Ladies and Gentlemen, this thread is a rougher, tougher critique thread.
the first rule of Write Club is...
... you do NOT discuss your own poems
The second rule of Write Club is...
... you do NOT discuss your own poems
Third rule:
You speak only when asked a question by one of your critiquers
The fourth rule is:
only two sentences to an answer, guys.
And the fifth rule of Write Club is:
If this is your first visit to Write Club...
... you HAVE to write.
Okay, get posting.

Solace as I age part two

What does give me comfort though,
as I age in this adult world so mad,
is to float back to my childhood bed -
tucked up tight in white, cotton sheets
with their seams coarse-stitched in red.
Silence was never so absolute then,
though the solitude still covered all.
The occasional growl of a passing car.
The soft adult whispers from the corridor;
deep, the echoes of their leaving footfalls.
The red vinyl mattress-covering sash.
The tray on which my meals were set.
I recall the grey-railed metal headboard
and pale turquoise paint on every wall.
Sleep didn’t always come easy at night;
awake, I awaited its soft sand’s descent
in the peaceful dark where the only light
came from the lamp on the nurse’s desk
further down at the far end of the ward.

Like the poem, generally. Very evocative of childhood nights in hospital, which I have extensive experience of.
But '....adult world so mad' doesn't sound right. It's grammatically correct but floats like an unmixed lump in the otherwise smooth Bisto of the work.

Whoa! What just happened? Did I just dream the last day's posts? I posted a really informative piece about a Burgess literary scam a few hours ago.
If there were legal issues with the DG poem then fair enough. But please let me know before you blast my prose into the ether. I could have pasted it into a private file if I'd wanted to keep it.

Sorry Simon
We still think Write Club is a good idea but got off to the wrong start will a stupid joke that went wrong - See Dermot's comment in "Chat" - so we thought it best to clean up the thread and start anew.

Actually - I think you could safely lose both the 'adult's, so to speak, they're superfluous and as Siren says - they interrupt the flow.
Cx

White...red...another red...grey...pale turquoise

A poem of this length should only contain this many colours if it is about interior decorating...

Shouldn't it be "easily" rather than "easy"?

'The occasional growl of a passing car.
The soft adult whispers from the corridor;
deep, the echoes of their leaving footfalls.
The red vinyl mattress-covering sash.
The tray on which my meals were set.'

They start with capital letters and end with full stops, but none of these statements could be grammatically regarded as sentences. There should be commas or semi-colons between them.

Actually, the more I read this poem, the less I like it. It needs a serious re-write. But it is worthy of more work.

Where is part 1. It might give us context.

The missing ingrediant in this poem of recall is the smell of the ward.
Just one reminded sniff and I would be transported

Assuming that "Where is part one...?" is a direct question, part one is unrelated to this poem other than both having the same title. Part one uses the title in a sarcastic title and is just a humorous poem about schadenfreude.

The title is bad because it is a distraction. It must be possible to think up a title different from a previous pice of work.

Apparently some form of adult distress at the state of the world finds solace in recollections of time as a child in hospital experiencing a range of snesations. The childhood sensations seem to be just a matter of record in the colours, textures, etc. The adult whispers are uninformative and the footfalls discomforting. Possibly like the adult feelings in the mad world, but why might they provide solace? Of course a mad world might be the perception of the world by a person who is mad. Then solace could come from anything.

The sleep, which was difficult to achieve or long in coming, comes across as a desire for the comfort of death accompanied by the discomfort of anticipating how or when it might come. Is the weak and distant light a faint hope within the mad world that there might be something other than oblivion to look forward to? This seems more complex than solace.

The final sentence is clumsy. Too long and "further down at the far end of the ward." is not elegant.

Comfort is used as a synonym for solace. Not bad, but not quite right.

Why is 'though' at the end of the first line? Though what?

I will not work through the punctuation in detail, but I find it uncomfortable in places.

The only line I really don't like is "this adult world so mad" which is just a clumsy construction. But I like the colours.

And I like the sentence structure. Keep that. Anything to annoy the grammar police.

I am not a member of the grammar police. I am not even a grammar community support officer. My poem 'Airborne Inversion' which features on my newly submitted profile contains no punctuation whatsoever. DG's poem does, but it is inconsistent. If this had been anybody else's poem I might not have mentioned it but I know DG to be a man who respects the rule of law (now I do sound like a policeman!).

Title is too much. I prefer 'As I age' - leaving the reader to pick the feeling of 'solace' from what you show us with your poem's other words. Which are too convuluted at times.eg.

'The red vinyl mattress-covering sash'.
It's like chewing too many Midget Gems at once. It's a sash. Too much description and a cliched description at that - for a hissy air-resticting fricative and common count noun.

Here's mine, inspired by a newspaper headline.

POLICE FIND BODY

Behind splintered doors and hardwood frames
lies a silence choked by a mess of thought.
A stillness borne of a confused and troubled mind,
as glints of light, casting daybreak, aim
their shade at fatality.

The fettered thoughts of youth and its reason
lie in silence now unaware of consequence,
a stillness sacrificed for a second, for ever.

A hint of the future in those last written words,
a different path, one without pity,
just time to think how a mortality will sever

a tortured soul. Now free, leaving tears
that fall on doubt and regret and love.
Siblings and parents providing grief and remorse.

The stranger in blue standing dignified.

Overall, an appropriate tone and a nice structure with the two three-line segments in the middle. I like the fact that it's fairly non-specific to any particular case (i.e. equally applies to a heroin addict overdosing on his/her own in a flat as it would to the mole-man horder who took a wrong turn in a tunnel through his rubbish, got lost and died of dehydration) and isn't judgmental or sentimental - let's your own feelings on the matter come through.

Change the word fettered though - it doesn't help the prosody and it's overused. Repressed or supressed might be better, but I reckon a suitable simile would be the best option here as you would probably have to communicate many instances of how the indiviual has had to try to keep a lid on him/herself in order to fit in.

I'm not to keen on the line that utilises sever as a rhyme for ever - I get the impression that you've distorted whatever it was you were trying to say in that line to the extent that I can't understand it, because you wanted to keep the rhyme. Must admit that I tend to like such "occasional rhymes" when they crop up in a majoratively non-rhyming poem, but I think in this case it is not needed and you could replace the line with equivalent syllables that don't necessarily rhyme but that get the point across better.

Finally, thanks to all those who commented on my poem - very detailed analysis. To anyone thinking of posting a poem to write club, I can tell you an unexpected bonus that I got from the experience:

People write whole articles on works by famous poets, and their poems are thought about and analysed to the nth degree. These last three days, one of my poems has been analysed and thought about and dissected in far more detail than the whole of the rest of my cannon put together! Anywhere else and people would glance at it and say "I liked the word 'shoes' on line seven - wonderfully evocative". You think about and work at a poem, and then you perform it in a few places, post it to places where people will give it one quick reading and very little thought before it makes its inevitable journey to the bin; that's usual. To actually have a little bit of the analysis time that a famous poet would get and to hear people get the point of it, but not be uncritical - such that they have really thought hard about what you are saying and how it is presented - has been a fantastic experience that I would recommend to everyone!

having re-read: I would say change "confused and troubled" for "confused, troubled". I get what you are trying to do by faltering the rhythm a bit to try to give it a poignant feel, but that line runs over by too much, and the tempo is slow enough anyway.

Rather than an unspecified death, this poem speaks to me of somebody who has taken their own life, and probably a relatively young person. It is a poignant and concise piece

Ln 1 I wonder why the frames are hardwood. Is this to emphasise the hardness of the lost life? If so I am not sure that it works well. I would favour reinforcing the need to break in to discover the body by using 'broken frames' or even 'fractured frames' to strengthen the imagery by alliteration.

Ln 2 In a point that I felt throughout the poem I find too many indefinite articles here. I would prefer 'lies silence'. Using 'a' so often makes the whole poem feel indefinite..

Ln 3 The sentence would start better with 'Stillness' for the reasons above and I agree with DG about replacing 'and' with a comma.

Ln 4 It is shadows rather than daybreak that are usually cast. I like casting daybreak.

Ln 5 I don't really like 'fatality' here. I don't have an alternative to offer, but it doesn't feel quite the right word to me.

Ln 6 I agree with DG about the use of 'fettered'.

Ln 7 The opening of the line is too similar to line 2 without being the kind of identical re-statement that enhances rhythmic reinforcement. I would prefer something like 'lies quietly'.

Ln 8 Back to my observation about indefinite articles. This stanza is a very powerful concentration of the feelings conveyed by the poem and I can see why it is delivered in a single sentence, might it not work as well by putting a comma after now and full stop at the line end. Then this line could start a new sentence with 'Stillness'. Don't know, but worth working at.

Ln 9 I take these words to be a suicide note although that may be wrong. If it is, the future hint is particularly painful, but even if it is a future hint in other writing of the now dead person it is still a strongly emotional point emphasising the possible content of the lost life.

Ln 10 the path of death, one without pity. The living future might have contained the fear of pitilessness. This makes me think. I like it.

