Repose

[twelveoone]

In spent fields the ravens glean;
we walk and the black waves pull apart.
"The sunset is coming soon,
what I had I gave to you"
I softly laugh.

"And when the stars come out?"
she laughs,
softer still.



_______________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________
________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

A dream!
And when the stars go out
ravens feed

[tab][/tab]on sallow flesh
hung on hollow bones

[tab][/tab]savour the eyes for last.

[barrie]

Strange and dark. I can't say that I fully understand it - the dialogue is a little obscure, unless it's just a device to signify progression - then again, maybe it's not important. I liked the contrast between the easily scared ravens and the flesh eating ones (an unkindness of ravens) - Have you been reading Poe?
Why the two lines strongly seperating the poem? Have I read it wrong and it's supposed to be totally seperate? - It's a little confusing.

savour the eyes for last. - Can you savour something for last? It doesn't sound right. Save, yes.

I like it without fully understanding why.

nice one.

Barrie

[Lubesh]

I liked this...contrast of the nice and rosey then stark reality sometimes? Not too sure about ur presentation re the lines but it ceertianly prompts more interpretation from the reader.

[twelveoone]

Thank you, barrie, Poe? Re-poe-s? Love Poe.
Thank you, Lubesh.

The lines, hoped it would be a total break between the nice and rosey, a wishful state of bliss (I copped a bit of cliche with the "black waves" could also be a metaphor for depression)and say gruesome reality. A horror.

savour the eyes for last. You are right, barrie, it doesn't sound quite right. It isn't. Carrion birds go for the eyes first. But there is a real cruelty in seeing a horror. I played here, going for the "off".

I'm not sure about "sallow" thinking maybe "fallow".

hollow bones, or rather hollow boned I read recently was a nasty reference to a condition from treating syphilis with mercury.

[Globus]

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 relationship?

Not too sure about the lines across the page. I think you have to be more formally experimental - do two opposing verses next to each other down the page or something - or let the words do the talking.

[twelveoone]

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 relationship?

Not too sure about the lines across the page. I think you have to be more formally experimental - do two opposing verses next to each other down the page or something - or let the words do the talking.

Hi, Globus
if foolishness exists, it exists on both our parts (isn't poetry wonderful). I didn't want to write a poem about clap, rather about something being eaten away. Outside and inside. Trust, hope, perhaps? Maybe life itself. I didn't want it to be specific. Notice in the first part a conversation, in the second no conversation. Unspecific as to whose flesh, bones, who said "A Dream!". Just disgust and horror in the daylight.

I think I used the lines as a compleat break on the page.They are opposing verses. I suppose I could have used white space. Opposing verses next to each other would not quite do the same thing. (it would put them in same timeline) I'm not sure white space would have done the same.
Timeline: Sunset, Night
break
Morning

Read it again I ask, forget the comments, if it does nothing, I'm the one doing the foolishness.

[Globus]

I didn't say it did nothing )

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 horror of the second stanza, knowing the stellar cycle will soon come round again.

The straight lines do get something specific across that's hard to do another way, and I take your point about parallel verses. Maybe it's the limitation of the form? Funnily, it feels like it could be animated well.

[Wabznasm]

Twelvone,

Welcome (back?) to the forum.

Dealing with the first point of contention, the lines: I don't think they are ncessary. Yes they represent a split. Yes they represent day-break. Etc. But a good poet could make that transition jarringly vivid without having to resort to formatting. And you're not a bad poet. So why can you not try something else with language, form, spacing, numbers? I do like odd formatting, but only when it intrigues and seems necessary. These two lines are just a circumlocution of something potentially decent and subtle. Still, if you think it really necessary...

Anyway -

I like the awkwardness of the first line and the use of a sea in the second. I think an 'and' would go far before 'what I had I...' just for a more natural, if still somewhat strange dialogue.

The writing of the second stanza is fine, but I'm somewhat confused by its 'bigger' picture. If I question the actual substance of this poem, I'm having difficulty coming to terms with it. Is this, effectively, just a 'It was all a dream' poem? The use of generalisations doesn't help. The only motive behind this poem (unless I've missed something) is the act of decay and the end of a dream. There's no real narrative, nothing particularly anchored. This is all, deliberately, dealing with abstraction. Which raises some problems for the reader. Do I have to attach my own experiences onto this? Or do I just read and accept the slightly daft metaphysical message of it?

I think 'A dream!' is a bit twee.

So it's a decent poem, with some good writing and good imagery (I particularly like the stars), but it feels a little hollow.

Cheers
Dave

[twelveoone]

1.) back yes, a little, thank you.
2.) Globus and Dave, thank you for the comments and accept my humble apology for the delay

A few words regarding. I had a few lines (the top) sitting around for over a year with nowhere to go. I changed the title to Repose and it was in the back of my head when I was reading a critque of "The House of Usher'". Crows, I thought, why they're almost as good as ravens, or corbies.
So I thought of the title again.
Repose
Re:Poe's
(i would agree with "A dream!" being a bit twee, but it renders it just a little more Poe-like)
There seems to be strange split in "Usher".
and then
Repo(session men)s a real horror - I don't know if it is a UK term.

After posting I realized, it probably needs a little more meat at the top - I think the crows have enough at the bottom.
The lines - an experiment, a test of reaction. (I was a bit taken aback pardon the pun at yours)it was posted on another site also, you two are in a bit of a minority.
They stay, or at least one of them does, I'm tempted to keep both as another pun of beneath the bottom line.
I'm wondering how it will go off if the bottom lines are enclosed in parens, as a negative balance often is.

However your points are well taken, and I hope to be able to address them with more meat at the top, still making it look like not much is happening, but with the ending that fits either path.

(at least I wasn't doing any carry-on puns)

"What I had I gave to you" I prefer to leave ambiguous; but nobody thought of money - trick is to put in better pointers for that one, without taking other potentialies away.

Thank you for your patience with my little experiments.

[twelveoone]

I didn't say it did nothing )

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 horror of the second stanza, knowing the stellar cycle will soon come round again.

The straight lines do get something specific across that's hard to do another way, and I take your point about parallel verses. Maybe it's the limitation of the form? Funnily, it feels like it could be animated well.

You know Globus, positive and stellar cycle can refer to different things. By Jove, I may be on the right track.
Thank you.