reverie

as requested

It's very pretty and pleasing to the hear lyrically, but maybe a touch too abstract?

Swaying Beauty <---allusion to "sleeping beauty" maybe, pairs nice with guarded towers

She is wilder than the flowers <--- nice use of line breaks in place of punctuation of say a colon or hyphen throughout. Still I wander if you want an implicit hard pause here or not (or at the end of your other lines). Lines breaks traditionally do not imply a pause, yet they still can somewhat imply a tiny pause sometimes, but not always... At any rate the sing - song rhythm (anapest?) seems to want a pause, yet the I can read most the poem just a well without pauses. Actually, I think it reads better that way for all save the first line, which I read as an implied colon or common.

a swaying beauty <--- Nice structure, noun fragment cool.

in a field

Half her life in guarded towers <--- okay, you're telling us part of a story here? For what purpose? Is she so wild and rare that she must kept under guard? wouldn't that deflate her some -- the solitude, her wildness. I know you are not writing a narrative, but you've chosen to bring out this detail of her life, which alludes to a history of some sorts that is not in the rest of poem. just something to consider.

her subtle strength <--- okay, what strength? Where? How? Only strength I can potentially see is if I let my mind run with the comparative metaphor of the flower(s) literally and see a "flower" as being strong since it can stand up to the sway of the wind. However, I do not see how this applies to the "swaying beauty if I read "her" as a human type figure. Unless you mean that her "subtle strength" exists because she needs to be guarded, and well I'm kind of going out on a limb to read that much into it.

now revealed

A pause to clear your mind of thoughts (Okay, a shift from 3rd to 2nd person. Who is pausing here? Is the speaker pointing to a third figure not previously mentioned. Personas: 1 - Speaker, 2 - the Beauty, 3 - whoever this you/your person is? You haven't primed your readers for this new entity, which could be forgiven if you developed him/her more, but you don't, so I'm confused. Other option is that the speaker is referring to the beauty who is reflecting on her situtation, but I think this unlikely with the way it's currently phrased.

best forgotten

washed away

She is wilder than the flowers <--- repeating first stanza. Neat enough, good for bringing the everything full circle, particularly in repeating forms or sing-songy ballad type stuff and it serves to reinforce your point / theme etc. Only problem is I have no idea what your theme/point is. You haven't (IMHO) informed me as to how she is wild and why, how, or in what way she is swept away and by whom or by what agency.

a swaying beauty

swept away. <-- Aye! Perfect rhyme with the same word repeated. In your first two Stanzas you used imperfect rhyme (or is it near or half rhyme?), so one would think you would keep up this tread. However nothing wrong with perfect rhyme intermixed with imperfect in such a short poem per se. However, to be blunt fulfilling a rhyme in an already established scheme with the same word in succession is just a failure of imagination.

Very nice. Works well enough as a song lyrics, but I feel as a poem it could be more thoroughly developed.

my thoughts,

rev...

Oh in that case you needn't quote yourself. Just write up immediately after your title: "In Responce to..."

That and few italics if you happen to reconstruct a phrase or two or hers word for word.

kudos... oh and you really should fix the Soldier thing if you were in fact referring to the younger Bush. Unintentional though it may be, it's stands as a snub to the both the Army and the Air Force. I would think more so on the Air Force side, since they had their reasons for separating form the Army Air Corp an age or so ago -- good reasons -- and it's not polite to disregard their wishes.

It's not the same exactly, but it's like saying that the Marines are just a small branch of the Navy. My Dad used that one a lot in Vietnam. He got into a lot fights, but he liked to fight so all was well.

all the best,

rev...

Pink as in the singer? She wrote the song to herself? as in referring to herself in the third person or is that you swapping the names. Do you have link to the original lyrics handy? Bush the younger was never a Soldier, he was an Airman in the Air national guard. I thought you might be referring to Bush the Elder's service in WWII possibly, but then I double checked and turns out he was a Seaman in WWII. This may seem like splitting hairs, but there really is a world of difference between the mindset of an airman and seaman v. that of say a Soldier or a marine.

Despite whatever their normal day to day jobs or missions might entail, at the core Soldiers and marines are combat troops.