Ln11 I agree with DG on 'sever'. I feel that this is more about the release of a tortured soul rather than just severance, but I may have missed the point. Sorry about my interminable focus on the indefinite article, but I feel sure that 'how mortality' is stronger without the 'a'.

Ln12 Nice

Ln13 'doubt, regret and love' flows better

Ln14 'providing' is rather ponderous for such emotions. Couldn't they be 'grieving and remorseful'?

Ln15 He seems to represent the world. Essentially outside the tragedy of the death and its consequences and actually impotent except insofar as he will facilitate the return to normality for all those uninvolved. I would like a comma after 'blue' and a full stop at the end :-)

Observing the rules for 'Write Club', in answer to the question -" Ln 1 I wonder why the frames are hardwood. Is this to emphasise the hardness of the lost life?

I would say 'reinforce' the sort of lost life the deceased person had, yes. That's the image I tried to conjure.

I think this 'Write Club' is brilliant.Thanks for your opinions DG and Malpoet. I've gleaned some considerable 'food for poetic thought'. Even applying just some of the suggestions to my submission, it is making the overall piece feel much tighter and polished.

I'd encourage anybody to subject themselves to Fight Club and its rules. Don't take it personal - it's the best way to learn - and much quicker.

Okay. Have a go at this one. It was chosen as poem of the month for the December 2008 issue of the Manchester LitList. But don't let that hold you back - my girlfriend is very high up in the Library Service....

The Search

With a wing fingertip quiver
The kestrel craves stasis. The ground
Is sheep-shorn in this realm not bounded
By the slow sliding river

Or the brittle, turbulent scree,
Nor by the lines of dry stone walls
Which hunker down when the bird calls
Its mate across the next valley.

Rodent prey is pinned by its sight,
Nervous, quick-hearted, impotent.
Wings are drawn in to aid descent -
More controlled falling than real flight.

Gravity and talons combine,
Impact is fatal, spine-snapping;
A tiny mammal caught napping
In fields denuded by ovine

Teeth. Distorting evolution,
Humanity’s search for its meat
Feeds the kestrel’s search for its meat.
The field-mouse finds oblivion.

Having met Siren's missus, I can tell you all that she is lovely - far too good for him!

This discussion forum doesn't allow us to set review periods for individual poems before the next one is posted, so for now I would say continue to review Darren's poem and Siren's until Thursday evening before the next one is posted, and state whose poem you are discussing in your comment.

Now, Siren, I think you already know my feelings with regard to these old-fashioned "isn't the natural world awe-inspiring" poems. The coutryside is just a convenient place to put gurning in-bred yokels with bad teeth who need to wake up, smell the coffee and invent fire - and other rubbish such as landfill, prisons, badgers and kestrels.

Really, there is no relevance here to my life - I'm not one for hovering over fields looking for rodents; life's too short. And as for the "Ooh! Crikey! I need to tag on an ending that sounds like a message for mankind at the end - I used to hate assemblies at school for precisely that reason. I always used to sit there looking at the member of staff delivering the assembly thinking "Come on, cut to the chase so that I can find out what you have been wasting my morning with and disrespect you for it."

From a technical point of view, this can't be faulted, although I would expect no less from you. You also know my view on these short, prepositionless phrasings that have become so trendy these days; need I say more than Nervous, quick-hearted impotent. Which brings me to capital letters at the starts of lines that are not concurently beginnings of sentences.

In short, apart from the technical skills (which you have in abundance and have utilised expertly - of note is the descriptive term "sheep-shorn" - bet you limped on blood-shod before stumbling across that one) and the coherence of the narrative, it embodies so much that I dislike in poetry. It's old fashioned, it's away from modern urban living, the ending doesn't slap me around the chops and leave me surprised or apalled at the sheer effrontery. Annoyingly, all of the foregoing is down to personal taste rather than being something I can argue as reasoned academic critism.

Things that I can, on the other hand include the following
I know I should probably get get behind the home team, but you haven't got me rooting for the mammal in this one - it's vermin!

The kestrel craves stasis. I'm not sure you can really ascribe that motivation to its hovering flight. The kestrel is concentrating as hard as its bird brain can on the strike. It's also a heavy-handed phrase, to my ear.

Not sure that squawking for its mate is one of its better ideas in verse two - for one it might alarm the prey animal, and for two, they may have to fight each other for the spoils.

Fields denuded by ovine... - ow my ears! You and your blinking enjambment! There you were trying to construct a slow-paced suspenseful atmosphere to suit the subject matter and then you blew it with a word that you put in for the rhyme with combine.

Distorting evolution? Rubbish! Whether conditions change due to man's activities or any other natural phenomena, the individuals best-adapted to the new conditions will propagate.

... finds oblivion - as stated above, the deep and meaningful seems tagged on, and fairly "urghh!" and fairly predictable, and the rest of it is not of our times, so... you have a perfect opportunity to wake us up with a bang. What really doesn't belong in this poem? Whatever it is, put it in there quick and it will redeem this thing in my eyes. "the field mouse shits its kecks.", for example. I'd fall off my chair if I suddenly read that at the end. Just... something - maybe not that per se, but something to lift the piece at the end.

Having thought about it a lot more today, here is a more constructive review. I will start with a direct question for you:
Whose narrative am I reading here, and what's his or her state of mind during these events? (two sentence answers only, remember).

You see, if I was a kestrel, I'd read it and say "Nice one; bit of the old hover, hover, hover, splat - we've all been there mate - you been reading my diaries or what?". If I was a field mouse I'd say "Scary stuff! Edgar Allen Poe meets Peter Benchley - be looking over my shoulder on the way up to bed now." The trouble is they're only 10% of your potential market (if that).

I'm a human and we make up a much larger share of the poetry reading public, and I can't relate to this on any emotional level. Someone is watching that scene and telling me about it in a poem, but I have no notion of that person. Has he/she gone out there specifically to watch the kestrel and is he/she excited or fascinated (and if so, why hasn't he/she got a job/life/etc). Is the person watching it thinking this is a metaphore for life and stating their inference about the farming and meat thing? If so, why so dispassionate a commentary? These last are rhetorical questions by the way.

If I am sitting there staring at Kestrel, it is either because I am stuck in a traffic jam on the motorway through a semi rural area or because I am stuck in a queue at the off-licence. In either event I'm daydreaming with my internal monologue interjecting various things related and unrelated to what my eyes appear to be watching. I think if you do the exercise of getting into that mind set, you can deepen this poem significantly by having that monologue in there, and link it in various ways to the images.

Or, you could just add a final verse:

Mrs Field Mouse wonders could
there've been some dying words spoken
‘Was one,' says I, ‘his spine broken,
er: “Rosebud.”’ ‘What? Rosebud?’ ‘Rosebud.’

The narrator is omniscient, a dispassionate observer, merely noting that kestrels have inadvertantly profitted from sheep farming. As for 'emotional engagement' (why the hell does everyone want that from poetry?), I am often accused of writing emotionally cold verse (usually by Libby) and indeed I do prefer to think of poetry as a series of beautifully written statements.

A question: If you are not trying to engage your reader emotionally - why are you writing poetry? - isn't that the whole point of it?

My dictionary gives the definition: Poetry - the art of rhythmical composition, written or spoken, for exciting pleasure by beautiful, imaginative, or elevated thoughts.

Personally I don't feel that the emotion incited has, necessarily, to be pleasure - but if your aim is not to engage your reader but merely 'to think of poetry as a series of beautifully written statements.' - wouldn't you find writing instruction manuals more satisfying?

Cx

Reviewing 'The Search' by Siren


The story is that a predator gets an easy kill in short grass. This could be very effectively conveyed in prose. What poetry could do which prose might not, is to create a strong emotional feeling, build more powerful imagery or convey meanings by making the main story a metaphor for something else. I haven't got anything from the poem that convinces me that it is really doing more than prose could.


“The Search”

This title suggests that that there might be something profound in here for a human. Meaning of life and so on. It is a bit of a let down to just be an easy search for a mouse in short grass. If the search is about greater insight into the impact of people on the environment and a consequent distortion of the evolution that would otherwise have occurred it doesn't work. I will come to that later.


“With a wing fingertip quiver
The kestrel craves stasis.”

This just doesn't work I'm afraid. Finger tips don't quiver. Wingtips could. Joining them is not an effective image. The anthropomorphic craving is wrong. You could infer a food craving to the Kestrel, but not a craving for position to efficiently collect the food. Stasis is wrong too. There is always movement in maintaining a hover, but anyway, what the kestrel is doing is getting a good fix on the prey. That is the objective rather than obtaining stillness.

“The ground
Is sheep-shorn in this realm not bounded
By the slow sliding river

Or the brittle, turbulent scree,
Nor by the lines of dry stone walls
Which hunker down when the bird calls
Its mate across the next valley.”

