– holds persistent –
Listen to audio
Another Face
– holds persistent –
Wouldst expect live
From child unclad,
To babbles’ demise
Beyond level of sad,
Save coherent wise
Who appear to add,
Purpose comprised
Of a raison d’être,
Afore another face
Need not be a fête,
In spell given hand
Occupies life space,
Thus, living the race,
That says you’re alive
Best before final date,
Ye so drag to survive
Find delay grave fate,
May not end so brave
When be made to face,
Despite eke of last steps
You will do so with grace,
The while holds persistent
Be too soon for another face!
© Jean-Jacques Fournier
Image - Wikimedia Commons
Music – excerpt of Almost Blue by Chet Baker
Audio - Jean-Jacques Fournier
ov written in Montréal
rewrote in Sweetsburg
November 30, 2022
Poetry on a canapé 
Beyond level of fad – a great description for this face.
>
Now if an encouragingly positive comment from you did not stand In the way of making sense, l would let it ride, but my rather large hands 🙌 hit two letters over typing In letter f instead of s for sad 😢, describing the look for time and years these elements contribute to our Person. I will make the correction. Thanks Paulette, for your help!
>
To me it meant that with aging he no longer had to hide behind the latest fad to fit in – the mask of pretense.
And by the way, with your interpretation of… with aging he no longer had to hide behind the latest fad to fit in – the mask of pretense. Lucky for they who choose to accept nature’s way of letting us know, gradually, that we are not forever, with the physical signs of age thus so. Sorry for the delayed correct reaction…
Faces are remarkable. I just read a fascinating Smithsonian article by Ben Panko (June 6, 2017) about how we recognize faces. My exploration was prompted by your poetry series on faces, Jean-Jacques.
“ Research shows that many people recognize faces even if they forget other key details about a person, like their name or their job.”
https://www.smithsonianmag.com/science-nature/how-does-your-brain-recognize-faces-180963583/
All my life I have instantly recognized a face of interest with one look. It is an uncanny ability I cannot explain. I will give one example only to prove my point. Years ago at Orly airport in Paris l was waiting for a friend to come thru arrivals, while waiting I noticed a very noticeable face came thru that registered on my mind. Four years later in Bermuda at the World Class Sail in, of the large yacht category l was attending a reception and noticed from a distance in the middle of the crowd, the face of that same young woman was there. When I approached her to tell her l’d seen her in Paris four years before and where, she was amazed, with me thinking it was quite normal, but of course it obviously isn’t. Et voila memory recognition is an amazing phenomenon. JEAN-JACQUES
>
I LOVE the anecdote, Jean-Jacques, which is a testament to how you are able to define and describe the beauty of a face.
Thank you Rebecca. I suppose, a memory for faces, is having a finite curiosity for the ultimate details that creates the elements of particular substance, at times even outside its immediate structural composition of a face. As in a specific smile or expression, sufficient to make it unique ( even in twins) and ergo solely memorable. That’s a lot of material for composing, at least in my concept of the language of poetry.