2002

[TranquillityBase]

made a second edit. can't seem to stop this from getting longer and longer.  

Cutting is the hardest thing to do, and it used to be that my revisions always got longer.  Pig pen has helped me with that.  Stick around, you will learn a lot.

to clarify on the line 'yet still fully formed in its image' - does it make more sense if you consider the narrator as the baby, and the 'you/your' subject as their mother? I tried to make this distinction more clear in my edit 

absolutely!  i thought that might be the case, but something was missing to make it clear, at least for me.  It still is not crystal clear to me.  I'm about to anotate where I might be missing something, along with just a few cuts.  This is a strong poem, but it could be stronger.

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2nd edit: 

Dry soil, dust lifting, and underneath it a floating wound
a mystery, or a forgotten belonging:                                 "a floating wound" is a mystery, so I think "a mystery" is redundant.
how you could run so fast but never get very far
is a relic of the truth, a tragedy
far removed from the prime of your life
yet still fully formed in its image.                         why "its" instead of "her"?  that would instantly distinguish the who's who or am I confused already  never mind, I get it now

With growing unease
I stare at the edges of your photograph
and think of what you were, 
what might have survived you: heat, water, bone, 
a favorite lipstick. Your fear of the light. 

A hunter-gatherer comes to the end of his route         I don't understand who is being talked about here? OK, never mind, I get it now.  inserted "a" instead of "the"
standing before the gorge
twin oceans of prairie grass and diamond sky
in place of the yellow-and-grey canyons of his youth. 
Looking for the warp over the scar
the yolk on your fingers, a twin without twin, 
peer without peer: what did you realize
when you saw land?                                this strange new land?  this changed land?

I imagine you holding me 
nursing by the small window, 
condensation tracking down the water glass
and breast milk drying on your skin, 
the ants in my ear humming a strange lullaby. 
An odd tableau
for someone more used to surviving than giving - 
in stillness, stars could burn you, but metal couldn't cut you
and time never altered you.      Prefer original last line (fabric.....); time never altered.. .. is kind of overused already

Having been made in your image
I find myself unable to turn the page. 
Springtime has arrived in Texas
and with it, the beginning of a new life; a new happiness   think this also is redundant
over the same sadness. White blossoms
cupping your smile,                                  your baby smile ?
the baby. Sunlight streaming in softly over your head
and the asphalt under your feet warming, a warning. 

Entropy studies me the way I study
  you. 

So I've tried to show some of my points of confusion.  I'm still unsure who's being talked about as the poem proceeds.  cancel this, I'm seeing it clearly now

I'm only one, easily confused reader.  Hope some other people will add critiques.  Thank you letting me continue to niggle.

TqB

______________________________________________________a few day later:

I reread this, and my comments, and the poem has become clearer, so I've adjusted the notes, added a couple of new ones.

TqB