soulstice edit 1 billy, erthona

[tectak]

Each dawn’s bright rise is but a turn, a cyclic twist of blinking earth;
The living count each passing day, clicked by a ratchet hooked by time.
But those below have run the race, and sense but seasons in their bones;
a winter comes, a summer next, spring and autumn barely touch.
Lagging warmth, slow risen, peaks: then drains so gently into ground.

The quick, above, entranced by life, enthralled by futures promised fair,
will come to yearn the fast embrace, the dreaming kiss of endless night.
That you know not what death can bring, nor care to know, nor dare to guess,
is all the better whilst you stir, and all the better when you die.
This the secret no one tells, why none return to clarify.

Ask not the question “What of me?”, for whilst you stride the changing plane,
your footsteps pulse upon your fate, and deep in darkness souls vibrate;
a friend or two, a brother lost, a father grieved, a mother mourned,
a lover once, but now long gone, a worshipped wife, a much loved son.
This is the way, the course, of life: and this is the longest day.

Tectak
The summer solstice
June 2012

[Erthona]

I think that is much better. Now maybe focus on tightening and clarifying the images, so they worked to build the energy by creating a greater smoothness to each line.

I offer some suggestion in the areas of the first stanza. I don't offer these as superior, just as alternatives for areas I see as problematic. Such as "blinking earth". I'm not sure that "pulsing" is any better than blinking, but I know blinking will not do. Blinking conjures up too much the image of a flashing traffic light. Just about any substitute I could think of seemed equally problematic. I don't have the time or the energy now to do more than the first stanza, nor would I if I did as i is not my intention to rewrite your poem. You may think of my suggestions as place holders until something better comes along, as a way of putting a section into a parenthetical stasis, so to speak.

However should you change nothing this is leaps above what you had before, and more clearly shows the potential it possesses.

Dale
----------------------------------------------------------------------------
"Each dawn’s bright rise is but a turn, a cyclic twist of blinking earth;" to
Each dawn’s bright rise is a simple turn in the cyclic twist of pulsing earth;
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
" The living count each passing day, clicked by a ratchet hooked by time." to
man counting each day by the click of a clockwork ratchet hooked in time.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------
"But we below have run the race, and sense but seasons in our bones;"
We run time's race, but sense nothing longer than the seasons in our bones;
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------
"a winter comes, a summer next, spring and autumn barely touch."
winter and summer ofttimes come like a heavy stomping boot,
while the waifs of spring and fall, are gone before we realized they had come at all.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
"Lagging warmth, slow risen, peaks: then drains so gently into ground."
Lagging warmth slowly rises, peaks, then dwindles as it seeps softly into the ground
---------------------------------------------------------------------------------

[tectak]

I think that is much better. Now maybe focus on tightening and clarifying the images, so they worked to build the energy by creating a greater smoothness to each line.

I offer some suggestion in the areas of the first stanza. I don't offer these as superior, just as alternatives for areas I see as problematic. Such as "blinking earth". I'm not sure that "pulsing" is any better than blinking, but I know blinking will not do. Blinking conjures up too much the image of a flashing traffic light. Just about any substitute I could think of seemed equally problematic. I don't have the time or the energy now to do more than the first stanza, nor would I if I did as i is not my intention to rewrite your poem. You may think1 of my suggestions as place holders until something better comes along, as a way of putting a section into a parenthetical stasis, so to speak.

However should you change nothing this is leaps above what you had before, and more clearly shows the potential it possesses.