The same cannot be said for an airman or seaman. While both the Air force and Navy have specialized units that do engage in combat operations -- the PJs (Pararescuemen), Navy Seals, fighter pilots etc -- the bulk of their forces are not expected to engage in combat on a personal level (that's what their ships, boats, and bombers are for) where as even the freaking members of the Marine Corp or Army Marching Band and kitchen staff would be expected to (and trained to) drop everything and fight up and close and personal with an enemy if it came down to it: usually in the form of a rotating duty on a rapid reaction force set up for defense purpose. Hell, I knew Soldiers that were in a communication (signal) battalion that got turned into Infantry (the entire battalion) during one of the troop mobilizations on the Iraq boarder during interim period between the Two Gulf Wars

Or another example. If you have seen the movie Blackhawk Down when the Rangers and Delta Force were cut off at one point, one of the Army commanders demanded that every single piece of armor be deployed to get the cut off troops out. Well, when I joined the army in '97 some of the Drill Sergeants that trained me where part of that mobilization. They told me the officers grabbed every army clerk, cook, mechanic or what have you and organized them into a rescue mission.

Fighter pilot would probably give the desired effect, but service man or in the service would probably sound better.

peace,

rev...

no grades for individual poems wyv... grade is by effort put forth over entire course.

a riddle?

Building a Bell Tower on top of a library is just plain sadistic.

Oxy: Ah, you never know. Writing last as long as it's remembered. You might change your mind one day. I did.

Like even great impromptu works like the insanely long 120 foot scroll that Jack Kerouac typed "On the Road" on went through some revisions in the end.

But nothing wrong with being Retro.

Your material is good, but seems to me, that this poem could benefit greatly from nuance and hesitation via choices pauses (varied at different lengths). Punctuation is one strategy for accomplishing this.

See my write up on Carl Phillips in the AAA Classroom for example of this technique taken to the extreme:

Dreamlost Class 3 "Halo" Poem

Analysis of "Halo"

Something that I took me a while to get regarding feedback (both poor and constructive) on anything you create:

It's not about defending or even agreeing or disagreeing, it's about listening to what was heard or mis-heard and why.

And what was heard says just as much about the reader as it does the author.

Definitely wish I'd had you around to explain this for me many, many times over the past seven years or so. Well put. :>) ~Ozy

Many, happy returns to you on this your special day.

repetitions adds a nice element to it. Makes it seem more like a repeating French form than the intended Japanese. God, I love hybrids. Too cool.

hmm, link seems not to working at the moment.

Still, I was assigned couple years ago to select a painting or photograph then write a poem about it. There's a term for it, but I can't remember it. I mistakenly thought it was called Ars Poetica, but apparently that means to write a poem about writing a poem or on poetry in general.

I say go for it. Multi-genre art is awesome! It's not poetry, but the rock band the "The Never" created a graphic novel like storyline to go with their album. The visual artwork is so good that the original paintings tour with band and is shown at local galleries / universities.

http://www.thenever.org/center.html

thanks, yeah I found an example of it online so went for it. Wanted to tie my hands sort of speak with this one. Insert some intentional awkwardness to mirror someone learning dance steps. Is experiment.

Figured this one is so close to complete, why bother with the workshop.

Thought I'd follow up Silver Wind's lead and see what I could manage out of a Cinquin.

Or rather a Cinq-Cinquain.

Yeah I know the ending sucks.

8/28/2007

Dance Lessons in August

The heat

serves us well. We

would be dancers prone too

often to leave our partners damp.

Be cool

Young friend

And spin her round

her halo tip, as you

twirl in step if only for a

moment.

Change up

your style: Sashay

that hip, spot turn—No, yes

Now—Fling out that wrist. Can you feel

it, how?

But turn

it down. It’s too

much that beat. Try it quick-

quick slow — box out that one two three.

Lead on

Boy, there’s

plenty of girls

out taken turns. Why care?

Just ask. A dance is just a dance

Just ask.

hmm, would like to see this one performed. Sounds like it could be at least.

rev...

I've recently succumbed to Netflix, so have taken the opportunity to catch up all those anime series I always wanted watch but never wanted to buy/rent.

Puni Puni Poemi

Probably the funniest two episode series I've ever seen. Definitely not for children, but great for teens! The plot of the story can be summed up as this: Insane parity of a cute-girl anime heroine series. Borrows or morphs several character from the Excel Saga, (by the same ppl, I think) which I've just started watching. Also hilarious -- just slightly less so, but takes a while to get started (which is actually intended). Someone in this thread has already did a much better and more thorough review than me, but I'm too lazy to find it.

Perfect Blue

Confusing and twisted. Borrows heavily from the pschyo-drama "Silence of the Lambs." If you're in to pscho-thriller / drama you might like this otherwise, I'd skip it.

