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Beneath the Willow Tree (Free verse) by cyan9 Lying down with the arc of my back against the mounds of earth, weaving
my vertibrae over each bump and clump of grass, of dirt, I inked my
index finger and drew a symbol to draw mana from the sky.
Ripples eminated from the connection, and through their vortex I found
myself sucked into a tunnel, sucked towards one bright one light.
As I twisted and turned through concave and convex, I awoke to a haze of
brightness, I awoke and began to stare at the surgeons vest.
Hurtling on a theatre trolley while doctors stitched together my brain,
having been out cold for days, I couldn't remember my name.
As I leant up to ask of my journey, my fate; ripples formed and the
vortex sucked me further in.
I was wrapped up in all the soft blankets the sun could offer, I was
cradled and lulled into a soft warm bed,
I awoke to the light of day, I awoke with light inside my head.
Up the ladder:
Mr. Jawharp Man
Down the ladder:
golden oldie
Votes: (green: user, blue: anonymous)
Arithmetic Mean: 4.0
Posted: November 15, 2005 6:12 AM PST; Last modified: November 15, 2005 6:12 AM PSTWeighted score: 4.9525743 Overall Rank: 8796 Comments:
224 view(s)
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Sure, we could run this thing into the ground but I've done this before with far wiser than you. Quite frankly, You have issues and nothing I can say or do is going to solve them or likely shut your ass up. So I'm taking the high road and conceding all arguments between us officially won by cyan9.
Are you happy now?
Nope, didn't think so.
"No nothing like." A very poor sentence, I'm geussing without education.
What do I think of your poem? It's not bad in an acid trip kind of way. You seem to portray the operating table as the dream and the nature scene as the world you wake up to. If that was your intent then good job. The average person would have gone the opposite route.
"one bright one light"???
In the future if you choose to make your biting comments then at least check it for faults. Nothing makes you appear to need a slightly more intelligence than a snide reply full of errors.
In contrast to what I have just sent over as a comment to you, this kind of commentry and thought is more than welcome compared to untangeable quippets that serve to flame zodiacs mild annoying and invalid mockery.
The punctuation is only there to provide appropriate length pauses, its symantic is in the ride it provokes. I would rather steer clear of the colons on the grounds that they invoke a list or parrallel verses; what I am writing is continuous verse, and thus I use semi-colons. I only use quotes in order to quote a person, or to indicate speach; and so again their use is inapropriate here.
When you see use of language such as one bright one light, take it for what it is, and what it provokes. Don't get so pent up on the syntax, and concentrate on the semantic and the ride. As far as I am aware there is nothing here that should cause anyone any difficulty in reading, as long as they just let it sink in, rather than fixate upon its syntax.
As for the biting comments, I write the comments in spare minutes that I have at work, I have little time to spare to check spelling and punctuation when engaging in slanging matches between teenage poetry snobs. The comments are less snide, but more of a irritated response to the image that you and zodiac have presented. I welcome the chance to receive feedback on my work, and get distinctly annoyed when I receive time waisting comments.
You are welcome and hopefully encouraged to leave anything of reasonable thought, of which you are obviously capable, and as I have said to zodiac, I regard this communication as interesting, worthwhile and positive (although a little annoying to start with).
I find this poem neither very evocative nor very original. Nor particularly meaningful. Considering that it seems written to be strong visually or evocatively (and not necessarily meaningful) I'll stick with that. Eminations, vortices, tunnels and such are so often repeated these days that they're practically meaningless to me. Besides, not having actually traveled through a vortex to a tunnel's vertex or however it goes, I've got nothing to connect this with my experience. Phrases like a "haze of brightness" pull their punches, going for a standard or vague formulation rather than working to evoke an actual image or impression. Vortex and ripples are repeated in the poem's second half to even less effect, and I wonder why. I liked the inked index finger, the theatre trolley, and the last line, but I found those parts overwhelmed by parts saying things I've heard a million times before and better. I especially don't like "mana from the sky", which, in addition to jarring with the poem's other imagery, is misspelled.
Regarding spelling and punctuation: There's simply no point in ignoring or going slack on basic rules of English. Even the best poem needs all the help it can get, and it hurts your poem's standing in EVERY SINGLE PERSON'S EYES, POETRY SNOB OR NOT, to come across bad spelling and grammar. There's no basis for using punctuation ONLY for pauses, even in 17th and 18th c. poetry, which is what you're thinking of. That's not semantic, anyway. There's no such thing as continuous verse. You've made that term up. Don't require your reader to do more work and expect him to like it. Seriously. Authorly tidbits like "take it for what it is" very rarely go over, even when they come from real authors. Incidentally, there are things here that should cause someone difficulty reading - at least inasmuch as your reader has to see "mana" and think "okay, he means manna".
