Breakout

[Leanne]

The carvery lunch at Grandad’s RSL
is all we can afford these days, a treat
for battlers. There’s a smell of yesterday
piped across the floor, where vets hum foreign songs
and drink about the war.

But the carpark today has a busload of
photo-collectors, clicking their Nikons and
smiling inscrutably. And he coughs and checks,
the old man, balks and walks away.

Don’t go in there, son, won’t go in there
Ripped out my nails and burned off my hair, son
Don’t go in there, I won’t go in there

So off to the caf for a java and a posh bit to eat
while his demons devour five dollar pork
at the opposite end of the street
and his yesterday-smell is further away
than tomorrow’s insistence on leaving behind
the crippled, the starving, the burned and the blind
the edges torn out of the mind

The garden that Nakajima created is quiet
in contrast, each November when tireless shutters
and lenses are stowed beneath the hush. Sakura Matsuri
still echoes, though the best blossoms have long since blown
away. I don’t ask if there are cherries on Kokoda
or lining that damned railway. Why rake the sand
with the nails of dead soldiers?

It is a haiku landscape that sparks the dreaming. This
silent bonsai is not its father elm. What seems strange
is simple through another eye, and I
can only ask.

Grandad lived and died in yesterday. He is headstone
heavy on hard won ground, but I found a pebble
that sang the songs of mountains.

[billy]

for now i'll say wow,
later or tomorrow i'll give it a few more reads and leave some proper feedback.

[Leanne]

If you insist :p

[billy]

The carvery lunch at Grandad’s RSL
is all we can afford these days, a treat
for battlers. There’s a smell of yesterday
piped across the floor, where vets hum foreign songs good image
and drink about the war.

But the carpark today has a busload of
photo-collectors, clicking their Nikons and
smiling inscrutably. And he coughs and checks,
the old man, balks and walks away.

Don’t go in there, son, won’t go in there
Ripped out my nails and burned off my hair, son
Don’t go in there, I won’t go in there these three lines are poignant in showing the horrors still within him

So off to the caf for a java and a posh bit to eat
while his demons devour five dollar pork
at the opposite end of the street
and his yesterday-smell is further away
than tomorrow’s insistence on leaving behind
the crippled, the starving, the burned and the blind
the edges torn out of the mind

The garden that Nakajima created is quiet good juxtaposition of good and with the bad in the 1st three verse.
in contrast, each November when tireless shutters
and lenses are stowed beneath the hush. Sakura Matsuri
still echoes, though the best blossoms have long since blown
away. I don’t ask if there are cherries on Kokoda
or lining that damned railway. Why rake the sand
with the nails of dead soldiers?

It is a haiku landscape that sparks the dreaming. This
silent bonsai is not its father elm. What seems strange
is simple through another eye, and I
can only ask.

Grandad lived and died in yesterday. He is headstone does it need an 'a' before headstone?
heavy on hard won ground, but I found a pebble
that sang the songs of mountains. the last verse has a certain elegance about it, i wanted to say beauty but i'm not sure the sadness of the first two lines allows it to be.

it moves easily from in an out of dark times. Matsuri show us as does the pebble and the nails of dead soldiers that there comes a time for forgiveness,
i love the build up to a peaceful thought. some excellent narrative, lots of sadness balanced by hope.

all jmo. on an almost perfect write. i'm sorry i couldn't be more constructive.

thanks for the read.

[Leanne]

I want to use headstone as an adjective there, "headstone heavy" -- I thought about breaking after "he is" but it doesn't look right, and I like the ambiguity that the line break gives now. Having said that, if it's confusing rather than just ambiguous I should probably do something about it. Does that make sense?

Many thanks Billy. Knowing what works is just as important as knowing what doesn't, so I certainly don't mind detailed positives

[billy]

I want to use headstone as an adjective there, "headstone heavy" -- I thought about breaking after "he is" but it doesn't look right, and I like the ambiguity that the line break gives now. Having said that, if it's confusing rather than just ambiguous I should probably do something about it. Does that make sense?

