The River

[Sparkydashforth]

Welcome Amani I see you joined only yesterday. If this is an example of your usual feedback
then I would say we are enriched by your membership - no BS.

I will ponder all of your critical points with a view to changes.

I may discuss some finer points with you later, but your suggestions will no doubt lead to a better edit.

Very much obliged to you

I'm not going to use the quote feature for this post--if that is not acceptable, let me know.

They are inside the water - molocules of memory;
horse and buggy, parts of eighteen wheelers,
a girl on a tricycle – squirrel bones,
the sludge of a delving tide.

This opening sets up the poem well, and establishes the river as a metaphor for history/forgetfulness.  "They are inside the water" is a little too passive of an opening line for my tastes, but it is fine.  "Molecules of memory" is weak because it is a paraphrase of the rest of the stanza's meaning.  The juxtaposition of "horse and buggy, parts of eighteen wheelers" is good because it highlights the depth of the river--this is not a human's memory.  "A girl on a tricycle" is excellent because it allows for the impossible.  The main problem w/ this stanza is that the punctuation is confusing.  As is, I would phrase the stanza: "They are inside the water--molecules of memory,/horse and buggy, parts of eighteen wheelers,/a girl on a tricycle, squirrel bones,/ the sludge of a delving tide."

No one can tell what is missing,
what iis still surfacing, what has become
lathered into womb-bearing suds.

I like the lathering metaphor, but besides that this stanza is weaker than the first.  The "no one" humanizes the scene--all of a sudden there are onlookers trying to figure out what is emerging from the water (or something like that).  This is not necessarily bad, but it detracts from the objective/force-of-nature tone of the first stanza.  "What is still surfacing" is passive and confusing.  "Womb-bearing suds" doesn't make sense as an image.

A wake nibbles the passing,
heaps up headless pomades,
a filigree of funnel cake,
cotton candy and rum;
the painted missing parts
of the once and will be.

Excellent.  This stanza has a texture of its own.  "A wake nibbles the passing" makes intuitive sense in a way that is difficult to explain, and "a filigree of funnel cake,/ cotton candy and rum" describes the frothy color of the water quite well.  These images follow the trend of the first stanza, but are different too, more specific.  "Of the once and will be" seems like a contrived way of saying 'everything.'

A momentous loss drifts by -
is found by stooping gulls;
mute tales are diced into mist.
Amid the tremble of reeds,
late summer copulates
with eddy, churn and jism.
Unbuckled slosh slips by a sipping sky.
There are rusting blooms
between spent shot shells.
Condoms colonize cattails.
The river slops together
wind-plowed concoctions -
blends the newly-unearthed
with the long abandoned.

Another good stanza w/ a unique feel--'sexual lethargy' or something like it.  The first three lines are strong independently but awkward syntactically.  In general, this poem has a habit of interrupting itself, and this disrupts the flow of imagery by forcing the reader to 'reorganize' the poem and figure out which descriptions/actions belong to which objects.  Lines like "Amid the tremble of reeds,/ late summer copulates/ with eddy, churn and jism./ Unbuckled slosh slips by a sipping sky" are easy to follow and natural.  While not terribly convoluted, the line "The river slops together/ wind-plowed concoctions -/ blends the newly-unearthed/ with the long abandoned" forces the reader to do a little re-arranging, and this weakens images that might otherwise hold their own.

The Ohio dredges itself,
sifts moments in fish-guts of time.
There are long trod dreads,
sweet smoke in hair-spun ecstasies.
Unseen acts that still beat
against eroding banks.

I like that you say the river's name here.  By placing the river in context, you broaden the perspective of the poem (which the final stanza subverts by focusing in on a specific image).  "Sifts moments in fish-guts of time" is logically confusing.  I think the fish guts are the sifters, but maybe the river is the sifter and "moments in fish-guts of time" are the things being sifted.  Regardless, the line isn't musical enough to justify disclarity.  On the other hand, "There are long trod dreads,/ sweet smoke in hair-spun ecstasies" is, like the earlier funnel-cake lines, smooth enough to make intuitive sense.  Once again I dislike the word "still" in the second-to-last line.

The backwash seeps as moon-spill,
or drives a John Deere
deeper into boggy entrails,
while barges slowly push
each muddy footprint
toward an empty shoe.

The push-and-pull imagery of "drives a John Deere/ deeper into boggy entrails,/ while barges slowly push" exemplifies the tempo of the river and the poem's shifting perspective.  These are good lines.  However, the ending is weak.  At first I thought there was only one shoe, and that obviously made for a perplexing image.  Now I read it as 'one footprint per shoe' which is better, but still unclear.  How many shoes are there?  I think it is a fine sentiment that you are trying to express--the idea that this river of incoherent memory approaches something that is inexplicably missing, but there are probably cleaner means of articulating that idea (or whatever idea you actually want to express).

In sum--good poem.  Syntax and imagery is sometimes cumbersome, sometimes musical.
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