Volley'd and Thunder'd

[Leanne]

“Never trust a poet.” That’s what Daddy said to me
when I was knock-kneed in the factory
and knocked up on the floor
while the whiff of something more
drowned in Brut and milky tea.

Lord Tennyson was late again
and half a league behind me
so he missed the mouth of hell
I described so bloody well
after waiting in the mill for him to find me

And the body odour hugged me, brotherly
with a slightly leering passage to the right
where the rotten gods had laced their boots up tight
and sabres bared, they left
to assault the barren cleft
while the mothers waved their banners in the lee

Trust a poet’s patterns while he traces them in air
for wayward thumbs to print in stammered ink
and bloodied girls to think
there’s an exit from the pink
to erase the flash of muddy underwear

But disillusion issues cold
from waters barely flowing
where currents travel there and back
but in between their charge is slack
and lives drift by, delightfully unknowing

[abu nuwas]

I have seen this elsewhere, I feel, and liked it then -- though I have a vague idea that it is not quite the same.

[billy]

“Never trust a poet.” That’s what Daddy said to me,
when I was knock-kneed in the factory
and knocked up on the floor
while the whiff of something more
drowned in Brut and milky tea.

Lord Tennyson was late again
and half a league behind me
so he missed the mouth of hell
I described so bloody well
after waiting in the mill for him to find me
i laughed at the 1st 3 lines of the above, this is my fave verse.

And the body odour hugged me, brotherly
with a slightly leering passage to the right
where the rotten gods had laced their boots up tight
and sabres bared, they left
to assault the barren cleft
while the mothers waved their banners in the lee

Trust a poet’s patterns while he traces them in air
for wayward thumbs to print in stammered ink
and bloodied girls to think
there’s an exit from the pink
to erase the flash of muddy underwear

But disillusion issues cold
from waters barely flowing
where currents travel there and back
but in between their charge is slack
and lives drift by, delightfully unknowing

it feels like a cross between Kipling's gunga din and the green eye of the little yellow god by J. Milton Hayes, which was a monologue, and the meter here is different.
i'm not sure if i should laugh but at the 1st person's misfortunes but i did.

factory feels a little forced to me, but i think thats more to do with diction on my part (i say it as fact ree and not as the dictionary)
the last line of the 1st verse was as solid and down to earth as it gets for me it also defines an early period in time. brut was biggest when i was young. i enjoyed the extended use of tennyson from 2nd through all the peom to the end. i'll be honest and say i struggled to find a consistant meter but it flowed really well and thats what meter's about isn't it?
all (JMO)

thanks for the read Leanne.

[addy]

“Never trust a poet.” That’s what Daddy said to me,
when I was knock-kneed in the factory
and knocked up on the floor
while the whiff of something more
drowned in Brut and milky tea. How undignified . Great start.

Lord Tennyson was late again
and half a league behind me
so he missed the mouth of hell
I described so bloody well
after waiting in the mill for him to find me

And the body odour hugged me, brotherly
with a slightly leering passage to the right
where the rotten gods had laced their boots up tight
and sabres bared, they left
to assault the barren cleft That is quite an expert euphemism. Well done
while the mothers waved their banners in the lee

Trust a poet’s patterns like this callback while he traces them in air
for wayward thumbs to print in stammered ink very fond of this line. "Stammered" is perfect
and bloodied girls to think
there’s an exit from the pink
to erase the flash of muddy underwear

But disillusion issues cold
from waters barely flowing
where currents travel there and back
but in between their charge is slack
and lives drift by, delightfully unknowing This part might be a little vague? It gets the point across nicely... but i don't know if the slightly veiled quality it was intentional.

Form-wise its impeccable, and frankly my contentions are only tiny, tiny, nitpicks . Great narrative voice too... the belle who mustn't trust a poet and really, knows the score more than she lets on . I enjoyed this a lot.

