller

Exploring the relationship between poetry and song, the pieces in this collection work to define the elemental human struggles of good versus evil and light against darkness. The poems take different shapes--newly forged dictionary definitions; praise-songs celebrating the Singerman in a Jamaican road gang; and simple narratives of ghosts, bandits, and other night creatures--and present an accomplished and progressive voice from a new generation of Caribbean writers.

Genres: Poetry

80 pages, ebook

First published July 1, 2010

About the author

Kei Miller was born in Jamaica in 1978. He completed an MA in Creative Writing at Manchester Metropolitan University and a PhD in English literature at the University of Glasgow. He works in multiple genres - poetry, fiction and non-fiction and has won major prizes across these genres. He won the Forward Prize for poetry and the OCM Bocas Prize for Caribbean Literature. He has taught at the Universities of Glasgow, London, and Exeter. He is presently Professor of English at the University of Miami.

Reviews

[Rebecca · Rating 3 out of 5]

True to the title, “song” and “light” are recurring concepts in these poems as Miller celebrates Caribbean folk and historical figures, contrasts his freedom to live with a lover in the UK with the continuing dangers homosexuals face back in Jamaica, and offers limber, metaphorical definitions, e.g. “Anything that climbs is a song; vines are a song; my father, seventy years old, at the top of the ackee tree is a song; all planes are songs” (from “Some Definitions for Song”). The multi-part “Twelve Notes for a Light Song of Light,” which opens the collection, is a stand-out; I recall him reciting it pretty much from memory when I saw him speak on the University of Reading campus a few years back. Overall, though, not as noteworthy as his other two collections I’ve read, There Is an Anger that Moves and The Cartographer Tries to Map a Way to Zion.

Neat fact: Miller also took the cover photograph, of a zinc balmyard in Jamaica.

[Narges Mirfeizi · Rating 5 out of 5]

کی میلر کتاب The light song of light را قبل از این‌که آخرین کتابش جایزه‌ی فوروارد را بگیرد نوشته است. با این حال نمی‌توانم بگویم این کتاب را بیشتر از کتاب تحسین‌شده‌اش دوست ندارم! دلیلش هم واضح است، غمب عجیب و دست‌یافتنی در سطر به سطر این اشعار برق می‌زند و همان‌طور که تو را با پرداخت متفاوتش شگفت‌زده می‌کند، همذات‌پنداری‌ات را هم تضمین می‌کند.
بسیار خوشحالم که با معنای واقعی "مجموعه شعر" در این کتاب آشنا شدم. یعنی وقتی روی جلد کتاب می‌نویسند "مجموعه شعرِ ..." انتظار داری واقعا با یک مجموعه‌ی منسجم و مرتبط و برنامه‌ریزی‌شده رو به رو شوی، حال آن‌که بسیاری از مجموعه‌های شعری تنها گلچینی از تازه‌ترین یا بهترین اشعار یک شاعر هستند و گاه آن‌قدر تنوع موضوعی و ساختاری دارند که متعجب می‌شوی از همنشینی آن‌ها با همدیگر در یک کتاب واحد. اما کی‌میلر به مجموعه شعر مثل یک مجموعه‌ی چندپاره از اجتماع تعدادی شعر نگاه نمی‌کند... او مجموعه شعر را یک فیلم واحد یا یک داستان پازل‌وار با قطعات مرتبط می‌بیند که از ابتدا تا انتها تو را به یک تصویر کامل و جامع از روایتش و حرف‌هایی که می‌خواهد بزند می‌رساند.
کتاب به دو بخش Day time (روز) و Night time (شب) تقسیم شده و هر بخش شامل چندین شعر است.
جدال بین نور و تاریکی کشمکش اصلی اشعار کتاب "ترانه‌ای روشن برای روشنایی" است. البته در ترجمه‌ی عنوان هم می‌توان عبارات بسیار متنوعی را به کار برد؟ چرا که واژه‌ی light و song در انگلیسی معانی مختلفی دارند و اتفاقا شاعر از این قابلیت هم برای رسیدن به مقصود خود بهره برده است. فرم در این کتاب آزاد است و با این حال مدام از شکلی به شکلی دیگر تغییر می‌کند. لا به لای شعرها گاه به صفحاتی می‌رسید که خیال می‌کنید از فرهنگ لغت بریده و چسبانده شده‌اند. مثلا نوشته است: "تعریف واژه‌ی نور"... و فرم تایپ و شکل خطوط و علائم اختصاری و ... هم کاملا مشابه دیکشنری‌هاست. اما وقتی مشغول خواندن می‌شوی می‌فهمی شاعر تنها از این فرم برای ارائه‌ی مفاهیم جدید و شاعرانه از این واژه استفاده کرده است. مفاهیمی که گاه مرتبط و گاه غیرمرتبط هستند. چند نمونه از این تعاریف را برایتان ترجمه می‌کنم:

نور [ریشه‌شناسی] فوتوفیلیا: عشق به نور؛ شیفتگانِ نور بیهوده به سوی آن کشیده می‌شوند، برای مثال: گل‌های آفتابگردان که با صورت‌های گرد، در طول روز مانند عقربه‌ی ساعت سفر می‌کنند، برای مثال: "آگاتا" که اگرچه حال خوبی داشت، اما به مرگ اصرار می‌ورزید!

