Re: a comment on August 23, 1944 - 102 miles west of Paris by Ranger	6-Jul-06/2:37 PM
Well, as far as farming/rejuvenation goes, isn't that the beautiful part of war? Life always follows. Poppies wouldn't carry the same amount of symbolism if they weren't living things. Sure, they look like blood - but it's the fact that they're a living representation of death that makes them so vivid, in my opinion. In the same way, a ploughed field appears dead and desolate, but something will grow from it again. 'Whittling' - I didn't want to use 'whispering', and it seemed right for the way in which the breeze is slivered by passing through something hollow (like a shell) and resembles the sound of the ocean. I'll have a look through the punctuation when I have the time (Lord knows when that'll happen...) Sometime soon I intend to inflict some paradelle mischief upon the ranker too...be very afraid... As always, thank you for the comments and ideas :-D
Re: What? (Wot?) by ecargo	6-Jul-06/2:26 PM
I'll remember to give this a proper read and vote tomorrow.
Re: Astronomy and Pharmaceuticals by wilco	6-Jul-06/2:22 PM
No time for a full-length comment at the moment, je regrette. Great song though.
Re: the only thing worse than living (revised, liberated) by Bill Z Bub	6-Jul-06/2:21 PM
Why the hell's this been zeroed? Line 13 - "birds".
Re: Bedlam Bazaar by Zoe	6-Jul-06/2:18 PM
More of an interesting Welsh verse than Catatonia managed. You'll be huge in Cardiff; you should read this from a tower in the (almost finally) renovated castle. They have peacocks in there. Poetry and peacocks - what more could we ask for? It takes a lot of practise to be able to read this aloud. Have a read of Nicholas Jones' works.
Re: a comment on canada day by Bill Z Bub	4-Jul-06/11:56 PM
Right nationality - wrong gender, I think you'll find.
Re: Hugo by little_angel_maria	4-Jul-06/12:27 AM
This is more of a letter (epistle) than a free verse poem, in my opinion - I wonder if nentwined might consider adding that as a category. If I'm brutally honest, this won't score very highly among many writers here. That's not meant as an insult and I don't want you to be offended by it. It's just that everything contained in here has been written countless times before. Love poetry now has got to the stage where you have to be original - even if it's just one brilliant, inspired line or passage around which the whole poem's built. As it stands this is a collection of cliches. For example, 'bleeding from the wounds in my heart' is just about the ultimate overused phrase in the world of teen poetry. I guess you could argue that it's how you really do feel. But then...don't you think that everyone else feels that way at some stage? And so if everyone wrote a poem describing the same thing, wouldn't love poetry get very boring very quickly? Be inventive. Read lots of poetry on here, note all the recurring images/phrases, and never, ever use them. The dancing in the park passage here is good - write about that. Write about dancing to no music whatsoever. Use 'love' no more than once in the poem though. "Show, don't tell" is very appropriate for that. Just telling us that you love someone makes us as readers feel nothing. Okay, so I've done a bit of critiquing. What I like about this poem is that the language is kept simple (something with which I struggle in my poetry) and, unlike 99% of poems like this, the grammar is pretty accurate and you've managed to capitalise 'I', which a hell of a lot of people don't do, and it annoys me ;-) Well, that's it for now. Hope this was of some use. Peace.
Re: a comment on Higher education by ecargo	4-Jul-06/12:06 AM
It had better be innuendo, otherwise you and I are both going to have to think very hard about changing the way we read poetry...
Re: a comment on August 23, 1944 - 102 miles west of Paris by Ranger	3-Jul-06/11:57 PM
I had to do quite a bit of research for this. It's set on the second morning after the Germans retreated from the Falaise pocket. I don't think the distance from Paris is particularly accurate, but it's the closest guess I could manage at the time (Caen's about 126 miles, Falaise is 18 from Caen, the road taken by the Germans was a little to the east of Falaise) so if anyone wants to set the record straight, I'd appreciate it.
Re: a comment on August 23, 1944 - 102 miles west of Paris by Ranger	3-Jul-06/11:51 PM
Believe it or not, I have never watched SPR. I've been saving it for a time when I'm hooked on war rememberance. Like now, only when I have the free time to watch it...
Re: Songs of the hedge bird by ALChemy	3-Jul-06/11:49 PM
I hope you weren't expecting us to give you any improvements for this, because really, it's excellent. Except for 'already been chose', but that's because I'm English and pedantic. A lovely read.
Re: O say, can you see? by Dovina	3-Jul-06/12:44 AM
Love it. Super use of the language. I wish I could say something more interesting, but I'm exhausted. And it's only 8.30am.
Re: Higher education by ecargo	3-Jul-06/12:41 AM
Fire Technology? Where the hell are you being taught? That sounds awesome - pyromania for the educated masses. Also, the last stanza made me burst out laughing. Shameful sentiments.
Re: Sonnet IX by tuthaliash	1-Jul-06/9:39 PM
Where the hell did this one come from? Superbly archaic in format and technique. Therefore it meets with approval. Only complaint is "Rehash'd"...it just doesn't sound like an old enough word for the piece. Excellent meter.
Re: canada day by Bill Z Bub	1-Jul-06/9:29 PM
This is magic. I don't get why, though. Maybe it's the spacing, the openness like the sky. I think that's why I want the last word to be 'plain'. Three more lines of description after 'darkest sky' would seem right, somehow. Do you listen to Arrogant Worms? This made me think of their self-penned national anthem, 'Canada Is Really Big'...
Re: Goliath by amanda_dcosta	1-Jul-06/9:15 PM
Good questions, excellent take on Goliath. It's pretty ironic that the laziness fights so much...I think of it more like a dead weight against which we struggle. The only thing I'd really change here is removing the exclamation mark at the end...they rarely appeal to me in poetry. Others may, of course, disagree.
Re: a comment on Patio 95 by ecargo	1-Jul-06/8:55 PM
I might as well post it, actually. We lost on penalties, therefore I no longer care for life, let alone poetry.
Re: Fallen Charub by Dovina	1-Jul-06/12:16 AM
Heh... another early chuckle. You guys have the humour going today, don't you?
Re: Aristocrats(Madlib for all those shock poets) by ALChemy	1-Jul-06/12:13 AM
I can't even accuse you of not giving me ample warning about this, because you did. And now I have to work all day with this, struggling not to superimpose all the customers I come across onto the scene... Good stuff for a saturday morning chortle!
Re: Patio 95 by ecargo	1-Jul-06/12:09 AM
This is extremely effective as a 'waiting-and-foreboding' piece, stanza 2 in particular. 'Flashing mimic bird', 'dark west', 'black locusts'. All excellent. But, dammit, I've used reference to wind & sea in the poem I was going to submit today...I think I'll leave it for a while... All round top stuff as is to be expected and like ALChemy says, I'm glad to see you around :-)