08-28-2015, 11:35 AM
Well... since you invited crit:
The edit, while good, leaves out some necessary details contained in the first draft.
(This happens to me all the time; it's kinda easy to do when they're both in your head.)
"A cold night's eye opened as you drove" - Such an over-blown metaphor would be
right-at-home in a hard-boiled detective novel; but, unless you want to re-write
this as a parody, you need to find something subtler.
The current "Cedars" stanza has had its ironic heart cut out of it. The original, while in need
of a bit of editing, was much better. In the context of the entire poem, this stanza provides
the reader the emotional relief necessary to experience the severity of the rest.
I'd take out the whole bit about the class, it's not believable (even if it happened)
and pushes this poem -- already melodramatic -- over the edge.
You should save your heightened emotions for "I had to listen to you choke".
It leaps over the edge and flies back... VERY believable.
Maybe you should think about reversing the order of events in the poem.
You could start, like many movies do, with the end event: the injury and the death.
The Cedar stanza would come next, followed by the events and that led up to it.
I think this would defuse the melodramatic aspect of the poem and thereby enhance
its emotional effect.
Ray
The edit, while good, leaves out some necessary details contained in the first draft.
(This happens to me all the time; it's kinda easy to do when they're both in your head.)
"A cold night's eye opened as you drove" - Such an over-blown metaphor would be
right-at-home in a hard-boiled detective novel; but, unless you want to re-write
this as a parody, you need to find something subtler.
The current "Cedars" stanza has had its ironic heart cut out of it. The original, while in need
of a bit of editing, was much better. In the context of the entire poem, this stanza provides
the reader the emotional relief necessary to experience the severity of the rest.
I'd take out the whole bit about the class, it's not believable (even if it happened)
and pushes this poem -- already melodramatic -- over the edge.
You should save your heightened emotions for "I had to listen to you choke".
It leaps over the edge and flies back... VERY believable.
Maybe you should think about reversing the order of events in the poem.
You could start, like many movies do, with the end event: the injury and the death.
The Cedar stanza would come next, followed by the events and that led up to it.
I think this would defuse the melodramatic aspect of the poem and thereby enhance
its emotional effect.
Ray
a brightly colored fungus that grows in bark inclusions