10-13-2011, 08:26 AM
S1: Yes, removing the question mark would help. I'd also suggest making it one line, but that's JMO.
S2: "A shirt sewn with buttons" again sounds to me like the buttons have been used as sewing needles. "A sewn button shirt" would be less confusing. Personally I think "patchwork" implies "sewn" without having to write the latter word.
S3: "Turned" evoked the image for me of a bird being turned over like an inanimate object. I wouldn't recommend replacing "trees" with "wind". A bird perched in a tree is a prettier image.
S4: I didn't criticise the fourth stanza? I said it was "My favourite verse. Crisp, strong and flowing image."
S5: I got that the two "no"s were supposed to seem conversational, but as the rest of the poem doesn't really read that way (IMO) it doesn't fit.
S7: If you meant to show the lack of a fixed address then why put "two"? Two is a specific number, which makes me the think the bird has two nests which he divides his time between.
S9: Why do you want people to think about the differences when you say you want to make birds "not so different"? I'm willing to agree that the differences are important, but in that verse you say the exact opposite, as you do in the two addresses couplet when you say "a bird is a man".
S10: How does S10 relate to 4 and 5? In 4, 5 and 6 you say the bird is a symbol of liberty, with no borders, who takes vacations and has time shares. In S10 you say that wings are only a means of getting from one place to another: here to home.
Look, I think up until "mulberry" you have a potentially great poem on your hands. Everything after it and your attempts to explain it though are just absurd to me.
S2: "A shirt sewn with buttons" again sounds to me like the buttons have been used as sewing needles. "A sewn button shirt" would be less confusing. Personally I think "patchwork" implies "sewn" without having to write the latter word.
S3: "Turned" evoked the image for me of a bird being turned over like an inanimate object. I wouldn't recommend replacing "trees" with "wind". A bird perched in a tree is a prettier image.
S4: I didn't criticise the fourth stanza? I said it was "My favourite verse. Crisp, strong and flowing image."
S5: I got that the two "no"s were supposed to seem conversational, but as the rest of the poem doesn't really read that way (IMO) it doesn't fit.
S7: If you meant to show the lack of a fixed address then why put "two"? Two is a specific number, which makes me the think the bird has two nests which he divides his time between.
S9: Why do you want people to think about the differences when you say you want to make birds "not so different"? I'm willing to agree that the differences are important, but in that verse you say the exact opposite, as you do in the two addresses couplet when you say "a bird is a man".
S10: How does S10 relate to 4 and 5? In 4, 5 and 6 you say the bird is a symbol of liberty, with no borders, who takes vacations and has time shares. In S10 you say that wings are only a means of getting from one place to another: here to home.
Look, I think up until "mulberry" you have a potentially great poem on your hands. Everything after it and your attempts to explain it though are just absurd to me.
"We believe that we invent symbols. The truth is that they invent us; we are their creatures, shaped by their hard, defining edges." - Gene Wolfe