Re: a comment on Inbetween Lovers/Blueprint by Ranger	god'swife 71.103.95.188	20-Apr-06/10:11 AM
In my opinion this follows the 'obsession theme' very strongly. Don't worry about following or not following the poem that inspired you; this is your poem. Concentrate on what you want me to understand about this situation. Also I think at this point if you really want to understand the process of poerty writing you need to step away form the glossa format. There are no rules that say you can't write a free verse poem which begins with lines from another's poem that inspires you, or that you can't finish each stanza with one of those inspirational lines. That would elimate some of the stress from editing. If you are willing to give up the glossa idea for now and if you can commit yourself to working on this and nothing else intil it's good, I am willing to concentrate on helping you along the way for as long as it takes. I should not secretly confess like this. 'This' is a pronoun which is used when the writer has already established what the pronoun 'this' is replacing. How am I suppose to know your saying you shouldn't confess in writing? The verb 'writing', or any of its synonyms, is no where to be found. Why can't you say: I should not secretly confess in writing/on paper/with a letter/with my pen etc...? You can't use a pronoun when nowhere can be found the noun which the pronoun is substituting. Love with the lips, you always insisted. This line is completely understandable. Anyone reading it would come up with both the image of talking and/or of kissing/making love. That line needs no further work. But then again you prefer emotions to be audible. Again this line says nothing about the true meaning your trying to represent. there is nothing about her dislike of the strong and silent type. I could only come up with the images of her either wanting to make you wail from heartbreak or her sexually teasing you intil you screamed. And even then I was uncertain about my interpretation. Say what you mean. Conveying the information you want to communicate(in this case, that she doesn't like the silent type) is the first step you need to focus on.
Re: a comment on Lovely Independence by Sunny	Sunny 66.69.36.222	20-Apr-06/9:50 AM
Revision of last vs. in Lovely Independence I am the mouse weary of the fat cat and the child eating cookies in the closet. I tip-toe on your word's current, and my mood changes when the tone of your voice hardens from sap to wood. I agree and forgive-agree and forgive. You love this pattern I have taken on recently. After we fight, you are the comforter that has the power to nurture my bleeding wrists, to untie the sailor's knot driven deep into my insides. The confident one...you are not allayed of the insomnia and the fear of botching it: in purdah and solely stag- my lovely independence.
Re: Tea and Battenburg by Caducus	Caducus 86.141.200.191	20-Apr-06/7:44 AM
a draft at present.
Re: a comment on Inbetween Lovers/Blueprint by Ranger	ecargo 167.219.88.140	20-Apr-06/6:54 AM
If by "ordinary" language you mean simple language--well, to an extent, you're already doing that. And it's WHY you've improved so much in my opinion. Even this poem--yes, there are places where you 'commit acts of poetry' (a capital crime), but much of it is pretty simply stated. Most of the best lines are, anyway: "How many times I have bargained, drunk with God To take this lust - I'll plead again tomorrow." Here's what Louise Gluck, the former Poet Laureate in the U.S., said on the topic of ordinary--well, simple--language. "The axiom is that the mark of poetic intelligence or vocation is passion for language, which is thought to mean delirious response to language’s smallest communicative unit: to the word. The poet is supposed to be the person who can’t get enough of words like "incarnadine." This was not my experience. From the time, at four or five or six, I first started reading poems, first thought of the poets I read as my companions, my predecessors – from the beginning I preferred the simplest vocabulary. What fascinated me were the possibilities of context. What I responded to, on the page, was the way a poem could liberate, by means of a word’s setting, through subtleties of timing, of pacing, that word’s full and surprising range of meaning. It seemed to me that simple language best suited this enterprise; such language, in being generic, is likely to contain the greatest and most dramatic variety of meaning within individual words. I liked scale, but I liked it invisible. I loved those poems that seemed so small on the page but that swelled in the mind; I didn’t like the windy, dwindling kind. Not surprisingly, the sort of sentence I was drawn to, which reflected these tastes and native habit of mind, was paradox, which has the added advantage of nicely rescuing the dogmatic nature from a too moralizing rhetoric." [From Louise Glück, "Education of the Poet," Proofs & Theories: Essays on Poetry (New York: Ecco, 1994) 4-5.] Gluck's not the final word on the topic, obviously--she's talking about her own experience, and certainly there's room for variation and experimentation. But there's something to be said for creating magic from common cloth. The trick to it is making simple, ordinary language seem fresh and your own, and using all the other poetic techniques--meter and the way the words play together--to make it something special. That's something not too many people can pull off, IMO--but it's worth striving for, I think.
Re: a comment on Murder Phoenix Born (meta-villanelle) by Ranger	Ranger 86.137.108.141	20-Apr-06/2:41 AM
Hmm, you might well be right. I'm debating whether 'columnar' or 'columned' would fit better.
Re: a comment on grim task by lmp	Ranger 86.137.108.141	20-Apr-06/2:37 AM
Oh, and 'for what he seeks' would feel better to me. Don't be too concerned about making the rhyming lines conform entirely, as that can limit poetry too much sometimes.
