Eminence

[k-j]

Nightfall: the city streets are furrows sown
with phosphor; glibly they delineate
intractable biography and fate:
a ring-road-girdled residential zone.

[R. Broath]

Four lines that you would be hard-pressed to pack with more impact, k-j. The city imagery is all there; lights, life and the discrete 'biography' of its denizens.
'Glibly' sits so well in this. It presages the tone of what follows with precision and its sound is built into the scene with crafty ease.
A quartet of lines with as much (far more) between them as in them.
The sort of writing that inspires. I was caught in its headlights and am truly impressed.

Jimmy

[bobvincent]

Very evocative and dense with meaning. I want to see more. writing of this quality must develop into a greater statement, please.

[ray miller]

I liked this too. Unlike Jimmy I'm not at all sure about glibly. If it were mine I'd use "strictly" but then I'm probably as dense as the poem itself!

[dedalus]

Change "glibly".

[bobvincent]

I like "glibly".

[David]

Very good. I'm agnostic about "glibly", but I think the last line is a bit of a tongue-twister.

Cheers

David

[Elphin]

A packed piece of work - several reads needed before everything became clear.

the city streets are furrows sown
with phosphor

are marvellously sounding lines full of atmosphere.

Methinks you chose glibly rather carefully - I suspect there is a lot being said in that one word.

Good stuff

elph

[Callum C]

This is the second poem I've seen on here today that doesn't seem to require criticism but still demands a response. A lot of people have commented on the use of the word "glibly", I like it. I can't think of a word that better describes the streets' thoughtless framing of portraits; your diction clearly isn't glib. You see what I did there, it was.....oh dear.

[k-j]

Thanks everyone. "Glibly" is a funny word isn't it - it's that "lbl" sound, like bubbles surfacing.

[David]

Thanks everyone. "Glibly" is a funny word isn't it - it's that "lbl" sound, like bubbles surfacing.

A no doubt apocryphal story - when John Gielgud had been introduced to Edward Woodward, he said, "Interesting name - sounds like a fart in the bath."

It does too, I think, he said (glibly).

[Ros]

For some reason it's a very funny name if you say it without the ds... sort of eeewar woowar.

I liked this poem very much, though I was very slightly disappointed in the last line. Seemed too matter-of-fact. But that could just be me.