Re: a comment on Gratitude by Dovina	Dovina 12.72.6.245	30-Jun-05/4:13 PM
Then how about this: On summer hills, a heavy bull drools, brittle brown grass like cigarillos in his teeth, his eyes fixed on consumption, oblivious to my presence, I wonder if he remembers the green blades of winter, or finds a duty of the living to pleasure in what the dead cannot, a gratitude for the running and mating that made this small pleasure possible. Okay, I didn’t give you a subset. I’m still hoping the running and mating of his parents that gave rise to his existence is what gives this bull the gratitude and the will to make it through bleak late summer, hoping for green grass of winter and reveling in the life of it all. Do bulls think like that? Probably not, but I can hope they do.
Re: Uncorked by impert&ent	Dovina 12.72.6.245	30-Jun-05/3:59 PM
Go home alone? The ending is weak if all you mean is that you unscrewed a bottle cap.
Re: a comment on WHAT KIND OF FOOL ARE YOU? by Joshua_Tree	Dovina 12.72.6.245	30-Jun-05/3:53 PM
I find it more useful to post my newest writings. That way I get comments, not on history, but on something vestigial, workable. Dividing it into "A" material and "B" material - well it should all be "A" material.
Re: a comment on A Righteous Prayer by Dovina	Dovina 12.72.6.245	30-Jun-05/3:39 PM
Rotten in what way? If you say the grammar is bad, look at the grammar in the average prayer. If you say the phrases do not say clearly what I mean, again, look at prayers.
Re: a comment on Try Thinking Too by Bankrupt_Word_Clerk	Bankrupt_Word_Clerk 69.231.25.124	30-Jun-05/11:49 AM
the glossy coat is on the un-manged intellect (dog) that is being ignored for the sake of passionate expression.
Re: Falling from grace (pt1) by sk8rs_rule_all	Shuushin 147.154.235.53	30-Jun-05/10:40 AM
please don't describe a feeling with the word "feeling" in the description. And don't say something inexpressible and then try to express it. That's all I have for you - I can't barely get through the rest of it. Sorry. My God - use your words more precisely, use a simile or a metaphor. Make a poem for christs sake instead of an outline for one. Never use "so" again.
Re: Daytime TV by jessicazee	Shuushin 147.154.235.53	30-Jun-05/10:32 AM
I would end with the "I have to shower" stanza, or possibly, just kill the last one. Otherwise it is fairly nice.
Re: Gratitude by Dovina	Shuushin 147.154.235.53	30-Jun-05/10:30 AM
"eats" is a weak descriptor - lost opportunity at best. Might want to tell me what it is you saw in his face that convinced you how he found the grass to be tastey. Conceptually, there is a wide range of things the living can do that the dead cannot - I have trouble pulling a subset of that from the grazing, running and matings of a cow. I think you can do it - but not by just telling me to.
Re: a comment on The choices we make by darby pyn	darby pyn 207.200.116.197	30-Jun-05/10:29 AM
The way I meant “inoculate the soars with rhetorical cement” is this is a poem about a man at a young age who hated what he saw. the government. his dad a poor man sent to war lost a limb and gets spit at on return, say the church who beats him and in his eyes full of hypocrisy. so say you want to memorize a number, 856, 856 , 856. you repeat it over and over. as a child he is saying “I will never be like that” over and over. and in that case which I meant it the phrase works. thanks for your insight.
Re: a comment on The Object of the Game by Dovina	fevriere 62.254.128.7	30-Jun-05/10:03 AM
I second that idea! I like what you're on to.
Re: a comment on We Have Never Spoken by fevriere	fevriere 62.254.128.7	30-Jun-05/10:02 AM
second stanza or throughout?
Re: a comment on Crying Tears with No Home by TLRufener	sk8rs_rule_all 24.160.154.168	30-Jun-05/8:02 AM
Yes, my friend also died in a car accident 3 weeks ago. :-| I feel your pain.
Re: Try Thinking Too by Bankrupt_Word_Clerk	Dovina 12.72.7.153	30-Jun-05/8:00 AM
So she has a glossy coat of passion covering mangy skin of unintelligence. Sounds like a passionate way of saying it.
Re: a comment on The Object of the Game by Dovina	Dovina 12.72.7.153	30-Jun-05/7:34 AM
No, this android, though predictable, will not this time say what you expect. I see what you and shuushin mean about the first verse and will clarify it thus: He wallows in hurt- women who wronged him Lovers so shallow they stab him on whims leave the very next morning The second verse is already clear, I think, but it changes from human to android. It ceases to pass for human as the first verse may.
Re: a comment on Father’s Day by Dovina	Dovina 12.72.7.153	30-Jun-05/7:16 AM
That’s a good explanation of your position — that I said things I believe to be untrue in order to jar people. That’s still a long way from saying "offensive untrue things about people." Since the poem is about a hypothetical man as far as anyone reading it on poemranker knows, it should only be offensive if he sees within himself a bitter core. Then he might be jarred into saying it’s not true. If so, my purpose is partly accomplished.
Re: a comment on Crying Tears with No Home by TLRufener	TLRufener 66.188.122.190	30-Jun-05/7:10 AM
Nice idea, but it makes it sound like he killed himself. He died in a car accident. I also want it a bit vague.
Re: Crying Tears with No Home by TLRufener	zodiac 194.165.157.165	30-Jun-05/3:42 AM
"For someone who has cut his life short." "It was just his time to move on." "When it seems that his life just got going." "He had planned so many times to explore," "Or meeting the love of his life." "Struck down in his prime without a second glance," "To fulfill its lifelong dream."
Re: Try Thinking Too by Bankrupt_Word_Clerk	zodiac 194.165.157.165	30-Jun-05/3:39 AM
I've spent the last fifteen minutes thinking about how intelligence may be like a dog with mange. I've got nothing. Sounds cool, though.
Re: Daytime TV by jessicazee	zodiac 194.165.157.165	30-Jun-05/3:37 AM
Great, just great. SOMEBODY: Haikus are supposed to be about nature! zodiac: You can eat it.
Re: a comment on -750,000 in Rwanda by ALChemy	zodiac 194.165.157.165	30-Jun-05/3:32 AM
Aren't you the hero? Oh, no, wait. You're not. Calling somebody who bothered to criticize your poem a "sadistic fuck" was pretty fucking heroic, though. Regarding, "This poem for good or bad reasons has at least got you thinking about Rwanda again" - well, excuse my French, but that's kind of a load of crap. If you'd only posted the word "Rwanda" and nothing else, it would have gotten me thinking about Rwanda again, so what's the point of the other thirty lines. As far as your assumption that no poem can get close to the experience of Rwanda so it's a bum criticism to say your poem didn't, well that's kind of crap too. At least, a lot of things can get a lot closer than you've gotten. I'm not trying to say you're crap as a poet or anything such. I'd just like to suggest that you try to make your poems more evocative. And, considering our earlier conversation on this poem, true as well. Ask yourself, Even though I'm just writing these poems for myself, don't I think it would be a lot nicer to write good poems for myself than bad poems for myself? Then ask yourself, And isn't it probably the case that I'm just pissed because nobody thought my poem was genius and that's why I'm acting like this?