wine

sympathy
for a machine's sudden death and a
blow to the head
I don't know now

plaid shirts,
a hurricane in my mouth
brings a long awkward pause
no thought to refine like

jersey skins
and your father's smile, you'll see it
hurts in the knees before
before becoming worthwhile

I'm almost afraid to even attempt to reviw this (and I think that's why there aren't any reviews thus far) because it's very difficult for me to wrap my head around this. Of course, with the title you've given us, I'm connecting the dots in the poem to actually make some amount of sense; thing is, I'm not sure if I've connected them correctly. Wine?

I'm sure that you're aware that this poem doesn't make a whole lot of sense, yes? It requires some deciphering. I think it's possible for your reader to do that deciphering, but only with the title; without it, I would have probably deciphered it to be about true love's first meeting or something. Looking back, you could also connect the dots to be about the importance of family. Everything is so ambiguous that we'll all probably come up with our own translations. I think that's great. *shrug* But you're the author, and is that was you were aiming for?

The lack of capitalization is something I come across in poetry, and normally it bothers me. Here, however, (perhaps because it's such a short poem, or perhaps because you've just executed it well) I don't notice the capitalization as much. It's much more subtle. Which is, I assure you, very good.

Here is my only little complaint:

no thought to refine like

Granted, the whole poem is vague and slightly nonsensical, but this downright just doesn't make sense. Is it even proper grammar? When I first read it, my eyes saw it as 'no thought to refine this', which was cool with me and everything, but re-reading it I saw that I had read this line wrong.

Besides that little part, everything else remains satisfyingly mysterious without driving us insane. I really liked this poem, and I hope some of the things I've said have been helpful!

~Evi

Hey Chevy! June here

I'm rather delicate about reviewing fragile poems like this; I hate to ruin them-- especially when they aren't following any particular form or structure. Anyway! I'll give this a shot .


I really like this poem, Chevy, because it's making me think.

I'm not sure if I've got this properly, but as I thought of this, a machine -- a life support machine -- suddenly died, causing a loss to someone else. I can't say if the blow to the head was to the person who moved on, or the person who suffered the loss (most likely the latter) can't remember exactly what happened?


I'm not too sure about the plaid shirts part, but it's certainly making me think. The hurricane in your mouth is the wine, being consumed out of grief? I'm not too sure.

And, then, something about this is bringing to mind memories of some sort.

I've probably got it wrong-- I'm extremely tired now .


Anyway! Morgan, I truly enjoyed this. The flow was perfect, it all rolled smoothly, and overall it was a beautiful poem.

Keep it up! And gold star for this!

June

Hey guys, thanks for the reviews.

Perhaps I should have named this "wine skins" for it's about the place in between the grape vineyard and the wine itself, and the (life) transitions that happen there.