نور [اسم] __در حالت جمع به ریه‌های حیوانات کشته‌شده lights گفته می‌شود. گاه حیرت می‌کنم که شاید حیوانات پیش از مرگ دست به دعا برمی‌دارند- که شاید پیش از آن‌که خنجر فرود بیاید، گاوها و گوسفندها و اردک‌ها، ریه‌ها را از سنگینی مرگ خود پر می‌کنند، از سنگینیِ پوچیِ در حال گذار... که شاید آخرین صدای آن‌ها نور (light) باشد که از نورگاه (lights ) بیرون می‌ریزد...

آواز (song ) __ (برای ریچارد و ناتالی) : ۱. سخن‌ گفتنِ پرندگان در "آواز پرندگان" ، البته با چند استثناء، چرا که کبوترها آواز نمی‌خوانند، کرکس‌ها هم آواز نمی‌خوانند.
۲. به معنای چانه‌زدن یا مبلغ کمی پول در جمله‌ی "آن جنس را به قیمت یک ترانه خرید (کنایه به بسیار ارزان بودن). چه می‌شد اگر می‌توانستیم با نغمه‌ها خرید کنیم؟! نغمه‌هایی که مثل سکه روی پیشخوان پرتاب می‌شدند و نرم‌تر از سکه فرود می‌آمدند!


آیا می‌خواهم بگویم کی‌میلر معنا را به چالش کشیده است؟ بله. این دقیقا همان کاری‌ست که او انجام داده و از این باب موقع مطالعه ذهنتان را بارها به نظریات ساختارشکنانه ارجاع می‌دهد.
کی‌میلر -شاید به دلایل استعمارستیزانه- از لهجه‌ی بومی خویش در سرودن نیز غافل نبوده است. در بعضی از اشعار، لهجه‌ی جاماییکایی را با انگلیسی ادغام می‌کند و زبانی منحصر به فرد برای خود می‌سازد.

خواندن این کتاب را پیش از دیگر کتاب‌هایش به شما پیشنهاد می‌کنم.
ای کاش در حال حاضر آن‌قدر وقت و انرژی داشتم که می‌توانستم با اطمینان بگویم این کتاب را ترجمه خواهم کرد. اما امیدوارم هر چه زودتر یک مترجم خوب و کاربلد این مجموعه را به فارسی برگرداند تا طعم شیرین متفاوت‌خوانی را بچشید و تنوع تفکر و اندیشه‌ی کی‌میلر را از نزدیک ببینید. تا آن موقع اگر انگلیسی‌تان خوب است پیشنهاد می‌کنم نام کتاب را در گوگل‌بوکز جستجو کنید و حداقل برش‌هایی از این کتاب را بخوانید... شاید شما هم دوستش داشته باشید!

نرگس میرفیضی
فروردین ۱۳۹۷

[Areeb Ahmad (Bankrupt_Bookworm) · Rating 4 out of 5]

"If this short poem stretches beyond
its first line, then already, already,
it has failed, become something else,
something its author did not intend
for it to become, a misbehaving,
rambunctious, own-way thing,
its circuitous journey a secret known
only to itself, its tongue its own.
The author is destined, I am afraid,
to write poems that escape him.
This, for instance, was to be just one
line long, or even one long line,
dedicated to Mervyn Morris and his love
of brevity, but it has become something else
entirely. The poem sings its own song,
reaches its own end in its own time."

// If this short poem stretches


I could see a free-er use of Jamaican Patwa here compared to Anger that Moves & I hope it grows. It is also less rigidly structured, although there is mirroring & play of opposites across the two sections. The Singerman's figure is crucial to a unifying theme, emblematic of the light and its abundant proliferation clarifying the contrast with dark & illuminating the shadows that lie between. Music is a common feature in Miller's poetry, how it appears as both subject and driver, verses lifted up from the page through rhythmic freedom, a liberational musicality. "A Short History of Beds We Have Slept In Together", a sequence of short poems was moving & will remain with me for a long time. I also really liked the three "Some Definitions of Light" poems and the title poem which opens the collection. I continue to be impressed by how Miller deftly explores the personal through the poetic.

[Phillip Marsh · Rating 4 out of 5]

Really liked this. Beautiful, happy, angry, sorrowful, passionate words.

