[[this is my first attempt at poetry--and in such company i am terrified. but i felt moved to write this, for some reason, so here it is. you've forced me out of my comfort zone, PB. be proud!!]]
sitting too close together
to the crackle-thump of speakers
I lean in to catch the whisper
of your shout and feel
your lips stir my hair.
you leave in short
hours that keep passing by
marching uniformed
measured steps
back to your new life
without me.
your hand softly
on the skin bared
between my belt and shirt
you speak
but what
I remember best
the tickle of your breath
and what it stirred
in me.
8 comments:
I am proud LO. I'm proud of YOU! Takes courage to jump into another genre. More writers out to do it though because you learn so much that way.
I see first of all that you're using one of the favorite tricks of poets, our annoying habit of using an adjective that we don't normally associate with the noun, e.g. "the whisper of your shout". You do realize this is one of the poetic habits that makes us very unpopular with most readers? :D
My approach is even more pesky, I normally find a way to put the adjective on a separate line from the noun so it would look like this:
I lean in to catch the whisper
of your shout and can feel
your lips stir my hair.
This bit of rearrangement has the added punch of discovering the noun we're not expecting after leaping onto the next line plus we have the sound of a shout on the same line that now ends with a touch in the word "feel" then down to the next line where lips are stirring the hair and not the usual breath.
In brief, my personal view of poetical mechanics is that the more you can cause the reader to stop either by surprise or fooling about with rhythm then the more you make them think. Could be dead wrong of course that's just what I'm up to. :)
Okay, I'll monkey with one more:
you leave short
in hours we keep
spending too quickly.
marching uniformed
measured steps
back to the new life,
without me.
What I've done with that one is mostly nothing more than eliminating spare words. It gives the stanza a faster pace literally but it also makes it a bit more uncertain, a bit more open to interpretation. That's just my taste of course and I would never suggest it has to be yours. Just showing you how I go about constructing my little puzzles.
Finally, think about what word you leave hanging on the end of each line. You can get a lot of power out of those end words. I very much liked your last stanza but I think you could rethink the line breaks a little bit. Very awesome work especially for a first effort. I am very proud of you indeed. Cheers!
LO,
First attempt huh? This is pretty good.
I read an interview that Claire Keegan gave a while back, and she said that poetry is the highest form of literature…or something like that. The more poetry I read and the more poetry I attempt to write, the more I can appreciate that.
PB and Tiger got me to read poetry, then to try to write it, and now I can’t leave it alone. Watch out…its addicting.
I cant add much to PB’s comments. The only thing that I really noticed (and PB already touched on this) is that you might want to tighten it up a little. For example:
“you leave in short hours that keep
passing us by too quickly.
marching with uniformed, measured steps…”
Do you need the “too quickly” in the second line? Perhaps get rid of a couple of unneeded words then rewrite those lines/stanzas. I am really guilty of this… being too wordy. I frequently add words that aren’t really necessary and don’t add to the piece.
Hope this helps.
Congratulations on your up coming graduation. Some days I wish I were back in college, other days I’m not sure how I ever made it through.
As always I enjoy your work…how about another poem?
- Steve
Oh yeah, forgot to mention. The title got me.
It’s usually harder to take leave than not to because it’s easier to stay than go back. I’m sure you know what I mean.
Thanks for posting this LO.
Steve
thank you so much for your wonderful comments, guys. its absolutely thrilling to be able to communicate in a new form and have people actually pick up on what you're trying to say. i know love poetry makes most people roll their eyes, so i apologize in advance...i'm newly head-over-heels and haven't ever had to deal with the iraq situation personally, so its difficult--but maybe inspiring for poetry. LOL. anyways, i just meant to say i am taking the comments under serious consideration and will rewrite shortly. Thanks so much!!
i rewrote--i see what you mean about poetry being playful, PB. it was so fun to tinker with this. and so much easier than editing a short story. LOL. hope you like the revisions.
So far so good, LO. Ready for lesson number 2? :D
I lean in to catch the whisper
of your shout and can feel
your lips stir my hair.
"I lean in to catch the whisper" works for me and you're setting up the device that will carry a lot of what you're really saying here so it works on more level than one. Always good. I hope that wasn't pure mud. I'm a bit tired. OK a lot tired. LOL
Now that you have the device, e.g. catch/whisper why not run with it? That's what poets do (sometimes to excess and yours truly is quite guilty of that at times...) but when you have a device working for you it will work throughout the poem. Soooo, instead of "...feel / your lips stir my hair..." why not "hear / your lips stir my hair." That of course works because you have "...of your shout..." at the head of that line. Am I being a daft poet? No worries, you can tell me.
Here's the other stanza that I have some quibbles with:
the blood rushes, sounding
in my ears, keeping time
with the tink of emptied shots slamming
home against the bar, letting
me know where
it counts most.
Why not, "...the blood shwick shwicks / in my ears, keeping time..."? I made up a word, true, but there just wasn't the right sounding word or I couldn't think of it. Besides, poets make up their own frequently. LOL I was going for the sound of a man's wristwatch. A soft yet relentless sound to go with the time reference. The point is that you can make up a word if necessary and avoid over used combos like "blood rushes". I believe this is acceptable in fiction too. You should use it sparingly of course but if you get a prime chance, why not go for it? :)
I didn't catch the first draft so I can't really comment on that one.
Just wanted to comment on economy of words and that is something you learn over time. When you write a poem there is nothing wrong with putting down what comes to mind, that is advised, it is when you have finished writing the poem that you realise a lot of the words may not be needed. So you pair it down, and you shape it to reflect your ideas.
That's why i think writing shorter poetry is a great exercise because you have limited yourself to less words, which means that each word has to be more packed with meaning.
Some of the poem is very hectic and frantic, words like 'slamming' 'thump' 'blood rushes' 'marching'. This could reflect on the time and the urgency of the situation and that there isn't much time - i like this. Time plays a big part here or lack of time and it adds to the poignancy of the situation. Whether the marching is in direct reference to soldiers or the marching of time is quite a nice reflection. The poem has quite a lot of depth on different levels.
Overall, well done!
hey all thanks for the comments...i haven't forgotten you or my poetry attempt, but finals have fallen on me like an avalanche. i will take a look at your comments and get back to you! thanks!
Post a Comment