Unplanned Maintenance edit 0.002 river,wjames

[tectak]

Hey Tectak. A nicely efficient piece whose central metaphor spans decades. I agree with River on this point:

"I just can't imagine all of the lights dying so splendidly. I mean, I guess there's a hint of the poem's conclusion in that explosive image, but touching on the reverse would give that whole bit added senses of depth and mystique."


I wonder if something anecdotal, almost parenthetical, might add to the reader's experience.

Eg. tell us how the first light went out when little Billy Bastard threw a rock at it and smashed its face...
or
tell us how the first went out when old Ms. Widow ploughed it with her car...

--These are not specific suggestions, of course, but I think a brief (likely allegorical) anecdote might pull more readers into your personal space. 
Thanks tiger,
I am worried by consensus....where do I say that all the lights went out at once?Or, perhaps more significantly, where did I say they didn't. It is an old one...the brightest burn out fastest. Yes?
Metaphors are bastards. They are born out wedlock and we soon forget their roots...I guess I was trying to say that "one by one" (cliche) our friends splutter out and die...it is probably not a simple metaphor which means just replace the bulb....must try harder.
Street lights were, for fifty years in the UK, shaped like dickie bows with curved underside lined with 1 inch square mirror reflectors...that bit is fact, the rest is poetry.
Best,
tectak

I could, of course be completely wrong.
Paul

---

I had no idea what "dicky-bowed" meant, but its placement in the sentence suggested it was a descriptive verb like 'swaggered'. Even after the explanation, I'm still not sure...some kind of bow-tie? Thing is, the poem is stunning, even with an incomprehensible first line..
I had no problem with how the lights went out, streetlights burn out in real life all the time, and sometimes do glow brighter for a second before they go out. I don't think you should tinker with this poem much, other than to find another word to describe the lights to open the poem.
I teared up reading it; it moved me the same way that the last part of Tennyson's 'Ulysses' does. Don't mess with it too much.

Thanks leah,
effect produced...result.
This street light thing will not be a problem to  brits over 60. You can still get these original lights at antique fairs, where they are snapped up.They lined hundreds of miles of urban and rural streets for fifty years...because of the shape of the reflector panels they looked like bow ties and cast a double cardioid illuminated area on the ground...again, reminiscent of the dickie bow tie shape.http://www.simoncornwell.com/lighting/install/wimbledon1/index1.htm
That is all.
Best,
tectak