Regarding the rest of your comment: I'm not teenage. I feel most of this came across in my first, admittedly cynical message. I highly doubt you'll welcome this feedback, or even read it this far. Do not suggest I lack imagination or ability as far as reading your poem goes. Thanks. Have a nice day.
In regards to the comment:
"Eminations, vortices, tunnels and such are so often repeated these days"
I donât believe that they are, and have not witnessed such repetition. Perhaps a couple of examples would strengthen your argument.
In response to:
"Phrases like a "haze of brightness" pull their punches, going for a standard or vague formulation rather than working to evoke an actual image or impression"
I would say that the piece describes a period of lazing in the sun (beneath the willow tree (though not mentioned)), starting to evoke the 'power' of thought with the drawing of the symbol in the sky. The transportation and surgery points to the ride and the benefit of this thought; awakening after sorting my head out from a chaotic week. The poem describes the solely the ride, not the cognition, and so avoids bringing individual thoughts or references to thought into the work. I am dubious that you allowed yourself to be taken on this journey, and I believe you have missed the point, that was to describe that ride. I believe it does evoke intense and mind manifesting imagery, a view that is shared by people who have commented on other sites such as allpoetry.com for example.
It's fair enough to say this poem evokes images and emotions for other people. I'll rephrase: This poem doesn't evoke images or emotions for me. I'm just one guy.
I think this site is better than allpoetry.com, but not for getting useful comments on your poetry.
"Wow! Awesome imagery, liked the line..."
"Nice Write"
"Wow! Deep ......."
Regarding your comments on spelling and punctuation:
(1) Perhaps suggesting improvements rather than saying this is poor, could make your opinion seem more qualified, and of use.
(2) I have noticed here that you are pre-occupied on what has been, what is stated in books, no wonder everything seems formulaic to you. You disregard my advice to see things for what they are as rarely going over âeven when they come from real authorsâ. You will not be able to understand a large quantity of work nor be able to appreciate other peopleâs creativity or originality with this mind, if you continue to regard everything as being driven by a formula. An example of this thought is the statement "There's no such thing as continuous verse.", you go for the dictionary, rather than reading and using your imagination to determine what is being said (this is a good example of why I say your appreciation lacks imagination).
You have sited on your âAboutâ section, that people should not bother having arguments about originality with you⦠I assume youâve had a lot of them, and hopefully over time you may listen to what is said about you.
(3) On a more Jovial note, before trying to correct peoples spelling, you may want to check that you are right before hand, for example by looking up the word âmanaâ as below:
mana
Dictionary
maâ¢na (mä'nÉ)
n.
1. A supernatural force believed to dwell in a person or sacred object.
2. Power; authority.
Is used as a reference to a supernatural force from the sky (not necessarily divine) over:
manna
Dictionary
manâ¢na (mÄn'É)
n.
1. In the Bible, the food miraculously provided for the Israelites in the wilderness during their flight from Egypt.
2. Spiritual nourishment of divine origin.
3. Something of value that a person receives unexpectedly: viewed the bonus as manna from heaven.
4. The dried exudate of certain plants, as that of the Mediterranean ash tree, formerly used as a laxative.
5. A sweet granular substance excreted on the leaves of plants by certain insects, especially aphids, and often harvested by ants.
However in retrospect the definition number 2 above (spiritual nourishment) could have added to the work (if anyone knew this).
In regards to:
âI feel most of this came across in my first, admittedly cynical message. I highly doubt you'll welcome this feedback, or even read it this far. Do not suggest I lack imagination or ability as far as reading your poem goes. Thanks. Have a nice day.â
I will leave the comments about childishness and underdevelopment out in future, but please comment and read with a little more of the thought that you are capable of. In your defence, annoying as this dispute has been, it has provided more of interest that the comments of most, and I would therfore count this dispute in your favour rather than otherwise. And as for the âHave a nice Dayâ, you are welcome, since I am indeed having a very nice day.
If I were going to talk about something here, I think it'd be this, from The Book of Questions, Volume 1:
Would you agree to be totally paralysed from the neck down for a year if it would save the endangered blue whale from extinction, given that its extinction is absolutely certain otherwise? Assume that your recovery would be complete and instantaneous.
Guy has option to save his own life by cutting out a key that has been surgically emplanted behind his eye, he must do this with a scalpel before the timer ends. Guy cant do it. Guy dies.
I think with enougth peer pressure I could just about be able to do it, as long as I could communicate and have some kind of interaction with the world; I would also need to believe that I would be judged on this action as well, otherwise I would buckle to my own selfish desires and would fail. I believe it to be the right and just way, and that animals may be able to have the same worth as humans, and I'd definately do it for humans, as long as they kept me entertained.
Its interesting that this follows on well from the last comments.
How do you answer by the way?
No, something tells me there's a McGuffin in your story that motivates you. Maybe even you haven't discovered what that is.
Sorry it must be the relaxing effect of listening to the 700 Hobo names that's got me spewing all this hippy psychobabble shit.