Many thanks Billy. Knowing what works is just as important as knowing what doesn't, so I certainly don't mind detailed positives

yes it does.
it isn't ambiguous, it's a nit, for me nits can found because the reader IS the problem. it's just what it feels to me....all or most others will see it as you meant it, i actually see it as you meant it as well. it just tugs at me a little is all

[Leanne]

Everyone likes a little tug now and then.

In a poetic manner of speaking, of course

[addy]

This is gorgeously crafted. The theme ties together really well... in the Japanese aesthetic, they accept that a certain beauty to be found in the passing of things, where the point of it isn't to forget/ bury the image but it isn't to get caught up in remembering either: you look on and accept bleak and changing things, past to present to future, with the proper reverence and distance to achieve "beauty". So seeing the narrative turn an immersive and critical eye on that cultural aspect is really interesting. Wonderful to read.

The carvery lunch at Grandad’s RSL
is all we can afford these days, a treat
for battlers. There’s a smell of yesterday
piped across the floor, where vets hum foreign songs
and drink about the war. Very evocative description

But the carpark today has a busload of
photo-collectors, clicking their Nikons and
smiling inscrutably. And he coughs and checks,
the old man, balks and walks away.

Don’t go in there, son, won’t go in there
Ripped out my nails and burned off my hair, son
Don’t go in there, I won’t go in there

So off to the caf for a java and a posh bit to eat
while his demons devour five dollar pork
at the opposite end of the street
and his yesterday-smell is further away
than tomorrow’s insistence on leaving behind
the crippled, the starving, the burned and the blind
the edges torn out of the mind Really like the flow in this stanza, the pace is picked up perfectly for the thoughts

The garden that Nakajima created is quiet
in contrast, each November when tireless shutters
and lenses are stowed beneath the hush. Sakura Matsuri
still echoes, though the best blossoms have long since blown
away. I don’t ask if there are cherries on Kokoda
or lining that damned railway. Why rake the sand
with the nails of dead soldiers? Haunting image

It is a haiku landscape that sparks the dreaming. This
silent bonsai is not its father elm. What seems strange
is simple through another eye, and I
can only ask.

Grandad lived and died in yesterday. He is headstone
heavy on hard won ground, but I found a pebble
that sang the songs of mountains. This part is perfect.

[Leanne]

Thank you, addy.

I've only been to the Cowra Japanese Gardens once in my life, when I was about 10, but the feeling of the place is easy to recall -- especially in contrast with a visit to the war cemetery there. I remember my parents -- both olympic-class racists -- speaking with rare respect for the Japanese POWs involved in the Cowra Breakout. It's funny what stays with you in life.

[addy]

That's brilliant, being a memory from that long ago... you've captured the impression so well for the reader. you chose a great subject; the physical contrast of the place and how it conjures up philosophical layers and contrasts in the contemplation of war, death, and commemorating the past...its all so fascinating to absorb and hard to shake off.

[crow]

I wanted to do a full line-by-line, but then I got overwhelmed by the presumptuousness of it, so I'm only doing up til the part where I started to feel ridiculous

Breakout

This puts me in mind of a prison. There's a place or thing that's going to hold a character in the poem, either the narrator, another figure(s), or both.

The carvery lunch at Grandad’s RSL

There's a simple meal at a standard cafeteria, hosted by a veteran's association. The public are invited, and the narrator has joined, most likely.

is all we can afford these days, a treat

Grandad is, perhaps, fostering the narrator. All we can afford is soldier's fare.

for battlers. There’s a smell of yesterday

Perhaps this is overwritten to accommodate the pentameters? Perhaps, "for battlers. The smell of yesterday" is an improvement?

piped across the floor, where vets hum foreign songs

The verb tenses are hard to assess. Consider, "Yesterday's smell / pipes across the floor, where vets humming foreign songs". Vets humming foreign songs is a brilliant tension. It's an affinity for NOT the homeland. OR, problematically, the songs are foreign only to the narrator. In which case I can't parse it out . . .

and drink about the war.

