flip-curl literature

Spoiler

Thanks to lovely little ryba.

my hands grow long, brittle stiff calcifactions
bleating jazz into written word
like the flip-curl of a starfish
pulled from a tidepool,
dried like salted peanuts on a bar counter, rattling
in an over-sized skeleton.

"I've still growing up to do, gangles in my limbs,
tangles in my hair, but sometimes my body feels so
old, morning joints curled back to starfish dreams again,
dried, slim fingered hands that could still bend,
cupping bugs, scrambling with ink and paint and monkey bars."

I'm finned like headlights are finned
in dark nights, seawater sight covering the streets,
bleary exhaustion.
seagulls carve ruins into sand like my
careless cat-scratches in paper,
all caught stroking an elephant's ear with
blindness, whispering about leather fans
the shape and size of Africa
and the elephant whispers back,

here is your religion, caught in
old literatures, old ignorance, pretentia pinned
and penned like farm animals,
sacrifice, Orwell, a lack of words and
relevance.

my fingers spread like spiderlegs and my
stomach scrapes the ground,
scrounging for little lips of literature to kiss;
with each page turned, 12 pt leprosy
leaks beneath my fingernails, and they flip-curl
into old-age trembles.

Great job! I really really liked this!!

Hi! I just wanted to let you know how much I enjoyed this. I had no idea what you were going on about, mind, but I felt passion and emotion through the words of your poem. It was lovely, and, if you fancy clarifying meaning for me, PM me! keep writing!
- Amelia

Puzzled by how you deliver the words. Yep. Puzzled but I enjoyed reading it.

Truth? I've adored your poetry for a while now. I don't think I've ever torn one of yours apart, though, and frankly, for such a beautiful thing, I'm not sure if it'd be justified. Might be mostly nit-picks, but here goes,

I thought your opening was fantastic, a wonderful hook of images we couldn't just see, but we can feel. This is exactly what I love to see in poems, originality and vivid images that meet you halfway.

cupping bugs, scrambling with ink and paint and monkey bars."

This is really all I can find to mention of off things without nitpicking. I'm honestly not sure about how much I like "scrambling" in here. It sounds kind of weird here to me, and I can't explain why really.


I've got nothing more for this but excessive praise, but this is the best poem I have read so far on my return here. You executed beautifully. For the most part, everything flowed beautifully together and painted an astonishingly clear picture, and, for that there's nothing but praise.

Very well done. Please, keep writing.

June

Hey Niagini!

So! You already know this is good, because you're good. But it needs some tweaking, a better kind though because I think you're getting into the swing of tighter images, however slowly. I certainly think you're working really well with full metaphors and extending your concepts through complete poems.

My suggestions are just to keep stripping some of those excess words and phrases. Consider what you're saying and how and if there isn't a simple (but as/more effective) method of saying it.

Below are my nitpicks. Don't be too enamoured with them, the rest of the poem needed no specific comments but didn't wholly stun me. You've written better emotionally but worse structurally, if that makes sense? Here we go:

my hands grow long, brittle stiff calcifactions (Why stiff? Lose it)
bleating jazz into written word (Do you need written here? I think of jazz as music, sounds and feelings more than words and song. I'd love to see you conceptualise that a little more, if it's possibly in such a conceptualised poem)

in an over-sized skeleton. (This doesn't jive with your previous imagery. I love the skeleton, but I love it because of the shell imagery, the hermit crab moving on and up, not for the salty peanuts. Which also have shells but... I have just decided it's an okay image, but I think you can do better?)

cupping bugs, scrambling with ink and paint and monkey bars." (Awkward as line. I don't know what you're thinking here totally, I'd consider losing the "paint" here. The paint works better with monkey bars but inks works better with your theme.)

in dark nights, seawater sight covering the streets, (You can lose "sight")

blindness, whispering about leather fans (Blindness? Whut and why?)

old literatures, old ignorance, pretentia pinned (Literature without the s)

sacrifice, Orwell, a lack of words and (cleverrrrrr. Jealous)

leaks beneath my fingernails, and they flip-curl (Consider swapping this one around. I can see your pattern but "curl-flip" is more fun, a nicer twist)


Maybe I've helped, but also maybe not. Luck with this one, could be awesomesauce.

<3

I....I don't know what to say.

It's beautiful, but the wording's so unusual that I'm not sure where to nitpick, and nitpicking is uaully how I try to help people improve....you know, general overview and "I think you could do this part better." But I'm not sure what you could do better in this poem because it's so... ethereal? It's not the style of poetry I'm used to writing, which is a duh because it's your poetry and not mine, but...... it makes me unsure. Soooo....... I'm gonna try to find something else to say. *searches*


Oh yeah. Calcifactions? I'm sure that's a real word (no wait, lemme look it up--I can't find it.) That one gave me pause--should it be calcifications?

