12-09-2013, 01:54 PM
Trueenigma, I love ya. I c a n n o t believe you edited as thoroughly as you did. Rewriting to your specs as best as I can
(Today 08:44 AM)crow Wrote:
Entropy
Big scared eye, pink, dumb,
He's unobtrusive as a broken clock.
I'm not certain if this is intentional or not, but this isn't a sentence. Even if
you're using fragments as a device, it doesn't work very well here to open the poem. Once you hit clock you stop dead wondering were the verb is and go back to reread the sentence to try and figure it out. It's enough to keep a reader from going any farther. It's hard to get in to a poem if nothing's happening. And your first couple lines are where you want to let the reader in.
--nice. fixed it?
Shocked, I drop him as he tears my arm.
He thumps his way over to the corner and digs at the carpet, my brother’s rabbit, because
You are doing something strange here, you have a fragment describing the rabbit, and then all these pronouns proceeding their antecedent, so the whole thing's flip flopped.
--hmmm. I'm not sure how to run with this . . . Maybe,
I drop him as he tears my arm, shocked.
He hops his way over to the corner and digs at the carpet, my brother’s rabbit, because
?
My brother’s come back home, numb.
Talks about how he talked to his wife today about the law,
technically this sentence is incorrect too; it should be "he talks". But I kind of like the experimentation here. It has a nice conversational tone. I dunno. I am ambivalent. I love the assonance of "the law, of all."
---
let me write the other version. It'd be, maybe?,
My brother’s come back home,
Numbed,
He talks about how he talked to his wife today about the law,
---
Of all things. Puzzles over his accounts and slumps
This is my favorite line break in the poem.
The connotations here are so much larger then going to the kitchen. The enjambment allows you to allude to these connotations without being melodramatic. I also like "slumps his way to the kitchen. Great image. And it let's me know that we are still finding new ways to say and describe things, so it's okay to go one more day without stabbing an ice pick threw my eyeball.
---
yessir. It can wait til the weekend
I'll leave that line put
---
His way into the kitchen for a beer. We don’t have any.
We don't have any. Nice. A lot of implications here.
Once, when wolves would eat the sick, it was
A better world. Now we have guns,
Doctors, ammo, medicine, and entropy
Alone we trust to kill us,
Passively.
This bit about the wolves etc. comes out of nowhere and interrupts the narrative. It is kind of strange, and detracts from the natural movement of the plot. I'm not sure how to fix it and I know you want something to tie to your ending. Maybe you could open with it. Or could the Narrator maybe see something on television about wolves to trigger the line of thought? I know that's a lot going on; brother,rabbit, t.v., but the speaker could be sitting there in the living room with the t.v. on.
---
I take a sip, watch the wolves eating the sick.
It was a better world. Now we have guns . . .
?
---
I was cutting the hedge at noon today when I saw
This stanza is excellent, but maybe break this line on today
---
It's a broken double-Italian sonnet. I've tried to avoid breaking form except where it's for drama. I'm going to leave it, but only after some more thinking . . .
---
The slim end of a tail slide over brokenand this one on tail.
Maybe even slide if you want to make things interesting
---
I don't understand . . . Can you give me the suggested rephrasing?
---
Holly leaves, drifting slowly,
and on drifting
---
?
---
Poorly camouflaged. It was Christmas, and I thought,
It’s cold out. Snakes should all be under rocks,
Hidden. And I wondered what had woke him
And scared him from his hole, and I thought,
maybe cut "and I thought".
---
Why so?
---
Can a snake get cold? Can a snake feel lost?
My father saw it and took a hoe and chopped
Its neck. Or maybe it was some other snake.
I don’t know. They all look a lot the same.
He tried to toss it by the tail across
The fence, but it got caught in a tree, where it hangs.
I’m raking leaves when my brother finally pulls in. He looks a lot
Like normal, but I know. He’s not. My father grins
And hugs him around the neck, and a cop
Turns around in the cul-de-sac, and it seems
Like no one finds this place except on accident.
I take off my gloves, and in no time flat,
The heat goes out of them, and I
Sit down behind a pile of leaves
And pretend I’m somewhere else,
Where there is no help,
And therefore there is no need--
Where the wolves would have you long before the grief.
