Primitive Things Evolve

It's different. From the voice; to the imagery; to the poetic diction ; to the tone and mood. It's defintely different. I can't really say why but maybe that's the after effect of the poem. It's mysterious to me. I don't really understand and see how the title of the poem is linked with the subject matter in this poem. It's just different. Not good and definitely not bad just different.

This piece really caught my attention and held me there. It has such a strange feel to it and its probably one of the most unique pieces I've read in a little while. The subject matter is so different, but its really just amazing. What brought this piece along? I didn't see any immediate errors. I like your style a lot =] I know this review doesn't help much since all I'm able to do is praise this piece. There is only one line I was a little iffy on, and its 'and maybe butterflies feel relieved when spiders give their wings a rest.' which might be what you had meant to say after all. But I liked this piece a lot =] Kudos.

This...is working.

It is good to see a natural evolution in your style -- no puns intended, with regards to the poem -- and a greater appreciation of your reader's sensibilities. I have a question for you, a general one: why could we argue that poetry is an art and not a science?

I can offer you something to help: science can be more logic-oriented; art, less-so. Some of your former work focusses a lot on the thematics of the piece, the intellectual machinations wrought by words. This poem, surprisingly, takes a different tack -- you retain the philosophy, of course, but you add in another element: believability. Coming up with an orderly, logical series of thought processes is one thing. Making them believable is yet another. How does one, then, go about forming that audience-work connection? By appealing to the audience's sensibilities -- and you are doing this more so in this poem than before. So. How to provide emotional connectivity? Different people argue different things -- some say imagery is key, which is true, of course, but I'd probably add to that and say surprising imagery is key; something innovative, refreshing; something that we (a) either haven't seen before or (b) haven't seen in the way you could show us.

In light of that, then:

I’d pick up the Bible,
the Qur'an,
whatever else is making the news,
if I didn’t have money bags in both hands.

Yes. Made me smile. The first two lines are interesting, hypothetical. The next is offhand, ironically so, and that adds to the humour. The last part is where I laughed. That's great -- see, too often, I see big themes like God and death and love getting lost in seriousness in an attempt to be 'subtle' and 'sophisticated.' Humour is so underutilised. But when used well, it can provide a refreshing effect by giving an age-old theme a new dimension -- and that dimension is believable because it's relatable.

Also, the rhythms of the lines are perfect. I can see you've paid attention to that.

ryanke, it's good to see you looking after the reader.

Or a name like a spider’s web hanging over my cradle.

Butterfly soup is sucked from a figure fixed in luxury,
but when I trip, I fall backwards

I think you understand that you must provide a greater element of surprise here, in terms of word choice, or how you phrase the lines, just to provide a break from the religious / major theme aspect by providing a sub-aspect, something a little more microscopic to divert the reader, something different to keep them captured.

However, these lines aren't working. The first is okay -- but can you hear the length of 'like a spider's web hanging' lengthening out the line strangely? I'd like something cleaner, there. More imagery, even, but with less 'other' words -- 'or,' 'a,' 'over,' 'my.' The 'butterfly soup is sucked from a figure fixed in luxury' line is constipated. Give it some breathing room to really let the imagery become definitive, crystallised, approachable, digestible. It's doing nobody any good to clog up a line like that if we can't read it easily. It's kind of weirdly amusing that you next say, 'but when I trip, I fall backwards' because that previous line trips over itself. But I think there must be a better, smoother way to convey 'tripping' than simply slapping an incomprehensible line down there. Sometimes, mimicking matter with manner works. Sometimes, it doesn't. In this case, it doesn't do you much good other than the rapidfire two-second impact that it takes the reader to realise the intrinsic irony -- after that, the response is: fine, there's a punny line, so what. It loses any further impact.

For a long term impact, I'd recommend changing the line.

into the net Father built his name upon.
He owns boats because people need fish

until the news says tuna are endangered.

'into the net Father built his name upon' is boring. I almost stopped reading the poem there at that point, which is such a shame, because that next transition you've got (from 'people need fish' to 'news says tuna are endangered') is just fantastic. Jazz up the 'into the...upon' part for me? In particular, it's that line arrangement that bothers me. Too pompous, trying too hard to seem formal. Leave it loose, ryanke, when you have already done such a good job of creating lightness in this poem. Light humour. Laughter. There is depth in lightness too -- or, at the very least, we all appreciate a good laugh. And while poetry like this depicts essential conflicts, there should be -- somewhere, in all art -- some brief respite from that, some moment of relief, somewhere where we can hope, or even just smile at the ludicrousness of it all.

You tilt the balance more towards the lighter side, but I don't think that in any way ignores the theme -- while it may provide some emotional distraction from the seriousness of it, we all realise, on some level, that the problems run deeper so it becomes an internal point of understanding between reader and writer: you can say, yes, I understand the depth, but no, I don't see the need to harp on about it like every other person before me has done, and I can be more creative than that, more surprising than that.