The density is starting to frustrate me . . . So, a smell is coming out of a ventilation duct into a room full of vets remembering long-gone war memories. They're drinking to forget the war or toasting their escapades or drinking otherwise? Also, the Grandad character has gone missing. You've lost your escort, so I'm thinking you and your nuclear family are receiving veterans benefits while your Grandad is elsewhere? The next line is a pallet cleanser, but the same confusions pile up . . .

But the carpark today has a busload of
photo-collectors,

I'm not familiar with this idiom. I know "tourists," and I'd understand, "photograph takers" or "foreign jerks." At an extreme, "photo collectors" would be objects that collect light for energy. That's a completely idiotic edit, as the line is clearly not meant to be read that way, but I thought it was an interesting notion, that the people scaring away the vet could be read that way . . .

clicking their Nikons and
smiling inscrutably. And he coughs and checks,
the old man, balks and walks away.

I need to learn forms better. I get anapest anapest anapest spondee / dactyl trochee trochee trochee . . . iamb? So, scrap my scansion, it's pretty self-taught. Uhm . . . Why the word "But"? We've got a veteran hating tourists with cameras, with maybe the thought that they're Asian--"Nikons"? When I "listen out" I understand that there's a veteran who's inhospitable to photo-collectors. When I "listen in" I get questions like, "is he coughing as a balk? Is it cancer? What does it mean to 'check' here? Walks away from the Nikons? From the narrator? From the RSL?


Okay. I'm chickening out. Sorry if I overstepped. I'm still learning . . .

---

I spent hours on that edit . . . I'm going to fall back some and bite off things that're more chewable . . .

[Truerenigma]

I wanted to do a full line-by-line, but then I got overwhelmed by the presumptuousness of it, so I'm only doing up til the part where I started to feel ridiculous

Breakout

This puts me in mind of a prison. There's a place or thing that's going to hold a character in the poem, either the narrator, another figure(s), or both.

The carvery lunch at Grandad’s RSL

There's a simple meal at a standard cafeteria, hosted by a veteran's association. The public are invited, and the narrator has joined, most likely.

is all we can afford these days, a treat

Grandad is, perhaps, fostering the narrator. All we can afford is soldier's fare.

for battlers. There’s a smell of yesterday

Perhaps this is overwritten to accommodate the pentameters? Perhaps, "for battlers. The smell of yesterday" is an improvement?

piped across the floor, where vets hum foreign songs

The verb tenses are hard to assess. Consider, "Yesterday's smell / pipes across the floor, where vets humming foreign songs". Vets humming foreign songs is a brilliant tension. It's an affinity for NOT the homeland. OR, problematically, the songs are foreign only to the narrator. In which case I can't parse it out . . .

and drink about the war.

The density is starting to frustrate me . . . So, a smell is coming out of a ventilation duct into a room full of vets remembering long-gone war memories. They're drinking to forget the war or toasting their escapades or drinking otherwise? Also, the Grandad character has gone missing. You've lost your escort, so I'm thinking you and your nuclear family are receiving veterans benefits while your Grandad is elsewhere? The next line is a pallet cleanser, but the same confusions pile up . . .

But the carpark today has a busload of
photo-collectors,

I'm not familiar with this idiom. I know "tourists," and I'd understand, "photograph takers" or "foreign jerks." At an extreme, "photo collectors" would be objects that collect light for energy. That's a completely idiotic edit, as the line is clearly not meant to be read that way, but I thought it was an interesting notion, that the people scaring away the vet could be read that way . . .

clicking their Nikons and
smiling inscrutably. And he coughs and checks,
the old man, balks and walks away.

I need to learn forms better. I get anapest anapest anapest spondee / dactyl trochee trochee trochee . . . iamb? So, scrap my scansion, it's pretty self-taught. Uhm . . . Why the word "But"? We've got a veteran hating tourists with cameras, with maybe the thought that they're Asian--"Nikons"? When I "listen out" I understand that there's a veteran who's inhospitable to photo-collectors. When I "listen in" I get questions like, "is he coughing as a balk? Is it cancer? What does it mean to 'check' here? Walks away from the Nikons? From the narrator? From the RSL?