A very long sentence. It is a bit ponderous and I find it rather difficult to read in a decently flowing way. For me the flow in reading is inhibited by capitals at the beginning of each line. For example, as your eye scans over the poem on first reading it is easy to miss the absence of a full stop after river and, seeing the capital at the beginning of the next stanza, make a pause which should not be there. I cannot see that any purpose is served by these capitals other than sticking to an obsolete convention.
In making the prey search area a 'realm' you confer monarchy on the kestrel. A fairly traditional 'animal kingdom' type reference. The thing is that a monarch has sovereignty and a kestrel doesn't have any exclusive conrol over prey here. The mouse could be snatched by a stoat or mink before the kestrel makes its swoop. The fact that the kestrel isn't confined by the river boundary is fine and we get the point that the grass is short.
Sorry, but rivers just don't slide. I know you want something other than flow, but liquids do flow. Solids slide when the friction between them is low enough to permit it.
Although scree can't be turbulent, this image does work.
When the bird calls I can imagine the mouse flinching (and in fact making it's escape, but there you go), but dry stone walls hunkering down just will not work for me.


“Rodent prey is pinned by its sight,
Nervous, quick-hearted, impotent.”

This sentence doesn't read smoothly to me and I can't properly understand it. Is it the mouse seeing the kestrel that pins the mouse? I suppose it must be because the kestrel doesn't pin the mouse by looking at it. The rest of the sentence obviously refers to the mouse. All of this suggests that the mouse is aware of the impending strike, has time to fear it, but doesn't have the ability to move away from it. Pretty questionable I would have thought. Anyway, the aesthetics of the language use are more to the point. Too many commas close together to read it smoothly.

“Wings are drawn in to aid descent -
More controlled falling than real flight.”

This just grates with me too much. The strike of a bird of prey is neither falling nor flight. Falling is an uncontrolled event and the action of this predator is extremely precise in diving from considerable height to such a small target.

“Gravity and talons combine,
Impact is fatal, spine-snapping;
A tiny mammal caught napping
In fields denuded by ovine

Teeth.”
Another long sentence which I find a bit clumsy. Nothing new is being said except the detail of the death. Restatement of 'sheep-shorn' with 'denuded by ovine teeth' is contrived.

“Distorting evolution,
Humanity's search for its meat
Feeds the kestrel's search for its meat.”


The distortion of evolution by sheep farming is just wrong. Riversides would be grazed by large mammals whether farming existed or not. The 'search for its meat' repetition in this sentence doesn't work well. Repetition can be very powerful in poetry. It will often enhance rhythm, it can drive home a continuing motif, and it can add to a hypnotic type beat in the work. This repetition is different. For it to have meaning you need to emphasise 'its' in the second use. That breaks the rhythm and feels clumsy in a single sentence.

“The field-mouse finds oblivion.”

Finishing on another false piece of anthropomorphism. The mouse wasn't seeking oblivion, it was just standing in a field.

You see, this attitude is part of the reason why I'm not well read and not looking to remedy that any time soon. You're competing with television for my attention, remember. And, with David Attenborough we're spoilt in this country. It's opportunity cost in terms of time - if I sit there and read and digest your dispassionate poem, it's done no more to me than life on earth, and I would argue it's done less because I have the facts delivered with great enthusiasm (that itself is emotionally engaging) and I also have the brilliant wildlife photography.

Steven King pioneered (and teaches) this approach - cut the interesting and characterful stuff out, and just tell the story as simply as you can. In that case, the books no more interesting or characterful than the movie, and I don't have to hold the thing, turn the pages, decypher the peculiar combinations of symbols (letters and words) and try and motivate myself to generate an picture of what's happening when I don't much care because there's no character that I can latch onto, attach myself to and care about.

By contrast, I shouldn't care about Anthony Trollope's storylines because they're so mundane and kitchen sink/soap opera-y (my other option is just to live my own mundane existence and I would do many of the same things as happen in such things and would have the added pleasure of being an active participant). However, his narrative style, which turns the voice of the narrator inside your head as you read it into a gossipy Kenneth Williams reading Will 'o the wisp character is superb - you probably couldn't do that in a film, so the books are worth bothering with because you can't get the same experience for less effort elsewhere.

In short, people want emotional engagements, because literature and art appreciations are escapist by their very nature and if you don't draw people in and amuse/horrify/outrage/sadden/etc them, they will not escape into your writing.

Revised answer to Chris's question obeying the Write Club Imperial Manifesto - I write poetry for my own pleasure and if other people like it (which they usually don't) that is an incidental bonus. The first sentence of 'The Search' is a good example of what I try to achieve when I write verse - every single word relates to the next either by rhyme, alliteration or assonance.

Who rattled his cage?

that, by the way, is not a direct question for Siren.

The defence (below) breaks both the first, and second rules of write club. The previous post with the two sentence answer was dodgy with regard to the spirit of write club - you aren't supposed to be defending your poem, you are only supposed to give the information asked for and bite your tongue on anything else. Besides, regardless whatever other functions poetry may be claimed to have by primitive (anyone who was alive before the 70's and isn't now) people with opinions no better than our own, we were saying that if poetry doesn't engage US emotionally there is no point in US reading it because we are not engaged.

Please do the honourable thing and delete the parts of that last post that are not answering Chris's question, and phrase the bits that are in a matter of fact manner.

I too like cryptic crosswords, I get satisfaction from decoding the clues and a mild feeling of superiority over those who can't even spell cryptic; I also like foreign languages, reading in general, song lyrics etc. - my appreciation of the written, spoken, and even sung, word is pretty wide-ranging - however - they are quite different in what they achieve (or seek to). If you just like pretty words then by all means do a crossword or learn a foreign language - I'm learning Greek at the moment and that has some crackers - ramatosima or apopse, for example - but I would still question why you would want to write poetry that has no emotional connection? Without a reader you might just as well have a list of interesting words, and without an emotional connection you won't have readers, surely?
And if you truly don't care about an emotional connection - why are you posting your work here and inviting critique? - which is, by its very nature, subjective and emotional. Otherwise - aren't you just asking; have I put the commas in the right places?
Is that too many questions for one post?
Cx

I have an intellectual interest in what others think of my work but I shy away from 'emotional' poetry. Probably because I am such an emotional man that I worry that it would spill over into schmaltz or manipulation.

I am not ashamed of the fact that I seek an emotional connection with things I read for pleasure, and I believe most readers look for that too. Even schmaltz has its place - despite those that find it worthy of derision. As for manipulation, I think you seem to be able to handle the English language well enough to know exactly when you are being manipulative .... or being many other things, for that matter.

On an intellectual level, I could only repeat much of what DG and others have already said, and add that I, too, found myself not caring very much whether the dormouse reached the oblivion he sought (rodent nirvana?), whether the kestrel ate it, whether the stream slid or sloped or meandered aimlessly .... etc.
Cx

I like clever; keep the clever. But, lose the watch and shrug picture show. No picture is beautiful to me unless it makes me FEEL that it is. So, keep the clever, but also put something more into this kestrel - some part of yourself as a person - I want to see you put some part of your person into this kestrel.

You maybe a very emotional person and you don't want to write something too intense. However, if you're sitting there watching a kestrel hovering, I'm guessing you're at home with the me that is on this journey at that point, so the emotional content probably won't be too intense - but it does need to be there - we need to get a sense of someone real actually being there and telling us about this kestrel...

... my final piece of advice would be to go back to that field and sit there for an hour just watching stuff and let your mind wander. Remember some of the things and some of the people you find yourself thinking about while sitting there. Put a few of those thoughts into this poem, and to make room for them, delete some of the bits that the reviewers weren't keen on. It's like method acting.

I have taken some of your advice and I now have some very nasty wounds and an injunction against me filed by the RSPB. My poetry hasn't improved.

Have a look at Gerard Manley Hopkin's 19th Century poem. Here Hopkins compares the the mastery and beauty of the Kestrel to highlight his greater love (and fear) of God (his "chevalier"). Written just as Hopkins was becoming a Roman Catholic priest.

The Windhover:
(To Christ our Lord)

I CAUGHT this morning morning's minion, king-
dom of daylight's dauphin, dapple-dawn-drawn Falcon, in his riding
Of the rolling level underneath him steady air, and striding
High there, how he rung upon the rein of a wimpling wing
In his ecstasy! then off, off forth on swing,
As a skate's heel sweeps smooth on a bow-bend: the hurl and gliding
Rebuffed the big wind. My heart in hiding
Stirred for a bird, -- the achieve of; the mastery of the thing!

Brute beauty and valour and act, oh, air, pride, plume, here
Buckle! AND the fire that breaks from thee then, a billion
Times told lovelier, more dangerous, O my chevalier!

No wonder of it: shéer plód makes plough down sillion
Shine, and blue-bleak embers, ah my dear,
Fall, gall themselves, and gash gold-vermillion.

I Held you like I diamond in my hands

I held you like a diamond in my hands
but you were sharp and cut me
and still I held you close even more.
I would not be parted.
I bled and my hands were sore
but I wanted you to be close even more.
You were so lovely and full of value in other-
people’s eyes.
But my eyes were sore from tears
and the sighs from my lungs had grown heavy.
I had to let you go.
I dropped you and you were gone
but I began to heal.
From now on I’ll have to survive on my own
and learn once more how to feel free,
because to possess you was not enough
and love is sometimes tough on lovers.
Sometimes we have to let go
of loved ones we know who cannot love us truly.
But one day they might learn of love they spurned
that was true and given freely.

