You Will Leave a Lacuna…

…And while thy willing soul transpires

Willing! You think me willing?
And that my soul transpires…
T’were nearer the mark to assert
my body glows with rage

At every pore with instant fires,

Blushes at first
when I your base desires
didst early espy but soon
‘twas anger coloured my face

Now let us sport us while we may

Sport you say
with you the hunter
and no doubt I the prey
but you have made me furious

And now, like amorous birds of prey,

I refer you to my previous stanza
furious not amorous
– we or I at least – are not animals
forever chasing food or mating

Rather at once our time devour

You see you even now confuse
the act of mating
with that of eating
but I will not join you at your table

Than languish in his slow-chapped power.

An age at least
would be too long
to tarry in your lascivious presence
in fact I will not waste another hour

Let us roll all our strength and all
Our sweetness up into one ball,

My strength will henceforth
be employed in resisting
your siren call
and enjoying sweet silence
when you are gone

And tear our pleasures with rough strife
Through the iron gates of life

Oh snake I see you now
taking my maidenhood
with rough strife
no thought to later
make me your wife…

Thus, though we cannot make our sun
Stand still, yet we will make him run…

Enough! Begone you tiresome poet
you can’t try your wiles on a Yorkshire girl,
a girl from Hull – and you should know it
and yet…
when you are gone…
you will leave a lacuna…

© Andrew Wilson, 2024

Image generated in Midjourney

We studied the poet Andrew Marvell at school and I suspect that more than one of us callow youths committed the poem “To His Coy Mistress” to heart in case these lines of seduction might someday prove useful in our own future seduction attempts…
Having just watched Bridgerton, Season 3, I was perhaps channelling the feisty women challenging the rather weaker men in reframing this response to lines from the poem.

Written for  Laura Bloomsbury in Meeting the Bar: Critique and Craft over at dVerse Poets Pub, who tonight challenges us to elaborate on a fragment of up to 13 lines from another poem – to “Elaborate Lacunae in the Fragment or Keeping Things Whole

13 thoughts on “You Will Leave a Lacuna…

  • June 14, 2024 at 11:07 pm
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    I work a lot of behind the scenes jobs in community theatre … I am imagining your poem as an epic soliloquy (or would it be a monologue) in any event it would be the highlight of the evening! And deserving of yet another standing “O” … I am all primed for Bridgerton Season 3!! Now, more than ever, Andrew!

    Reply
    • June 16, 2024 at 6:05 am
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      I could extend the poem to encompass the rest of Marvell’s poem but I was restrained, in this case, by Laura’s 13 line rule. Were you familiar with Marvell or this poem in particular, Helen? I never know what poets are taught or familiar in America…

      Reply
  • June 15, 2024 at 9:34 am
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    this is a marvellous Marvel rendition of the coy mistress answering as to how coy she is not!
    “my body glows with rage
    At every pore with instant fires,

    Blushes at first”

    the fact that you kept the language adds to what is already a brilliant blend

    Reply
    • June 16, 2024 at 6:05 am
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      Thank you so much, Laura…

      Reply
  • June 15, 2024 at 8:47 pm
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    Andrew, I like how you turned the poem, and this young man’s attempt to seduce, on its ear. Very nicely done and put a smile on my face. Truth speaks to power here.

    Reply
    • June 16, 2024 at 6:07 am
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      Thank you, Lisa. As I said to Helen, it might be fun to extend this poem to cover the whole of Marvell’s poem.

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      • July 26, 2024 at 4:05 am
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        “and enjoying sweet silence
        when you are gone”

        Rereading it again, and this stands out to me this time. Perhaps it goes along with my first comment.😂

        Reply
  • June 16, 2024 at 3:41 pm
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    I had not heard the original poem, but I smiled hearing the lass answering back. The picture made it even better.

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    • June 17, 2024 at 6:34 am
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      Thanks Björn! I have put a link in to the original now – it is a fine poem despite my mocking it…

      Reply
  • June 23, 2024 at 3:18 pm
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    “we or I at least – are not animals
    forever chasing food or mating”

    Aren’t so many though, in this age of fast everything and instant gratification.

    Reply
    • June 25, 2024 at 5:48 am
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      You’re not wrong Melissa…

      Reply
  • July 10, 2024 at 11:02 pm
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    A most interesting poem. I thought of Dylan Thomas when I read your opening lines. A great take on your Andrew Marvell poem.

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    • July 11, 2024 at 5:21 pm
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      Hi Dwight – thanks it was fun to do, especially with the old language – is this a poem you knew at all? I guess you study quite different poems at school…

      Reply

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