08-03-2016, 12:40 PM
Hi - I think the revision has tightened your first draft, but there's more tinkering to do.
Our Daughters in the Backyard Swing
Below volcano San Pedro
a Mayan master weaver hustled you Does the poem need the fact that she's a master weaver? I think this line is clunky, and something must go. There's a tension for me between 'master weaver' and hustling.
into her dusty blanket shelter
revealing woven Quetzal suns, embroideries of moons and flowers. too passive and prosey
In Tz’utujil, Spanish, English her finger crooked Great imagery, active
toward a blanket swing, hung from nearby trees. Trees inside the shelter? Hard to picture.
“It fits two.”
“Si ella sea pequeñita.” I like this aside in Spanish
You punched my arm
and pointed toward the one with green and blue. I thought there was only one blanket swing? Again, this line feels prosey.
I like the way your poem starts in the distance, on the volcano, then pulls in, past people, into the blanket shelter, and focuses on fine weaving and delicate embroidery. Your reader moves closer, from everything, to a particular part of the scene.
I like the focus on the finger, and 'her finger crooked' reflects for me back into the painstaking, and often painful, work of weaving and embroidery.
I like the direct speech and the intimacy shown. But I had no idea what the poem was about without the title. I think I want to know what prompted the narrator to follow that chain of memory, it would help me make some kind of emotional connection. At the moment I'm not doing that.
I hope I haven't been remiss with this crit in Mild; the poem is worth spending more time on. Thanks for posting it.
Our Daughters in the Backyard Swing
Below volcano San Pedro
a Mayan master weaver hustled you Does the poem need the fact that she's a master weaver? I think this line is clunky, and something must go. There's a tension for me between 'master weaver' and hustling.
into her dusty blanket shelter
revealing woven Quetzal suns, embroideries of moons and flowers. too passive and prosey
In Tz’utujil, Spanish, English her finger crooked Great imagery, active
toward a blanket swing, hung from nearby trees. Trees inside the shelter? Hard to picture.
“It fits two.”
“Si ella sea pequeñita.” I like this aside in Spanish
You punched my arm
and pointed toward the one with green and blue. I thought there was only one blanket swing? Again, this line feels prosey.
I like the way your poem starts in the distance, on the volcano, then pulls in, past people, into the blanket shelter, and focuses on fine weaving and delicate embroidery. Your reader moves closer, from everything, to a particular part of the scene.
I like the focus on the finger, and 'her finger crooked' reflects for me back into the painstaking, and often painful, work of weaving and embroidery.
I like the direct speech and the intimacy shown. But I had no idea what the poem was about without the title. I think I want to know what prompted the narrator to follow that chain of memory, it would help me make some kind of emotional connection. At the moment I'm not doing that.
I hope I haven't been remiss with this crit in Mild; the poem is worth spending more time on. Thanks for posting it.