(The poem before this post, written by daniel hook) To say that there are a lot of poems that have love as their subject is an understatement. This one is a mediocre one. Whilst I like what you have tried to do the rhyme is childish and the structure does not flow.

I am assuming that the 'I' in the title is a typo.
The 'sharp' in the second line is possibly not necessary. We know diamonds have sharp edges so the simile will work without that expositional word.
'close even more' does not really work. 'closer' or 'close for longer' or something would make more sense.
One person cannot be parted, except maybe by a broadsword.
I would avoid the word 'lovely' - too banal and cliched.
I really like the rhyme between 'gone' and 'from now on' - it ties in a rhythm to the piece.
I also like the half-rhyme between 'truly' and 'freely' although truly is another word to avoid if possible. In this context it sounds like something from a popular song lyric, which is a criticism which could be made of a few phrases you use ('spurned' is a word that seems only to be used in songs or poems because it rhymes with yearned so should also probably be avoided).

Love poetry is REALLY difficult to do well. The emotions love (and particularly lost or unrequited love) produces feel conducive to the writing of poetry and for that reason it is a flooded market. Almost everything that can be said has been said, and often in the aforementioned popular songs. This downgrades and cheapens genuine attempts to tackle the genre.
Well done for having a go, though. Poetry is a craft like any other discipline and you have to keep doing it to get any better. The myth of the instant poetic genius is exactly that - a myth. T. S. Eliot said no poem is ever finished.

Almost forgot. If I don't ask you a question you don't get to answer. And I know how that feels. Do you revise your work and if so how long do you leave it before go back?

Before you answer, Daniel, can I remind everyone to only provide factual information requested by the reviewer in their two-sentence answer and that you do not have the opportunity to defend your poem. Your poem can do that for itself in two ways: 1) by being so good that it gets mostly praise with a few minor criticisms, 2) by being so good that anyone who does say that they don't like it and gives reasons comes across as churlish and uneducated.

Now, onto my review:
stated outright by Martin and hinted at in the diplomatic phrasing of Siren's "it ties in a rhythm to the piece", I would have to say that I can't dance to this one at all. I tried clapping along as I read, but no... where is the beat?
The missing beat is manifest when you try to rhyme I bled and my hands were sore with and still I held you close even more with I would not be parted in-between the two. But, the line that follows that throws it wide open and makes it plain - there just is no coherent musical structure here.

Your internal rhymes (if they can still be said to be internal with out anything that you can call the end) show promise - you are clearly willing to mix up the non-rhyming, "end rhyming" and "internal" so that the reader won't get complacent and start pre-empting.

As to a saturated market and all that caper, I don't mind the odd love poem every now and then (in truth, belonging to a genre of poetry won't put me off any individual poem, so long it (a) does more than just describe what's physically there, and (b) does a whole hell of a lot more than just describe what's physically there). This love poem reads genuine enough on the face of it, and that falls off a little on closer inspection of one or two individual lines, but localised laziness such as "I dropped you and you were gone" and "because to possess you was not enough" doesn't kick the whole thing into touch - that sort of thing is easily done. And, the narrator is not romantic and unrealistic about what's involved in love and knows when to cut his/her losses and finish because he/she is putting in commitment that is not being fully reciprocated, which puts this a little bit above average.

I don't like the "Sometimes we have to let go of loved ones we know who cannot love us truly." bit - sounds to much like and agony aunt's advice or Jerry Springer's final point of the day.

Things seem to have gone quiet on Daniel's poem so here is another target:

Only Child

I was an only child, one of five.

The ghost of a brother, dead before I was born,
followed me out with my mates.
The sound of my mothers voice rang in my head.
“Don't climb trees. Remember George.”
Impossible for me to forget
what wasn't possible
for me to remember.
Just an only child, one of five.

A sister in her teens when I was born
is briefly a sort of mother,
then disappears
to the Air Force,
from which
she returns a stranger.
To an only child, one of five.

Another sister is a mother
although only a child herself.
Living a couple of miles away,
hers was a place to go
away from my old mum.
Her only child. One of five.

My brother has left
his privileged school.
The scholarship for a poor kid over
and he needing to go from the
father he couldn't live with.
Just an only child. One of five.

I am an only child. One of five.

Interesting subject. I confess to being fascinated by the psychological implications of birth order. I read a fantastic book on it once that seemed to give plausible rough-guide personality sketches of most of the people I knew with regard to where they came in their particular family hierarchy. It was like astrology, but with a basis in fact. Eldest siblings and the youngest of large families share some traits in that they are effectively only children but for different reasons. Eldest children actually are only children until the next are born and usually retain the pschological qualities associated with only kids but with added protectiveness and jealousy. The youngest child (of more than two) is treated differently by the parents (who have learnt a thing or two about parenting by now) and by the older siblings. They effectively become mini-parents of the sprog. Hence the reference to the Air-Force-bound sister briefly being a mother figure.
There is a possibility that the refrain, 'I am an only child. One of five.' (and its variants) could sound self-pitying but I think read in the correct way, this is not the case. What I am not sure about is whether this phrase is a bit rich, in meaning and syllabic density, to repeat quite so often. The use of repetition in poetry is perfectly valid but difficult to pull off without doggerel/song lyric connotations. I don't think 'Only Child' is down to that level but it may be shuffling on the cliff edge.
The first sentence (after the 'chorus') is great. A potentially sentimental subject treated in a psychologically matter-of-fact way. There is an apostrophe missing from 'mothers voice' (I am now attending the grammar police training college). Then the line beginning 'Impossible for me..' is beautifully paradoxical and concisely formulated.
I wonder if 'mother while only a child herself' in the third stanza could be put a different way? That phrase is a bit of a cliche now (especially where I come from, where the average generational gap is about 14 years) and the clever, dispassionate phrasing of the rest of the piece makes it jar a little. Obviously what it is actually saying fits right into the work.
Not sure about 'he needing'. Bit too impersonal, too formal, in the context of the piece.

Personal preference-wise, if I had written it, it would look completely different, formally. I would be looking to make the lines of each stanza match each other in length or actually be counting the syllables as I went along. Rhyme would probably intrude in a completely inappropriate way. I'd make a right pig's ear of it.

I have no questions. Some may ask if this is truly autobiographical. I think that is completely irrelevant. I actually don't want to know because I'd rather see the thing for what it is - a good poem that needs a little work.

I've spent a couple of days on this and there's not much there that I'd fight with. Nice enough flow to it. Could do with another single unstressed syllable in "Don't climb trees, ...." and not sure I'm too keen on the "...impossible... possible" maybe a differently stemmed word would have a nicer run. other than that, it's definitely one of your better ones.

Okay, then. Have a crack at this one....


Go! Go! (An Orwellian Sonnet)

Twende! Twende! - today’s language lesson -
Ten miles from Nairobi, its blade in the air,
Another word slips on its jackboots to press on
The face of humanity somewhere out there.

In here, aglow in my gown of resentment,
My heart full of love for this country of mine,
A matter of fact came to shatter contentment
When history proved just a matter of time.

Teach me the language of infinite sorrow,
Tutor my tongue in the jargon of fear,
Fluency might mean that this time tomorrow
I’ll know when to run from the blade at my ear.

My kin is diverse; my culture may lack roots
But monoglot faces will bloody my jackboots.

Will have a think about this one. My initial thought is I quite like it as Geography lessons go, but not too sure about this idea of starting a sonnet with what are effectively two spondees.

Am I allowed to comment on Malpoet's poem?

I, too, am interested in the subject: emotionally engaged with it, if you like. I was an only child of three. Elder sister being much older so that, when my younger sister arrived - well, my life has been ruined ever since of course.

For me, the style seems to interfere with the rhythm of the lines. It seems overwritten. For example, does the phrase "with my mates" add anything to the understanding? And the line:

The sound of my mothers voice rang in my head

is tautological perhaps: if you cut "the sound of my" you lose nothing but gain a tightness, or, better perhaps, cut "my" and finish the line at "voice"? Why do voices always "ring" and were else would they do so but in your head?
Could you cut the word "just" or the word "one" without losing the sense of it but helping the rhythm. And the words "for me" seem redundant; it is obvious who we are talking about.

E.G.

The ghost of a brother, dead before I was born,
followed me out.
The sound of mother's voice:
“Don't climb trees. Remember George.”
Impossible to forget
what wasn't possible
for me to remember.
An only child - of five

Well, just a thought.

Go! Go! by Siren

I don't like the title. I think twende means something like go (if so, why is it capitalised in its second use in the first line as if it were a proper name?) I presume the title is telling me the meaning of twende. If not, I have lost it a bit before I really start. On its own, 'Go! Go!' would work in this way. My dislike comes with the bracketed information that this is a sonnet and, obliquely, that it is about double speak.

It is never very elegant to give a poem two titles. If it needs to be named twice you have probably left something out of the poem.

In technical terms it fits the English sonnet structure just as I would expect from Siren. The question for me is why anybody would want to adopt the discipline of trying to say whatever it is they want within this particular fixed structure. It makes no more sense to write in the form of Shakesperian sonnets than it does to speak in Shakesperian English.

