01-10-2016, 10:45 PM
Apache,
Try writing these lines out in sentences to see if they make sense before going all artistic.
The dark and (oily - a bit obvious) blood of dinosaurs coagulates(in) remote in desert bores suckled by the gnattish maws of platforms. (Trying to hard here to be poetic with "gnattish maws of platforms". That doesn't really convey much of an image)
Pumped into the sky to burn, the warmth of prehistoric heartbeats melts the ice to water palm trees. (Use enjambment judiciously) Is this a sentence? What is pumped? Pumped is the verb, but there is no subject, following pumped is a dependent clause.
Larva plump like rice in stagnant swamps. (Dependent clause. No verb in this one. "Larva was/is plump...")
Mosquitoes, long and thin, shake the air off of their wings in ecstasy. (As air surrounds, one questions the idea of air being on wings, seems a bit nonsensical, along with the idea of shakes. Maybe some better descriptors. )
The siren clout of dino-blood's (dino's-blood's, personally I'd write the word out, the poem gains nothing from the abbreviated "dino", calls to mind the "Flintstones" ) temptation draws them from the tropics. (Again ad hoc use of enjambment. I'm sorry but this whole line is just awkwardly said. If the writer is meaning to say that the burning of fossil fuels is warming the environment and causing the mosquitoes that carry malaria to move beyond their normal range, it is not very clear, nor very elegant. I think it starts with "siren clout" which should be "siren's clout", but either way it is a clumsy usage. Sorry, don't mean to be harsh, but it just is and another needs to be found. I can appreciate trying to avoid cliche, but "siren's draw" would be better than "clout". Plus with "blood" being so close it is easy to think of "clot".)
Led astray, bearing minuscule conquistadors: protozoans wave their whip-like flags and pray in chapels made of chitin. I had to read this line several times before I understood the meaning. I think a better word than bearing is in order, maybe "infected by". In this situation "Bearing" is to ambiguous, and this is a place one does not want to be ambiguous, although I do like the image "minuscule conquistadors". Don't really get the reference to the "chapel of chitin". That doesn't really seem to fit what is being said.
Marooned where prey is bitten by the insect's thirsty drilling, history repeats in miniature.
Probably just "history repeats in miniature" would be sufficient, or "Thus, history...". The first part of the line is redundant, kind of like a news recap, which is fine if one is doing the news...
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Although the negative impacts of fossil fuel have been gone over with a fine tooth comb, and it has become a bit disingenuous to lambaste them, as we all are reliant on them and do little to cut that dependence, I do like the general idea/metaphor here (it is reminiscent of King Aurthur's being connected to the land of England, and as he went, so went the land). So even though a bit hyperbolic as the earth cannot contract anything remotely similar to malaria, it is still a nice idea. It is however the execution that appears to suffer. There are many grammatical errors. The use of enjambment where it really has no right, ad hoc lineation and incidental end rhyme that seem to benefit the poem to no degree, as well as no discernible rhythmic pattern. So while the idea is certainly a workable, even a good one, much work is needed to justify whatever form or formlessness is put around it. Even in free verse there is form. I think the piece could benefit from a martial rhythmic pattern similar to what Whitman did in the battle descriptions in "Leaves of Grass"; as the writer is describing war is he not? Humanity's war on the earth, the parasites war on man. Both thinking it can kill off the host and continue on. Nice irony there. Anyway, good luck with this. Look forward to future revisions.
Best,
dale
Try writing these lines out in sentences to see if they make sense before going all artistic.
The dark and (oily - a bit obvious) blood of dinosaurs coagulates(in) remote in desert bores suckled by the gnattish maws of platforms. (Trying to hard here to be poetic with "gnattish maws of platforms". That doesn't really convey much of an image)
Pumped into the sky to burn, the warmth of prehistoric heartbeats melts the ice to water palm trees. (Use enjambment judiciously) Is this a sentence? What is pumped? Pumped is the verb, but there is no subject, following pumped is a dependent clause.
Larva plump like rice in stagnant swamps. (Dependent clause. No verb in this one. "Larva was/is plump...")
Mosquitoes, long and thin, shake the air off of their wings in ecstasy. (As air surrounds, one questions the idea of air being on wings, seems a bit nonsensical, along with the idea of shakes. Maybe some better descriptors. )
The siren clout of dino-blood's (dino's-blood's, personally I'd write the word out, the poem gains nothing from the abbreviated "dino", calls to mind the "Flintstones" ) temptation draws them from the tropics. (Again ad hoc use of enjambment. I'm sorry but this whole line is just awkwardly said. If the writer is meaning to say that the burning of fossil fuels is warming the environment and causing the mosquitoes that carry malaria to move beyond their normal range, it is not very clear, nor very elegant. I think it starts with "siren clout" which should be "siren's clout", but either way it is a clumsy usage. Sorry, don't mean to be harsh, but it just is and another needs to be found. I can appreciate trying to avoid cliche, but "siren's draw" would be better than "clout". Plus with "blood" being so close it is easy to think of "clot".)
Led astray, bearing minuscule conquistadors: protozoans wave their whip-like flags and pray in chapels made of chitin. I had to read this line several times before I understood the meaning. I think a better word than bearing is in order, maybe "infected by". In this situation "Bearing" is to ambiguous, and this is a place one does not want to be ambiguous, although I do like the image "minuscule conquistadors". Don't really get the reference to the "chapel of chitin". That doesn't really seem to fit what is being said.
Marooned where prey is bitten by the insect's thirsty drilling, history repeats in miniature.
Probably just "history repeats in miniature" would be sufficient, or "Thus, history...". The first part of the line is redundant, kind of like a news recap, which is fine if one is doing the news...
___________________________________________________________________________________
Although the negative impacts of fossil fuel have been gone over with a fine tooth comb, and it has become a bit disingenuous to lambaste them, as we all are reliant on them and do little to cut that dependence, I do like the general idea/metaphor here (it is reminiscent of King Aurthur's being connected to the land of England, and as he went, so went the land). So even though a bit hyperbolic as the earth cannot contract anything remotely similar to malaria, it is still a nice idea. It is however the execution that appears to suffer. There are many grammatical errors. The use of enjambment where it really has no right, ad hoc lineation and incidental end rhyme that seem to benefit the poem to no degree, as well as no discernible rhythmic pattern. So while the idea is certainly a workable, even a good one, much work is needed to justify whatever form or formlessness is put around it. Even in free verse there is form. I think the piece could benefit from a martial rhythmic pattern similar to what Whitman did in the battle descriptions in "Leaves of Grass"; as the writer is describing war is he not? Humanity's war on the earth, the parasites war on man. Both thinking it can kill off the host and continue on. Nice irony there. Anyway, good luck with this. Look forward to future revisions.
Best,
dale
How long after picking up the brush, the first masterpiece?
The goal is not to obfuscate that which is clear, but make clear that which isn't.
The goal is not to obfuscate that which is clear, but make clear that which isn't.