Reading Ulysses by the Snotgreen Sea
- write4hire
- Aug 26, 2022
- 2 min read
Reading Ulysses by the Snotgreen Sea
I’ve walked over water to the far rail,
Rodanthe Pier, hoping to see a loggerhead
—and I’m standing there next to Russell,
who I’ve known 43 years but only nods
as he yanks up hard on his rod, pelicans
dive bombing into what a good ol’ boy
on the other side, Chris embroidered
on his hoodie, tells me is a school
of menhaden beneath the rolling green water,
casting his line, yanking it hard like Russell,
smirking through a round forlorn face,
saying sharks keep taking his live bait—
when the swells flatten out and the menhaden
disappear in a sudden suspension of voices,
words, movement, a stillness at loggerheads
with the thick book I’ve left behind on the beach,
681 pages fluttering on an abandoned folding
chair, momentous wordsphrasesallusionsillusions
tumbling into one another between the shiny covers
speaking of hypocrisies in the holy church, eating
breakfast, Sinn Fein, daily gossip, Shakespeare,
lusts, corrupt politicians, agonizing births, senseless
death, gravediggers leaning on shovels—
when a gust of wind lifts me over the rail,
and I float off toward the cirrus horizon,
where Joyce (Joyce?) tosses a ring buoy
off the deck of a schooner, its four masts
falling off the edge of earth as I find myself
floating back to shore on gently rising swells
past the pier, past surfers sitting on their boards,
past children playing in the surf until I roll off
onto sand, skin gritty with the spirit of body,
the corpus, the corpse, lunch, sweat, the private
life between the covers, that endless longing,
all of us trudging, trudging, battle after battle,
meal after meal, breath breath, thrust thrust, this
achingly long story of our journey back home,
wave after wave of words crashing into foam.
—SL, Rodanthe, NC, August 2022
Such good timing -- I uncovered an old Bloomsday clip I wrote inn 2004 and no, I've never read it the book, though I saw the movie. Then, while perusing The Oxford Book of Death, I came upon an example of his work and probable reason why the book is so ... difficult. I'll send along both toot sweet. In the meantime yes, your poem works for me though I remain more admoring of the book than eager to dive in.
The imagery in your third paragraph transported me to an away place (which I could use right now!)
I might now give Ulysses a try again - for the third time.
Words crashing into foam, not unlike the alligator's last meal at the pond. Life rolls stumbles, flies sinks, and slides steadily until we see the life ring in front of us and don't reach out and finally finish the book. Go well L
Good luck friend. Personally, I never managed Ulyses, and, to tell the truth, gave up. There must be things we give up on, for smarter people to understand.
Mihai