Poetry / Chert

This is very good.  Someone will publish it.  I think you overused the word combining once too often with “oxwagon”, only time it felt pretentious or attention grabbin, the other uses were ecellent.

“opalescent, a deposit of pearls
eyehigh skein on the cutbank”

Had no idea what it meant but sounded marvelous and by then you’d established narrative authority so I didn’t case.  Like meeting a beautiful woman in Paris who doesn’t know English.

Also commend you on the closing.  People often miss the emotional payoff when wrapping up, but this is exactly what the poem needed, especially after that ride in the next to last verse.  You also portrayed your local knowledge and sense of history without screaming “Look ma, no hands!” which many people miss due to insecurity.

Nice work.  Good luck.

Wonderful imagery, and very nice combination words (neverquite, whitegrey, landgrab). Melodic. I love the last stanza.

You are a great poet, but you use far to many big words to appeal to the general population. Im not telling to change your style im just saying your target group is going to end up being die hard poet fans. You use freeverse well however.

Well written. I think it can use some work though. Capitalize the first letter of each line, pop in some grammar and make sure your stanzas are all the same length (4 lines/stanza, ect).

Beautiful poem though.

I liked the trip you took me on.  And, by the end, when you suggest how to possibly feel about these things we saw, I was right there with you.  Who saw Spurr blow?  Was it the planet itself or is there someone else I should know more about?  This could seem a bit pushy at the end, but I thought it was just strong enough.  You could definitely compose some local insights that would publish well.  Stay local and immersed.  That’s where your voice is.  I look forward to reading some more.  

A poem that makes extensive use of simile, metaphor, and alliteration and does that well. The portions which use metaphor are more powerful than those that use simile. The following initial lines are  an example of the best use of metaphor:

“dry rolling hills
brown tallgrass prairie
sliced straight across
interstate artery”

Compared to them the simile prone lines are less effective because they are less literary. I’ve written about this phenomenon in a book called Visions and Voices of Victorian Poetry. Literature has more fiction, more lies. “rolling hills” or “interstate artery” for instance are more fictional than

“on sunflower billboards
growing like weeds”

or

“limestone
slabs like tombstones”

Poetry should be metaphorical and even similes come under the broad category of metaphor in poetry. I consider this poem very successful because of its tropes.

The vaste sweeps of the imagination that the poem encompasses are really impressive. The visual aspect of this poem hits you. It has a pictorial imagery that picks up its main pictures from the geographical world of a stony landscape.

Keep writing. I would love to read more of your work.

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April 18, 2008

by brewdog

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43	M	Syracuse, NY	April 11

thanks for your insightful words… I hadn’t given much thought to the balance of metaphor and simile as I was writing mainly to capture the images, but as I revise, I’ll keep this at the ready.

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I liked it. i felt like it might describe my thoughts while sitting on a covered wagon heading west for the first time. It was broken and choppy , just the way i like it. It felt arrogant and free spirited. I liked it.

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April 18, 2008

by brewdog

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43	M	Syracuse, NY	April 11

the broken and choppy landscape is what struck me when I travelled through… glad you liked it.

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