[Mary Meriam]

Wonderful, Timmy.

[David Danoff]

I think the short lines contribute a shot of energy to the poem's movement, and I like them. I also like the couplet rhymes: they seem right for a poem where the wish fulfillment is front and center, where there's nothing mysterious or secret or hidden.

I agree with Roger about "deep-seated"; it seems a bit weaker than the rest of the poem.

[Julie Steiner]

I like the trimeter lines in theory, but I have some reservations about their application. They do inject a certain childlike energy into the poem, thus adding to the "Fourth Dimension" of the title. But they also draw a lot of attention to themselves, and I'm not sure that closer examination of those lines always does the poem a favor.

In particular, the sole trimeter of the sestet seems to be shouting, "Hey, look at me, I'm the most important line in the whole sestet!!!" But when I focus on it, it really doesn't seem much more important than its surrounding lines, or than the concluding lines of the sonnet, from which it seems to want to steal the spotlight. I would strongly suggest shortening at least one more line of the sestet to trimeter, if only to reduce that distracting emphasis. (Actually, I would suggest cutting the words "by Heaven's grace" from L14, so that the concluding Gillespie reference could be one of those emphatic trimeter lines, too.)

Why "in dream" instead of "in dreams" in L1, I wonder?

Anyway, a lovely, liberating poem.

[Bruce McBirney]

Beautiful work, Tim. Thanks for this.

Your touching allusion to Alan also carries with it an echo, I think, of earlier sailing poems you wrote. I can't seem to find it at present, but there was one short sailing poem especially that I felt could have been a watercolor rather than a poem. Perhaps you can post that again at some point.

If you do decide to take up Julie's suggestion of using more trimeter in the sestet, and Roger's suggestion of dropping "deep-seated," you might consider doing both at once by shortening the 3rd and 4th sestet lines something like this, which would parallel the three lines of trimeter in the octet:


Hands ten to two holding the Cessna’s yoke,
fearless, I never choke
but barely clear each wire
to sate my deep desire
to soar above our prairie and be awed
by Heaven’s grace, to touch the face of God.


In any case, it's a lovely poem.

Best, Bruce

[Editing back in to say I meant to indent the second, third, and fourth lines of the sestet above, but the formatting seems to have dropped out when I posted it. I'm sure there's a way to indent in these posts, but it's late at night and I'm too tired to find it. Anyway, you get the gist of what I meant.]

[Julie Steiner]

Ooooh, I really like Bruce's suggestion, which would give the poem two indented tercets of trimeter.

[Jennifer Gordon]

Not to be rude or at all cast aspersion on our right Honourable Judge's choice and assessment, but this particular stanza left me reeling back in another alleged sonneteer from some years back who smugly claimed he liked to write one-line sonnets. I'll put this little number in there for its saucy disregard for rules in favour of lending a sense of the illustration in hand.

That said, trimeters deliberately placed half seem to argue it could not have shone as brilliantly if we'd submit. I'll beg to differ and leave it there.

Tis easier then to lose oneself in the vision unfolding than bothering with how it unveils itself, the arbitrary metre keeping readers on their toes as if prose had said it felt poetic and would write a sonnet just to prove that.

Therefore I lose me in said dimension, happy to join the birds, whilst culling images from said invocations until the less than sanctified closing couplet hits--would that be the inevitable astroid belt?
Charming. Thanks for sharing.
La, at this rate I enjoy our right Honourable Judge the veritable gluttony of feasting on all entries, thankful I did not need to more than pick through 10 as now I must choose 3....oh me.

[Tim Murphy]

I want to thank Bruce McBirney for "but barely clear each wire/ to sate my deep desire." I can't edit the DG's post, but that is how the poem will appear, and I thank everyone who contributed to the thread. Alan always wanted Blake's fearful symmetry in a poem, and this gives me that.

[Siham Karami]

Amazing what a difference Bruce's suggestion makes. I love the use of trimeter in the octet and that solves what felt like an inconsistency and a touch of wordiness that is eliminated with the trimeter in the sestet. Lovely.