The poem is well constructed and I enjoy its rhythm and rhyme. Although the metre is correct, the last two lines of the first stanza do not flow as well as the rest of the work.

I like it, but I imagine the heavily obvious final line rhyme will grate with some people.

So far as the content is concerned, I am not really sure what I am getting from it. Is twende Swahili? (rhetorical) If so it is part of one of those attempts at culture crossing unviersal language. English was never that, but American power and the influence of the Internet has made it a universal language. Here we have a rootless African language meeting a rootless colonial language.

I don't know whether the 'country of mine' is Kenya or not.

This seems to be about transition from the known to the unknown and in which different types of oppressor crush uncomprehending victims. Presumably if the monoglots learn the language of infinitely complex conflicts they will be able to anticipate the approach of the jackboot and avoid it.

This could just as easily be a reference to the end of British colonial occupation of Kenya or the mayhem and butchery following Kenya's last, rigged, election and the bizarrre double government coalition that it spawned.

A thought provoking piece which is nice on the ear. I think it suffers from its choice of form and rather daft, heavy handed titling.

Oh I forgot. I should have moaned about the capitals on the first letter of each line again. Of course the justification is that if you are writing sonnets ,that was how it was done. Another reason for not writing sonnets.

It's a long time since I did GCSE's and my swahili is not as good as it used to be now, but I seem to remember pretty well that twende meant "go to".

Anyway, that aside, I'm not usually keen on the single rhythms of these strict-form poems, although sonnets are infinitely preferable to sestinas and vilanelles, and you have disguised this one well. If you perform it, I recommend you don't bother to tell your audience it is a sonnet - it will prejudice them one way or another.

Teach me the language of infinite sorrow,
Tutor my tongue in the jargon of fear,

No, I won't do either of those - they're silly. I mean... the language of infinite sorrow? Are you serious? What does that even mean?

And jargon of fear? I didn't even know fearful people had their own jargon. What happens if you're a fearful person and you don't know the buzzwords? Do the others just not hang out with you because you're not a cool fearful person.

And "monoglot faces"? How can any one of those objects that that noun signifies be that adjective?

Other than those points I have just made, I thought this was a nice poem, and it reads interstingly and in a well-pace fashion.

So 'lurve' poems have had their day then? Try this one:

The Exorcism

I rebuked him, stone cold refused him
Until I had the upper hand.
I denied him (fuck pacifying);
Became the owner of my land.

I adored him, then abhorred him
As he stretched me on the rack.
It was the twist of fates that floored him;
My inner strength that pulled me back.

I deceived him, then appeased him
Re just what he meant to me.
Though not intentional but yes, consensual
I learned confusion was the key.

And yes I loved him, oh how I loved him,
The only one to claim my heart.
Amid a sea of fake pretenders
The rugged diamond stood apart.

And now I mourn him, all blank before him,
No shining lights on this dark day.
Take caution lover or run for cover
For you lie where he once lay.

Love poems will always be written. It is probably our strongest passion and however overworked it may be, good poets will manage to produce good work on the subject.

When Daniel posted his poem I read it carefully and thought about it. I decided not to do a review. I didn't like the poem and I didn't feel able to offer anything worthwhile for inprovement.

Sorry Bella, but your poem is awful. Write club has had plenty of discussion so I must assume that you know the rules. Please don't feel hurt, but the idea of this is to give honest opinion so I won't hold back.

The poem doesn't scan. It does flow in places, but there are plenty of other jarring parts where it is very difficult to read in a satisfying way.

The ryhmes are contrived and horribly so at points. For example, where you substitute 'land' for 'body', 'self' or whatever else you owned loses the genuine meaning and feeling at the same time as it produces the crass rhyme.

Internal rhymes can be good and I suppose it is to your credit to try them, but they don't work here. 'Adored...then abhorred' and 'deceived...then appeased' might be OK in a proper context, but they don't fit with the rest of what is in the stanza.

Pretenders are fake. Tautology is distracting and just sloppy construction. Cliché in 'rugged diamond' to follow it doesn't help.

Sorry, I am running for cover. Who are you by the way Bella. I don't see you in the showcase.

Who am I? A girl on her journey. Correct; I'm not in the showcase.

Thanks Bella.

Bella nexus means something like beautiful connection. I am sure that you have a beautiful connection with someone other than that rugged diamond. Good luck on your journey. I wonder if it will be poetic?

The Exorcism (revised by a stranger)

I rebuked him, I refused him
‘Til I had the upper hand.
I denied him (fuck pacifying);
Became the owner of my land.

I adored him, I abhorred him
As he stretched me on the rack.
It was the twist of fates that floored him;
Inner strength that pulled me back.

I deceived him, I appeased him
Regarding what he meant to me.
Unintentional but yes, consensual
I learned confusion was the key.

Yes I loved him, how I loved him,
The only one to claim my heart.
Amid a sea of dull pretenders
That shining island stood apart.

Now I mourn him, fall before him,
When his memory lights the day.
Caution lover, lest you discover
That you lie where he once lay.

Sorry. Very cheeky, I know....to take someone’s precious work and revise it out of all recognition. But this is Write Club and things are different here. I was going to agree with Malpoet about the lack of scansion and the tautology and the cliché and yet....and yet.....I quite liked the poem. The rhythm hinted at a nice cantering pace which was interrupted by the syllabic irregularities. The imagery, while occasionally tenuously linked to the subject, was also mostly sharp and incisive. There is a satisfying confidence and ‘spikiness’ about the poetic voice which raises it slightly above your average love poem. But it needed work. And I thought the best way to demonstrate what sort of work it needed was to just throw down a quickly revised version of my own. You may well have wanted the scansion to falter, Bella, I don’t know, but I’ve cleaned it up a bit. I’ve also switched some imagery and inserted some of my own (which is unforgivable, I know). I realise that this changes meaning but I’ve tried to keep within the spirit of the piece. If I ask you what you think of the revision then, under the rules of Write Club, you have two sentences to call me a meddling bastard.

Hmm!

It's a bit better. Not much else to be said for it.

Not so sure that this really is a love poem - seems to be more of a warning. I would lose some (possibly most) of the internal rhymes. The rhythm isn't that bad if you read it as more of a rap than a poem.

Don't like the It was the twists of fates that floored him line - if the rhyming line that you have come up with doesn't sound like something that someone would say in the natural course of a conversation, then either play about with it until it does or change it completely for a non-rhyming line. The other problem with that line is that you are saying you turned the tables on him, but then you change it for what insurers would call an act of god.

Don't like re just what you meant to me either - sounds too much like you're circulating a memo around a corporate environment, which is not really appropriate to the subject matter.

As to the threat at the end, it is too oblique and wishy washy - I think this would benefit from a last line that states exactly what you will do if this latest fellow annoys you something like "or I'll carve you up good style" would make a much stronger ending.

Siren, your revision of a piece I wrote over ten years ago was a useful exercise – exactly what Write Club should be about!

! ?

Thank you, Bella. I hoped you would take it in good part and realise that I would only bother doing such a thing with a piece I liked. I think the rhythm of the piece is nice. Somewhere between lyric and (as DG said) rap. And the theme of the great love gone, which all others are measured against, is powerful, and powerfully expressed.

As for it being a warning rather than a love poem.....love encloses all human emotions and motivations....that's why we love it.

Hello.

Perfect City

Its mornings are washed in post-storm sunlight; burnishing slate roofs on sleepy-eyed homes; casting shadows on streets dusted down with a baked bread scent.
Its song is the creak and clunk of a front door that fills the world and shakes the sunrise from its slumber; each dawn a melody and rhythm for footfall to fathom.
Its expression is found beneath the weathered surface of stone, steel and spray; an answer half-heard, ever changing in prospect, or the mood of a new arrival.
Its humour burbles like the eager grumble of an engine ticking over, where impatient seconds open up as chasms making the day’s promise seem unreachable.


Its journey carries vessels along paths that defy compass readings to places that threaten opportunity and deliver choices. Such sustenance can feed and poison.
Its work is methodical and to the point, pausing only for tea and chitchat about biscuits; a mannered preamble to conversation concerning holidays not yet taken.
Its talk is fuelled by mischief, like the wicked joy of a child discovering swear-words, or a playful flirtation between colleagues that’s recognised but never acted upon.
Its dusk shimmers and allows everything to fall from its grasp, save for a few precious remnants; the warming satisfaction that comes from time filled with significance.


Its roads pulse with traffic, viewpoints in transit keen for fresh discoveries; hot rumour of alliances; forsaken appointments and laughter that conceals teeth-gritted envy.
Its care responds to the sound of the wine glass smashing against the wall of the over-priced flat; it’s the arm around the shoulder under the railway arch where tears fall.
Its noise ricochets between buildings and down alleyways like the fade-out on a much-loved refrain, till all that’s discernible is an affectionate whisper of farewell.
Its nights give shelter and tranquillity to the lucky who have avoided its inevitable rain; heavy-eyed thoughts drift and cloud the mind into dreams of a perfect city.

