May 24, 2005

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  This is a REPOST of an entry from Friday Oct. 8th, 2004, with ADDITIONS and DELETIONS. I am "upgrading" the INTRODUCTIONS page to the ElectricPoetry website, which contains my "complete works". Previously, three of the eight introductions had been transcribed. I transcribed two more from handwritten pages to the internet over the weekend. The first Introduction previously posted on the WhenWordsCollide entry is here but since I will post another entry with two more introductions written before the 1982 introduction, I have deleted that one from this post.  I also posted the already transcribed Introductions on my ElectricPoetry Group, in three posts, so members of the group who also read my blog might have already read this complete post. Well, enough with the introduction to "THE INTRODUCTIONS" MFN 5/24/05
  

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  The photo above shows both the 1972 and the 1980 editions of "The Collected Works of Michael F. Nyiri." These are the actual "Poetry Books" I have kept since I began writing at the age of 14. I have two more "volumes" from 1984 and 1995. All the poetry on the ElectricPoetry website originated here in these volumes. Some of the work was typed, but most is handwritten. Beginning in 1972, when I typed most of the poetry from 1967 to 1972 on my trusty old Underwood, and closed the rings on the first binder, I wrote the first of eight "introductions" to the work. MFN 10/08/04  (EDIT 5/24/05) I am transcribing the Introductions that have not yet made it to the internet. If anything, this serves as "one man's reasons" for writing poetry about life throughout life, or "why I write Poetry" Some have been online for a while now, but the 1974 essay "Poetry: The Lifeblood of My Humanity.", the 1977 essay: "Poetry: A Reality to Offset the Craziness", and the 1980 Introduction to the complete works (when one volume became two) are presented here for the first time.
  

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  The 1972 Introduction to The Poetry of Michael F. Nyiri
  Poetry, A Loosely Constructed Essay

  
  

  Written by MIchael F. Nyiri at 19 years of age in 1972.

  
  

  When two people meet, they notice only that outer covering called the "skin" and only a "pinch" of personality. They fail to realize that the one standing across from them is not a walking doll, but a human being with fears, hopes, achievements, and failures, a paradox on two legs, a ,map of life. We so seldom think of others, we say we do, but we feel sorry for ourselves even more so. The casual passerby who asks for the time is as much  a person as we are, yet we fail to realize this. He has porobably fallen in and out of love, witnessed tragedy, and pulled through an accident barely alive also.

  
  

  The poet accomplishes two things in this world of people. He writes about himself and others. Writing about life is difficult, but it forces others to realize people are "here', they are living, they are alive.

  
  

  No poet is perfect. They all try very hard, though. A poem is a thought or an emotion, expressed through the eyes of the poet. Some poems are written in a month, a year, others in a moment. Poems diagram a small bit of life. Each poem is a heartbeat on an oscilliscope. Each poem is  a small part of a great whole.

  
  

  The poet can only be biased. He can't help it. Even though he may try, he only "knows" himself. He only tries to write about others, and the poem only proclaims what he thought at the time he wrote it.

  
  

  This collection spans a few years. When the poet is extremely young, he hardly knows his own feelings. The poems are merely versed stories, most with no content other than entertainment.

  
  

  The poems grow in insight with time. Some are bad only because they are not understood. No poem is really good if it tries to imitate a moment in life. The poet is extremely fortunate if people understand what he feebly attempts to say.

  
  

  A poem may or may not rhyme, it may or may not have punctuation, or strict meters. What it does have is one feeling or thought, one bit of mind of the poet.

  
  

  A poem is only a group of words. They may be constructed in any number of ways, but they only try ot convey, to communicate with others one facet of life.

  
  

  Whether they succeed is up to life itself.

