Poetry Forum

Vision enraptures
captures
distills the essence
of scents and ascents
balancing
mentally,physically
wondering
why?

Jimi,

It's often an assumption here that people give criticism before they expect it:

viewtopic.php?t=3267

Dave

RhyminJimi,

Over all, I like the idea of the poem. I just think the execution is sloppy.

enraptures
captures
distills

Seems needless. The tone of this is rapturous, ecstatic, but the rest of the poem contradicts it. If that's deliberate then it's alright, but I think it a little needless in the context of the rest of the poem. It makes me expect something else.

ascents seems frivolous and only in the most vague theamtic context can I link this in the to poem instead of seeing it as a quick, needless addition.

balancing
mentally,physically

Nice play on form there.

wondering
why? I don't see the point in this to be honest.

I like the idea behind this - the mind illuminating, shaping and creating the world around it. But the actual poem itself seems to be a poem written for the sake of it - touches of style and voice just seem to be included because you felt you could. The very basic idea is a good one (but not an original one), but it's a loose poem that doesn't sit anywhere. Nor does it go anywhere - it's just a riddling aphorism that isn't hugely original. I would like to see some of the poem scrapped and put into a more definite context. How about a situation where the mind does actively distill the surroundings around it instead of just this.

Theamaitcally sound. Poetically useless. Sorry if that's a bit harsh, but that's honest.

For a pointer I would suggest looking at Wallace Stevens - The Snow Man is a good example - for a way to get into this idea you have.

Hope that helps
Dave

hmm .. interesting .. I deliberately did'nt give it a title so that it would be contextless. My theme actually was rockclimbing with the heightened sense of awareness as a result of beauty in the surroundings, the cliff beneath one, the physical and mental challenge .. and ultimately the age old question ... why?

Gidday

Knowing the context makes a big difference to way the reader puts it together in their mind. Can I suggest that you change the title to include rock climbing? e.g. "from a cliff face" or some such.

Punctuation could be improved - one space after a comma (nit-picking) and there needs to be a break of some kind after balanced & physically, perhaps a dash.

I enjoyed it much more after knowing the context. Nice one.

Cheers
(another) Dave

Jimi,

This is all a bit too nebulous and vague for me:
capturing WHAT?
wondering about WHAT?

The only clue to rock-climbing is ascent.
There is no sense of height, or the elements, movement, etc etc

I like the idea of balancing the mental and the physical, though.

NotoftheClanDave
(Geoff)

Hey Jimi..

As always, I stand by simple, short poetry. This is abstract, has subtle rhyme, and short. I appreciate short, simple and concise. "distills the essence of scents and ascents" is a perfect example of subtle rhyme. This is stripped down and I like it. good job.

heidi

RhyminJimi wrote:the age old question ... why?

Why what? "Why?" isn't really a question... this is why I don't like your poem, I'm sorry. The first four lines aren't bad. I think it's a good choice of subject matter, but of course I didn't know it was about rock climbing until you said so. I'm not sure why you want it to be contextless. I'd go as far as saying that your explanation of the poem is a better poem than the poem (apart from the age old question stuff):

...rockclimbing with the heightened sense of awareness as a result of beauty in the surroundings, the cliff beneath one, the physical and mental challenge...

Why not write a poem about the same thing, but put it in context and use imagery that relates to the climbing experience you've just described? I think this poem is too vague, basically - it could be about almost anything, and I think that is a bad thing.

I disagree with you Thoke. Poetry can be vague, and abstract. Maybe I don't want to know it's about rock climbing. I'm glad that inspired Jimi to write it...but I don't necessarily need to know what it's literally about, in order to appreciate the words. Stripped down and simple are good, I stand by this. I can imagine that rock climbing might be very "zen" ; and maybe one might ask, "why, what or whatever", no?

Heidi wrote:I disagree with you Thoke. Poetry can be vague, and abstract. Maybe I don't want to know it's about rock climbing. I'm glad that inspired Jimi to write it...but I don't necessarily need to know what it's literally about, in order to appreciate the words. Stripped down and simple are good, I stand by this.

Okay, well each to their own.

I can imagine that rock climbing might be very "zen" ; and maybe one might ask, "why, what or whatever", no?

I don’t know much about Buddhism. What do you actually mean by, “why, what or whatever”? Have you actually got something in mind? Do you mean that rock climbing might trigger thoughts about the nature of existence or the origins on the universe or something like that? If so... why not say so?

If all you're going to ask is, "why?", then why bother? That conveys no information whatsoever to whoever you're saying it to, so why not refrain from asking it and keep the empty questions to yourself? Language are communication are about passing on information, and "why?" contains no information apart from 'this person is asking a question of some sort'.

'This person is asking a question about X' is a more interesting piece of information, so why not convey that?

Well , much has been said about your piece. Only like to add, I personally like it.
-Arunansu

arunansu wrote:Well , much has been said about your piece. Only like to add, I personally like it.

I keep on coming back to this wonderfully compact piece of work, and entirely agree with you. I really think that other comments have lacked any insight into the poem's metaphysical nuances, but there you go.