Re: a comment on Inbetween Lovers/Blueprint by Ranger	Ranger 86.137.108.141	20-Apr-06/2:34 AM
Having said all that, however, I should also say that I'm often hesitant to use 'ordinary' language in any more than minimal quantities. Whereas poetry is partly about detailing life it is also about making an impression. It is about being memorable, and ordinary language very rarely does that. Even the passage I took from Blueprint is not ordinary. Whenever I read a poem I think 'could I have written that?' And if the answer is 'Yes, easily', then I get turned off to the poem. I don't want to find poetic writing easy; I want to test myself. And if that means that I test the readers, then great. The trick is to provide an easily-accessible surface story if I've buried a more complex meaning in the language. It will also mean that I improve my own reading of text. It's no good being able to write well if you can't read well, in my opinion. Anyway, these are just general points, I will spend some time looking at how to incorporate your advice into my writing.
Re: a comment on A Bronze Mule by Dovina	Ranger 86.137.108.141	20-Apr-06/2:17 AM
Presumably there's a third rule of three, just to continue the trend. I'd ask how many women you've had, but the impression I've got is that the text box isn't nearly big enough...
Re: The Way of Monsters by MacFrantic	Ranger 86.137.108.141	20-Apr-06/2:12 AM
Some awesome lines - 'quips installing', 'Burning smoke for curls concerning', 'Dismay has clasped a frozen fist' (my favourite of the lot), 'Come now hell or come high fire (not far behind). I assume this is about Vikings invading? If so, 'gears' didn't quite fit. Last line of stanza one was good, and was what first made me think of Vikings - then the drink and the fever. In stanza one I felt that the non-rhmying lines were too slow for the quick, rhymed triplets. And I would have preferred for stanza 2 to follow the same scheme, but I'm not complaining too much.
Re: grim task by lmp	Ranger 86.137.108.141	20-Apr-06/2:04 AM
Nicely written! I'm of the opinion that poems with complex structures require a careful reading, so I shall make a more detailed comment later today when a) I'm more awake and b) I've thought about this more. In the meantime, here are a couple of minor suggestions: 'he cares to say' would bolster the rhythm a little (in my reading, anyway). 'He does awake...' would work better reworded without the 'does'. It brings nothing grammatically. 'he awakes and *insert passage here* to pray', maybe? And a couple more adjectives would have looked good to me. Good, strong rhyme scheme here. I will return later, hopefully with more to say. In the meantime, here is an 8
Re: a comment on Inbetween Lovers/Blueprint by Ranger	Ranger 86.137.108.141	20-Apr-06/1:55 AM
And, of course, thank you for reading and making suggestions. You're right, I do want to improve. And I honestly think I can. That's why I came back.
Re: a comment on Inbetween Lovers/Blueprint by Ranger	Ranger 86.137.108.141	20-Apr-06/1:54 AM
Righto, well I gave the connecting theme in my reply above. I'll now explain each stanza. 1) 'Scene-setting'. This is something that the protagonist is dying for her to know, but doesn't dare say it. Silence and invisibility = the old cliche that you never sense what you have until it's not there. Pain killer = the way in which the protagonist is always there afterwards to 'pick up the pieces'. Foreign sun = moon = one night stands/short term relationships (which will inevitably hurt the protagonist as well). 2) He is talking about, essentially, boredom and loneliness when she's away on her jaunts. 'Dream wife I've glimpsed in print' is one hundred percent reality, hence the reference to ALChemy's poem. 3) Despite enjoying brief flings, she also wants that apparently universal desire of women (according to Hollywood, at least) - the knight in shining armour, while all along there's the protagonist right next to her. 4) Continuation of stanza 3, seeing each new lover (the current), and giving in to the knowledge that confessing all this won't do any good whatsoever. It's a monstrously cliched story, but I've tried to practise what I preach and make it original. It'd be quite nice to create new cliches.
Re: a comment on Inbetween Lovers/Blueprint by Ranger	Ranger 86.137.108.141	20-Apr-06/1:37 AM
Okay, let's see if I can clarify the meanings in here, and then I'll set about looking at editing this one. I think (having read your comments) in hindsight, that this is more abstract than I first thought it to be. The fact that it doesn't wholly follow the 'obsession' theme of Blueprint might not help my cause here, but I didn't want to just do a rewrite of your work, I wanted to add something to it. The first three lines gave me a headache. 'I should not secretly confess like this [in writing, hidden away]/Love with the lips, you always insisted [open, honest speech and kissing]/But then again, you prefer emotions to be audible [no good being the 'strong and silent' type]. I guess I am going to have to rework this although getting round the structural constraints is going to be tough. After that - yes it does deviate. I thought I could get away with it through the 'silent I' play to connect the two sections, but maybe it didn't work. 'Invisible wings' is actually pretty vital to the piece. I haven't included any filler in this, every line is relevant. I just need to make it a whole lot clearer. Maybe I should title it something like 'The Best Friend's Complaint'. Because that is the idea behind this. It's the traditional tale of 'her best friend being madly in love with her'. Hence the last two or three lines of each stanza, and the storm passage which you picked up on in your next post.
