TLRufener
replying on Jealousy's Game by TLRufener
24 Oct 2004, 11:32 AM
The stout man is the lady's ex-lover, whom she left for someone who looks better. He is a representation of how looks can alter choices when it comes to who loves whom.
Clumsy in places, but I thought it was interesting and fairly original. I can't think of many people on this site who'd have the vision to include a tiny, stout, scheming man with a pudgy head in their love poemes, let alone the vision to have him feverishly planning out his revenge on paper. Is he a metaphor for the human condition?
jsp-id=67469
somehow "good" and "upscale" seem contracdictory.
"trapped in a horseshoe" What's that? Thanks.
the blunderbuss line? wtf? The rest is excellent. mock me if you like.
while a few of your points make some kind of sense, this is mostly ill-conceived nonsense unworthy of your time and my response.
Not a bad suggestion on S2, L1.
"Praise sought" is sought by God. That seems to be one of His desires. "Praise uttered," then is a human response. Thanks for your thoughts.
I am a courtly white-haired gentleman who dresses impeccably. You are an uncouth bum.
I've never worn a bra. It sounds wonderful. Both the bar and the bra seem to be located in a good neighborhood.-Upscale-
And then, because you always make me feel kind of furtively generous, here's some real criticism for your poem. It's more and better than you've done for anyone else here in recent memory. That's the whole fucking point. Check out this hook:
1) "with great beauty and wit" is poorly phrased and an innaccurate description of how you'd set up a world. If "with great beauty and wit" is how you'll be acting while you're setting up the world, then beauty seems kind of out of place. If the world is going to have the qualities "great beauty and wit", even before you've made people in it, then wit is out of place. You might consider changing it.
2) "discover all ... quite pleasing and right" is an innappropriate use of discover. You can't or shouldn't, for example, "discover a dog friendly". You might consider changing it.
3) I don't understand why you're not "leav[ing] about" ancient texts, when you just said you'll "show them... how their world was formed" etc. Aren't those pretty close to the same thing? You might consider changing one of them.
4) What are you on about "self-made diseases"? That's all kind of pleasing and nice, but if you're going to believe in a God, you pretty much have to believe He made diseases, too. Oh, right, you're not going to be that kind of God. Well, you might consider changing it so people don't think you're just taking a super-easy way out.
5) In fact, there's no kind of conflict here, except the half-alluded-to one with the real God, which isn't really enough and isn't fair since God can't answer. Besides, almost everybody in the world besides you and me, practically, thinks God IS exactly like this poem. As it is, this poem is just kind of a daydream and fluff. You might consider doing something about it.
6) The places where the rhythm is off make the rest of it - the rhythmed part - seem kind of jumpy and weird. You'd do better to either loosen up the rhythmy parts or tighten up the non-rhythmy ones.
7) Stanzas 2-4 just repeat the same idea, sometimes contradictorily. The last stanza, particularly, doesn't pack very much of a punch, mostly because it's already been said. You might consider adding some more ideas and condensing these to one stanza.
8) Other than an inconsistent rhythm and the big honking central conceit, there's not really a lot of poetic phrasings or devices (like bits of simile, metaphor, alliterative words, or original ways of describing things.) You should consider adding some of these.
9) By the start of the twentyfirst century, this is all kind of old hat. The only part that makes it not old hat is that most twentieth and twentyfirst century writers have figured, probably rightly, that their worlds would have all sorts of problems, too, while you haven't.
10) If you say this isn't criticism because I haven't added some, I don't know, praise-thingy on the end here, well, sorry, that's not my idea of criticism, and I guess I should have a pretty good idea about it by now, shouldn't I? Well, ta-ta!
Yours truly,
zodiac in Karak Islamland
It's easier than -=Dark_Angel=-, P.I. makes it sound. If "insults slammed at poets and poetry ... form no part of the quality of those people or their work," then what difference does it make if someone calls your poem, say, "a Fiat's-rooftop-displayed stool of incoherence"? None, unless you're a giant suck. Personally, I mostly agree with you. And I'd go on to say your typical meaningless dribbles of praise have nothing to do with useful criticism or evaluation, either. But you're not really having any of this 'it doesn't affect my true sense of self worth' stuff anyway. That's the whole fucking point.
Besides, if I said what was horribly wrong with your poetry in an inoffensive way, you'd be forced to find some other reason to disregard my advice or, maybe, have yourself a good cry over it and then find yourself a new way to feel good about yourself like hanging with Goths or being a really great porn star specialised in interracial sodomy. Trust me, it's better for both of us this way.
You're both wrong. Imagine a beautifull statue, 50% of which is smeared in stools. The statue is in a boothe with a microphone connected. Every time someone praises the statue, a robot arm connected to a moist wipe removes 50% of the stools on the statue. Every time someone insults the statue, 50% of the statue that remains unstooled is enstooled. It is easy to see that the amount the piece is insulted or praised is intimately linked to its beauty. Unless you consider the people looking at the work and praising/insulting it, and the microphone, and the stool cannons, as just as much a part of the piece as the statue. In which case you'd need a meta-microphone, and a meta-audience, and a meta-stool cannon and a meta-moist wipe pointed at the audience. Meta-meta-wipes? Fuck off! Either way you fail.
A small suggestion:
S2, L1:
-My creatures shall find everything I've created
Just my own tick really. In response to your piece, I say that:
Faith sought & praise uttered, inevitably conflict; for gods shape is incomplete, recklessly manifested-- burdened with the weight of confused human expression and mis-calculated interpretation. Amen.
Blessed with seven.
Reminds me of my own reflection beheld before unforgiving eyes...
I likes it, loves it, sucks it till achieves limpness.
Blessed with ten.
Indeed.
(cracks whip) then get back in there and "beat" it up, damnit.
lol.
...and then there were none.
Love it!!! Does my " trapped in a horseshoe" do justice?