"bleating" is an unusual choice. I would've expected bleeding, but.... "bleating jazz" it's different. (My punctuation in this line, I feel, is atrocious. Do forgive me.) It's not bad, just different.

I love the "growing up" stanza in italics. (Sometimes I feel old, and just look at my ....other name? What do you call that, again?)

Headlights are finned? I don't really understand this part. (The seagulls, however, are a fairly familiar imagery, though you threw your own twist in there with the elephant's ear. I was kinda like, "Huh?")

Hm..... the religion stanza is interesting. (I'm trying remember what you've said about it, now. )
((Religion, I mean.)) ...heh. So much packed into that one little stanza, I think. Anyway, I like the pinned/penned thing you did there. Very nice. (Say with rolled r. ;3)

Annnnd the last part is brilliant. Do you want to keep the "12 pt", though? (Simply because things are usually written out in official works.) I especially like the "little lips of literature" line.

On the whole, it's different, and I think the imagery you use really sticks with the reader, which is obviously a good thing.


......aaannnnd I feel like such a total noob right now, because I can't think of anything else to say, and because I feel this review has been kinda directionless and.... simply worded. It.... common language feeels different after reading this. (I like common language, though....)

Good job. This is a good piece.

This was really great and i enjoyed reading it!

Hello my dear! So I like this, I think you have some strong words and images but it's a little over-loaded at the moment so that the reader doesn't know which images to concentrate on, where they're going next or really what you've said by the end of the poem. Here's a few specific comments which might better explain what I mean:

my hands grow long, brittle stiff calcifactions [Alright so the lack of capitalisation bugs me but that's a personal choice so I'll go shush. However, you have too many adjectives here which are all fig
hting with each other for the reader's attention. I'd suggest that stiff be the one to go because that's already suggested by brittle and calcified anyway.]
bleating jazz into written word [I'm not sure about written word. I think that could have been a stronger image. Maybe soulful conversation or something along those lines instead? Bad example but hopefully you get the idea.]
like the flip-curl of a starfish [I like this line.]
pulled from a tidepool,
dried like salted peanuts on a bar counter, rattling
in an over-sized skeleton. [You lose me a bit here. I love the individual images but there's not really anything to link them? And I'm not sure what you're trying to say. I've read the full first stanza and all I know is you're talking about your hands and then music and now just all these other things. I could not turn this into a story or into something that makes much sense at all to me. Maybe I'm missing something but it feels like the meaning is so vague and distant and coming at me through a tinny old phone while I'm sitting on the underground.]

"I've still growing up to do, gangles in my limbs,
tangles in my hair, but sometimes my body feels so
old, morning joints curled back to starfish dreams again, [Not sure how I like the repetition of starfish but other than that these three lines are beautiful. Lovely sound of gangles and tangles and the tone is very nice.]
dried, slim fingered hands that could still bend,
cupping bugs, scrambling with ink and paint and monkey bars." [I think this could be spruced up. So I like the choice of childhood items but maybe try combining them, try to reflect the feel of memory with your words? My childhood memories are a mess of smells, of over-lapping pictures and this feels too clear and vague at the same time. This could be anybody's memory.]

I'm finned like headlights are finned
in dark nights, seawater sight covering the streets,
bleary exhaustion. [I'm not sure I get how headlights can be finned. It's a real strange image to try and picture and I think you need to either explain it better with some more imagery or change it to something clearer.]
seagulls carve ruins into sand like my
careless cat-scratches in paper,
all caught stroking an elephant's ear with
blindness, whispering about leather fans
the shape and size of Africa
and the elephant whispers back, [Some nice lines here.]

here is your religion, caught in
old literatures, old ignorance, pretentia pinned
and penned like farm animals,
sacrifice, Orwell, a lack of words and
relevance. [Now this is a good stanza. Your images are clear, your words have meaning. I liked this one very much and would love to see it reflected throughout.]

my fingers spread like spiderlegs and my
stomach scrapes the ground,
scrounging for little lips of literature to kiss; [Loving the repetition of the i sound.]
with each page turned, 12 pt leprosy
leaks beneath my fingernails, and they flip-curl
into old-age trembles.

A good ending. Be careful though with repeating unusual images like the starfish and flip-curl. Unless you're adding something new to them or presenting them in a new light, it feels too much like you've come up with one good idea and you want to rub it all through your reader's face. I'm sure that's not what you had in mind but it's more powerful given just the once.

I haven't much else to say to be honest. I felt your power built later in the poem but I still leave not quite sure what I've read. Perhaps that's more my own fault than yours, I don't know, and despite it I did enjoy your use of images and the structure of some of your lines. Well I'll leave it there then. All the best,

Heather xxx