Dale
----------------------------------------------------------------------------
"Each dawn’s bright rise is but a turn, a cyclic twist of blinking earth;" to
Each dawn’s bright rise is a simple turn in the cyclic twist of pulsing earth;
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
" The living count each passing day, clicked by a ratchet hooked by time." to
man counting each day by the click of a clockwork ratchet hooked in time.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------
"But we below have run the race, and sense but seasons in our bones;"
We run time's race, but sense nothing longer than the seasons in our bones;
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------
"a winter comes, a summer next, spring and autumn barely touch."
winter and summer ofttimes come like a heavy stomping boot,
while the waifs of spring and fall, are gone before we realized they had come at all.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
"Lagging warmth, slow risen, peaks: then drains so gently into ground."
Lagging warmth slowly rises, peaks, then dwindles as it seeps softly into the ground
---------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Thanks Dale.
blinking-because it turns so fast in and out of days. Pulsing, I think, implies volumetric cycling.
sense nothing longer in our bones. No. sense nothing shorter. I am not making myself clear. Six feet down rapid changes above are not felt. The inertia of the grave only permits for slow changes to be sensed......like the damping of daily temperature variations by the oceanic volume. This is a crucial part of the piece in that it goes part way to explain the time extension after death in a less spiritual context. Epic fail, to use a hated vernacular.
The "lagging" warmth attempts to use both the meanings of the word.I don't need to explain, I know.
The rest will be digested.
Oh, and btb, the use of indefinite article before winter and summer is self explanatory after the aforegoing. We are talking eons not weekends here Indefinite time scale.

Best and hope all well your end. You are becoming pathologically pleasant. I only get that way when pissed or patronising

[Erthona]

" I am not making myself clear. Six feet down" no you are not. There is nothing I can point to that implies that in the lest. If you are going to use winter or summer as eon, then I think I would at least cap it, simply preceding it by an indefinite article only means you are not specifying which, not that it is meaning to represent an enormous time span.

"blinking-because it turns so fast in and out of days." There is nothing that clues the reader to this being what you meant. Metaphor in generally has to hold to the restrictions that are generally placed on that which the metaphor is using as it example. 1. The earth does not turn so fast that it blinks, and 2. a blinking effect could only be observed from earth's surface. You have not previously set up a mechanism (such as H. G. Wells does in the time machine) to explain why it would be perceived to happen, and and how one accounts for the physical impossibility of the earth spinning so fast that it would fly apart should such a thing actually occur. Certainly as we get older the perception is that time passes more quickly, and one could hypothesize that this process continues once we die, but here the implication would be that it continues on like this, and instead of a blinking, it rapidly progresses to a blur of light and dark, which quickly changes into a grey smear. The problem being that we are "six feet under" and could not see any of this if we had eyes to see, which we do not. This is not to mention the fact that whatever temperature change that occurs on the surface, would hardly be noted at that depth, as one is close, if not into the depth where a more or less constant 65 degrees F is generally maintained, this is beside the point that time is progressing so rapidly with the blinking and all, that we would be dust, and as such, lacking the necessary sense organs to perceive such a change in temperature, were it capable of being perceived.

Someone might ask, why is he making such a big deal about this? The answer is that a reader generally approaches a text with certain preconceived ideas, such as the laws of physics work as we are accustomed to them working unless otherwise noted with a corollary explanation (being transported to another dimension) that explains the change, and specifically defines what has and has not changed. To expect the reader to infer all of this from such things as the use of two indefinite articles, and the word "blinking" that he has entered into an indefinite time scale (whatever the hell that means) is to piss into the oncoming wind of a hurricane and expect not to get wet.


Best,

DT

[tectak]

" I am not making myself clear. Six feet down" no you are not. There is nothing I can point to that implies that in the lest. If you are going to use winter or summer as eon, then I think I would at least cap it, simply preceding it by an indefinite article only means you are not specifying which, not that it is meaning to represent an enormous time span.

"blinking-because it turns so fast in and out of days." There is nothing that clues the reader to this being what you meant. Metaphor in generally has to hold to the restrictions that are generally placed on that which the metaphor is using as it example. 1. The earth does not turn so fast that it blinks, and 2. a blinking effect could only be observed from earth's surface. You have not previously set up a mechanism (such as H. G. Wells does in the time machine) to explain why it would be perceived to happen, and and how one accounts for the physical impossibility of the earth spinning so fast that it would fly apart should such a thing actually occur. Certainly as we get older the perception is that time passes more quickly, and one could hypothesize that this process continues once we die, but here the implication would be that it continues on like this, and instead of a blinking, it rapidly progresses to a blur of light and dark, which quickly changes into a grey smear. The problem being that we are "six feet under" and could not see any of this if we had eyes to see, which we do not. This is not to mention the fact that whatever temperature change that occurs on the surface, would hardly be noted at that depth, as one is close, if not into the depth where a more or less constant 65 degrees F is generally maintained, this is beside the point that time is progressing so rapidly with the blinking and all, that we would be dust, and as such, lacking the necessary sense organs to perceive such a change in temperature, were it capable of being perceived.

