At one time, when I thought of the word "ecstasy," I pictured flailing arms, the body and the mind all out of control. I pictured people drunk on the spirit of God or on drugs.
What I did not picture was quiet exuberence. That is how I've come to think of ecstasy in my own life, as a kind of quiet quickening that happens deep within. In reading through an article on James Wright tonight, I ran across the word "ecstasy." Kevin Stein, the author of the article, points out that the origin of the word "ecstasy is from the Greek, meaning "to displace."
Thus, to experience ecstasy is to be somewhere beyond yourself, "to inhabit, if only briefly, an alternate reality." As for my own taste in reading, I cannot pronounce it "good" unless at some point in the reading, the author takes me, if only briefly, to some place beyond myself.
It is an odd feeling, a simultaneous feeling of detachment and union. Sometimes that feeling only lasts a split second--I get an electric jolt or a feeling of effervescence in my blood, And, suddenly, I have entered the author's consciousness, the author's dream.
I experienced this feeling most recently after reading a story written by a student in my fiction workshop, a story about a young girl growing into maturity, recognizing the world's corruptibility. The tension created by the imagery in the story rent my spirit from my body and suddenly, I was somewhere "out there." It was not a "perfect" story, but it woke me up. Although it took me "out there," it also brought me back to myself. (I had been feeling detached, numb, sad lately.) That is what I mean about being displaced ("out there") but at the same time connected, unified with a greater whole, thus being brought back "to myself."
This kind of tension in one's writing, to me, is worth ten thousand times more than any plot.
Wright is one of my favorite poets. I've done an entry on him before. ("The Wright Stuff" 12/13/04)
He lived on the Ohio River and knew a lot about corruptibility. The article quotes copiously from Wright; I've chosen the stanzas that speak to me in the way of tension. The kind of tension that creates ecstasy within me:
In the following lines, we see the tension between sunlight and shadow and how the speaker's shadow is unified with that of the horse:
The white house is silent.
My friends can't hear me yet.
The flicker who lives in the bare tree at the field's edge
Pecks once and is still for a long time.
I stand still in the late afternoon.
My face is turned away from the sun.
A horse grazes in my long shadow.
The author of the article says that in such mystical accounts of Wright's, "animals serve as ambasssadors of an alternate reality." The following lines are among my favorite of Wright's:
We paused among the dark cattails and prayed....
We ate the fish.
There must be something very beautiful in my body.
I am so happy.
To me, the poet is describing a feeling of quiet exhiliration, of ecstasy.
Reading the lines, I feel it, too.
8 comments:
I think you're right. Ecstasty is that quiet, separate place that is both beyond and within.
Happened upon your journal and am enjoying it very much. I felt what you were referring to with Escasty in regards to writing or reading others works and thought to myself, now that is a good word to describe what one feels when one connects with say, Rumi's poetry. And so we get closer and closer to the true meaning of feelings through the words we relate to them in our own minds, or do we? Oh well, at least it helps us understand what we feel. That's the first step anyway. The second is being able to describe those feelings or emotions in words that others can relate to and catch the spirit of what we wish to share. I believe you have done this beautifully.
Marlene-PurelyPoetry
http://journals.aol.com/mkolasa101/PurelyPoetry
I love that feeling. It is something so rare and powerful. You can never forget it once you have experienced it. Sounds like you may have the beginnings of a writer in your class.
Yes indeed...I love a book or story that transports me to another reality. True escapist fiction. The only problem is, when the book is finished, I get depressed. I don't want the story to end.
It's amazing how a few, austere lines can capture the essence of what the author is trying to convey.
I silently told myself to assume the stance of a skeptic and not be too willingly to get swept away by what I'm about to read. But the words swept me away just the same, against my will.
You called it quiet exuberance which is quite accurate. I prefer to call it quiet exhilaration. Amazing how the words of an extraordinary writer have the power to do that.
Aww, theresa, a beautiful soul you have.
V
You said the story "rent my spirit from my body." What an ecstatic experience. Ecstasy is such a powerful experience. I sense it as a great washing over me, physical, mental, emotional, spiritual, of utter joy. There is a peace to it but also something revelatory, that relates to the displacement, I guess. I hadn't thought of it that way before (and I should have - it is ex stasis - and I did study Greek!) That was what I experienced when I attended the exhibition I have just written about in my own journal (on Art), And writing can do that. That run-on sentence at the beginning of Cormac McCarthy's ALL THE PRETTY HORSES describing the coming and going of the train was an example. So it doesn't even have to be a large piece of work.
As for the Wright poems, how utterly perfect. He describes those moments I love, when I just stop. When no-one is aware of me but me. ("My friends can't hear me yet.") Sometimes I stand on the trail in my hikes. I hear the silence, stirred only by breaths of wind, bird calls, and insects humming. I simply "am." Those are the moments of quiet exhilaration.
What a lovely, lovely entry my dear.
Vicky
http://www.livejournal.com/users/vxv789/
What is the opposite of self-absorbed? When a person is totally outside of him/herself, yet mindfully aware, and totally involved in the experience? It seems to me that this is the closest I feel to "ecstasy."
I think I had it when we went to the reading and talk by Tim O’Brien. Recently I wrote in my own journal he seemed to be in an altered state…some state of higher awareness than most of us. The experience altered me, in a positive way. B.
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