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TO THE GIRL NEXT DOOR
As we lie in our rooms
waiting for sleep,
I know you can hear me
ringing the bell, that cholera-curse
suspended over the potter's field,
even with the whirring of the fan by your feet
and the prowling on the roofs
of the robber rats and the midnight owls
whose cowls are the color of fallen leaves.
But what do you feel? Not that love your eyes
betrayed this morning, I'm sure --
for here in suburbia, lovers like us,
lost in the cock's two crows,
we all wait for the same Christ.
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(01-28-2016, 03:24 PM)RiverNotch Wrote: TO THE GIRL NEXT DOOR Unless you were planning to send up the cliché, which I am not getting, the title is cringe-inducing, particularly with all caps.
As you lie in your room
waiting for sleep, The way this is phrased is a touch cliche; no offense, but I swear I read this and in my head went... I hear the secrets that you keep.... (pardon my 80s flashback)
I know you can hear me The use or lack of punctuation feels a bit random.
even with the whirring of the fan
by your feet
and the creaking of the ceiling and the beams
to the prowling on the roofs a) from the; b) her house has multiple roofs? That said, we can likely figure out they are on the roof if the ceiling is creaking, so you could probably lose "on the roofs".
of the robber rats and the midnight owls
whose cowls are the color of fallen leaves -- again, Tightened, I like this little section with the sounds, it is descriptive.
I know you can hear me I don't think the repetition helps here.
tolling the bell, that ancient
measure of life in the potter's yard Is the N actually tolling a bell? I am clueless on the metaphor if not, I have no idea why or what for if so. Why is it in the potter's yard (I don't think of potters having big bells)? Is that a literary allusion that zoomed over my head (granted, sometimes not tough for that to happen). Dare I ask for whom? That's the problem with tolling bells, they are a bit cliche.
suspended, as the vespers and matins
wait for the dawn Being a once-good Catholic boy, I think got the reference, and I don't have any inherent issue with personifying abstract concepts (or toasters, for that matter) if it serves a purpose, but I have no idea why an early evening prayer would wait for morning, let alone a chronological reference (as the words have sometimes been used for ... 6:30 pm waits for the dawn is like... umm okay?)
and the cock's three crows -- don't you know? I love the occasional internal rhyme, but this feels forced (prowl-owl-cowl above, while still a touch forced, worked better).
Lost lovers all share the same coffin,
all wait for the same Christ.
There are a bunch of ideas in there that could be developed into a more coherent total, but they feel kind of thrown together. It gets all biblical reference-y at the end, but none of that feel is introduced or developed in the first two-thirds of the poem.
I am not even certain what the relationship between the N and the girl is -- the cultural history of the "girl next door" cliche would indicate object of desire, somewhat reinforced by the "I know you can hear me's" but then the end talks about lost lovers and infers betrayal, which suggests an ex, which conflicts with the opening. But then again, there isn't even any direct evidence of any connection at all. Could the N be some personification of death? That could be neat, but the title and opening lines don't support that.
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A few counter-notes, though in general I do agree this could be somewhat clearer:
The title being in all-caps is an editorial choice. It has no bearing to the poem's meaning whatsoever.
Grammatically, the lack of punctuation at that point is correct. Read it again.
No, it's to the -- the ceiling and the beams creak to the prowling....the prowling causes the creaking. But that line, "the creaking", can be removed, yes.
And the rats and owls are prowling on the roofs of the neighborhood, not just the girl's house -- this is partly why "the creaking" should be removed, I think.
N is tolling a bell, yes, though the bell is meant to mean something, especially with the poem concluding with the speaker and the girl in a coffin. The potter's yard is a literary (fine, Biblical) choice that zoomed over your head, yes. And I will never write for whom the bell tolls, xP
This last part was meant to create a chiasmus, but I do agree that it could be cleaned up.
And the girl next door, though it does mean someone desired, also means someone who desires, who waits for someone's return. It's a loaded reference, but obviously I didn't succeed there.
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Cringe-inducing was perhaps an unkindly characterization; I was in a bit of a mood for some reason when I responded to this. Nevertheless, I disagree strongly that typography and layout have no effect on meaning. The effects can be subtle, and in many cases irrelevant, but they are very real. Still not a fan of the title -- I suppose it helps establish the connection between the N and the girl, but I don't think such value outwieghs the other issues with it.
