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esmond
Junior Member
since 2004-01-04
Posts 11


0 posted 2004-02-02 04:30 PM


The river flows smoothly through the morning,
then veers into a maelstrom. A rapacious afternoon
around the bend scuppers my sails, barricades
the gateway to my mind; sinks a hoy of ideas.

My muses utterly shuttered and firmly battened
I latch onto a solitary salvaged thought:
better the measure be short of the brim, than
sop the literates’ laps with stagnant overspill.


© Copyright 2004 esmond - All Rights Reserved
wintertao
Member
since 2003-11-17
Posts 366
Okaloosa Island, FL
1 posted 2004-02-02 04:46 PM


aye !

I loved this except for the ending!

"
better the measure be short of the brim, than
sop the literates’ laps with stagnant overspill.
"



Grover
Senior Member
since 2004-01-27
Posts 1967
London, ON, Canada
2 posted 2004-02-02 06:56 PM


A real oyster! Grover.
Severn
Member Rara Avis
since 1999-07-17
Posts 7704

3 posted 2004-02-04 12:56 PM


How about....losing half of the adjectives and seeing what you're left with?

K

Sunshine
Administrator
Member Empyrean
since 1999-06-25
Posts 63354
Listening to every heart
4 posted 2004-02-04 10:17 AM



Shuttered?  Or shuddered?

colbalt
Junior Member
since 2004-02-03
Posts 20

5 posted 2004-02-05 06:29 AM


I latch on to that thought too. Quite often actually! smiles.
I enjoyed the read esmond. Thank you.

regards
colbalt

thinktwice
Member
since 2003-12-23
Posts 125
United States
6 posted 2004-02-05 08:17 AM


for some reason i really want to go sailing now...
Adam

esmond
Junior Member
since 2004-01-04
Posts 11

7 posted 2004-02-06 08:53 PM


Thank you all for your comments.

hi Severn.. if I said:
You have a nice face with blue eyes,
and firm breasts and shapely legs.

and I left out half the adjectives,
what whould YOU be left with?

I ask this in the nicest way.


esmond
Junior Member
since 2004-01-04
Posts 11

8 posted 2004-02-06 08:55 PM


hi Sunshine.. definetly Shuttered.
Severn
Member Rara Avis
since 1999-07-17
Posts 7704

9 posted 2004-02-07 04:29 AM


Hey Esmond....lol, just so you know clever little turn-it around's-so-you'll-see-my-point don't do much for me.

You don't need all those adjectives, pure and simple. A poem doesn't need every moment of itself described and outlined. It's ok to be raw. It's ok to have mystery. It's ok to leave some images up to the reader to interpret.

It's more than ok not to inundate with description, description, description. The fact is many poets truly believe that their poems are empty if they can't cram in an adjective to go with every noun. After all, how will a reader know what the poet is saying if it's not all right there for them to see?

What's more, flowery language and the demonstration of a large vocabularly is poetic right? This is not helped much by tradition. Traditional poetry - well, can't get much more adjectivalised than that stuff. (Which is not to say that I don't respect it; I'd be a fool not to).

At the moment you're relying on your adjectives to bolster your poem. And it's obvious. I would take a step back and objectively have a look at it from that perspective. Think about ways to make it cleaner.

You're writing a poem, not describing one particular person.

K


esmond
Junior Member
since 2004-01-04
Posts 11

10 posted 2004-02-07 08:25 AM


hi Severn..

thanks for solid comments.
I'm certainly looking at this
from your point of view.
You say it's too obvious,
does that mean that
the metaphor is too weak?
Or is it solely down to
being over descriptive.

I pay a lot of attention to sound,  
maybe this doesn't come over to you
all that well because of my dialect.
I'm from Wales, UK.
I do have this poem on audio tape
(as I do - all my poems)
and it sounds okay to my ear.
I do love to get my tongue
around words, and love a good mouthful.
To prune this piece of adjectives
would would deminish the tone
(to my ear)
and it's only an eight-liner.

Still, I am tossing your comments
around in my head, and thank you
for your insight.
  


Severn
Member Rara Avis
since 1999-07-17
Posts 7704

11 posted 2004-02-15 07:35 PM


Hi Esmond...sorry to take so long to reply, I've been offline for a week..

Hm, no, I wasn't referring to the metaphor, just the adjectives.

Another hm...dialect privileging? Or should that be accent privileging? Let me explain...

It's premature to think that your reader will be aware of, let alone care, about your dialect/accent while they are reading the poem in their own mind, or even out loud.

I will not deny that sound is important within poetry. It is, to me, a key element when writing on my own poems. However, if sound is essential to your writing, and you wish to communicate to a reader, then dialect - in my opinion of course - is not always an effective method of commuication. Dialect, if used well, can be wonderful - it can also be colluding for a common reader. Having said that though, I see little of any dialect in this poem given that the definition of dialect is: 'a form of language spoken in a particular geographical area...'

No, I see the straight-forward English language brutalised by too many adjectives.  

I think you're saying that you like the sound of all these adjectives (stemming back to how poetic it all sounds). Sounding nice and relating directly to dialect are two different things.

Also, to further that, the welsh accent is highly rhythmical and lyrical, no doubt about it. It follows that alliteration and assonance would sound devastatingly pretty spoken in that accent.

Eg: My muses utterly shuttered and firmly battened
I latch onto a solitary salvaged thought:
better the measure be short of the brim, than
sop the literates’ laps with stagnant overspill.

There's also a lot of those two things in this poem.

You have a very nice sounding poem, Esmond, no disputing it. With the thoughts outlined above, though, do you see where I'm coming from about relying on adjective (and now 'sound') to bolster your poem?

K

esmond
Junior Member
since 2004-01-04
Posts 11

12 posted 2004-02-16 06:52 PM


hi, Severn, thanks.
I'm with you all the way.

hush
Senior Member
since 2001-05-27
Posts 1653
Ohio, USA
13 posted 2004-02-22 11:52 PM


I'm a fan of brevity. Some people aren't... some people love to just read descriptors and enjoy the flow of words. I don't. That's why I stumbled my way through the Scarlett Letter and flat out gave up on An American Tragedy 60 pages through...

to digress for a moment- I am still terribly bitter about this. In my junior year of high school, in honors eng., we all got reading assignments- novels for a book report. I was assigned Dreiser's 900 page nightmare. Well, my cousin-by-marriage, P.C. (his nickname b/c he hails from Port Clinton, AKA Pimp City) was assigned London's Call of the Wild. A book I read in a basic freshman reading class. (I didn't fare too well on the book report.)

Anyway... you have a whole lot of multi-syllabic words here, and quite frankly, I get lost. Million dollar words work well when used sparingly, but here? I've gotten used to you tossing bills my way... and in only 8 lines.

BTW, not a knock on you, b/c a lot of people do it... but I'm not understanding the inherent value in a poem about writer's block except as a writing exercise. Is it just me?

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