Favourites:

• Twelve Notes for a Light Song
• Questions for Martin Carter
• Thinkin Home
• Unsung
• De True Story of Rolling Calf
• A Praise Song for Sudden Lights
• A Smaller Song
• The Law Concerning Mermaids

[Eric · Rating 5 out of 5]

The Law Concerning Mermaids

There was once a law concerning mermaids. My friend thinks it a wondrous thing — that the British Empire was so thorough it had invented a law for everything. And in this law it was decreed: were any to be found in their usual spots, showing off like dolphins, sunbathing on rocks — they would no longer belong to themselves. And maybe this is the problem with empires: how they have forced us to live in a world lacking in mermaids — mermaids who understood that they simply were, and did not need permission to exist or to be beautiful. The law concerning mermaids only caused mermaids to pass a law concerning man: that they would never again cross our boundaries of sand; never again lift their torsos up from the surf; never again wave at sailors, salt dripping from their curls; would never again enter our dry and stifling world.

[Emma-Louise Ekpo · Rating 5 out of 5]

Beautiful poems.

I preferred the Night Time section over Day Time.

Absolute favourites were the poems in “A Short History of Beds We Have Slept in Together”. Incredibly touching and filled to the brim with gay love and experience.

[Nurain Ọládèjì · Rating 4 out of 5]

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[Kanene · Rating 5 out of 5]

I have a lot of favorites here. liked the definitions & etymologies & light. the poems are touching and creatively constructed.

[Zachary Littrell · Rating 5 out of 5]

My goodness, do I love this little collection. I feel the compulsion to re-read it. I never felt sadder when I realized that Miller's stream of poems would soon be ending. My heart is all a flutter when I think of the emotions and events that Kei Miller captured and gave birth to on these pages.

A Light Song of Light is truly dichotomous; the poems are even divided between 'Day Time' and 'Night Time'. There are poems that are absolute joys to read aloud and let Miller's Jamaican-influenced syntax roll off the tongue. But then there are times that Kei Miller made me audibly gasp -- my heart ached as I read "A Smaller Song" and reached the line:

And on the phone this mother agrees to her son that nasty people must dead. And in this moment, a son knows that his mother does not love him.

There is so much pain and heartache embedded, sometimes hidden and other times in plain view, in these poems, but what truly makes this such a memorable read is Miller's dogged insistence for hope. In "Epilogue," concluding the chapter, "A Short History of Beds We Have Slept in Together," after a string of describing the beds he has shared with his lover, he states:

Let us not repeat the easy lies about eternity
and love. We have fallen out of love

But rather than wallow in the demise of a relationship, he turns it on its head and rejoices how "we are always resurrected/into it".

It is fun, it is heavy, it is frank, it is sarcastic. I am in love with this collection. If you have at least one iota of interest in poetry, you owe it to yourself to pick this up, carve out a few hours to curl around the verses, and introduce yourself to Kei Miller.

[Michael Palkowski · Rating 3 out of 5]

Often quite personal and subtle, with a wide variety of slang and intense metaphor. Noctiphobia uses a type of enjambment that I love in that the layout requires a pause mid phrase, mid thought and allows an extra tinge of imagery to seep into the brain. I wasn't convinced by the title poem or it's development but enjoyed the dated poems encapsulating a moment or place, like a snapshot of life. They are simple and do not attempt to over-impress the reader, it's a genuine expression that many of us can relate to:

"In the small bed that could not fit
our torsos side by side, we fell asleep
in opposite directions and woke
hugging each other's legs, as if to hold them
from all directions that lead away"

From the poem "A Short history of beds we have slept in together"

Other poems are a tinge too preachy even in his subtle voice like "A Creed" which seems to insinuate that anomie is a result of misguided devotion/securalism. The diversity included in the book however is good and is worth skimming through.

[Nicolette Bethel · Rating 4 out of 5]

Loved it, but I'm biased. Contains one of my favourite Kei Miller poems, Noctiphobia.

[Julia · Rating 5 out of 5]

One of the most uplifting and inspiring poetry collections that I have read for a while. The title poem is a joy to read - I have read and re-read it. Fresh, vibrant writing full of energy and life.

[Bee · Rating 5 out of 5]

best poetry I have read and heard in a long time

[Rebecca · Rating 5 out of 5]

Gorgeous, gorgeous, gorgeous. I think I've found a new favourite.

I particularly loved the 'A Short History of Beds We Have Slept in Together' sequence, which is stunning, and the opening/title poem;

'A light song of light is not sung
in the light; what would be the point?
A light song of light swells up in dark
times, in wolf time and knife time,
in knuckle and blood times; it hums
a small tune in daytime, but saves
its full voice for the midnight.'

That right there could not be more timely and lovely than it is right now.

I could quote endlessly, but I won't. Go read for yourselves.