I didn't say the grammar was wrong, I said it felt a bit random to me. Technically -- and correct me if I am wrong -- the section beginning "even with the whirring of the...." is a (somewhat extended) modifying phrase; such are often set off by commas -- not saying they necessarily must be, that is a different debate, but certainly can be and customarily often are. But this isn't prose, and I am definitely not a grammar nazi, so I said "feels to me".
If the N is actually tolling a bell, for me it kind of undercuts the opening. "Tolling" implies a huge bell -- you don't "toll" the front desk bell at the motel, you toll the church bells in the tower. So, it is like: I know you can hear me, late at night, over the cat's on your neighbors roofs (which indicates it is a quiet neighborhood) and the fan by your bed, as I hammer a huge bell a few feet from your window (girl next door....), I know you can hear me; my thought reading it is -- Buddy, everyone within five to ten miles can hear you...
I am curious though, what is the potter's yard -- I tried running an (albeit quick) web search, and got nothing conclusive.
While I am intellectually tickled by the idea of using a literary device that means cross with a line involving Christ, I am not sure I see it here: What elements are inverting?
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I know every choice on typography and such has an effect on the poem, but the all-caps is really not meant to be taken as anything -- I only put it there to distinguish it from everything else without having to use resizing codes (too fidgety), bolds (might mix up with future comments), and with making it coherent with most everything else I've posted here (at least lately), and with some of the anthologies of other poets I've been reading. I could choose not to repost the title, of course, but in my experience, that tends to make it easy to forget, which can make everything all woozy.
Good point on the tolling. I'll change that.
And I just realized how streamy I've been: potter's yard sure as hell sounds better, but potter's field is what I meant.
The inverting element is with the waiting objects, but I'll change the poem up to practically remove it, anyway.
I'll try and have the next edit up tonight And so it is.
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This is the best of your poems that I've read thus far.
Pretty much par
For any course.
From 'prowling' to 'leaves' is a tour de force.
I didn't like some bits of it, though.
Crit below.
(01-28-2016, 03:24 PM)RiverNotch Wrote: TO THE GIRL NEXT DOOR
As we lie in our rooms
waiting for sleep,
I know you can hear me
ringing the bell, that ancient ......this may be a reference to some arcane Christian myth. I consider myself as having a decent enough superficial knowledge of the world's major religions, but can't figure out what ringing the bell while trying to sleep at night is a reference to. Are you choking the bishop? Because that's what comes to my mind. In that case, it's a hilarious image, but it doesn't go well with the serious tone of the rest of the poem.
measure of life in the potter's field .... again, can't connect the bell to a potter's field.
suspended, even with the whirring of the fan ... what is suspended? the ancient potter's field where the bell rung upon? or have you stopped spanking the monkey of a sudden?
by your feet
and the prowling on the roofs
of the robber rats and the midnight owls
whose cowls are the color of fallen leaves -- you know, ....underlined: this is absolutely brilliant
lovers like us,
lost in the cock's two crows, ....underlined: more fantastic stuff
we all share the same coffin,
all wait for the same Christ. .... the random morbidity of the last two lines doesn't sit well with the rest of the poem. Until 'lovers like us' I'm thinking of lovers sleeping apart. At the end, I'm getting the impression that you're talking about a pair of lovers - one alive, one dead. However, in that case you wouldn't be both 'waiting for sleep'. The dead are either waiting to be resurrected / reborn / liberated (moksha) - in which case they are already asleep, or they are ghosts roaming the earth, and in no mood to go to sleep. If they did, they'd be going to sleep in the daytime, and have a different Circadian rhythm.
~ I think I just quoted myself - Achebe
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Hallaig:
Bells: nothing so ancient, this time. Reference to the safety coffin. Ringing a bell in bed is perfectly possible....ever tried it? If the walls are thin in your place, don't.
Two dashes: that's how I denote an em dash. I don't know my unicodes or whatever, and I don't have that number pad thing anyway. Meant to show how the two sentences are not independent, but how their closeness isn't as close as with, say, a semicolon -- but (hehe) I tend to overuse it, anyway. Not sure if this is a case, though.
by your feet cuts the thought-rhythm in a good way, I think -- everything that follows is just so, er, vivid, and yet so separate, that it'd be kinda too much not to.
