Dear all,
Thanks for the poems.
Hope the thoughts below are helpful.
cheers, David 🙂
Heather
I like this a lot. Like "though i must", "hunted for pasta sauce", "just across
the lake", magpies and bird-essence. Love "not slicing" and "vodka
bottles...puddle". I wonder if airplane should be "aeroplane(s)"{as this is oz
poem i think, not yankee; in line with your once-stated double-country usages}.
Or else "aircraft" to avoid issue! Not sure about the sudden past tense bits; i
think it would be better to stay present tense throughout. Not sure what noun
the "them" before "respect" refers to. And i think you could lose the "then"
between "fly" and "suddenly". The last line could be stronger, the word "wet"
doesn't add much after "weep" and "puddle"; what about just "sympathetically"
(pronounced as 5 syllables) for a final line? Or "stained with sympathy"? You
asked for other titles? What about [From] One Haibun to Another ? Lake and Sky
? Magpies and Vodka ?
Gaby
Love the title. And the line "and so the mind knew to stay away." Also "the
clouds stilled and seemed not so high". And particularly "Each touch pulled us
closer into yesterday". in the first stanza i really like the second line , but
every time i read it it seems a bit long; i can't work out why 🙁. The third
stanza (which again i like) seems a little archaic with its "lost-time" and
"measure" Shakespearean, and "desire" Blakean. The fourth stanza is phrasal,
but not a full sentence for me. In the final stanza i love the first line, also
the "sea of bats who paddled...", but the last line feels like it should be
shorter; what about replacing "you had to go..." with "still went..." ??
Rachael
I know this must be a hard poem for you to write. Apart from a couple of small
suggestions like "Rome's cobblestones" rather than "cobbles of Rome" in stanza
1, and "echoing (in)" rather than "sounding the" in stanza 5, i think the poem
really begins in stanza 6 with the ugg boots, heart and "soft things",
continuing strongly through to stanza 9. I wonder whether you can condense the
Rome stanzas from 3 to 2, and the Alpine stanzas from 2 to 1. And perhaps, if
you can stand to do so, put in a stanza or two of Adelaide Hills walking in
happier times, before finishing with the "no reason to walk" stanzas. Sorry.
Julie
Strong title. Even stronger first line. And i think this poem is the perfect
length. All i really have is small suggestions, as follow. in line 2 maybe
"time" could be "half-hours" or "three-quarter-hours" or whatever. In line 3
"to hold" could be "has held". in line 5 "with" could go. In line 6 "my" could
be "a". in line 7 "and" could be "with". In line 8 i think you need hyphen to
make "paper-thins" a verb. in line 10 "some" could go. In line 11 "as" could be
"while" and maybe "leaving" could be "leave-taking". 🙂
Jennifer
I love this one. Not sure about the "/" in the title. What about just
"Disappearances Returns"? Love the first line. Also "inventing adventures",
"dizzying baton", "syncopates to timpanis and trumpets", the key-changes,
"accidental", Spring gentian and turlough-sward. Magical. My only suggestion is
that the last line's "bring me with you" might be "take me..."; or even "bring
[take] me too".
Mike
Really like this one. love the first line, the key, the movement of ideas, the
elephant, audience, "gone", just dammit the last line seems a bit awkward in
expression/instruction. And why do you need to pick the lock if you have the
key?? What about "...spit the key to your hands, open the padlock" ??
Three minutes to midnight, cheers, David 🙂
