stormtroopers – a simple man

The Awakening

Palpable was the excitement of going to see Star Wars Epsiode I: The Phantom Menace in the spring of 1999. I distinctly remember riding in the back seat of my father’s car, driving along the highway towards our local theater. I remember sitting on the end seat, next to him, and my brother on the other side of my father as the lights of the theater dimmed and the opening crawl floated up the screen. Despite my high excitement, disappointment followed. I was twelve years old then, and had grown up watching the original Star Wars trilogy so many times that my first experience with Star Wars had long been forgotten. It seems I had always loved watching Star Wars.

It is now nearly the end of 2015, and with it a new era has been born. Unless you’ve been hiding out on Dagobah with a broken holonet receiver, you know that the sequel trilogy has been launched with Star Wars Episode VII: The Force Awakens. I’ve seen it twice now, once in regular old two dimensions, and once in IMAX 3D. If you want to stop reading now to avoid spoilers on the story, I will simply say this: it was better than the prequels and a true Star Wars film full of the space adventure and fantasy we’ve come to love from that galaxy far, far away…

What has made the Star Wars universe great and has allowed it to endure for generations are the iconic, memorable characters. From the beginning of The Force Awakens, we receive terrific new characters that I believe will live on in the zeitgeist of the world consciousness just as have the original characters from the original Star Wars.

Right away we are introduced to the first non-human character that will drive a large portion of the film as a Macguffin and that is the orange and white ball droid BB-8. Early on in the marketing and releases about The Force Awakens we saw BB-8 and I must admit I was less than impressed. I thought the robot was overly cute, and was attached to my nostalgia for R2-D2 and C-3P0. But from those first few moments on screen, BB-8 captured my attention in exactly the same way Artoo and Threepio did in the beginning of Star Wars. Moments later we meet Po Dameron, the heroic and dashing X-wing pilot and Kylo Ren, the angry, yet strangely compelling new Dark Lord. At this point, I got caught up in the story and the film, and wondered where these characters would take me. Again, early on, as these characters were revealed, I thought that Kylo Ren in particular was trying too hard to be the new Darth Vader, but seeing him on the big screen, as the story unfolded, I saw an angry, hurting young man trying desperately to live up to a legacy he admired, albeit for all the wrong reasons. As the film progressed we were introduced to the main characters, Rey and Finn the defecting stormtrooper. Rey is a simple human living in the literal shadow of a decades old galactic war, scavenging for survival and awaiting her future. Finn is rejecting the only life he has ever known and seeking a way to freedom. Both meet up, and the adventure really gets going as they steal a familiar piece of space garbage and outrace the new Empire: the First Order. Reintroducing the Millennium Falcon and previous owners Han Solo and Chewbacca was less a slavish devotion to past glories, but an acknowledgement of the age of the universe and the passage of time. Things move on from our lives and sometimes old friends return in unexpected ways. Later we meet Leia Organa, less princess and more general, and even she feels like a totally new character. She is no longer young and feisty, but now strong and resolute with the burning fervor of conviction and experience. I loved the thousand year old Maz and her little cantina on a backwater world, her unexpected wisdom and yet shadowy side as someone who hung out with the dregs and downcast. She was the dark mirror to Yoda, ancient and wise and somehow a young outlaw on the back edge of the galaxy. All of these new characters immediately became as interesting and compelling to me as the droid duo, Luke Skywalker, Ben Kenobi and Yoda, and Han Solo from Star Wars. I desperately wanted to know their stories and follow them on their adventures.

Secondly, the locations hearkened back, in a good way, to the the original trilogy. There was the desolate desert world of Jakku, the ice planet/superweapon of Starkiller Base, the forest world of Takodana, all mirroring Tatooine, Hoth, and Endor. This became a theme to the Force Awakens: revealing the new through the lens of the old. There was the Millennium Falcon given new life as the fastest hunk of junk in the galaxy racing along the Jakku dunes and derelict Star Destroyers and the new planet destroying super weapon. Far from drudgingly repeating the past, the new Star Wars gave me quick tutorial in what I already loved, setting me up for something that I will never have imagined in Episodes VIII and IX.

Thirdly, there was plenty of new twists and further revelations of the galaxy far, far away, which is far more vast and old and lived in than I imagined. I loved the brief introduction to other smugglers and outlaws aboard Han’s new freighter, the rathtar beasts Han was transporting, again, hearkening back to Jabba’s den of despicable denizens and the rancor which lurked below. I loved the X-wing/TIE fighter battles, the exchanges of blaster fire, the familiar yet new First Order risen from the ashes of the Empire, Jedi mind tricks, and unexpected stormtrooper humor, no longer clones but real people fighting for a cause they believe in.