  
  

  MFN 1972

  
  

  
  

  
  

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  The 1974 Introduction to The Poetry of Michael F. Nyiri
  "Poetry: The Lifeblood of My Humanity"

  
  

  As I look back upon this volume and ponder, I find my best period by far was the year 1971. Apt that it should be the last phase of a particular part of my life and the beginning of a somber, more personal outlook. Some people can muse all they want about how three years can change someone, and I believe wholeheartedly that my whole concept of reality now is somewhat more complicated than it was in 1971, although outwardly and inwardly I find this change more stupefying than it need be. Three years in one's life are hardly a large slice of the pie.

  
  

  I choose 1971 as the good year because it is then that the poet discovers truth in poetry and forsakes the earlier, more absurd balladic form found in much of the poetry of 68-70. The poem which still evokes for me a kind of satisfaction of the art is "Like Ships That Pass Etc." and I still feel sad everytime I think about that "essence". The poems in 71 are the start of directions which take me, sometimes too rapidly, to the present. In order to keep to a time scale so that study is more fulfilling in discovering the poet, let me look at each "series" or "groupings" of poetical thought in 1971, and then follow them to their inevitable end.

  
  

  Before I undertake that task, however, let me assert my expressions of my own poetical behavior. In 1972, when I wrote "Poetry - A Loosely Constructed Essay", I had just stepped into this crazy world rom the sanctity of "highschool". Highschool images, which will forever haunt my poetry (cf. "Class of 71", "Reunion", "Portrait of the Majorette", "To My Sister", "Ode to Friendship", "Morning After", etc.can be directly juxtaposed to the real world images which so clearly bothered me when I wrote "Who ever said that people are indifferent. : The aren't : To themselves." ("Meditations XIII", 1972) and poems like "Title Tune" and "Untitled IV".

  
  

  Poems came quickly in 1971, but as my life slowly changed, my poetry came out more slowly. I wrote "A month, which promised so much last month : Is past " ("Reflections on a Month Gone By" 1972)

  
  

  I became disillusioned with the entire tautology of being. My religious poems increased in number as 1973 dawned. ("Thanksgiving Prayer") I fell in and out of love (again) and rushed headlong into the state of mind I have now with the help from many outside and inside forces. Poems came seldom and there have been long periods of time when I have not been able to write at all. (as when my father recently died) I find now that I am less poetical, and can take life a little more granted, but then again, I find myself turning toward pen and paper oftener and oftener to ask the same fundamental questions.

  
  

  As I look over those many poems of 1971, I can find many "roots" to future directions, which in 1974, seem to channel into one mainstream thought, to what purpose is my life, if after so many revelations in my oh so short existence, I find I still "so flatly exist" to so many people.

  
  

  "Premonition" in 1971 stated a basic fact which I still believe - which in fact has spawned the basis of each "love" poem - that is if we think about our emotions - we cloud the very essence of the emotions themselves. "Thoughts in the Cubicle", like "Martyred" and "Escape", and then in the sequence, "Failing to Bridge the Gap" have in them my essences of social protest, which began an early part of my thought processes, but which sort of dead ended, although certain poems do pop up occasionally including "91770 Express", "Impetus" and "My Hometown".

  
  

  My themes certainly are numerous, but in order to clarify how my mind runs through 1971 to the present, let me present one thematic concept and it's changes.

  
  

  In 1971, with "Ballad of a Razor Blade" and in 1972, with "Couldn't Help It" I elaborated my suicide complex poetry, which wracked my thoughts almost completely after two very unsuccessful attempts at love. The suicide poems could be traced to portraits such as "Smith" and "Lover's Little Stranger" in 1971, because "Lover's Little Stranger" does have a bit of the poet in him - and of course the last line "Not much more can Stranger take" closely parallels some of my stronger feelings at the time.