Okay. I'm chickening out. Sorry if I overstepped. I'm still learning . . .

---

I spent hours on that edit . . . I'm going to fall back some and bite off things that're more chewable . . .

Hey. Nice bump. You found a good one. It's actually my favorites from her book. "A pebble that sang the song of mountains" really resonates for me and has been stuck in my head for days.

[Leanne]

No, it's ok to ask questions. The RSL is the Returned Services League -- understandably, these are veterans who are hostile to the Japanese. This is referencing the Cowra Breakout and those Australian soldiers who served on the Burma Railroad. It may be too Australian a reference for some other nationalities to appreciate.

[milo]

I wanted to do a full line-by-line, but then I got overwhelmed by the presumptuousness of it, so I'm only doing up til the part where I started to feel ridiculous

Breakout

This puts me in mind of a prison. There's a place or thing that's going to hold a character in the poem, either the narrator, another figure(s), or both.

The carvery lunch at Grandad’s RSL

There's a simple meal at a standard cafeteria, hosted by a veteran's association. The public are invited, and the narrator has joined, most likely.

is all we can afford these days, a treat

Grandad is, perhaps, fostering the narrator. All we can afford is soldier's fare.

for battlers. There’s a smell of yesterday

Perhaps this is overwritten to accommodate the pentameters? Perhaps, "for battlers. The smell of yesterday" is an improvement?

piped across the floor, where vets hum foreign songs

The verb tenses are hard to assess. Consider, "Yesterday's smell / pipes across the floor, where vets humming foreign songs". Vets humming foreign songs is a brilliant tension. It's an affinity for NOT the homeland. OR, problematically, the songs are foreign only to the narrator. In which case I can't parse it out . . .

and drink about the war.

The density is starting to frustrate me . . . So, a smell is coming out of a ventilation duct into a room full of vets remembering long-gone war memories. They're drinking to forget the war or toasting their escapades or drinking otherwise? Also, the Grandad character has gone missing. You've lost your escort, so I'm thinking you and your nuclear family are receiving veterans benefits while your Grandad is elsewhere? The next line is a pallet cleanser, but the same confusions pile up . . .

But the carpark today has a busload of
photo-collectors,

I'm not familiar with this idiom. I know "tourists," and I'd understand, "photograph takers" or "foreign jerks." At an extreme, "photo collectors" would be objects that collect light for energy. That's a completely idiotic edit, as the line is clearly not meant to be read that way, but I thought it was an interesting notion, that the people scaring away the vet could be read that way . . .

clicking their Nikons and
smiling inscrutably. And he coughs and checks,
the old man, balks and walks away.

I need to learn forms better. I get anapest anapest anapest spondee / dactyl trochee trochee trochee . . . iamb? So, scrap my scansion, it's pretty self-taught. Uhm . . . Why the word "But"? We've got a veteran hating tourists with cameras, with maybe the thought that they're Asian--"Nikons"? When I "listen out" I understand that there's a veteran who's inhospitable to photo-collectors. When I "listen in" I get questions like, "is he coughing as a balk? Is it cancer? What does it mean to 'check' here? Walks away from the Nikons? From the narrator? From the RSL?


Okay. I'm chickening out. Sorry if I overstepped. I'm still learning . . .

---

I spent hours on that edit . . . I'm going to fall back some and bite off things that're more chewable . . .

Hey. Nice bump. You found a good one. It's actually my favorites from her book. "A pebble that sang the song of mountains" really resonates for me and has been stuck in my head for days.

From the book! (Slaps head) I was wondering how I could have read this when it predates me by a 2 years!

Ok, nice poem then, carry on, mind the split infinitives.

[crow]

Oh! Now things make sense--and this has been published? Well, I'll go back through it anyway. Edits are bracketed.

Breakout
[Cowra, 1944]

The carvery lunch at Grandad’s RSL
is all we can afford these days, a treat
for battlers[:] There’s a smell of yesterday
pip[ing] across the floor[.] [The] vets hum foreign songs
and drink about the war.