I thought the acting in this film was superb, and that is what ultimately won me over to the classic nature of the new Star Wars. Harrison Ford, Daisy Ridley, John Boyega, Adam Driver all did fantastic work in breathing into their characters the breath of life. I believed all of them. But the real surprise was the reveal of Luke Skywalker at the end. Mark Hamill communicated so much without saying a single word that I was totally blown away. The shot lingered on his face as he turned to see Rey and what her outstretched arm held and I saw sorrow, pain, recognition, remembrance, resolution and so many more emotions in his eyes. He realized the fullness of what his failure to train Ben Solo had wrought on the galaxy, he acknowledged what his absence fostered in current events, he recognized his lightsaber, and with it the pain of his failure and loss against Darth Vader so long ago, and he made the choice to no longer look to the past but to rejoin the present in hope of a better future with Rey and the Resistance.

Finally, the death of Han Solo, which I completely expected to happen given Harrison Ford’s complicated relationship with the character, was still shocking and emotionally gutting. Here was everything that was awesome, funny, and beloved about the original trilogy being brutally murdered by its own offspring, the sequel trilogy, and the message was clear: despite the winks, the references, and the familiar, this is not your father’s Star Wars anymore. This is a new beast altogether and in the future, nothing is certain. Here the brilliance of Lawrence Kasdan’s writing and JJ Abrams’ direction was shown in full: this was the narrative being constructed below the cool space story above.

I know I just said finally, but I must shoutout to the stellar John Williams and his amazing score. If the special effects and characters are the body of Star Wars, Williams’ music is the soul. One of the greatest composers of our time, Williams brings the best of his genius to underscore every beat of the Force Awakens and I will enjoy his new music just as much as I have loved the original soundtracks.

The Force Awakens is not without it’s flaws, but for every seeming plot hole or convenient occurrence, I am reminded of similar aspects to the films I love: Star Wars, the Empire Strikes Back, and Return of the Jedi. The original trilogy succeeded on the spectacle, heroics, and characters we loved, not from perfect plotting or consistently complete logic. Star Wars is a space opera, a grand fantasy adventure among the stars, and should be loved as such.

(Repetitive) Poetry

I sojourned down to Barnes & Noble for my weekly poetry meet up with Stephen Fry (oh how I wish I could actually meet up with Fry to write poetry!). It was a cool, crisp fall morning, just perfect in every way.

Today’s poetry is a continuance of the rigid forms I have been exploring, with repetitions and rhyme schemes and convoluted processes. It sounds burdensome, but when you get into writing within the form, it can be quite fun to see the poem unfold. Today I have two (one is quite long, which is why I only have two): the sestina and the pantoum which my spell check wants to correct into phantom. Anyway, the sestina repeats ending words in a specific pattern at length followed by a three line Envoi that includes all six ending words in a set pattern. There is no official metre, though I have chosen iambic trimeter for my sestina. There isn’t a rhyme scheme, other than the way repeating words might be said to rhyme. As given to me by my friend Bobby Callaway, the theme of my sestina was “double” whatever that may mean to me.

Double

I wash my face and stare
into the frosty mirror.
What I see there scares me,
or is it me I see?
It could be him that looks
at me from out that glass.

I wipe and clean the glass
and start to climb the stairs.
From each picture a look
at me as if a mirror.
Each one is tossed, a sea
of thoughts churning in me.

I want to know: who’s me?
My soul’s fragile, like glass.
The cracks that form, I see,
I lose my gaze, I stare:
each one a hundred mirrors.
I am compelled to look.

Within each crack, a look,
a gaze, another me.
Each one another mirror.
Am I hollow as glass?
Do they, at me, all stare?
All this I can’t un-see.

But now that this I’ve seen,
I’ll take another look.
With new purpose I stare
into the eyes of each me
and find, as clear as glass,
the clear answer in’th mirror.

I’m me and him, mirrored,
each self that I have seen
in every single glass
a different side, new looks
at the same old, same me
at whom each day I stare.

Envoi

Into the mirror I look
And now just see just me
into the glass I stare.

So there you have it: a sestina. By nature, a long poem as it takes time to work through all the ways the end words may be jumbled. It can continue indefinitely, but with each sixth paragraph it starts to repeat the way the lines end.

Onto the next, the pantoum. The pantoum has an endless number of four line stanzas, each line composed of 8 syllables, and ending with a rhyme scheme of ABAB BABA etc. At least, it should rhyme, but it doesn’t have to. Additionally, starting after the first stanza, the second and fourth lines of each stanza are repeated as the first and third lines of the next stanza until the poem ends, in which case the first and third lines of the first stanza become the second and fourth lines of the last stanza. The explanation will perhaps be clearer with my example. The repetition and rhyme often lends itself to solemn themes, so I have chose the Battle of Hoth, from Star Wars: the Empire Strikes Back as my theme.