  
  

  The dejected feeling expressed in "Depression II", which is only a thematic reproduction of my first poem, "A Chlorophyll Filled Death", was written in one of my truly depressionistic periods of 1971, but that took root in the later, more sophisticated poetry of "Couldn't Help It" where the suicidal thought reaches culmination in accident. The account inspired by "Couldn't Help It" later appeared again in the more ambitious "Thanatopsis" (4-73) "a year later speeding home on the freeway : All of a sudden "where is home?" ("Thanatopsis")

  
  

  Both "Thanatopsis" and "Ballad of a Razor Blade" are not the poet's suicide thoughts in essence, though "Razor Blade" is the projection of a girl I knew in high school, and a vision of what I believed her death might be. (The same girl is the subject of "Wings of Dust", appears in "Rosencrantz is Battling the Dusk" and is also the subject of "Last Time I'll Think About Her, I'll Bet")

  
  

  "Thanatopsis" is the lamentation for a girl I happened to meet last year through my brother. The poem helps me to release some of my thoughts and actually only gives the subject some 17 lines.

  
  

  In "The Morning After" (12-72) I use the imagery of "waiting for Act III" which I still doubt is a suicidal expression , although it could be. Sometimes the poetry comes out of me and I don't know exactly what it means.

  
  

  With the poem "Nothing", early in 1973, I changed my views somewhat, although "Thanatopsis" was written sometime afterward. With "Nothing" my "poetic ramblings" reflected for the first time my mother's illness, which is interesting to note, because since my family's misfortune, the suicide poetic thought in me diminishes. It is treated lightly in an untitled poem written 2-12-73 which begins, "I laughed I floored the pedal..." This means I had found myself somewhat. ("Thanatopsis" was written for the benefit of it's subject, but unfortunately she never read it.)

  
  

  My middle poetry of 1973 concerns two "love" affairs, one in deed and one in thought, they were never really unrequited enough to cause an inspired suicide rambling which by this time had been pegged by the poet as a mere theme and nothing to worry about.

  
  

  The suicide feeling disappeared somewhat when I wrote, in "No Meter" (1-10-74) "Don't know about tomorrow, but I'll fight it today." ("No Meter")

  
  

  It is apparent that the poetic mind is changing when "home" as a suicidal image, turns into the maternal home in "Coming Home", one of the few poems written directly before my father's death.

  
  

  In the second movement of the poem, my questions are asked directly -and then, as a conclusion I proclaim "I shall know how it is to feel : My existense someday" ("Coming Home")

  
  

  Poetically, I am still there, and after my father's death, he is not mentioned. In fact, to come back to my recent poetry, this past September, I am analyzing present relationships again - but what is interesting is that now I'm having more trouble expressing myself, and also, I want to say more.

  
  

  Of course I deal with other poetical themes which were instituted in 1971 then developed. For instance, my spiritual poetry very much developed in 1973-74 with "Four Walls" and "God Proved Himself to Me", "Poem for the New Year" and "The Religions"

  
  

  Now, however, I find my themes clashing and mixing with each other and poems prove difficult to appear. I even deal with our inability to communicate in the "What are Words But A Hindrance to Communication" essays.

  
  

  So now my directions are channeling into one theme. "Where am I in the scheme of things, and how do I reslove my position". From there, I know I will find new, however few, ideas for directions in 1975.

  
  

  I can see myself lecturing, as usual, and holding poetic discussions, and letting my closest friends read my volume (or as I call it , my life thoughts on paper) but I still cannot see publishing as a desired end. I only hope those who read can understand me more - and can realize that these cardboard people they come in contact with everyday are little microcosms of the universe and have probably been through as much or more tha we have too.

  
  

  I really don't know whether I've written this second preface for the people who will read this volume in 1975, or whether I've written it in fact for myself, because I can see future thoughts brewing, and I do want ever so much to write about everything I experience. How else can this volume express my complete being.

  
  

  I've been tortured this past year with the facts I've been confronted with in the Book of Revelation in the Bible, and I can see myself comiling a "Paradise Lost" of my own, but then I remember in 1970 when I wanted to write my own Biblical interpretation.

