Editor's Note

by Laura Fiorini

excerpt

 

 

... similar ... the persona in Rolf Uher's poem, "Meeting L.C." (276), takes no action to combat his own indifference. The person reads the work of the relatively anonymous "L.C." every night after an initial, obviously enrapturing introduction to this person's writings. In order to have "fullfilled [his] debt of lines every night, " the persona excerts arduous and diligent effort in his pursuit of reading "the seven-thousand words" L.C. wrote. This author, through his written descriptions, teaches the person "about chances of the unbridled nights," the risks involved, and, one may assume, the gratification gained from embracing those chances. However, the persona's inability to take action due to fear of the risks involved surfaces when Uher writes that the persona "took to [his] heart the most courageous" of L.C.'s words: The persona reads and absorbs only the most heroic and inspiring words, still failing to assimilate those words and to translate them into action. His remaining static even after being so inspired by L.C.'s works is a disclosure of the fact that the persona is more comfortable with living vicariously through L.C.'s words than with doing the living himself.

In another vein, while the persona devours all of L.C.' words and allows them to inspire him, he still does not take action either by writing himself or by attempting to live the scenarios presented by L.C. The persona sits and reads

 

between milk and bread

between un-payable French cognac

and the glance from immortal brown eyes

which could fill pages between soft music

and the air from dusty tubes....

 

No creativity emerges in the persona, who may only be able to recognize half-conciously the potential for literary creation. He is wholly unable to create anything in actuality; "the glance from immortal brown eyes" only "could fill pages" [italics mine] - it has the potential to inspire the persona to write but it remains as merely a possible inspiration since the persona cannot shrug off his resignation to his inert life in order to write or to engage in life as an active participant. The persona waits for things to happen to him instead of actively pursuing their fruition. Sitting in

 

rooms in which darkness shines

and in which we wait

for the courageous fullfilling of these words

 

the persona expects that life will simply befall him while he takes no action to make life fulfilling for himself. His inspired interior does nothing to manifest itself in his outer life, leaving him static and unchanged, waiting for life to happen.