Re: a comment on Inbetween Lovers/Blueprint by Ranger	god'swife 71.103.98.44	19-Apr-06/11:30 PM
I have come up with some incredibly well put together sentences that I had to just throw away because they obscured the point I was trying to express. And guess what, they're often my favorite lines at the beginning. I try and try and try to find a place for them but they just don't fit. Anyway the point is- this poem says a lot about nothing. I know that you are trying to express something inspired, and without inspiration buddy, you might as well pack up and leave,so that means you are driven, but you need to use some of the frankness of ordinary speech. you do just that with "then you tell me I'm the only one who protects you through every storm and you reduce me just a little more". That's just fucking beautiful. It's not only what you say here, but how you say it, which gives this image the reality it needs to be understood. Any human being could imagine themselves thinking that thought. And for some you will have put into words feelings they had but could not express. That's poetry my friend. It's not a bunch of fancypants on a catwalk. It's engaging the audience and holding them all the way to the end of your poem. And that last line, that crucial line, must either hit them right in the gut or make them see cleary for a moment the loveliness and wonder of the world. not in one of these stanzas can I make the connection between what's written before hand and what's written in the last line. Is there suppose to be a relationship there? The heart is in the right place but this poem is hokie overall and that's a real shame because there are so many exquisite lines contained within it. Keep plugging away.
Re: a comment on Inbetween Lovers/Blueprint by Ranger	god'swife 71.103.98.44	19-Apr-06/11:30 PM
I should not secretly confess like this Love with the lips, you always insisted But then again, you prefer emotions to be audible This is very diffucult to understand on first read. The lack of a period at the end of the first line you wrote along with the comma between -...lips, and you always insisted- confuses what your trying to communicate. There should be a period at the end of line 1(when I refer to line numbers I'm not counting the first quantrain). the first piece of information, that you shouldn't confess, ends there. What she says is related but it is a seperate image. Then you reconsider how 'she' might like your confession, but alas, you don't confess, in fact you become silent and then the next 3 words tell us you have wings and then they're wrapped around 'her'. I am not saying you can't display many images in a small quantity of words. What i am saying is that here, without periods, pauses or sustained images the reader is sopreoccupied with trying to follow your train of thought that they can't relate to the poem. A reader can only be moved by art that strikes a cord in them. If they haven't experienced what you're discribing, then your discription should make them feel that they can imagine what it must. Ultimately you're trying to convey human existence, not some fabulous display of words and images, all poets are born with the ability to do that. The craft of writing is the ability to take an insight or emotion and express it, not only with style, but above all, the writer must do it with all sincerity. Say only the things that help your point get across. Everything else must go.
Re: a comment on Inbetween Lovers/Blueprint by Ranger	god'swife 71.103.98.44	19-Apr-06/11:27 PM
There are some good strong lines and images. 'ever the silent', 'drunk with god', 'bring me the dream wife I've glimpsed in print', 'I admit my favourite shade is jealous', 'and you reduce me just a little more'. I understand this has a certain structure that must be abided by and I know structure has much to do with choices, but the only way I can possibly critique this is simply as a poem, so bear with me if I make suggestions which go against the structure. My assumption, due to your ability to create images and sounds, is that you sincerely want to improve. Anne Sexton once said about her teacher at Boston university, the poet Robert Lowell, that "He works with a cold chisel with no more mercy than a dentist. He gets out the decay. He didn't teach me what to put into a poem but what to leave out." I have always been good at getting precisely to the point. I'm no Robert Lowel that's for certain, but many people have used me as an editor for every kind of writing from business letters to love letters. I don't know how much good I will do you, but- I know I can't do you harm.
Re: a comment on A Bronze Mule by Dovina	Dovina 12.72.36.128	19-Apr-06/8:51 PM
Once upon a time, there was a woman who had a man; and she was his one-and-only. He catered to her desires and placed her likeness on a pedestal in the public square of his life. Then along came wicked glamour-warriors, encroachers upon her man. He, finding some of them lovely, made pedestals for them also, and had bronze statues of then crafted and placed in his public square beside hers. Their statues were beautiful to look upon, where hers was a mere working mule who gave him pleasure as she could. Finally she was fed up. She left the king to his serfdom, and trotted off to plow rows and write poems
Re: a comment on It destroyed my life by T. Jonathron Remp	T. Jonathron Remp 24.107.192.217	19-Apr-06/6:38 PM
MY FEELINGS ARE VALID AND YOU CAN'T CONTROL ME
Re: a comment on A Bronze Mule by Dovina	ALChemy 24.74.100.11	19-Apr-06/5:30 PM
I think it means you're a lesbian. But worry not, once men realize a woman's a lesbian they all want to have sex with her.
Re: a comment on A Bronze Mule by Dovina	ALChemy 24.74.100.11	19-Apr-06/5:25 PM
Now you must tell me the true interpretation of your poem lest I be inspired to cause a holocaust upon all the bronze statues of the world.