The Mist of Time. Spectrum Publication, 1976; The Waves. Spectrum Publication, 1988. Victoria (Australia).

There are a dozen years between these two publications, but the mood and style are much the same, although they differ in form. The Waves presents a melange of free verse and prose poems. The latter intrigued me more as it is a rare genre. Prose poem is almost unknown in Australian poetry. I have been reading literary magazines here for half a century and only once came across a prose poem.

In France, the prose poem or verbal genre-painting has a prominent place — Mallarmé, Baudelaire and the sensation Rimbaud’s publication of Les Illuminations caused in Paris in 1886. Therefore, Neeme’s choice of form tells us something about his learning and sophistication as a painter, sculptor, poet and playwright. His subjective experience creates on the pages a new reality that is like a dream and song:

Living, knowing, believing and dying — all this is repeated a thousandfold before my eyes. The sea waves seek truth through self-knowledge and belief. Not only to find, but also to experience the truth.

The Mist of Time has only one short prose poem. Here Neeme lets the free verses flow unrestrained. His cadences are pleasing. His questioning of time and truth are expressed in a mood that has an Oriental acceptance of death and time’s decay.
Pledging allegiance to the mechanized world does not camouflage the mind’s battle against subconscious impulses. The depth of soul must have an outlet for self-expression, otherwise it will wither away like a flower in an autumn wind. Art has a calming influence in Neeme’s poetry where the sea becomes a symbol of eternity:

Oh time, please grant me
this simple delight,
and let me live my life undisturbed
as an incorrigible dreamer
among all images, colours
and feelings.

At times Neeme’s poetry presents an incantatory sonority bestowing a new depth to ordinary fragments of speech.
Both books are classy and elegant, printed on heavy, glossy paper with many illustrations by the author. Reading Neeme’s poetry one has to admit that Estonians have a capacity to be multi-faceted creators.


( The recent passing in Australia of Gunnar Neeme, 1918-2005, artist and poet, one of the few Estonians of his generation who wrote poetry in a language other than his mother tongue, prompted the above as tribute. It also serves to posthumously acquaint with his work.)

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