Fiat Camena

Love’s language is hyperbole, but whispered,
sibilant similes and promises sotto voce.
It’s easy to imagine you’ve misheard,

the form and content clash, create this weird
distortion like an echo or a tape delay.
Love’s language is hyperbole, but whispered.

On which do you place emphasis: The words?
Or the breath? The farfetched or the foreplay?
It’s easy to imagine you’ve misheard

when objectivity has disappeared
and your lover is getting further carried away.
Love’s language is hyperbole, but whispered

vows? It’s hard to take him at his word,
or hers: Speak up! Proclaim! you want to say.
It’s easy to imagine you’ve misheard,

hard to admit one sharp as you is stirred.
You need to back off, cool down, act blasé.
Love’s language is hyperbole, but whispered.
It’s easy to imagine you’ve misheard.

– Richard Hoffman

Postscript:

I find poems that use repetition compelling when done well. Some poetic forms encourage or even require this – villanelles, for instance, and sestinas. The two lines that recur are both very powerful and disturbing – ‘Love’s language is hyperbole, but whispered’ and ‘It’s easy to imagine that you’ve misheard’. The poem builds in tension until it winds up with those two lines juxtaposed in a finale of sorts.

You can read a bio of Richard Hoffman here, and take a peek at his website here.

Tagged: love poetry, melancholy, repetend, Richard Hoffman, unsettling, villanelle