Someone might ask, why is he making such a big deal about this? The answer is that a reader generally approaches a text with certain preconceived ideas, such as the laws of physics work as we are accustomed to them working unless otherwise noted with a corollary explanation (being transported to another dimension) that explains the change, and specifically defines what has and has not changed. To expect the reader to infer all of this from such things as the use of two indefinite articles, and the word "blinking" that he has entered into an indefinite time scale (whatever the hell that means) is to piss into the oncoming wind of a hurricane and expect not to get wet.


Best,

DT

Ah, that's better. I thought aliens had taken over your cadaver. Bugger physics.....I'm for theoretical fantasising any day.
Best,
tectak

[Erthona]

Oh, go screw a greased higgs! :p

[tectak]

Oh, go screw a greased higgs! :p

......and go check out

Underground temperatures as indicators of surface temperatures – part 1 Posted by Ari Jokimäki on February 28, 2010

Particularly:
When surface temperature changes, the change is seen immediately in the soil that is in direct contact with the surface. The temperature changes in surface soil are being transferred deeper by heat conduction. Therefore the deeper ground shows the same temperature change as the surface, but in later time.(lagging-tectak)

and:

From the measurements it has been found out that daily variation of surface temperature can be seen in the depth of 2 meters and annual variation of surface temperature can be seen in the depth of 20 meters. Rapid temperature changes are therefore not conveyed very deep so the temperature reconstructions from boreholes don’t show rapid temperature changes, but they show how the temperature has varied during decades and centuries.

and finally, though I know you know, it is not that the night/dawn cycle gets faster....it is that time speeds up for our long dead "observers". One year becomes one day. 365 revs in 24hrs works out at 0.25 rpm. Not exactly blurring but blinking just might do...4 minute traffic lights?:D
Best as always,
te tak

All relativity my dear boy,relativity.
So there.:P

[billy]

Each dawn’s bright rise is but a turn, a cyclic twist of blinking earth;
The living count each passing day, clicked by a ratchet hooked by time.
But we below have run the race, and sense but seasons in our bones;
a winter comes, a summer next, spring and autumn barely touch.
Lagging warmth, slow risen, peaks: then drains so gently into ground.

The quick, above, entranced by life, enthralled by futures promised fair,
will come to yearn the fast embrace, the dreaming kiss of endless night.
That you know not what death can bring, nor care to know, nor dare to guess,
is all the better whilst you stir, and all the better when you die.
This the secret no one tells, why none return to clarify.

Ask not the question “What of me?”, for whilst you stride the changing plane,
your footsteps pulse upon your fate, and deep in darkness souls vibrate;
a friend or two, a brother lost, a father grieved, a mother mourned,
a lover once, but now long gone, a worshipped wife, a much loved son.
This is the way, the course, of life: and this is the longest day.

Tectak
The summer solstice
June 2012

though small, the edit adds something to the poem. count works better than feel; the dreaming kiss of endless night also feels better. so yes, it works

[tectak]

Each dawn’s bright rise is but a turn, a cyclic twist of blinking earth;
The living count each passing day, clicked by a ratchet hooked by time.
But we below have run the race, and sense but seasons in our bones;
a winter comes, a summer next, spring and autumn barely touch.
Lagging warmth, slow risen, peaks: then drains so gently into ground.

The quick, above, entranced by life, enthralled by futures promised fair,
will come to yearn the fast embrace, the dreaming kiss of endless night.
That you know not what death can bring, nor care to know, nor dare to guess,
is all the better whilst you stir, and all the better when you die.
This the secret no one tells, why none return to clarify.

Ask not the question “What of me?”, for whilst you stride the changing plane,
your footsteps pulse upon your fate, and deep in darkness souls vibrate;
a friend or two, a brother lost, a father grieved, a mother mourned,
a lover once, but now long gone, a worshipped wife, a much loved son.
This is the way, the course, of life: and this is the longest day.