Cheers Steve,

Will have a good long think about this one and might even do a Siren on it. My first thought is that it doesn't seem to scan - have tried tapping along steadily while reading and couldn't get that to work started counted the syllables per line (I've been caught out before on that one), but couldn't work out a line length. Haven't counted syllables per stanza, but that'd be tenuous, if not dubious as a measure.

First impression: there are some good phrases here that can be linked together into a better shape, but that the poem isn't there yet.

Hi Steve,

I’ve read your piece over a few times. I think you've created some beautiful images: 'mornings are washed in post-storm sunlight,’ and the piece has some quirky touches: ‘the wicked joy of a child discovering swear-words’, 'the wine glass smashing against the wall of the over-priced flat.’

The main issue I have with this piece is that the majority of the poem is spent giving an impression that this is the perfect city and then, the last line tells us that the protagonist is dreaming of another place, therefore, in my opinion, it seems to die a death and the ending is weak. I think the piece lacks an edge; the lack of tension results in the piece amounting only to some pretty descriptions.

I’ll leave the issues surrounding the technical errors to the big guns on here but another bugbear I have is that I didn’t feel anything when I read it. I didn’t want to visit or live in the city but neither did I feel an urge to avoid the place – I just couldn’t get emotionally involved. Finally, I think there’s just a little too much schmaltz for my liking but everyone’s tastes are different.

Thanks.

First of all Bella I apologise. I didn't believe you were real. It doesn't change my view about your poem, but please forgive me for doubting you.

Now Steve and Perfect City.

First of all I like the underlying idea of describing a city through a range of metaphorical approaches written with some very promising imagery in places. The problem with it is that it doesn't have a good flow.

I can see why you have done it, but starting each element with 'It's' feels clumsy. I agree with DG about the scan and with Bella about the weakness of the end and the feeling that it doesn't fit properly with the feelings created earlier.

The idea and the poem are very well worth development. Some of the use of language shows a real feel for putting words together beautifully. One carp in that area though. Baked bread doesn't have a scent. That destroys the image for me when it has been well built to that point. Fresh baked bread is an excellent part of the morning you have drawn for us and then I think 'scent', no that's not right. Difficult I know, but that's what poetry writing is all about. It is getting just that right combination of words to really grab the reader or listener.

Perfect City

Its mornings are washed in post-storm sunlight burnishing slate roofs – sleepy-eyed homes. Their shadows on streets.
Its song is the creak and clunk of doors that rouse the day from its morning sleep; each dawn’s a rhythm for footfalls to fathom. But,...
...its expression is found beneath the surface: weathered stone, steel and spray; an answer half-heard, changing in prospect, the mood of a new .... [not sure what you were trying to say here but one syllable only].
Its humour burbles like the eager grumble of an engine ticking over. Impatient seconds open up as yawning chasms keeping the day’s promise out of reach.


I've sirened the first stanza, but have deliberately left it structured in clauses rather than cutting off at the line length, because it looks nicer that way. Read that and tap along and you'll find it works better (although there are a couple of deliberately feathered bits such as changing in prospect). Someone else keep that tap pattern and rejig the second stanza.

Direct question for Steve: What did you mean by a new arrival in that line that I haven't finished? (eg. was it a new day? some new hope? a new opportunity?)

Okay, looks like that thread has died. Here is one from Winston Plowes. Your comments please:

The Final Night of the Moon at Warrington Bank Quay


The last moon rolls along Unilever’s pipes
Low red resting crossed by catenary light
Dragged from a skidding yellow smudge
Tonight it’s so low, never so hungry to land

To judge. And never have we been so near to death

A double vision divided by hand
Aboard, on this land, on a ticking train trap
Pale face pressed onto pane to isolate
Eager to see the Bank Quay seconds stall

Platform clock’s pace crawls in the race
And the main line time is 20:07 in 2008
Plenty of time to wait for a minute
Till equalities tock freezes the fall
On a train, on a track, but of this pain
Worst of all no love to taste and swallow
To fill the hollow heart until departure in haste

I have spent time at said station.
I enjoyed this poem, its compact, intelligent and vivid, and feel that there's little I would like to change. I feel I understand Winston's message. The 'close to death aspect' is never more apparent than on the high speed (125MPH) lines.
Why the hollow heart? is my only question.I think Winston thinks of a missing lover, whilst waiting for the train, I would be perfectly happy reading this just how it stands.

have I broke the rules already? 2 sentence rule?

(Rules - Lauretta, I believe it is only the poster who is limited to 2 sentences and whatsmore my reply must be specific to the question asked. I am therefore not supposed to elaborate. nor can I defend any criticism and have to bite my lip.
Is this right DG? Assumig it is)

I have been asked the question -

Q - Why the hollow heart?
A - I was trying to sum up my feelings in this, my final minute of life, trapped on the train on my own. Thinking of all the things I may have done, have still to do and being on my own without a lover seemed the most important of these feelings.

Win

The poem is explicitly about death. It seems that the travel of the moon is a metaphor for death, life is going along train tracks and that death will occur when the clock goes to 20:08 in 2008 and when the moon sets (presumably at the same time). OK if it is done well although the life 'track' is hackneyed and moon images and metaphors are very well worked.

The poem is only partly punctuated. This causes problems reading it which are accentuated by the use of capitals at the beginning of each line. It is impossible to work out where sentences end. After two or three readings I actually found myself even less comfortable about the flow.

The title is too long. It feels as though it is part of the poem.

"The last moon rolls along Unilever's pipes "
Nice image.

"Low red resting crossed by catenary light"
I didn't know what catenary meant so I looked it up and that didn't help at all. In the right conditions there could be red in the moon or moonlight,but the construction of the line makes it catenary light which makes no sensse. The absence of punctuation makes things worse. I couldn't get anything from this line in the end.

"Dragged from a skidding yellow smudge "
Confused pictures of the moon making the yellow smudge in a twilight red haze, but it is not drawn for me very clearly. Sorry to go on, but that is partly punctuation again.

"Tonight it's so low, never so hungry to land"
Like the movement of the clock, the landing of the moon is a death metaphor. No problem having two metaphors for the same event, but does it add or would it have been better to concentrate on delivering one metaphor with the maximum impact?

"To judge. And never have we been so near to death"

What is being judged and by who? It seems to make most sense if there is a comma at the end of the previous line and it is the setting moon that judges. Having said that what do you take from a moon being in judgement of a life.

"A double vision divided by hand"
Don't know what that's about.

"Aboard, on this land, on a ticking train trap "
A clumsy line. The meaning seems clear enough. You're on the train of life going along a fixed track, waiting for the final tick of the station clock. Could be handled more elegantly.

"Pale face pressed onto pane to isolate"
Pressed to the pane maybe reviewing the life that has been lived. Don't know what the 'isolate' is about.

"Eager to see the Bank Quay seconds stall"
Keen to stave off death. Fair enough.

"Platform clock's pace crawls in the race"
What race? Just for the rhyme?

"And the main line time is 20:07 in 2008"
Yeah I se the idea. A bit clunky.

"Plenty of time to wait for a minute"
Don't see what this line does.

"Till equalities tock freezes the fall"
All equal in death? Don't know. The tock is the flip over from the last tick and provides a third death metaphor.

"On a train, on a track, but of this pain"
A rather ponderous drumming in of the fate and inevitability message previously created.

"Worst of all no love to taste and swallow"
So it is a loveless life or death. Could be put better. The sort of love you swallow is something I won't explore further.

"To fill the hollow heart until departure in haste"
Reinforcement of lovelessness. Where did the haste come from? There is a contradiction which doesn't seem to be intentional. The reference to 'race' might fit with haste, but then we have 'plenty of time' and 'seconds stalling'.

I think there is promise in the poem. A life coming to an end is a well worn subject and it is very important to avoid repating the ways it has been done before. The opening imagery is strong if tidied up a bit. I am not clear whether the life is of a person who worked at Warrington Unilever. If that is the case it could be strengthened to give more authenticity to the link.
If seen as a work in progress it could develop to a tight and powerful poem.

Malcolm,
Wow, I have never thought about dissecting writing in such ways, I mean beyond the person.
By this I mean that the essence of a poem is the person, in automatic writing every single word would be scrutinised and irrelevantly relevant. For this reason I often hold back on taking things apart. Times pulling apart reel to reel tape decks and DECCA tv's did not help either! could never get the things back together.
However by reading your analysis of Winston's poem I realise that in order to step beyond the realm of self satisfaction it's necessary to think very carefully how the feeling is put down (sorry for death pun on this poem)

hmmm, I have learned something today.
I do feel though that I have strung up Winstone and thrown rocks at his message. Perhaps I suffer from guilt or no nerve? Not sure.

I think that your comments are agreeable and Justified and in the context of the exercise welcome and necessary, I just never thought about it, and I thought I was a deep thinker

I kind of feel, humbled.

Will ask Pete to discuss with you at Wirral Words

Thank You Malcolm, great discussion, love it.

Malcolm,
Using your ideas of dissecting (if I may call it that)
first of all I have never had such a rapid learning curve, I took apart a monologue I posted and realised I could apply the ideas you highlited to this.