Invasion: Hoth

It’s a cold, snowy day on Hoth
The battle lines are drawn in snow.
Lord Darth Vader, all black and goth:
fear in the hearts of rebels grows.

The battle lines are drawn in snow,
The Imperials cut a swath.
Fear in the hearts of rebels grows
of troopers, white visigoths.

The Imperials cut a swath
Vader at their head, a black crow,
and troopers, white visigoths,
rebel blood in red icicles flows.

Vader at their head, a black crow,
Lord Darth Vader, all black and goth,
Rebel blood in red icicles flows:
it’s a cold, snowy day on Hoth.

This pantoum is fun, a bit like a villanelle, but to my mind and poetical sensibilities, a bit easier to pull off.

I hope you have enjoyed this week’s poetical musings, with all their repetitions and fun-ness. I certainly have. Until next week, then…

An Ode to Odes

It was cold and rainy as I made my weekly trek to Barnes and Noble, a perfect fall day. On the trees the leaves were changing and in the air there was a crispness. I felt juvenated and alive. I sat down at a large table in the back of B&N and took out my copy of the Ode Less Traveled and began to read and write.

Today’s forms included the many types of odes. These days an ode can refer to any kind of poetry, but there are specific forms that are “proper” odes. Among those I attempted the sapphic ode, the pindaric ode, and the horation ode. A sapphic ode is usually written with three stanzas, and each stanza is composed of four lines, three of iambic tetrameter and one of iambic dimeter. I say usually because there are many variations possible within the form, but as described is the classic form.

An Ode to Stormtrooper Armor

All gleaming white, the armor stands,
the black insidious eyes do stare.
It clothes the Empire’s ruthless bands;
should just be bare.

It takes a hit, a hole appears;
the soldier dies, a flash of light
upon the chest: what poor career
the choice, a blight.

Why wear the armor bright? It yields
no benefit. The man beneath
just groans and dies. Bury him in fields
of green, the heath.

A pindaric ode is written in three stanzas. Each has a function, and while overall the meter is variable, each stanza must be composed identically in form. I chose to write each stanza with four lines of iambic dimiter, trimeter, tetrameter, and pentameter in ascending order. This ode need not rhyme. Actually, no odes need to rhyme as odes are originally a Roman thing, and there isn’t much rhyme outside of English.

An Ode to Stormtroopers

Strophe (Turn)

All hail!
the brave, the few, the true,
an Empire’s legion: stormtroopers.
They fight and die to win the Empire’s day.

Antistrophe (Counter Turn)

But they
cannot take aim or shoot
a straight and forward beam of light
at their targets, through “crack” and “best” they be.

Epode (the Stand)

Perhaps:
secret rebel dreams hold
behind their masks of white and black
to let the heroes live to fight back.

Then there is the Horation ode, which is much like the pindaric ode where the prevailing method of the form is that it remain consistent to each stanza. I chose three lines of iambic trimeter and one line of iambic pentameter. Just because.

An Ode to Barnes & Noble

I love thy smell of books
and coffee commingled in’th’ air
I love thy stacks and rows
of history, humor

of toys and games and Nook
the digital book for all
and desks at which to sit
to read and write a poem

There are a few other odes, some proper, some not, but due to the variability and required subject matter, I skipped them.

Lastly I moved to other forms and attempted a villanelle, which is a fun, favorite form that I love to try. A villanelle has no set meter, but does have a set rhyme scheme in which certain lines repeat. Usually it is A1BA2, ABA1, ABA2, ABA1, ABA2, ABA1A2.

An Villanelle Ode to Baseball

Baseball is a many pleasured thing:
the ball that buzzes, the bat that cracks;
it starts after the anthem rings.

Pitcher fires the ball, batter takes a swing,
he hits a double with a mighty thwack!
Baseball is a many pleasured thing.

The runner’s picked off, a sneaky sting.
He jogs to the dugout, bent back.
It starts after the anthem rings.

The submariner a curveball slings,
the batter whiffs, the ball glove smacks.
Baseball is a many pleasured thing.

The centre fielder to the wall springs,
he leaps and makes the catch at the track:
it starts after the anthem rings.

It all can change with just a swing,
a swift strike or a homer bat crack,
baseball is a many pleasured thing:
it starts after the anthem rings.

As usual, I claim no greatness or mastery, unless it be of fun and adherence to form. I do my best to enjoy the process of writing and sharing poetry, and leave greatness to the eventual tinkering and adjusting that is editing and the time that is the measure of all things. I only hope you enjoy reading my poems as much as I enjoy sharing them.