Gathering at the Light

[Removed for editing]

Hi,

I think that this is a beautifully written piece.It flows nicely and the imagery is great. I especially enjoyed "chewed her nails" and "the rumpled sheets...mountains" and "linen land."

I think that the last sentence in each stanza is a bit weak. You drop the imagery, and "lover that gave the world significance" was a bit cliché- you express it more eloquently than most who use it, but it still tells us nothing new. I'd try for some more visual lines here.

"Languorous pencil idled" and "moth-like perforations" and "scraggly algae" are too much. I felt they were showing off vocabulary without any real purpose. I'd keep it simple. It would fit in better then with the rest of the piece, and not draw the reader out of the poem. I was wrapped up in it until these lines and this snapped me out-they were too consciously poetic.

A beautiful piece nonetheless, and it flows nicely.

Hope this helps,

Jas

Thanks for the comment, Jasmine!

I suppose the show-offy-ness of a vocabulary depends on the person cos I use scraggly and algae and perforate (even frozen tv dinners use it: "perforate seal before microwaving") but I will admit I had to remind myself how to spell languorous. Actually I'm still not sure if that's spelled right; I can't look it up on the iPhone...that should've been a dead giveaway

And note that it is "the lover that gave the WORD significance" as in morgana that completes the word. (by chance also a fictional character from which the word is derived but I don't really know much about that.) I was trying to side step the cliche one only slightly.

As for the last line of each stanzas, I suppose I was going for an immaterial siren song kind of thing, but I suppose I could try thinking of a visual immaterial thing...I'll think on it.

Thanks a lot, again for the crit!

Hi sargsauce,

I didn't enjoy this much as the other one I reviewed, but it's still good. I think it suffers from a lack of punctuation -- I think you need at least one comma in the first stanza (I reckon after night), and there's a similar problem in the other two. Nonetheless, your command of structure and flow is mightily impressive.

I thought some of your images were not as creative as I might have expected from a write of your calibre (yes, I've judged you quickly). Rumpled sheets like mountains is pretty standard fare (in fact I seem to remember another poem using that idea which I read today) and so is moth-like perforations (perhaps not that exact turn of phrase, but I always seem to see nightdress and moths together).

Good luck with any revisions!

Hey sargsauce!

The way your stanzas move kind of bug me. Like, right now all of them seem like sighs. Like, they start off sharply and then they are released slowly until they finally die out. Because each stanza seems to die out in the end, the poem really doesn't seem go anywhere. This doesn't mean sighs are bad... it just is repetitive and makes me wonder. Try making your middle stanza more raging. I think that might help out.

...and yes, this was the most abstract critique ever. -_-;; If you have any questions (and I'm sure you do) feel free to PM me.

Firestarter: I know, right? I read that same mountain-sheet poem earlier today and went, "curses!" And for some reason, nightdresses and moths seem like they go together well, but I don't really know why...
And as for your opinion of me...hmmm...I hope you take that back because there's too much pressure now and I won't be able to post my garage band's song lyrics. (That's a lie...)


Snoink: Well, it means I did my job right. However, just because my intention was carried out, doesn't mean it's a good thing. The poem is a portrait of an ex who was nothing but sighs. She moved languidly through life, got excited about little trifling new things but always burned out before long and moved onto something else, but she always dreamed of an idealized past that never existed and, thus, never got anywhere. Sooo...if the subject is lacking, then there's no saving this poem.

Thanks for the reviews. Now to see if I can contribute a few reviews in these last 15 minutes!!!

*sigh* I don't like this poem. Even its good, the choice of right words is very important especially in poems where you relay more emotions to the readers comparing to other forms of literary works. I can't really follow you.

Hey Sarg -

Other than a snapshot of someone that we cannot at all discern is an ex-wife from the poem, did you want to incorporate some longer lasting effect at all? Or not really?

As it is, the poem does not read as one entity. Snoink said something about a series of sighs - the enjambment, I think, was the problem I also noticed - but you reckon that's how it should be. If you want to mimic content with style, that's fine. But that's not the reason I think this is not reading coherently. It's because it currently reads like a list. A grocery-shopping list of adjectives and verbs about seemingly random things she does, each of which seem enchanting on their own, but together read like a hodgepodge of half-chewed thoughts and character quirks. They seem there for the sake of being there. Because you perhaps could not find anything more productive to say about her, about her life - or if you did, then you dwelled on it so briefly it is as if nothing significant occurred.

This is a relatively short poem. You can't really afford to throw about too many ideas - or if you do, you want to make sure they are well linked. That there is some kind of focus, clarity, a centre point - or at least something that makes us aware that you are talking about an ex, since I see that as being significant. Of course, you might argue that her life is scattered apart, which is why you are again mimicking content with style. I will only say that the poem in no way indicates that you have purposefully scattered it; it seems by accident, hence I argue that that mimicry is not justifiable on your part.

And also, I'd probably argue this too: a poem seems stronger if it has a central focus (or, conversely, if it has a relevant and commanding lack of focus and a longer length / interweaving of motifs to make up for it - which this does not). Surely the 'scattering' in areas of her life is due to one thing that has consumed her, taken over everything else, no? So why not dwell on this a little longer? Why not play out the contrast, the sureness with which she embraces madness/an ultimate distraction with the other distractions themselves?

Just a few thoughts, that's all.



Navi