I hate Darwin and thinkers who draw parallels,
but primitive thinking does us worse: Sushi bad. Sushi bad for

father never saw the purpose in swimming lessons,
but my stream has reached an ocean and money bags don’t float so

Oh, perfect. The transitions are what make this part particularly likeable. There's so much surprise here, that it jolts us a little at every turn, adds another layer to the humour. You see? Emotion can also be multilayered, like intellect. The fact that no transition makes complete sense is why I like this. 'Sushi bad for / father never saw the purpose' doesn't really make sense, does it? But that's what adds the dash of inventiveness -- almost like you stop in mid-thought, change tack, and talk about something halfway related. A slightly crazed narrator is what I like to see.

I open my Bible. It’s got cobwebs in its pages.

Tell you what. Forget the darn cobwebs -- you've got a one-liner before this that mentions them. Instead, use something from your existing water / sea / ocean / stream / fish metaphor to expand on, diversify from, and use that to depict the fact that the Bible has been unread for a long time. This is a neat, snappy poem, and you've got one solid motif. Stick with it, rather than cramming in another in a mere two lines -- one word, at that ('cobwebs').

Overall, a good effort. Keep working at it.




Navita

I definitely like it better than the other piece. I particularly liked the third stanza. Sushi Bad Sushi Bad. I liked that idea.

also "and maybe butterflies feel relieved when spiders give their wings a rest." was pretty grand.

Also I liked how the last line brought back ideas from the first stanza, that was an effective way to end. I'm not familiar with your writing except that one piece, but I think this one is a lot different, and you know I can appreciate how difficult it is to make a leap in voice like that.

I like how you hate parallel thinkers and correct me if I'm wrong but there are parallels here to webs and nets, spiders and your father. I really like the idea of being trapped in your father's web, and you conveyed that feeling, at least to me, without spelling it out, which I liked.

Of course, every poem could use more sensory detail and this is no exception, I think there are some revisions in order if you'd like, maybe some places where the lines can become more concise. You've got some really potent metaphors, some which I'd like to see explored more fully. Of course, I've grown a little wary of revising, I think maybe it is better to just write a new poem with the mistakes you made on the previous one in mind, see if you can perfect your art. There is only so much you can achieve by just tinkering. Poems have an asymptotic relationship to perfection, I think. You can approach it but never reach it.

Well done.

best,

ryanke,

science works to reduce the meaning of symbols into one-to-one correspondence. Art, however, relishes the ambiguity and multiplicity of symbols, and words are great for their many meanings

Exactly. So it doesn't really matter what meaning I see, as long as I get something out of reading the poem. I am your reader. Put yourself in my shoes. All I care about is personal gratification (whether that be emotional or intellectual). I want to feel something when I read a poem -- catharsis, joy, wonder, sadness, disgust -- I want you to provide escape of reality by enhancing it; strengthen my emotions to distract me. Poetry, art -- all marvellous distractions.

So it does not matter that you and I derive different motifs from the poem - you as writer have had some kind of catharsis, or so I would assume, and I as reader have had some kind of catharsis, albeit for differing reasons. In fact, I'd go so far as to argue that makes a poem all the stronger -- that possibility of multiplicity, different layers of meaning, different ways something can be unravelled. It's why we're all still arguing about what Shakespeare was thinking when he wrote Merchant of Venice or King Lear -- because the possibilities are endless. Art -- as you rightly said -- is about creating possibilities.

I also didn't address theme nearly as deeply as I could have in the previous review, because I was more focussed on style. There were lines that had problems, were clogged, or flowed weirdly. You've since fixed everything, and I like how it reads now. I only did a stylistic review because it honestly wouldn't matter to me how complex your theme was if the lines were boring or dodgy or not-well-wrought. You're an artist, not an essayist, just here. You need to amuse as well as advise (Aristophanes: We are here to amuse you, citizens, and advise you.) Manner and matter.

But you know what:

Start with a social/cultural problem: why do W. Europeans place so little importance on church and God compared to Americans? I do a little investigation: maybe it's because they have so many social programs keeping them from feeling in real danger. In America, the government does so little to offer us financial help that we constantly feel like we are in crisis, so we turn to religion. I wanted to take an American who feels financially safe (born into a good family) and toss him into the bigger world to see what he does (turn elsewhere for support).

That's great, even so. The political references were clear. The financial (in)security idea was clear.

And, best of all, this is not a cold, hard logic thesis, a poem wrought out of mere theme and motif and meaning -- you care about the reader's sensibilities enough to address them, which makes reading it a pleasure. Ultimate effect is that you not only have a well-cooked theme, but you present it palatably. Flow and rhythm don't need to take backseat to theme -- if you're good, you can do both; and you have done both just fine. Don't you dare compromise manner with matter -- the poem will be too unappetising if you do that. And you want me to taste it, right?


Good work.



Navi