Edit 6: Eventide

[alonso ramoran]

Hey Knot, some responses to your critique

Hi alexorande
I think this is a nicely evoked memory of childhood that is just a bit overwritten/cluttered in places.
Enjoyed reading it.

In an artless time—
Nice opening
Don't understand the em dash I wasn't sure about the em dash either. I feel I get a bit too em dash happy sometimes.
my sister and I chased
brine-dripping seagulls
'brine-dripping' seems to be trying to hard,
and rather undercuts the innocent youthful simplicity of 'my sister and I'. I agree with this
off the edge of the world
nice
I think you could leave a space/line here; and that the piece be structured in four line verses. Don't know about this. I want the piece to have a loose feel to it. I think the only time the piece having a loose feel becomes a problem is in the third stanza, which I feel goes on too long. Still trying to figure out how to solve that.

while the waves crooned
through our Grandparents' lips,
making their calls to us
seem like sand on the wind

that stirred Muhly grass
and tossed finer hair,
seem like the fragrance
do you need 'seem' here? I think I do, bc when rereading it, it sounds like I'm making a simile with the wind instead of their calls.
from sea slushing on rocks.
('slushing' is rather unpoetic by comparison, perhaps 'slipping'?) I'm pretty set on slushing, I like the sonics of it. Enjoyed the thought though!

I like the thought underlying this section
but I don't think it is a well, or clearly, expressed
as it could be. Ah, yes. This is where I feel things start getting cluttered and drawn out in the piece.
We ran until we met
the aging day's drowsy tug
— to whom we complied when
(Do you mean 'with which we complied'?) I wrote "to whom" because the day, which is the subject here, was personified.
we hopped in the shower,
ripened up,
and got dry.
We sprung on the bed
before catching some episodes
of Ed, Edd n Eddy.
(perhaps just 'the Eds'?) People won't know what I'm talking about. And I don't think anyone called the cartoon that, at least when I was a kid.

Abuela, in her silken gown, reads
Abraham Lincoln's biography.
terrific detail
Grandpa, who doesn't talk much,
is fast in his sleep.
(are you trying to say 'quickly asleep'?) Yes. I'll do some rewording here
Grandpa looks a bit short-changed by comparison Haha, it's just how he was! He's a quiet guy in comparison to my grandma. We love them all the same though. I think what you're getting at here is that he deserves a metaphor? I agree in that case. I think it was Todd who said it, but at this point, the piece seems to be having a "and then this happened" feel to it.
Tonight the moon's face
resembles Abuela's
soft disapproval
another excellent image.

of our late-night television consuming
— to which, of course, we comply
repetition of 'compliance', why? I'm drawing comparisons between the previously used "aging day" (nature in other words) and our grandparents, how we comply to both when it's bedtime.
with the ease of the
shore's ever-sweet lullaby.
Then off goes the lamp.
Not really as successful as the rest, could it not simply reduce to
'Then off goes the lamp'? It feels like I'm leaving stuff out.

I'm not sure you need any of the lines below. They don't seem to add anything, and the central thought - 'was born out of love' - comes through and does not need to be explicitly stated. Well this was the overall point of the poem: the contemplation of memories being dreams as a kid or an actual memory, then tossing that contemplation out the window. Without this, the poem is just a retelling of an assumed-by-the-audience memory. I'll toy around with these final stanzas.
A temporary stay at temporal ban.

I confounded this thought
with dreams and all a boy could experience,
into warped meditation.
And though the value of this
is blotted out so beautifully,
I am as sure as a stone is a stone:
eventide at that beach was born
out of love
for when decrepitude comes.
Hope this helps.

Best, Knot.

Thank you for your thoughts. They will be heavily considered in my next edit.