Whilst I tried hard to find lines to hack, I did find a lot of unecassary little bits of info

had it not been for write club I would not have realised this. Obvious stuff but somehow, I don't know, heck there's stuff to learn everyday. I would like more lessons! Just cant handle vitriolic critique as has been seen previous on write club. I fleet your critique re Winston was balanced and sensitive enough to make it handle 'able'

I'm tempted to put some of my stuff on here.

It seems that htis exchange (winston/malpoet) was something that I could buy into, I did not feel it smart arsed or condescending, I get switched off by the occasional holier than thou ambience that blows into WOL town sometimes (but rare)

great

I would only alter small parts of the poem (WBQ) though!
as I mentioned essence of the poet, I think it would damage the fragility.

When writing fresh works (or re-writing) I will bear in mind my actions on others in a more acute way.

I'm quite getting into the academic side of this now!
thanks Winston/DG/Malpoet and everyone else on the write club/nice club

I fear that I may be seen as a hurler of vitriol. The purpose of WC is to get a straight response from people who take time to look at your work. I try to do that and if I am going to be honest I am going to sound bad on poems that I do not like at all.

Other people may think the work is great and the poet should remember that, but they know the rules when they submit and I think it is very worthwhile for there to be a place for unvarnished opinion to be aired.

I certainly don't want to hurt anybody and I hope that all readers will believe there is never any malice, only opinion.

However, sorry Lauretta I am not going to talk to Pete about it. I want it from you, only you :-)

By the way, give us your stuff Lauretta. I am longing.

Malcolm
I don't think you are a hurler of vitriol!
you present your critique in a way that makes we want to get involved.
I know that you run an excellent evening in Liverpool and you present feedback forms and things, its supportive and brilliant.

I respect it
very much.

Hi DG, Hi all

Haven't forgotten this thread. Am not ignoring your comments/questions and will definitely answer them. Just rushed off my feet at the mo with my upcoming zine launch.

Great seeing you and the others at Inn Verse. Really enjoyed it.

Steve

DG

'mood of a new arrival' - is to do with questioning the ominous. It's about when something or someone appears briefly and how the overall mood of a place can, or has the potential to, shift from one emotional state to its direct opposite.

That would make a good end to that line - get rid of the word new and use the word presence.

Okay, here's the latest poem for review - haven't yet asked whether I can tell you the writer's name or not.

The train-driver

Jack retired at sixty - did not tell his wife
Married for forty years, it was time for a life
The railway company gave him a free-train pass
And a watch for his retirement into less-greener grass
He'd worn the uniform of husband - never lied
or cheated, Except for that Christmas party in 75
A kiss, though in truth, it was only ever half a kiss
But he had closed his eyes for his conductress
They still held doors for an 'ess' in those days
It was his only unscheduled stop in life - and railways
He had driven the train from Crewe to Carlisle
And home again, always home, counting each mile
Eyes ahead, eyes always straight ahead
No amber, the stop-lights going from green into red

Now Jack uses his free train-pass to commute
Four hours in any direction from home, any route
His wife still packs the lunch, he does not eat
Decades of cheese sandwiches, he hungers for a treat
Danish pastries and fresh French coffee, so hot
his mouth burns with memories he thought he'd forgot
Sometimes he goes into Boots, tries on the perfumes
tries to recapture the scent of the records-room

On the train Jack's quiet, keeps his head down low
just stares, carefully out of the train window
watching life sag into the disappearing scenery
But it's better than Countdown or daytime TV
In forty years, there was never time to enjoy the view
He was a driver; a husband - always work to do
Eyes ahead, eyes always straight ahead
No amber, the stop-lights going from green into red

When the train arrives at any unknown town
Jack goes to the door, puts a foot on the ground-
one foot only. One foot on the platform is like half of kiss
half a betrayal, half of a man no-one would miss
The staff ignore him-the train is cleaned and prepared
as he feeds a cheese and pickle sandwich to a bird
The bird once sated flies, belly-heavy, but it flies
over the train, over the train-tracks into the sky
Jack thinks that trains, trains are not at all, like marriage
Smiles to himself, as he returns to the carriage

The quickest way to do this is to paste the first bit of the poem into the box and then dissect line by line (or couplet by couplet). As a general criticism I would state that the language used is not very 'poetic'. I know this statement will inspire howls of protest from certain of my fellow poets/critics but allow me to elaborate. This poem is not formally remarkable, or even particularly competent, so why is it a poem? The narrative could easily be presented as a short story, indeed the sentence structures are very prosaic. There is no apparent abstraction and the metaphors are quite standard and cliched. I see little point in poetry which has insufficient elegance or unimpressive structural form.
Having said that I quite liked it as a story....the fact that it purports to be a poem put me off a bit.


'Jack retired at sixty - did not tell his wife
Married for forty years, it was time for a life'

Dodgy rhythm right from the off. And NEVER rhyme 'life' with 'wife'. NEVER NEVER NEVER!

'The railway company gave him a free-train pass
And a watch for his retirement into less-greener grass'

Pointless hyphen between 'less' and 'greener'. Either a grammatical misunderstanding, or a misfiring stylistic idiosyncrasy.

'He'd worn the uniform of husband - never lied
or cheated, Except for that Christmas party in 75'

Why the numbers rather than words? Even accepting that, why the lack of apostrophe denoting the missin '19' from '1975'? Why the sudden half rhyme in a poem which mostly rhymes? It's distracting. The reader has to stop and look for the scheme.

Anyway, I could go on like this but my girlfriend wants to use the computer to check her email.....

Yep your girlfriend had a better use for the computer Siren and wife does only rhyme with strife as we all know.

Nothing to add to Siren's comments really. OK as a small story although it is one that has been done many times in variations. It doesn't work as a poem.

Just to keep things ticking along, here is a winter one to dissect:

Winter

Silhouettes glide slowly under ice.
Golden slithers in a silver haze.
Life signs in frozen wasteland hint
of pleasure yet to come.

Now is a beauty all its own.
Featureless, pure and white.
Crisp blanket over every part.
Hiding weed and plant alike.

Crystal spikes from gutter gleam,
twinkling rainbows through the scene.
Pale yolk of winter sun,
glitters in the daggered rain.

Frail arachnid filigree,
links ice bowed bush to naked tree.
Feline footprints deeply trace,
live shivers through this frozen place.

I also like this, but I wouldn't be me if I didn't have issues...


'Silhouettes glide slowly under ice.
Golden slithers in a silver haze.'

Gold/silver? Hint of cliche?

'Life signs in frozen wasteland hint
of pleasure yet to come.'

Rhythmically, I would prefer a one syllable word inserted before 'in'. 'Set', perhaps?

'Now is a beauty all its own.
Featureless, pure and white.'

The word now in this context is reified. Perhaps it should be italicised. Or would that be too much?

'Crisp blanket over every part.
Hiding weed and plant alike.'

Weeds generally are plants, aren't they? And I also wasn't sure about every line in this quatrain being full-stopped. It may be grammatically correct but it looks and feels wrong, somehow.

'Crystal spikes from gutter gleam,
twinkling rainbows through the scene.'

The sudden appearance of a strong half-rhyme (a three-quarter rhyme, if you like) drew me up a bit. The poem progressively rhymes more and I wonder about this method. In the sense of form mirroring content I could see how this would work if the poem relates a gradual move from disorder to order or something, but this one doesn't.

'Pale yolk of winter sun,
glitters in the daggered rain.'

If the 'glitters' is a verb the comma is extraneous. If it's a noun I don't know what it means. I think the 'daggered rain', Chris, refers to icicles, which would not melt the snow.

'Frail arachnid filigree,
links ice bowed bush to naked tree.'

Love 'Frail arachnid filigree'. Not for the image (which is well-worn in winter poetry), but for the assonance and alliteration. It's a lovely sounding phrase, the sort that makes me love poetry. The 'r' and 'a' in frail reverse the corresponding letters in 'arachnid' and the 'i' from that word occurs three times in 'filigree' (phonetically speaking - which is all we can ever do, ha ha). Then there is the two-letter alliteration between FRail and FiligRee. The other line also has nice alliteration but also a fantastic rhythm. A great example of how just one short line can demonstrate a poet's skill.

'Feline footprints deeply trace,
live shivers through this frozen place.'

Again, if 'live' is an adjective the comma is unnecessary. Nice image though.

As you can see from the amount of question marks in my pedantry...er...criticism, some of my points are ambiguous. All in all I liked it very much. If you want to answer any of my criticisms, Mal, let's meet round the back in the 'Jibber jabber' thread. I think poets, like goalkeepers, should be able to defend themselves.

Coming back to the train driver poem, I would annotate it as follows:

1st line - sounds a little stilted on the modern ear - change did not for didn't (same number of syllables).

