Battle to the Depths (edit of Community)

[wasellajam]

Good morning, ella!

So, I have come to make comments here and backed out about a dozen times now as I try to figure out what I want to say the /most/ here.

First - they say write what you know and you take that to heart more than anyone so your poetry is always laced with rich personal details that seem effortless.  The listing of flowers feels real, interesting and natural.  i already did a couple passes for meter and the whole thing reads smooth and natural.

There are minor nits you would probably catch  yourself like - "does a farm have sympathy?" and the possessive form of flowers but I don't think they are enough of a concern.

I have - maybe 3 concerns and none of them really need to be addressed, just some thoughts:

1. The title.  Too overt.  It is not the payoff that maybe you were hoping for because the payoff is in the poem.
2.  There are a couple spots where it feels you think you need to "poem" instead of trusting your own instincts to deliver.  Mostly the last strophe, felt like you were trying to deliver a message in a way the poem already had.
3.  Metaphor - right in the beginning - you use a line that screams - "Hey! Look at me! I am the central metaphor!"  And it was such a good line, I kept reading the poem over and over trying to figure it out but, if it's there I am not getting it.  It is this - "the poisoned planks are bound to leach their chemicals, forever tainting nearby soil." - this is a great line.  This is a great metaphor.  It is the type of thought people build poems around - the thought that living at a lake metaphorically poisons the area.  It is irony and dichotomy all at once.  For some reason, I never get that out of the poem.  i get the solution - a farmer offers a spot to substitute for that human need, but I don't think you ever sold the idea of the lake poisoning the community so for me it is a red herring.

To undertake a garden dockside

minor note on undertake

is ill advised, the poisoned planks
are bound to leach their chemicals,
forever tainting nearby soil.

The alliums for flowers sake,
the daffodils and hyacinth
are fine to plant but vegetables
would drink their fill of arsenic.

Right down the road a along-held farm
had sympathy for neighbors stuck
beneath the trees in lakeside shade
and turned a field to garden plots.

From dawn to dusk the sun is full,
the cows approach and moo hello
from their side of the six-foot fence,
our veggies growing safe and pure.

minor nit on veggies safe and "pure" - I know technically that is exactly what they are doing - it feels like it is trying to point to a moral purity which is not realized

A trade off comes with every step of life,
our time spent here is somewhere else denied
but every now and then we find ourselves
the lucky few who right now have it all.

That is all.  Loved the poem - I could picture Greenwood Lake which is a bit off from you but similar in my mind.

Thanks for posting this

Well, thanks for loving it while I don't, mostly due to the points you picked up on.  I figured it's a place to start. Agree on the title, a throwaway and an easy fix will come to me at some point. I can fix the farm/sympathy and the flowers, I appreciate those notes. My conclusion is hokey, but did it sound familiar? It's a habit I guess I never broke, I can hack away at that.

That leaves #3, the metaphor. ding ding ding. That's the line I couldn't mess with, the heart. I know I did not do it justice this go-round but I can try again. Much appreciate your time and encouragement.

And don't be giving the prying internet a path to my house.