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Critical Analysis #2
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Illusion
| Critical Analysis #2 |
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Illusion |
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TomMark Member Elite
since 2007-07-27
Posts 2133LA,CA |
How thin a smear of frost on window pane. And who has licked you almost to none? For even if I left my glasses off You still can not pretend to be the moon. |
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| © Copyright 2007 TomMark - All Rights Reserved | |||
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oceanvu2 Senior Member
since 2007-02-24
Posts 1066Santa Monica, California, USA |
Hi Tom: No fluff: this is an absolute stitch, great combination of Imagist and Surrealist poetry. I know it's not what you intended, particularly the Surrealist part, but, if you submitted it to an "intellectual" magazine, it would be considered a work of genius. I think of this poem as a brilliant accident. The image is totally clear. The words are totally you. The result is something some people try for for years and never achieve. If anyone gets snarky, sarcastic, or mean about this, remember the pseudo Latin phrase: "Non illegitimi carborundum." Wiki it if you don't already know it. You'll laugh too! Or maybe you're just flat smarter than all of us smart-asses. Best indeed, Jim  |
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TomMark Member Elite
since 2007-07-27
Posts 2133LA,CA |
my dear Jim, I am not smart. I try to tell the scene of a transparent, paper thin, and blurring moon around 11am over LA yesterday. see, not good. have a laugh. I thought I get the stress right but now I again counted wrong and did not rhyme also. can't get anything right! Don't laugh. |
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oceanvu2 Senior Member
since 2007-02-24
Posts 1066Santa Monica, California, USA |
Hi Tom -- No, no, no, Tom! I am laughing with DELIGHT! You continue to amaze and startle me! Again, I ask, do you have any idea of how hard this is to do? How much you accomplish in not just startling me, but in moving ANYONE with words? Just accept it as someone telling you that you are doing a good job! Best! Jim |
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TomMark Member Elite
since 2007-07-27
Posts 2133LA,CA |
Thank you, Jim. You are kind. Have a wonderful day! and post poems. Tom |
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serenity blaze Member Empyrean
since 2000-02-02
Posts 27738 |
Smiling wide--Jim is right. This could be taken as an editorial with a bite, but your work (as such as I have been delighted to read) has a quality of innocence which makes discernment of intent a bit more confusing--but it's okay--that's what makes this sparkle like a perfectly cut gem. You do make me smile TM. |
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chopsticks Senior Member
since 2007-10-02
Posts 888The US, |
Tom, you are kind and wonderful and very poetic . |
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Bob K Member Elite
since 2007-11-03
Posts 4208 |
Dear TomMark, Don't worry about "I know nothing about poem;" it puts you about ten steps ahead of most of us. I can see this makes you uncomfortable, so I won't belabor it. You don't have to worry about stresses or rhyme. When you relax and don't try to be "poetic," whatever that may be, you pull off some very fine things. The trick is not to be watching yourself so hard when you write. For example, I know people who would kill to have said "a transparent, paper thin and blurring moon." That's the way you seem to think and talk when you're not busy beating yourself into the ground. Holy cow! Fella, that's first rate stuff. I'm not against rhyme, mind you, but if you find it limiting what you say rather than opening up associative possibilities for you, this might not be the time for you to use it. It may feel more comfortable later, and serve to open things up for you rather than shut things down. That's generally what forms are for, to open things up, and then to serve as aides memoires for people who are trying to memorize blocks of material when you're trotting out the version of The Illiad you're trying to entertain the Lord and His Pals with tonight at the Feasting Hall. It's still useful for that, and still fun sometimes, for some people. Sort of like crossword puzzles. But it's not fun or even useful for everybody. And you don't need to count stresses either. You simply have go make sure the lines have integrity within themselves and some sort of rhythmic cohesion. The unit of a line can be almost anything, a number-count of syllables, length of your breath unit, the "feel" of the line, whatever, so long as it is a unit you can feel and your reader can feel as well. I once asked a pretty good and very well published poet what the metric was he was using for a particular poem; and he said, putting me firmly and appropriately in my place, that he was using between two and five stresses per line and between four and eleven syllables. That is, he was using enough to do the job and no more. No line was any longer or shorter than it had to be. He tried to make each line break mean something when he could, and tried to make the beginning of each line start with a bit of a kick, if he could. I know you feel a victim of the homework vultures, but there are some books that help. I think the best single one is by the late Richard Hugo. If this means anything to you, the man's collected poems are still in print 25 years after his death and so is his short collection of essays about writing poems, The Triggering Town. Nobody done anything even close for both information and even straight entertainment. He's good about talking about the function of play in poetry. Even serious poetry. Without some playful element in poetry, it would be difficult to read and painful to write. For this poem in particular, you've burdened yourself too heavily with a need to fill out 10 syllable lines. You've had to pad them beyond what you'd do if you were simply writing or talking to friends. If you took out the padding and everything that you didn't need to say, what would be left? If you believe in second drafts, TomMark, that's where your second draft would start. I, myself, have a terrible problem with narcissm, and grown painfully attached to every little pronoun and comma. I tend to be blind to my imperfections and it can take me decades to see what's obvious to at least some others almost right away. I've come to look on rejection slips with as much difficulty as before, but now with a certain amount of gratitude as well, thinking of the mistakes they have helped me avoid over the years. And so on. I hope this has been of some help. Yours, BobK. |
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TomMark Member Elite
since 2007-07-27
Posts 2133LA,CA |
A big, huge "thank you" to you, dear Bob K. And thank you again from my heart. If you don't mind my silliness, I try to write a sonnet some day(not a easy task). But first I have get a ten syllables a line and make it look like a poem. Then I will get the iambic meters and then the right rhyme form, silly me, in different poems. if you or any one else laugh, fine with me. Tom |
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chopsticks Senior Member
since 2007-10-02
Posts 888The US, |
I did enjoy the Dear TomMark post by Bob K. It gave me insight in poetry that I’m so glad I got. Thanks TomToo for writing Illusion. If not for Illusion, I would never have read such and interesting post as Bob’s Btw, This doesn’t mean that I have stopped appreciating Essorant and Balladeer. |
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jbouder Member Elite
since 1999-09-18
Posts 2534Whole Sort Of Genl Mish Mash |
TomMark: I like this very much. You've caught a moment really well here. I've played around with the sound a bit to try to get it to get my ear to sync with the poem's mood ... unfortunately, this is all I have to show for my effort. A spot of frost upon the window pane, Like stars will be caressed to nothing soon. For even if I left my glasses off You still could not pretend to be the moon. I'd recommend you keep working on this ... it's definitely a keeper. Jim |
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beautyincalvary Member
since 2006-07-13
Posts 98 |
Someone said it has an innocence to it; I'd definitely agree. There's something really honest about it. |
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