But the carpark today has a busload of
Nikons [clicking and] smiling inscrutably.
[H]e coughs and checks, the old man, balks and walks away.

["]Don’t go in there, son, won’t go in there
["]Ripped out my nails and burned off my hair, son
["]Don’t go in there, I won’t go in there["]
--the repeating intro quotes make it seem like dialogue. Just a thought.

So off to the caf for a java and a posh bit[e] to eat
--I'm a fan of punctuation, and I think "So," would be better for cadence and ease of understanding.
while his demons devour five[-]dollar pork
--the Japanese? If the meal is symbolic, heighten it? Try, "while his demons devour unlivered pork" "gnaw cheap pork legs," "wipe pork grease from their . . ."?

at the opposite end of the street
--they're ignorant to the pain they're causing? Or is this purely metaphoric? Maybe, "downwind"?

and his yesterday-smell is further away

--can the yesterday smell be imprisoned, itself, in the RSL?

than tomorrow’s insistence on leaving behind

--make more active? Can tomorrow insist?

the crippled, the starving, the burned and the blind

--consider omitting "the"

the edges torn out of the mind

--this line loses me some . . .

The garden that Nakajima created is quiet

--why not "Nakajima's garden"?

in contrast, each November when tireless shutters

--drop "in"?: ". / Contrast Novembers. Tireless"?

and lenses are stowed beneath the hush. Sakura Matsuri

--I want "hush" to do more work. E.g., "hushed" or italicized hush?

still echoes, though the best blossoms have long since blown

--excellent.

away. I don’t ask if there are cherries on Kokoda
or lining that damned railway. Why rake the sand
with the nails of dead soldiers?
--excellent.

It is a haiku landscape that sparks the dreaming. This
--"sparks" could feel dangerous, if you wanted to make it part of some psychological arsenal

silent bonsai is not its father elm. What seems strange
--I supply "just as" to "This" on the line above. "[S]eems" feels weak here. Try just "Strange".

is simple through another eye, and I
can only ask.

Grandad lived and died in yesterday. He is headstone
--I'd put a comma after "headstone".

heavy on hard[-]won ground, but I found a pebble
that sang the songs of mountains.
--this is a reference to the Zen tradition of adding stones to bonsai arrangements and Zen gardens? It's also a contrast with the idea of a headstone? Mmmk. So . . . I'd add another line or two to the end. Like, "and I've hidden it from him" or "and I don't know what's buried underneath". I feel comfortable making these direct edits because they're the most efficient way to say what I mean, and you're a strong enough poet to take my meaning without feeling strong-armed. If I'm wrong, let me know, and I won't do it again

---

I must say, I agree this is a powerful work. I just wanted to suggest some, mostly useless, revisions, in case they help

[Leanne]

I don't mind, it's interesting to get another perspective -- although what you've essentially done is told me how you would write the poem, which is fine of course. That it's published doesn't mean it's not available for editing, but many of your suggestions are a bit too heavy-handed for my liking. They're always welcome though, and I do consider them -- even if it seems I discard most.

---

Please don't be dissuaded from offering similar editing suggestions on any poems -- I'm just arrogant enough to consider this poem pretty much where I want it to be at the moment.

---

PS. It's not "Nakajima's garden" -- he's the designer, but it's a public memorial.

[crow]

Thanks for saying--new to this

I'll be more suggestive and less aggressive with everyone in the future. Thanks for helping me cut my teeth

[milo]

Thanks for saying--new to this

I'll be more suggestive and less aggressive with everyone in the future. Thanks for helping me cut my teeth

You are not being too aggressive but it is two years old and published
Try focusing on things newer, that people are currently working on.

[Leanne]

If you want to practise, I'm ok with you going through any of my stuff -- and I'll generally tell you why something will or won't work if you want me to. But as milo says, it's good to focus on the new workshopping material. (Though new perspectives on old poems are often very useful).

[crow]

Gotcha.