Line 4 - I quite like less greener grass as a sound, even if it's utterly wrong grammatically - less preceding a comparative that denotes more

5 & 6. 75 as a para-rhyme is assonance and strikes a bit of dischord for his momentary dallyance

7 & 8. again, conductress and kiss are discordant (but both enjoyable in their own way, I suppose)

9-13. Eyes straight ahead - this sets us up to infer something as to his character - and the character of the poem - linear and maybe unimaginative sort of bloke, train tracks might also connote him being on the straight and narrow

v2 l1 Commute seems wrong - sounds like he's going to work... but we know he's retired, so ?
v2 l3 Again - does not for doesn't. He's evidently still with his wife, and is just pretending to still be working - presumably will go home to her again that evening.
v2 l7-8 Nice image, but you'd have to have a lot of self confidence or just not care in order to pull that one off - he'd be going home to her smelling like he'd spent the day in a french brothel.

v3 Looks like back story and filler but...
v3 l4 Suggests he is doing it to fill the emptiness.
v3 l6 Again - echoes of the marriage keeping him on the straight and narrow or constraining his imagination. You start to wonder if the brief encounter was kept at one and just a kiss due to a lack of imagination rather than loyalty to the missus
v3 l8 Suggests his lack of imagination comes down to a lack of down time in which to dream - comes back to the married life constraining him theme

v4 l1-4 Now i'm confused - he seems to have a bit of imagination now and a desire to explore "unknown towns" - is the poem just saying that he's left it a bit late.
v4 l9-10 Another odd turn around - the whole poem seems to have compared trains to marriage, and now he seems to think of the train as giving him the freedom that his marriage doesn't

What about 'puts a foot on the ground - one foot only'. I thought that one might have rankled with your sense of logic, DG.

If I were to review your review I would first of all point out that 'dalliance' is usually spelled with an 'i', not a 'y'. But seeing as how we tend to write these reviews quickly, I don't think we should be held to the same literary accountability as the poets....so I'll let you off.
I would however, suggest that your review is very uneven in tone. You begin with matters of poetics and grammar and then segue straight into the subject of the work. This makes your piece read as either grammatically top-heavy or subjectively (?) bottom-heavy. Either way something is heavy which shouldn't be.

It's a full set of notes, dealing with both. I don't make too much comment on the language, as the point has been made already that it's not the most beautifully constructed thing in terms of the flow and usage, and overall, I'd agree with that statement.

Ah. I see. We have now embarked upon a 'continuum of critique'. Cool.

Mmmm

Okay and here is my annotation of Winter:

L 1-2 Shadows of goldfish -the narrator clearly already knows that the fish are goldfish because the gold colour wouldn't be known from a silhouette
L 3 Sloppy phrasing has led to the dropping of the article here.

L 4 hint OF pleasures suggests that hint means the same as "a dash of", and that the goldfish will be pleasing when the ice melts rather than the whole thing being a metaphore for "things will get better again soon".

L 5 The narrator finds wintry scenes beautiful, but is breaking the "show, don't tell" rule
L 6-8 The lack of prepositions is grating, and makes a mockery of the punctuation

v 3 the alternate assonance of white and like in the previous verse has proven portentious, now the whole thing has ditched its initial good intentions altogether and descended into rhyming couplets

v3 L1 sloppy phrasing again losing the article and the sentence structure is archaic.
v 3 L1-2. It's all gone a bit rubert the bear annual captions at this point.
v3 L4 Glittering the daggered rain would be better - the sun itself doesn't really glitter, but its light reflects unevenly on the rain if you're near the rain front and the sun is directly behind you (which incidentally is the only way you will ever get to see a rainbow)

v4 L1-2 I like the sound of these words in that order but i have no idea what it is getting at
v4 L3-4 may hint at a purpose to the poem when taken in conjunction with v1 - might be saying that even when life seems to be on hold, life goes on.

I wrote this one for WOL Hebden Bridge last week. Very much unrevised. Some criticism would be welcome.

DANCING TWIGS

I will miss this winter...

The snowed-in cosiness of gentle confinement,
the bold cacophony of rain-heavy streams,
each one a little valley in the making.

Waking in the darkness to the silence of birds,
the cold days shortening to a few wan hours
before the solstice switch’s see-saw plunge.

Buying new boots and a coat perhaps;
braces between body and water and air,
layers of humanity against elemental spite.

The random architecture of bare wood branches,
the dancing of twigs in coquettish winds.

Breath made visible like mystical speech,
garden plants shrouded in fleeces of love,
soil hardened to a thick sleeping crust.

And then the breaking,
the warming,
the light.

Goodbye old friend – I’ll see you next year.
My other guest is here
wearing brighter clothes.

my immediate comment is swap "shortening" for shortened. The clipped endings on both words cause the reader a slight pause to readjust his/her mouth before continuing on. Rhythmically, that makes the line too long with "shortening" and not just that but it makes that line really seem to drag as if there are too many rather than not enough hours in the day.

Will post a fully annotated review when I've thought the poem through for a day or two. There is evidence of a parallel purpose alongside the physical description of nature here, so it already beats the pants off the kestrel.

How do you know that you have been awken by the silence of the birds.... I know that silence can be ....deafening....however...if it was birds ....how did you know....???
Curious...
Gus...

'How do you know that you have been awken by the silence of the birds.... I know that silence can be ....deafening....however...if it was birds ....how did you know....???'

It's 'waking.......to the silence of birds', not 'woken....by'. If one wakes expecting to hear the dawn chorus and there is none, I think it is reasonable to describe such an experience thus (given poetic licence, negative capability etc.).

“DANCING TWIGS

I will miss this winter...”

These both appear to be titles. Make your mind up. I prefer the second one provided you cut the ending. See later.

“The snowed-in cosiness of gentle confinement,
the bold cacophony of rain-heavy streams,
each one a little valley in the making.”

Well it flows along in a banal kind of way, but it makes me say “ if you're snowed in you can't hear or see this noisy stream carving its valley.”

“Waking in the darkness to the silence of birds,
the cold days shortening to a few wan hours
before the solstice switch’s see-saw plunge.”

The buggers never go silent here. They wake me up in the morning in winter as well. Anyway, the day length change couldn't be more gradual: it is no plunge.

“Buying new boots and a coat perhaps;
braces between body and water and air,
layers of humanity against elemental spite.”

Don't get it I'm afraid. Doesn't paint a picture for me.

“The random architecture of bare wood branches,
the dancing of twigs in coquettish winds.”

Hmm! OK. Don't like coquettish much. Not keen on anthropomorphism as I have indicated before. Attributing trivial human attributes to wind doesn't d it for me. If the language were more beautiful I could be converted.

“Breath made visible like mystical speech,
garden plants shrouded in fleeces of love,
soil hardened to a thick sleeping crust.”

OK simile, the metaphoric remainder is sort of alright , but ponderous rather than poetic.

“And then the breaking,
the warming,
the light.”

I know it is the toilet level at which I always first see things, but I could not help going into 'breaking wind' on the first line. What warning? Glad you have seen the light.

“Goodbye old friend – I’ll see you next year.
My other guest is here
wearing brighter clothes.”

Bloody 'ell Siren. Talk about banal. It is not only rhymes that you can see coming from miles off. We all know that spring comes after winter and that the cycle happens every year. So winter is your friend, but you're tired of him. You could find a Siren way to put it that would surprise and enchant us, but you haven't.

Yeah, better than kestrel. Work on it.

Responding to a question mark that may have denoted rhetoric - it is warMing, not warNing (and yes, I am aware that is also banal and it sounds a bit like something out of Highlander.....). I do wish you people would read the stuff thoroughly before wading in.

Great age and eyesight I'm afraid rather than inattention. It is clearer now. Not very exciting.

Re – Dancing Twigs

I will have a go at making some observations from my point of view. I do not consider myself an expert poetry analyst and have not read the other reviews of your work on this thread on purpose.

Line 3 for me is really specific to Hebden Bridge and works for me because of this. ”Little valley” seems rather simple otherwise.


Silence of birds – For me these winter mornings are reminiscent of birds which make a noise in the dark early hours and yet that doesn’t seem natural. I think that’s what you are trying to get across here but not sure it does it completely.

Wan hours – “Wan” sounded to me to be from a different language/age compared to the rest of the poem.

Liked the idea of the solstice switch (noun).

Liked the layers of clothes and layers of humanity comparison

The random architecture… coquettish winds were the most striking lines for me

Within the rules of Write club I will now ask a question – Is it intentional that this section has only 2 lines? And if so why?

Breath made visible… weak line.

Liked the unexpected jump in the word love. A stronger, more emotive word than I expected but seems to work

Last line – For me, for rhythmic reasons the last line could do with at least 4 more syllables for a better close, this would give you the opportunity to say more too. Otherwise it seems to tail off in a bit of an anticlimax.

Winston

Hello Winston.....there is a two line stanza in the poem because when I first wrote it the whole thing was just a solid block intended to be a list of the things I like about winter. As usual with my poetry, when I came to a quick revision for WC I found certain groups of meaning, unconscious assonance and alliteration, which seemed to indicate the thing should be chopped up into stanzas....that's just the way it came out.

Important Announcement,

Write club is closing down temporarily. It will be back in another form (possibly two other forms) shortly. Please submit poems for the new version to dermot@writeoutloud.net

Blimey Charlie! I didn't realise 'Dancing Twigs' was that bad!