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I went ahead and performed this sequence, acquiring for myself all the necessary ingredients (including the gravefence pot) and the potion went off without a hitch, so I'm afraid this poem needs to be marked down for inaccuracy.
I think what is great about this personification is how neurotic the mist seems to be. She's clingy (naturally), and suffers "rheumatic distresses." As she expands she is aware of her own impermanence. And no one seems to like her, except for me!
The weakness here is perhaps in the phrase "points and parsings". I think one apprehends, by the end of the narrative, that this could mean "my thoughts"; but the lack of clarity is a big price to pay for clever alliteration, and certainly such a contrivance is not strong enough on its own to hold up a villanelle, which depends on the reconciliation of its two main lines.
A person feeling like they are in exile in their own land or country. "Those dreary days/buried splinter-like inside my chest" is a stinging line of regret. And worst, and epiphany evaded... I feel this poem is reaching for a Dantean sort of irony with the inexorable feeling of its narrative, but something is missing to make it clear what the source of that irony is for the reader.
Whereas Sonnet for a Prodigal Son seems to come from a place of personal reflection, this piece casts its grievances outward and even rings of a kind of puritanism. It may also be a bit of self-castigation; but one often sees a paradox with Reformists, that the moral standards of their creed are so high that, in practice, it is more pious to be a failure than it is to honor any aspiration toward rectitude.
Narratively, I'd like to see the people's reaction to the squirrels' rampage. It would have the makings of a mini-epic, a kind of skiourosmyomachy; besides, I'd hardly find it droll if I learned my neighbors were chewing up my wires, and I know a few folks who would get their bb guns ready.
This poem conveys an atheistic type of cynicism and lands straight between the eyes. Technically, the original Son knew his father's commandments (who is a stand-in for 'the Lord'); this is the weakness in this speaker's argument. In that sense, the tone errs toward something which might have been thought of by the humanistic Erasmus of Rotterdam.
The rhyme and rhythm are not strict, but the weight of the poem leans very much on its message and not its metricity.
The rhyme and rhythm are not strict, but the weight of the poem leans very much on its message and not its metricity.
Like an autumn leaf, a stanza seems to have fallen from this poem, and leaves the conclusion a little dried up.
A few lines about off-brand candy. Hmm, that last line in the third stanza... Needs to rhyme with something. Either 'course' or maybe 'pyramids', though that's a toughie.
I like the contrast of the phonemes '-unch' and '-een' in this poem, and it concludes with an energetic type of alliteration.
A poem about inspiration and gratitude, and a little recursive in that it seems to reflect on its own creation. I think the image of a poet working in their house, while observing termites building their own house within that structure, is nested and anatomical. Then there is the abundance of the termites themselves, which are so prevalent that the speaker can't seem to avoid seeing them. With the declaration of guilt at the end, which might be ambiguously trustworthy, it all rings a little like something from Edgar Allen Poe.
Hmm. An alternate timeline? Abounding with humorous notes, though I am wondering what it is the speaker is looking at which gives them toward this fanciful speculation (since it deals with a discrete subject), and just who this amber-encrusted quack is, anyway.
Nice imagery here with colors running into the lake, then blending with a cup of tea. It describes the kind of "action" a mood can have on us; only, by the last line, the speaker does not seem too impressed!
The honeybee here is the Unknown Soldier, and the poem a little like a letter we might write to them, never to be read; it reflects our own sense of impending history.
The line with "daughters of Adria" is the most evocative, but seems a little out of place in a piece which seems to address itself to evolution. I tried to discover what might have been meant by it, but the nearest counterpart I could find was a city of the same name, which sits on a buried town from antiquity.
The line with "daughters of Adria" is the most evocative, but seems a little out of place in a piece which seems to address itself to evolution. I tried to discover what might have been meant by it, but the nearest counterpart I could find was a city of the same name, which sits on a buried town from antiquity.
This sounds like a riddle you'd find in one of the old point-and-click style games I used to play as a kid (King's Quest, Monkey Island, etc.). As I poem, I like the immediacy of action it gives to a mundane consideration.
There's a bit of ambiguity here but the subject seems to be psychological. Shame? The shortened final line gives the poem a claustrophobic resolution.
This poem has a nice sound and the anecdote is mostly clear. There are a few blurry lines. For instance, what is the "rope" in the second stanza? Another might be needed to explain what the "shiftless class" is to a reader not familiar with the writer's biography.
I'm inclined to say that this reads like an extended metaphor for the cycles of human civilization, rather than an ode cosmology. The personification is all too scrutable, and we know very little about our physical origins. In the end, we are left to talk about ourselves.
I like the odd-numbered feeling that is created by the rhyme scheme. Following my interpretation of the poem, I wonder who or what 'entropy' is, whether the actual physical concept is being referred to or something more along the lines of postmodern futility. Or both.
I like the odd-numbered feeling that is created by the rhyme scheme. Following my interpretation of the poem, I wonder who or what 'entropy' is, whether the actual physical concept is being referred to or something more along the lines of postmodern futility. Or both.
I like the symmetry of the rhyme scheme in the first four lines, followed by three which form a "foot". It's hard for me to visualize what a "prismatic nook" is in this drawing.
"Although the Crystal Heart was a beacon for doom-laden prophecy, none of us could deny its penchant for strident coloration and condensed movement."
Paging WIP