Re: a comment on Gaia and Man by Blue Magpie	27-Feb-06/6:40 AM
It is really a case of show don't tell. You start with image then degenerate into dogma. Things like we must cease war with ourselves are so vague as to be meaningless.
Re: Gaia and Man by Blue Magpie	27-Feb-06/6:36 AM
The main problem with this poem however is that it attempts to classify the entire human world by using slogans such as 'If Mankind’s soul is ever to find peace this war against itself must surely cease, and man accept his place as just one piece of a far greater whole, this would increase his understanding,'. It would be more productive for you to examine the minutiae of this world view. Use metaphor that kind of thing.
Re: Gaia and Man by Blue Magpie	27-Feb-06/6:32 AM
Too many commas it makes your sentences long and rambling. I will use one example: 'One evening ‘midst the glory this entails, just as the sun slipped through checkered rails of distant trees whose awesome height curtails, 07 like troubled thoughts, the view that goes beyond the local scenes of which we are so fond, an owl approached and lighted on a frond.' Firstly: '‘midst the glory this entails,' is redundant because you have not changed scene you are already there midst the glory. Then 'whose awesome height curtails,like troubled thoughts, the view that goes beyond the local scenes of which we are so fond,' is utterly garbled. What happens is the height of the trees curtail ('like troubled thoughts' is nonsense) the view. Full stop. Then you see the owl light on a frond through the rails of light full stop. Otherwise you have clauses all over the place. Also reading your replies I sense you are rather pious. Each to his own and all but I don't think writing earnestly is entirely compatible with writing lines such as 'beard of obvious reknown' and using words such as 'awesome'.
Re: a comment on An Interview With King David by amanda_dcosta	27-Feb-06/6:07 AM
I think you should ignore Blue Magpie's advice to put a comma between person and inspired. He seems to have a comma fixation for some reason.
Re: a comment on During the Grace by jahnotis	20-Feb-06/1:56 PM
There heads are naive at the time they split open?
Re: a comment on Conflict Resolution by Dovina	20-Feb-06/11:38 AM
There are a number of ways to draw in the reader. Having your poem make less sense is not one of them. :(
Re: Stealth Assassin (draft) by Mona Lisa	20-Feb-06/11:13 AM
If you are going for pathos I would prescribe attention to small detail rather than writing rape every five seconds.
Re: During the Grace by jahnotis	20-Feb-06/11:07 AM
'No one perceived the bullet's path, and naively their heads split open.' Is fine 'No one realized the thorn's approach, and vulnerably their windows remain open.' Is not. How does leaving ones window open let in 'thorns'.
Re: The Dead Poet's Dream by drnick	20-Feb-06/11:04 AM
This doesn't make any sense. :(
Re: a comment on Conflict Resolution by Dovina	20-Feb-06/10:59 AM
'For instance, lines 6 and 7 could have been worded in a not-so-obvious sort of way (ie "I wanted her to understand, but let mercy be my tounge instead").' This is terrible advice. It infers that the less likely the reader is to understand it the more magical the poem becomes.
Re: a comment on Lost In Her Effervescence by ALChemy	15-Feb-06/3:12 PM
Oh, I didn't realise you were just putting opposites next to eachother without though of the dire and terrible consequence of such an action. I thought you were attempting to write a poem that made sense. The bubbling which is often associated with heating-up but was actually caused by the swell of a river or a plunge pool or something which was cold is a smart metaphor. But how the hell is the ocean cold and boiling. :(
Re: In response to by INTRANSIT	14-Feb-06/12:56 PM
'I am the deer caught off guard by my own complacent headlights' is fine. I don't think it is meant to be an image so much as a reference to and modification of a cliche.
Re: Happy 40th Anniversary by Dovina	14-Feb-06/12:50 PM
'Of what fabric are wishes made?' is a punchy line to start with but you make no attempt to elucidate. It can't be ascertained why you sneer so much. To start a thing is vague and quite clunky. The middle of the poem is unarresting. Death refrain is an interesting use of language. Good to say we've come a long way is a decent idea. I just think the poem needs more meat in the place of the cliches of wilderness, anniveraries pass etc.
Re: a comment on Racial Hate by Glasseyez	11-Feb-06/2:35 PM
I find you very ignorant. This is a true story.
Re: Racial Hate by Glasseyez	11-Feb-06/4:47 AM
I read that in tests if you place a blanket over the face of a mongoloid baby it sits there placidly. If you put the blanket over the face of a caucasoid baby it gently stirs. If you put the blanket over the face of a negroid baby it throws the blanket off and shoots you with his oozie. I therefore conclude that your poem is factually inaccurate and written by a dimwit. :(
Re: a comment on My Father’s World by Dovina	11-Feb-06/4:25 AM
I too have changed my understanding of poetry because of your wisdom. By the way this poem is crap; not enough talking ass. :(
Re: My Father’s World by Dovina	10-Feb-06/3:11 PM
When I first read this the voice in my head was reading with a whisper and I missed that it was rhymed in an aa bb manner. On second read I heard it and it seems kind of pointless. This is not written in couplets after all. Other than that this is a fine poem. It is devoid of your usual pretention and that is why we continue to argue with you. At the back of our minds we think 'yeah, she talks ass, but in time she'll reflect on our advice and realise we were correct'. It makes it all worth while for me.
Re: Memoirs of a miners son by Caducus	8-Feb-06/3:14 AM
Very good. Anvil eyed needs a hyphen or the anvil is doing the eying. Davy lamp doesn't need quotation marks, and is a much more relevant and precise image than hero's sword. The details give it pathos and I think it benefits from not being overloaded with adjectives.
Re: Whales in Gastineau Channel by zodiac	6-Feb-06/3:10 PM
Isn't it more fragile (I know you put in fragiler for a reason but I am at a loss, other than to make the poem more idiosyncratic, what that reason is). And the last sentence doesn't do it. There is no need to talk of your ache, it is inferred by your opposition to 'something always fragiler'. I think the poem would end better keeping on the theme of others yen for fragility. Then don't touch it. The details are fine.
Re: I Heart You by Enkidu	6-Feb-06/2:51 PM
Does the narrator have Parkinson's.