First Edit: On Finding Another Dead Literary Journal

[Lizzie]

Hi Richard! You keep lamenting the demise of the poetic word (or perhaps, the poetry reader) in your poems. I liked your others, but this one makes too obvious a play on the emotions. I find the rape bit particularly overstated and not appropriate as a metaphor -- if poetry is getting ignored, how is it getting raped? The comparison simply doesn't work. An acknowledgement of a poet's work is denied certainly, but is it murder? The poem lives on -- it wasn't annihilated because some publisher didn't print it that one time. A journal died, yes, but you haven't made a compelling case to me of murder. It sounds more like a letting go, the culmination of a slow demise, not a sudden, jarring, knife-stabby death. So, I don't think the metaphor of murder works either.

I find that people tend to throw in violence (rape, in particular) as a way of strengthening their point, like how people will throw God into a conversation to bolster their position. It's a loaded subject, it gets attention, and it's too easy to throw in like a swear word or two to make a poem feel edgy. What I'm saying is that I don't think the reference works here -- the piece is short and it seems like that bit is overstated to give the poem gravitas.

Moreover, you're preaching to the choir. If someone is reading your poem in a journal (I'm making the assumption that you're published or that you intend to be), they are a lover of poetry and will lament it's relegation to the fringes of our culture's literary experience regardless. I don't think you particularly need to jackhammer the point.

But, what do I know.

On Finding Another Dead Literary Journal -- I'd drop "On Finding" and just say "Another Dead Literary Journal." It just sounds better to me. Less wordy.

The publisher employs words like
discontinued,
unprofitable. -- this stanza feels incomplete. Who is the publisher talking to?

The editor -- comma at the end here and after "job"
worried about his next job
calls it a shame and moves on.

The writer,
a stoic survivalist,
shrugs and finds another.

At first, the poet empathizes.
Then comes the anger: -- these two lines are too much tell and not enough show. I don't think they add much, actually.
another possible page has been crumpled,
another metaphor denied,
another poem snatched from main street,
beaten, raped;
the body dumped in the river.
And most people don't even notice. -- maybe "you" instead of "most people"? Make it more accusatory in tone? Just an idea.

Hope this helps some.

Best to you,

Lizzie