  
  

  I never know what to expect in life, and I'm ever so confused about whether or not I'm ever going to find a release for my "passionate" feelings, rather than the pen and paper - but as Shelley believed, we are all striving for perfection, and the only alternative is death and what's beyond it.

  
  

  I'm looking forward to my own poetical revelations in the coming years.

  
  

  Michael F. Nyiri October, 1974

  
  

  
  

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  The 1977 Introduction to The Poetry of Michael F. Nyiri
  "Poetry: A Reality to Offset the Craziness"

  
  

  As I sit down and begin to annotate this lexicon by adding yet another introduction. (We have to keep these things up to date, you know.) I'm tempted to use a large amount of old cliiches, then close the book and return it to the cupboard, where it can gather dust until next year, when I write three more poems to include.

  
  

  Sadly, though, I can think of only one apt cliche, and that is "Here we go again" because cynically, as I notice I've written merely seven poems so far this year, I can only laugh and hope I can "really" sit down and "produce" this year. God knows. I've got many themes to elaborate, and if I don't elaborateI simply won't ever get out of the same thematic rut.
  Well, then. "Here we go again".

  
  

  The very last poem I wrote in 1976 (out of a whopping twenty for the year) was titled, ironically enough, "The Poetry Returns". If I continue this trend, I will seem to suffer only a couple a year, and I know they will be inferior. The only way I will return to my loquatiousness in the art is to practice, write down every thought in my head, as I used to. God knows I'll really try.
  If I don't try, then I'll lapse into a cynicism about my poetry, and if this happens, I can't guess what will happen to my own perception. As it stands, my poetry is about the only thing I'm not yet cynical about , and if I can, I will attempt to recreate why I'm cynical in the poetry of the coming year.
  During the past six months, I've been incredibly lonely. Because of no car, and because of no job, I see few people, and they have not given me any cause to write poetry. Oh for a poetic personality like Mike Ford to venture into my life. If not, then I'm sure I will get angry in poetry, and I'd much rather be sensitive.

  
  

  I've discovered two very disconcerting truths. (if they are truths) the past few months. One is that I think true friendship disappears as we get older. I hope this is not the case, and I certainly hope it is not just me. Because if it is, then I do not have a reason for existing. Maybe my trouble stems, as it has in the past, from the fact that I give of myself too much, and nobody else does. However, I think the main trouble is that I'm not "mobile". When we are mobile, we can see who we want at whatever time we want and discuss whatever we want. I find I'm restricted to waiting for whoever happens to drop by here, and then that person may not be the right person to discuss what I want to. What I really need is a girlfriend. Maybe I shouldn't have broken up with Ruth, after all, I haven't found anybody  since who was as understanding of me (male or female) and all the girls I've met haven't lived up to Ruth in my eyes. I really think I punctured that relationship "royal" as we used to say in grade school so long ago.

  
  

  My second observation, I'm sure, stems from the fact that I've been using a lot of drugs and "hanging around" (at least before the past six months) drug users. My vocabulary has diminished, I've forgotten how to correctly express myself, and I find conversations stilted, uninteresting, and unnecessary. And if conversation becomes unnecessary, then of course so does communication, and if we can't communicate, then our world falls apart and we sybolically die. I think this is happening to me and I fear it badly.

  
  

  I'm very glad I haven't had that much time (or money) for drugs these past few months (not that I'd ever again put them down as in high school) because now I think I may become more productive because my mind has been given a chance to work. There is, I truly believe, and I by no means profess myself an expert, only one drug worth taking, and that is LSD. This is a "positive" drug, in that certain "personality planes" can be attained, thereby forcing truth into the open. The drug is two-way, however. One person alone cannot enjoy the experience very much.

  
  

  All other drugs are negative, and tend to confuse people, especially if they are not entirely open with each other or tend to neglect the "reality" of the experience.(or, to reverse that, if they point out the reality to someone who doesn't want it.)