Thanks for the welcome!
What about "coldly" or "cruelly" instead of "passively"?
(Today 08:44 AM)crow Wrote:
Entropy
Big scared eye, pink, dumb,
He's unobtrusive as a broken clock.
I'm not certain if this is intentional or not, but this isn't a sentence. Even if
you're using fragments as a device, it doesn't work very well here to open the poem. Once you hit clock you stop dead wondering were the verb is and go back to reread the sentence to try and figure it out. It's enough to keep a reader from going any farther. It's hard to get in to a poem if nothing's happening. And your first couple lines are where you want to let the reader in.
--nice. fixed it?
Shocked, I drop him as he tears my arm.
He thumps his way over to the corner and digs at the carpet, my brother’s rabbit, because
You are doing something strange here, you have a fragment describing the rabbit, and then all these pronouns proceeding their antecedent, so the whole thing's flip flopped.
--hmmm. I'm not sure how to run with this . . . Maybe,
I drop him as he tears my arm, shocked.
He hops his way over to the corner and digs at the carpet, my brother’s rabbit, because
?
My brother’s come back home, numb.
Talks about how he talked to his wife today about the law,
technically this sentence is incorrect too; it should be "he talks". But I kind of like the experimentation here. It has a nice conversational tone. I dunno. I am ambivalent. I love the assonance of "the law, of all."
---
let me write the other version. It'd be, maybe?,
My brother’s come back home,
Numbed,
He talks about how he talked to his wife today about the law,
---
Of all things. Puzzles over his accounts and slumps
This is my favorite line break in the poem.
The connotations here are so much larger then going to the kitchen. The enjambment allows you to allude to these connotations without being melodramatic. I also like "slumps his way to the kitchen. Great image. And it let's me know that we are still finding new ways to say and describe things, so it's okay to go one more day without stabbing an ice pick threw my eyeball.
---
yessir. It can wait til the weekend
I'll leave that line put ---
His way into the kitchen for a beer. We don’t have any.
We don't have any. Nice. A lot of implications here.
Once, when wolves would eat the sick, it was
A better world. Now we have guns,
Doctors, ammo, medicine, and entropy
Alone we trust to kill us,
Passively.
This bit about the wolves etc. comes out of nowhere and interrupts the narrative. It is kind of strange, and detracts from the natural movement of the plot. I'm not sure how to fix it and I know you want something to tie to your ending. Maybe you could open with it. Or could the Narrator maybe see something on television about wolves to trigger the line of thought? I know that's a lot going on; brother,rabbit, t.v., but the speaker could be sitting there in the living room with the t.v. on.
---
I take a sip, watch the wolves eating the sick.
It was a better world. Now we have guns . . .
?
---
I was cutting the hedge at noon today when I saw
This stanza is excellent, but maybe break this line on today
---
It's a broken double-Italian sonnet. I've tried to avoid breaking form except where it's for drama. I'm going to leave it, but only after some more thinking . . .
---
The slim end of a tail slide over brokenand this one on tail.
Maybe even slide if you want to make things interesting
---
I don't understand . . . Can you give me the suggested rephrasing?
---
Holly leaves, drifting slowly,
and on drifting
---
?
---
Poorly camouflaged. It was Christmas, and I thought,
It’s cold out. Snakes should all be under rocks,
Hidden. And I wondered what had woke him
And scared him from his hole, and I thought,
maybe cut "and I thought".
---
Why so?
---
Can a snake get cold? Can a snake feel lost?
My father saw it and took a hoe and chopped
Its neck. Or maybe it was some other snake.
I don’t know. They all look a lot the same.
He tried to toss it by the tail across
The fence, but it got caught in a tree, where it hangs.
I’m raking leaves when my brother finally pulls in. He looks a lot
Like normal, but I know. He’s not. My father grins
And hugs him around the neck, and a cop
Turns around in the cul-de-sac, and it seems
Like no one finds this place except on accident.
I take off my gloves, and in no time flat,
The heat goes out of them, and I
Sit down behind a pile of leaves
And pretend I’m somewhere else,
Where there is no help,
And therefore there is no need--
Where the wolves would have you long before the grief.
Thanks for the welcome!
What about "coldly" or "cruelly" instead of "passively"?