Poemranker [Replying] Sun May 19 23:59:46 PDT 2024

Replying to a comment on:

Directly in front of me the one I call husband Our eyes meet for one true and necessary instant Then turning away as a stranger does back to his lifeâs recesses Those places I have not been and will never be invited The taut lean torso a silhouette in my doorway The sure hope of his shoulders standing inert

hammer

11-Oct-04/10:26 AM

Dovina, why do you write poetry. The only reason I can think of for writing poetry is to communicate something you think valuable. If you have something valuable to say surely it is important that the reader understands it as it was meant. To suggest that people interpreting it wrongly is a good thing is absurd. Hence my comment about confusion. Who would be the author of confusion?

The most important thing a poet can express in my opinion is an uncertainty or an excitement over a coming together of images. In that sense the reader does not need to know what the poem means as such, rather grasp some kind of imaginary order. The Dylan Thomas poem 'the force that through the green fuse lights the flower' for instance communicates a sexual excitement understood through water on rock, quicksand stirring etc.

As for the poem I believe zodiac's anger is driven by your lack of care. It is full of cliches - eyes meet, true, hope etc and seems unbothered that lines go by without offering anything ('directly in front of me the one I call husband' makes up a whole verse, it could easily make up one or two words, directly in front being redundant as it is presumed the narrator is paying attention).

People make different interpretations of certain poems because the lack of depth allows them to, not because it is a good poem.

Track and Plan your submissions ; Read some Comics ; Get Paid for your Poetry

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