  
  

  I'm convinced that drugs do ot enhance truth or conversations, and are good only in crowds (where two people can find the same reference point and laugh at everybody else.) or alone, when maximum attention can be focused on one thing.

  
  

  To present an example of a two person negativistic drug related experience (at least for me) (everybody is different) I find if I want to concentrate on one thing ("Here, buddy, you'll love this song") and the other person doesn't I'll feel dejected and terrible, and sense (by the stoned BORED expression on the other's face) that he doesn't like the record. If there is conflict of any kind, I feel intensely negativistic and disgusting, and in order to fight my feeling, I become, as one good friend has correctly pointed out, an "a**hole".

  
  

  I know this is beginning to sound like a drug treatise, but then drugs have been very familiar to me, and I'm still trying to figure myself out in their context. Remember, many people in the sixties used drugs in order to "find" themselves. Well, they "found" themselves so much I think, that they tended to "lose" everybody else, and I'm da*n sorry that this happens because, then again, as I've pointed out, we lose our communication.
  Well, as I write, I find I'm trying to find answers as usual, and hopefully I can successfully ask my questions this year in a poetic sense.
  Maybe at some time in the future, someone will read a poem from 1978, and say, as people used to say in 1972, "Yes, I felt that way once". As a poet, that is all I can hope for: that spark of recognition, which makes me realize that even though each living individual is a world of colliding and conflicting thoughts, a galaxy of hopes, dreams, and imagination, a universe of sorrows and interrupted reflections, he or she is related to everyone else by some reference point. We are all part of a universal mind, whether called God or the cosmos. We all touch each other's lives for good or for bad, and by relating mine through the art of poetry, I can only hoe to touch that spark of recognition in another reader.

  
  

  To repeat myself from my first essay, "whether I succeed is up to life itself."

  
  

  Thank you for listening.
  Michael F. Nyiri December 12th, 1977
  "I'll never really know, but I must try
  To separate the truth
  From all the lies"

  
  

  
  

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  The 1980 Introduction to The Poetry of Michael F. Nyiri
  "Introduction to the Two Volume 1980 Edition"

  
  

  This tome comprises thirteen years in the life of the poet. Beginning when he is merely thirteen, the poet attempts the difficult struggle to emote on paper, a task which sometimes proves easy, sometimes proves futile, but nevertheless remains interesting.

  
  

  The poet analyzes his productivity (or lack thereof) in the semi-annual introductions, so this simple introduction to the complete work shall not attempt to do this.

  
  

  Suffice it to say that the poet charts life, however inconsistent, with truth, and, as poets in the past have attempted, to infuse this truth with beauty, and create art.

  
  

  Sometimes he succeeds, and only so if the reader can recognize him or herself, for the poet truly believes that all thought processes are universal, and poets are merely the gifted few who mouth that universality.

  
  

  If the reader can understand, by charting the poet's feelings throughout life, his link, and ultimately, mankind's link with the universal mind, then the poet's purpose has been fulfilled.

  
  

  Each year is sectioned showing the poet's age and some of the year's accomplishments.

  
  

  No poem is ever truly complete....because lfe rarely, if ever, can be called complete.

  
  

  Michael F. Nyiri  3-13-1980 Torrance, CA.

  
  

  
  

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  Still to be transcribed and UPCOMING in a future entry: "Poetry: Why I Cry: (An Introduction to the poetry to be written in 1979 and an epilogue to the poetry of 1978)" which includes the "Cathy Poems"  and "Poetry: Looking for the Fulfillment Exit on the Freeway to Nowhere" from 1980 which was the actual 1980 introduction. The "1980 Introduction" posted above is for the complete two volume "work". For any new readers who might have just stumbled upon this blog, you will actually find the POEMS to which these introductions refer on the ElectricPoetry Website and sprinkled throughout the WhenWordsCollide blog.

  
  

  (STILL TO COME)

  
  

  

  
  

   

  • 8:29 am
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