Martian Successor Nadesico: The Motion Picture: Prince of Darkness

Awesome, only wish it was longer. A lot darker than the original series, but still worth the watch. Ending seemed a bit too easy too. Think they ran over budget or something.

***

Non-anime:

Born-Ultimatum

Not bad. Like a super-charged bond film but with more edge and less sex appeal. Basically the movie is one long almost-continuous car-crash scene. Gonzo film making gone Gonzo to the nth degree, but that's cool. It's a ride, I get it. Only thing that really bugged me was the title. Can someone please tell where the !@$!# there was even a mention of an "Ultimatum." More the like the Born-Identity-Crisis or the Born-Gonna-get-my-Vengeance-on. or the

Maybe an Ultimatum was in the book, but it got written out of the script. I don't know, it just bugged me.

a few choice line-breaks would add some nuance to your first stanza.

just an opinion.

rev...

I had the opportunity to meet Gayle Danley a few years back in D.C. I was very fortunate to hear her and about five other fellow slam champions that night as well.

I used to think that Slam and Spoken word relied too heavily on performance to act as the legs of the poem, to carry it. Just like a lyricist relies heavily on the musical score.

However, after hearing a room full of slam champs, I quickly changed my mind. I realized just how young Slam is. It takes time for any poet to develop and fill out, and the things I heard that night was good enough fill a series of one-act plays. They're like the leaders in the first or second generation that has matured.

So to me slam poetry is just like any other poetry out there. Lot's of people out their trying, but only a few stick it out long enough to be able to reach the highest levels.

What I'm saying is that from either perspective spoken or page: poetic depth within each individual takes time to mature.

So don't worry, so much about translating to the page, eventually it will happen on it's own, or if not someone with transcribe it for you. You know Paul Mccartney and John Lennon never learned to read music. Other people wrote it down for them.

rev...

cool. Reminds me some of Elizabeth Bishop (that delay thing she does). nice word economy. no punctuation?

Not bad. Some of your smilies and metaphors could use some streamlining though.

For example:

Hot air enfolds around me like tupperwear.

While hot air may enfold you as a cloud would. IMHO, Tupperwear evokes a stronger association: as in to seal, encase, or enclose.

Or alternately you could just drop "around" (a word that would serve to emphasis the primarily meaning of "enfold") and the stronger connotations of the secondarily meaning of "enfold" should carry the line. Don't ask how I know this, am going on instinct.

---

Suddenly, a drip. The infamous piter-patter,

Saying "a drip" then full stopping it with a period implies you mean like a single drop of rain. Nothing wrong with that, but then you qualify that statement or follow it with "The infamouse piter-patter." Piter-patter implies more than one, so I don't think it can fully describe "a drip." Simple solution is to add the word "then" somewhere in the line e.g.

Suddenly, a drip. Then the infamous piter-patter,

Or skip the "then" and insert a line-break after "drip" and change "the" to "an":

Suddenly, a drip.

An infamouse piter-patter,

Combination of a full stop and a line break might be enough to carry the effect of an entirely new set of actions across, if I've read it right...maybe.

---

The clouds heave and gasp.

The heavens open.

The blank clouds expressionless,

Saying clouds "heave and gasp" has personified them, so it makes me wonder why you leave them "bland" and "expressionless." Your first line in this stanza has created an opportunity, you should take it.

***

Try this on for size:

The rain becomes irregular outside.

It is nearly spent, <--- lose the comma

After the great effort. <--- maybe nix the period, maybe

And all I hear

is the gutteral gurgling

of the drain pipe, below.[/i]

All and all not bad. I like it. Altered your last line because I felt the further personification of the drain pipe was unnecessarily. The "gut" carries it.

look forward to more.

rev...

Hmm. Gonna play a little with your first stanza. Hope you don't mind.

There is no God, I say to all! (? in title vs. !)

No guiding hand to save your fall.

A man will worship in spite of fears,

The farce of heaven or loved ones' tears. (Yeah, I know it doesn't make as much sense, but I'm fiddling.)

In pulpits pastors preach and wail:

Listen not and go to hell.

Ya know, you can edit a post on this site, if you'd like.

Poem has life, i.e. isn't flat, I'll say that. Good job.

"A decay wrapped in tempt."

Line seems a bit strained. Might as well say "temptation" or even "tempting" (though it may skew the meaning some and you'd have to run with it too).

cheers,

rev...

Peppermint soap = Fun

Bleach turns polyester yellow. @!#$

oh, hmm, well then should turn the riddle into a dialog then, or possible an echo thing. Or narrate it as such.

rev...