They’re all okay. #4 is a bit obvious. Lose the first line and think about adding something else at the end. Perhaps another stanza or two. I actually think #1 - #3 work as a single poem more or less, like three snapshots. All they really need is a good title to link them. I like the expression ‘stutter of light’ in the first poem but ‘soaking’ doesn’t really go with that; ‘spraying’ perhaps? Stutter has a ragged, corrugated feel. Perhaps although it’s a good expression it’s not the right one here.
Actually, with a little revision (getting rid of the word ‘nearest’ in #2) I can see a narrative that would encompass all four poems, a sailor’s wife looking out across the Clyde with her kid, the kid she would not be burdened with now if only she’d said, “No,” at the time. I could see that working. Again the title would be all important to tie it all together.
i like the fragmentariness about them, i would see them exactly like this, glimpses, random thoughts and insights, of course there is a narrative winding through them, but it doesn't need to be clearer like this because it is simply made out of these bits and pieces of the vision of the poetic 'i'. there is something japanese in this attention to the condensed, realist detail of nature...
thanks roxana, I'm really an imagist at heart I think, and I love the concentrated detail of haiku poetry.
thanks dominic, you know I've never read much of Ian Crichton Smith though I keep meaning to every time I'm reminded of him. I really must get a collection or a selected of his sometime. He lived in Oban which is only about an hour and a half drive from here and he was brought up on the Isle of Lewis where I was born!
7 comments:
1 and 3 strongest for me. Very taken with 1.
thankyou titus :)
They’re all okay. #4 is a bit obvious. Lose the first line and think about adding something else at the end. Perhaps another stanza or two. I actually think #1 - #3 work as a single poem more or less, like three snapshots. All they really need is a good title to link them. I like the expression ‘stutter of light’ in the first poem but ‘soaking’ doesn’t really go with that; ‘spraying’ perhaps? Stutter has a ragged, corrugated feel. Perhaps although it’s a good expression it’s not the right one here.
Actually, with a little revision (getting rid of the word ‘nearest’ in #2) I can see a narrative that would encompass all four poems, a sailor’s wife looking out across the Clyde with her kid, the kid she would not be burdened with now if only she’d said, “No,” at the time. I could see that working. Again the title would be all important to tie it all together.
that's an interesting perspective, jim! thanks for your comments!
i like the fragmentariness about them, i would see them exactly like this, glimpses, random thoughts and insights, of course there is a narrative winding through them, but it doesn't need to be clearer like this because it is simply made out of these bits and pieces of the vision of the poetic 'i'. there is something japanese in this attention to the condensed, realist detail of nature...
I like all of these - and the accumulative effect. I'm reminded of Ian Crichton Smith.
thanks roxana, I'm really an imagist at heart I think, and I love the concentrated detail of haiku poetry.
thanks dominic, you know I've never read much of Ian Crichton Smith though I keep meaning to every time I'm reminded of him. I really must get a collection or a selected of his sometime. He lived in Oban which is only about an hour and a half drive from here and he was brought up on the Isle of Lewis where I was born!
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