[Leanne]

it feels like a cross between Kipling's gunga din and the green eye of the little yellow god by J. Milton Hayes, which was a monologue, and the meter here is different.
i'm not sure if i should laugh but at the 1st person's misfortunes but i did.

factory feels a little forced to me, but i think thats more to do with diction on my part (i say it as fact ree and not as the dictionary)
the last line of the 1st verse was as solid and down to earth as it gets for me it also defines an early period in time. brut was biggest when i was young. i enjoyed the extended use of tennyson from 2nd through all the peom to the end. i'll be honest and say i struggled to find a consistant meter but it flowed really well and thats what meter's about isn't it?
all (JMO)

thanks for the read Leanne.

Many thanks, Billy -- I think irony is the best way to deal with some things, at least for myself. The meter should switch between stanzas, I may get around to recording this to show you but I'm a very lazy poet, you know

My ex husband wore Brut and barely passed a teabag through a cup of milk, he was most disgusting and not at all poetic.

---

Form-wise its impeccable, and frankly my contentions are only tiny, tiny, nitpicks . Great narrative voice too... the belle who mustn't trust a poet and really, knows the score more than she lets on . I enjoyed this a lot.

Addy, thank you I should possibly make the last stanza less vague, but I'm not sure if I'm ready for that. I need to think a lot more on this as I keep coming back to edit it, knowing it's not jelling, and never seem to quite manage the right balance.

---

I have seen this elsewhere, I feel, and liked it then -- though I have a vague idea that it is not quite the same.

You know I'm a compulsive tinkerer, Edward -- this is nowhere near where I want it to be yet and I can't let it rest.

[abu nuwas]

Leanne, I should apologise for having just written one line on the 'serious' thread -- I had overlooked that. I am sure you will bring it home to port one day, as it is part of your story, and also has a universal ' condition humaine' aspect. (Must stop using that.) There is perhaps more of you in this than you think: the tinkering to get it better, the ambiguity to prohibit, in the words of the Qur'an, anything to show, except that which shows. Now there was a man who would have understood you!

Now, perhaps if you were to write out to intention in simple prose first......no, perhaps not...

[Leanne]

To me, every comment outside of the generic cut-and-paste jobs is as valuable as the next, so I won't tolerate your apologising

It's funny, I quite like a lot of the verses in the Qur'an... even before doing so was considered perverse in the extreme! And old Suleiman Mahibbi had a decent thing or two to say also. Of course, the Light Brigade was rather opposed to all of those chaps...

[Leanne]

audio here if you're interested

[abu nuwas]

Well! That was a surprise! I listened to all four pieces several times, beginning (as to be expected) by thinking ''She doesn't sound as I thought she would!'' and ending, after the brain had been in gear AND listening,by thinking that I could imagine no other voice. It was especially effective when enunciating your diatribe about Mrs Popplebottom ! !! *wink*

[billy]

audio here if you're interested

you can post your spoken word poetry here.

pm me and i'll explain how. then you can repost or delete the copy as you see fit.

[Leanne]

Thanks Billy -- but it's not intended as a spoken word piece and I don't really want to post it twice. I only bothered with audio because you mentioned you had trouble following the meter. Unless you really don't want audio here? If so I'll just delete the link.

[billy]

it's okay as a one off. don't delete it hehe,
i'll delete the one of it i did.

[heslopian]

This is a very dense and lyrical work, so much so I can't quite comprehend every line, though overall I think it a comparison between the elevated beauty of verse and the harshness of reality, the narrator somewhat bitter that her place is with the latter. One suggestion I will make is that you remove all the punctuation (besides the apostrophes and quotation marks), as the commas and the full stops are so sporadic they're rendered unnecessary (IMHO). Other than that great work. I especially enjoyed the Tennyson verse.

[Leanne]

Thank you Jack -- I think that's one of the most excellent readings of this poem I've had to date, and pretty much as I intended (of course, my intent isn't important but it's still nice to know that it makes sense to someone!)

I've taken out all end punctuation, as I completely agree with you that it should be all or nothing and I hadn't quite got around to deciding which yet. Now I have I'll leave the commas in the middle of lines though, I need them for pacing.

Again, many thanks.