Poetry Forum

Hi all Bit of a long shot this one, but a really good friend of mine is getting married and want's to check out a poem as a reading. She heard it on radio 4's poetry please a couple of years ago, and it's called 'Dub Love', but she cant remember the author. Not much to go on, I know, but does it rin...

A friend of mine is a maths fiend, and it's interesting talking to him. He sees the world around him in mathematical terms; he looks at buildings and sees geometric and mechanic maths, at crowds in stations in terms of flow dynamics etc. I think the connection's stronger with music than poetry; your...

Thanks for your kindness, and also for reminding me of this one. The re-edits have lessened the value of S2, but I cant quite bring myself to ditch it yet. I'm coming round to the idea slowly. Your comments pointed me to the last verse and I've changed it to: - Laughs come, the given-away toasts a g...

Havent got anything wise to say, but thank you for posting this.

I've seen very little good poetry about clubs and I enjoyed this a great deal (partly as I have spent a long time in Sheffield and her clubs...). Do post any updates.

Bicycles eh? The preferred mode of transport for the surrealist. I think confusion can cuddle (though it's somewhat unfortunate and I wouldn't recommend it), but it's a stretch. My take on it is that the pre-rain light from the combination of clear sky and cloud makes the birds glow stupidly and is ...

Another point of view, just to be sure you get a full range of perspectives and no consistency whatsoever! I wasn't persuaded by the strength of the rhyming - it's a slight poem and I dont think it has the space for such strong rhymes; they clang too loudly. The first four lines are poigiant and eff...

I dunno if that helps

It does; as it always does...

Funnily, I found a copy of Clockwork Orange on Sunday and have been reading it for the first time on the way to work this week. Horrorshow writing, my brothers. I understand the comments about the line breaks - I did want it to jar and lurch rather than flow, but the breaks aren't the right solution...

Cackle jaw sitting underface a-laugh with splinters, bastardised anecdotes. The rough housing skinhead, blustering censure and teetering along the wall With the fat step of a beerleader, knuckle eyesockets, mouthy spin threatening As the massive swear up over the road gets yours mate snot worth it, ...

The comma does need counterpoint somewhere. You could have another after 'eyes' and lose the 'and' at the beginning of the 3rd line? Not sure about the first person here either - for these 3rd person seems a better fit to me. At the moment it doesnt quite have the enigmatic tone that a haiku can con...

' playing possum' suggested to me it was a human pest. Ace poem - the rhythmic structure is strong and the varying line length managed well. I particularly liked the sound of: for we shall see the patterns in their actions and prevail and then lay awake, waiting for his thumping gait I'm struggling ...

Nice. The final rhyming couplet pins the poem down very well, and I like the implied hooks / crooks that precedes it. I'm not versed int' Bible, so I've been googling up to speed but may be missing some of the depth; my fault not yours. Agreed with JuliaDB; around "in the dark that deafens touc...

Geoff, It's ended up quite funereal for a poem about a wedding. It wasn't intended to be, but the theme keeps rising to the fore. I'm a little concerned the marriage context is too understated now; I shall ponder on. 'Dispersing his estate' refers to his daughter marrying and so bringing more people...

Thanks David. It is a mean ending, but I fancied a dig - it's all a fiction though, rather than a generalised comment on the relationship between father/daughter. The list of thanks is meant to function variously as comic, specific, atmospheric and arbitrary. Guilty as charged of flowery elaboration...

Niftily put together revision Father’s heavy watch sits behind a long cuff clasped with handmedown metal and stops. Words stick in his tarry lungs. His invirginal hosanna all grown up and dispersing his estate; she resounds with beauty. Burlesques of plastic flowers dialled onto wire antennae bob u...

I was reading a book of poetry by Dom Moraes when I was travelling recently, and in the introduction he says that he rewrites each poem about fifty times. He will attack a subject from different perspectives and in different styles to work towards the final poem that says exactly and exquisitely wha...

Um, kind of?! Not heard of a philosopher called Kantar, but it is the official Egyptian weight unit for measuring cotton. Probably not what you mean though. After rewriting this crit 4 times it's finally, maybe, sunk in. Maybe it's my literalism, but that was not easy to arrive at. There's nothing t...

Thanks for reading. The 'balance' was meant to be that, despite the apparent chaos, coherence and stability is being unmoored in the dash for cash. I still think it's touch and go whether the surrealish ending hangs on. There is not meant to be a crash, flood or actual gold - the gold and the sociol...

I've been coming back to this all day and I'm not sure I've sorted out my thoughts. Some lines I definitely dont get: teasing screaming hampered hearts Bavarian brains shaking up crainiums correlation cleansing haven?, Quite a lot of other lines I'm not confident I understand. There's a lot going on...

I love this; it is great fun but also very smart, and a class above loads of writing inspired by science the Arts Council try and fund into life. Arced doesnt read badly to me. I suppose you could use 'arch' for a more explicit gag? You write god with a small g, so I'm reading the 'sent by' as ironi...

Thanks for the constructive and sympathetic readings. I think the scatter graph is a stretch too far; I had a synaesthesia kind of view of the beeps hanging in the air in the manner of dots on a scatter graph, but I dont think it's workable. The blue air was meant to be from the dense pollution, and...

I didn't say it did nothing :o) Spending more time with it I am getting an increasingly vertiginous sense of falling from the positive (if slightly foreboding) first stanza to the bleakness of the second. The coming/going of the stars is simple, insidious and rhythmic - I find it increases the horro...

Junction A scatter-graph of abrupt horns detaches from banging palms and bursts into the congestion. The air’s a fug, wrung with blue like cheap steel worn on the thin wrists of women riding mopeds side-saddle. Only men ride the bicycles, gearless and heavy, curling in ragged arcs through rickshaws...

Hi Thirds on the use of "pregnant, swollen", and that the subsequent stanza's are strong. Though I like the idea and the image of the bonfire, I'm not sure 'mind walls' is the best phrasing to express it with. It feels like it needs to be tidied up a bit. Is 'The [cats...]' meant to be cap...

Hi I've only had a quick read, so forgive any foolishness on my part. I think that if you are intending reference to the treatment of syphillis with mercury, you should develop that more explicitly. It's an orrible thing and one surely full of wordplay? Does it offer an angle on the characters relat...