Achebe:
Again, safety coffin. Although masturbating (which is much easier to type, ahem) is a double meaning that could work....hmm. Will think about clarifying, now that it's been twice noted.
"that ancient measure of life in the potter's field suspended" reads clear to me, even with the inversion -- the ancient measure of life, the bell, is suspended in the potter's field -- but I'm usually wrong with this. This is prolly the section I'll reword, for the safety coffin reference to work, but I'll try and keep suspended, cuz' it feels perfect for "potter's field".
I disagree that the morbidity here is inappropriate. waiting for sleep, potter's field, fallen leaves, and then potter's field, suspended, cock's crows, Christ -- the reveal here is very well supported, though I guess what it reveals is still a bit confusing. I'll think of a way to clarify that.
Thank you both for the feedback! Welcome to the pigpen, Hallaig!
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RN wrote: "The title being in all-caps is an editorial choice. It has no bearing to the poem's meaning whatsoever."
Yes, but that does not make it a good choice. Putting something all in caps makes it seem like one is shouting, is that the effect being sought, if not, change it.
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Some of this stuff I think you are just making up, or mashing up, or maybe misappropriating. mainly this idea of a potters field and "an ancient measure of life."
The only ancient measure of life I am familiar with is the number of days God set for man to live, which was 120 years. A potters field is a place where paupers' graves or common graves are.
So with that in hand:
"I know you can hear me ringing the bell, that ancient measure of life in the potter's field suspended"
makes no sense.
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Kant was a great on for writing long sentences, but he was a German philosopher. I do not believe writing extremely long sentences does much to benefit a poem.
As we lie in our rooms waiting for sleep, I know you can hear me ringing the bell, that ancient measure of life in the potter's field suspended, even with the whirring of the fan by your feet and the prowling on the roofs of the robber rats and the midnight owls whose cowls are the color of fallen leaves -- you know, lovers like us, lost in the cock's two crows, we all share the same coffin, all wait for the same Christ.
All other punctuation aside, this is a run-on sentence.
Complexity for complexity's sake, and obscurity for obscurity's sake, do not make for good poetry, just confusion. The title is "The Girl Next Door", which one would assume from the beginning is a love interest, yet more than half of the imagery and allusion has nothing to do with that. What is the point of writing if the clarity level is so low that all the readers just give up? That's what this is. At first it seems interesting, but the further one goes the murkier it gets until the reader says, "I give up, I don't get it."
I suppose I could comment more, but this one has just kind of worn me out. The bottom line, you make the reader work way too hard, you need to learn to meet you reader half way, which would involve using more commonly known allusions, real allusions. Not combining Roman and Christian allusions as though they came from the same source and so on. That would be a start. You have a lot of potential, but you really need to think more about how your reader will perceive what you right, we do not know what you know
Best,
dale
How long after picking up the brush, the first masterpiece?
The goal is not to obfuscate that which is clear, but make clear that which isn't.
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Dale: I'll keep it capped still -- it just looks better to me than font change, bold, italic, underline, or no-change, and I'd like to keep certain choices constant.
I've hammered out that measure of life thing, which I agree does steal away sense, but I've kept the "potter's field", since here I hearken to the term's usual origin. The thing describing the bell should be more definite now.
No way is this a run-on (and if you ignore punctuation, then of course this is a run-on, but so would about 70% of all sentences in this world, I think). The two big halves are properly connected by em dash, and the second half's two independent clauses are smoothed by parallelism and comma splice. This is just long -- painfully so, sure, but that's where the lines come in. Nevertheless, I've broken up the long sentence, but only 'cause I don't think the em dash does it any justice, and yes, I do agree there's a great haze over this whole work.
Anyways, here's a new draft, with the changes growing as you move down. I'm still not sure how to duly clarify the safety-coffin image -- it's supposed to be in a sort of limbo between metaphor and reality (the speaker doing something like ringing that bell, but never daring to clarify what it is), but I don't know if that even makes any sense! And the ending's a bit off, I think -- I mean, I hope the whole sentiment is a good deal clearer, but it just....the whole coffin image doesn't feel crystallized right. Oh well, slow progress is still progress: here it is.
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