[Tim Murphy]

Paul Stevens is going to publish this sequence of epigrams that came to me in dream, during the disordered sleep that followed my stroke, and I wonder whether the community thinks any last changes are needed. I would particularly like to thank Aaron for getting me to write my Eagle scout stanza. Because the Wilbur influence is so strong, because he and Charlee both figure in it, I have dedicated it to him.

Short Shots
for RW

High Altitude

I met him in a movie or a myth,
no finer friend to ford a river with.

Last Supper

He flushed out of a nine row shelter break
some thirty feet behind me.
Sweet Jesus, please remind me
never to make so clever a mistake.

Female Rhyme

“She’s just a little rosebud of a baby”
my mother claimed. I grinned and answered “Maybe.”

Padraic

Will I live to take you hunting when you’re growing?
In church I saw your grandma’s visage glowing,
and I shall tell Moloch “No more flying,”
but what’s that Pat? I hear your sister crying.

La Victoire

Une victoire historique pour ma chere France.
Mon President, vous commencez la danse.
Le Comte de Rochambeau, et Lafayette?
France and America are friends well met.


The Grail

I could have made Eagle at age thirteen
except I was so risible a swimmer.
No body fat, a sinker who was slimmer
than any boy, I earned it in a dream
when I found the Lost Scout beside a stream
and I became an Eagle at age sixteen.

The Runner

I watched his calves and thighs go flashing past,
and Father Christensen was running fast
in the half light, around the hour of seven.
My priest was on his daily race to heaven.

To Alan

I wake drenched with dew,
and the dew salt with sweat.
I lived by loving you
and all my dreams are wet.

I remember stepping out
as the DJ played us "Shout!"
Then thirty troubled years
of mitigated tears,
hundreds of poems, (nobody's ever read them.)
And tears? Till I met you I never shed them.

Charlotte

She said what she meant and she meant what she said,
and now my heroic lady friend is dead.

To My Brother Lector

You once spoke forty evensongs in Lent,
the season granted Christians to repent
of untold sins. This year I did you better.
For seventy days I read the Psalm and Letter,
finally making pacem with Saint Paul
and sang King David who outdoes us all..

To The Chief Musician

Where shall I find my refuge and hold fast
except under the shadow of Thy wings
until all my calamities are past?
So from antiquity King David sings.




[This message has been edited by Tim Murphy (edited May 22, 2007).]

[Jim Hayes]

But if Paul Stevens is going to publish these- what does it matter what the community thinks?

[Alan Sullivan]

I have asked John to delete this thread. It is an announcement -- and a thumb in the eye -- not a work posted for crit. There is another board for announcements.

Alan

[Quincy Lehr]

Still not sure what holds them together, other than that they (apparently) came to you at the same time. The revision seems to be more one of cut-and-paste than qualitative re-thinking.

A few things to note that are, I think, new. In "To Alan":

"and all my dreams are wet"--a wet dream? I'm sure you don't mean this, but it's how it sounds. if it is what you meant, you might want to revise it, because it really clashes with the tone of the piece as a whole.

In "To My Brother Lector"--the "pacem" bugs me, a quick attempt to smuggle in some Latin, either to let us know that you're a Catholic or that you know some Latin. Not sure which.

"Female Rhyme" remains a not terribly funny squib.

"La Victoire" just doesn't fit--to the extent any of this does.

I could go on, but I won't because--you know what?--you jumped the gun and submitted before the piece was ready, and (forgive me for saying this, Paul and Nigel) the publisher did you no favors by accepting it. Publication should be secondary to creating a good poem, and by the very fact of posting this again, it is implied that you aren't satisfied with this yet. If not, why did you send it in?

Quincy

Editing in--Well done, Alan!

[This message has been edited by Quincy Lehr (edited May 22, 2007).]

[John Beaton]

Transferred to "The Accomplished Members". Tim, this is a publication announcement, so it should have been posted here.

John

[Max Goodman]

Apologies to all concerned if offering an opinion is uncalled for here.

If I had written a body of work comparable to that of Tim Murphy, I would be concerned that a reader who cared enough to search online for my work might find these early in the search.

If I published an online journal, I would be concerned that a reader familiar with what Tim Murphy is capable of might think these poems reflected Mr. Murphy's opinion of my publication.

[Quincy Lehr]

No, Max, it is not uncalled-for. I suppose that what also gets my goat is that it ropes Paul (and, I suppose, Nigel) into a fight they did not pick, as well as imposing terms and limitations on them that they did not sign up for, namely, that we were (in theory, at least) being asked to comment on a poem that is, apparently, already "theirs," at which point, if Tim changes anything, revisions they may or may not like, they will have to negotiate that, too.

Poorly done, Tim.

Quincy

[epigone]

Think about what Max is saying, Tim. If you take his words to heart, this thread will have been worthwhile.

But then again, if you take Max's words to heart, what I am to think, as I have said exactly the same thing and you did not heed your,

epigone

[Michael Cantor]

What Jim said. What Alan said. What Max said. What Quincy said. What epigone said.

I urge you to delete the announcement, Tim. It does nobody, particularly yourself, any good.



[This message has been edited by Michael Cantor (edited May 22, 2007).]

[Tim Murphy]

John, please close the thread. I had no idea it had been moved. I thought it had simply been deleted at TDE. I did want further critique, which is why I posted it. But obviously I can't get along with anyone here, except Paul Stevens, who buys his ink by the barrel. This is a completely inappropriate forum for posting work in need of critique. I am confident of the sequence, but I would have liked to improve it with the help of those who used to help in the heavy lifting. Hail and fare well.