Tectak
The summer solstice
June 2012

though small, the edit adds something to the poem. count works better than feel; the dreaming kiss of endless night also feels better. so yes, it works

Thanks for that billy.
I have sneeked in a couple of person changes to appease that old mould erthona. The guy grows on you like penicillin....you know he does you good but can cause allergic reactions!
If I put this one to bed now it won't be too soon.
thanks again. Good workshopping.
Best,
tectak

[Erthona]

Exactly how do long dead observers...observe?
----------------------------------------------------------------
[undefined=undefined]......and go check out
Underground temperatures as indicators of surface temperatures – part 1 Posted by Ari Jokimäki on February 28, 2010[/undefined]

I did, that article is about climate change! (roll eyes)
--------------------------------------------------------------------
No, you go and check out: Thermal Inertia at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thermal_ine...al_inertia
----------------------------------------------------------------------
I almost died once from an allergic reaction to penicillin. Closed up my throat....couldn't talk, nearly killed me :p


Pest,

Dale

[tectak]

Exactly how do long dead observers...observe?
----------------------------------------------------------------
[undefined=undefined]......and go check out
Underground temperatures as indicators of surface temperatures – part 1 Posted by Ari Jokimäki on February 28, 2010[/undefined]

I did, that article is about climate change! (roll eyes)
--------------------------------------------------------------------
No, you go and check out: Thermal Inertia at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thermal_ine...al_inertia
----------------------------------------------------------------------
I almost died once from an allergic reaction to penicillin. Closed up my throat....couldn't talk, nearly killed me :p


Pest,

Dale

---

[quote='Erthona' pid='98691' dateline='1341487622']
Exactly how do long dead observers...observe?
----------------------------------------------------------------
[undefined=undefined]......and go check out
Underground temperatures as indicators of surface temperatures – part 1 Posted by Ari Jokimäki on February 28, 2010[/undefined]

I did, that article is about climate change! (roll eyes)
--------------------------------------------------------------------
No, you go and check out: Thermal Inertia at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thermal_ine...al_inertia
----------------------------------------------------------------------
I almost died once from an allergic reaction to penicillin. Closed up my throat....couldn't talk, nearly killed me :p


Pest,

Dale

Dead observers observe for EXACTLY 42years, 42mins, 42 seconds....I thought everyone knew that!
Regarding the superflous polemics of sub-soil temperatures, I go back to my old Nelkon and Nelkon days.
( 1) Q=Ka(t1 -t2)/x where K is the coefficient of thermal conductivity of the material under consideration, a is the area of applied heat, t1 is applied temperature at source and t2 is the temperature at sink, x is the thickness of the material under consideration.
From (1)
t1-t2=Qx/Ka
t2=t1-(Qx/Ka)
or, in layman's terms, t2 will always be affected by t1 regardles of x or K provided we don't exceed quantum limits!!!

...or not.

Good here innit. Sorry billy. End of discourse. Got a bit carried away.
Test,
tectak

[Erthona]

42?...Wrong question!

Why would a dead person have a sink underground?


dale

[tectak]

42?...Wrong question!

Why would a dead person have a sink underground?


dale

Don't you get around much anymore? 42 is the answer to everything. Google.
....dead people are sunk underground. Its just a matter of tense.
Best,
tectak

[Erthona]

So, first they were sinks and now they are sunk? Do sinks, sinks, or have sinks, sunk, and who has sunken them?

I googled the accuracy of answers from google and it said that the answers are 100% correct only 42% of the time. So 58% of the time 42 is the wrong answer, and the question is wrong 42% of the time, because the right question "42" is only 100% correct 58% of the time!


Pest,

Dale

[tectak]

So, first they were sinks and now they are sunk? Do sinks, sinks, or have sinks, sunk, and who has sunken them?

I googled the accuracy of answers from google and it said that the answers are 100% correct only 42% of the time. So 58% of the time 42 is the wrong answer, and the question is wrong 42% of the time, because the right question "42" is only 100% correct 58% of the time!


Pest,

Dale

You are absolutely correct in all things without exception; I am sunk.
Rest,
tectak

[Erthona]

Nah, I give you ten years at least!


Dale