if i go out and observe a fern,
helpless meal for a snail,
holding out a frond rolled like a fist--
impotent protestation
maybe i will become a poet
like mary oliver, and people
will implore me to read in public forums
and local bookstores
and publishers will plead.
then how would i write on this machine?
(after listening to oliver reading oliver in my car all week. hmm)
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7 comments:
the first stanza is upset by the commas. makes the flow kinda weird.
i like the 2nd stanza, very casual.
i like this enjambment:
like mary oliver, and people
will implore me to read in public forums
i dunno if you did it on purpose, but i like how it reads like you will be a poet like "mary oliver, and the people" implying that all people are poets in some way.
i blame that on TPS! those comma-kaze mods there (sorry, brad). but don't you need the punctuation to follow the meaning? in this case i'm not sure line breaks are strong enough.
this poem was tossed off, ala bradmckenzie style. thanks for your comment. (hell---all this time i thot u were a girl!)
well yea, you need punctation, but i like to vary it up a bit. my favorite is the "--"
i dont really follow rules(unless its necessary for the meaning) with my punctuation. i just read the poem aloud the way i want it to flow, and i use my punctuation as a sort of metronome:
comma- weak stop
semicolon- little stronger
colon- getting there
dash- almost the best
period- BAM stopped it.
just my opinion though, punctuation is not a science, its an art, and you can use it however you please.
hmm..i guess my writing has a hint of feminity?
i take that as a compliment, women are more graceful than us.
punctuation is a necessary evil--to be avoided if possible. i think the semi-colon is extremely ugly in poetry--rarely use it. the dash, however, i love, and probably overuse. the dash points to what follows it. i am also extremely fond of parentheses. i will watch for how you use ".."
girlish writing. i doubt it. i just had that preconception. i will now try to find something to critique in your poem here.
ok, i changed the punctuation a bit. tried dropping all commas, but it didn't work. so changed one to a dash. and put a period end of 2nd stanza. thot about a sem-colon or colon end of 1st stanza, but hope the stanza break will be enough. what do you think? i know i should use capitalization sometimes, but i'm so damn lazy!
I love that the fern is the helpless victim of the usually helpless snail... Love that section.
and the title is stunning, btw.
I can't think of much critique, I love the images in this piece. The poem as a whole goes down really well.
Love it.
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