A tumultuous down-the-valley-its-thundering kind of a piece that leaves you with a bit of white knuckles. I understand the nay sayers. The considered pauses aren't there; there's a split prepositional phrase; enjambents darting around corners like NASCAR drivers. But the point of these is to accelerate and palpitate and obliterate rational thought. I think it works.

Lance

I enjoy the mild incoherence, and the unwillingness to settle to any clear line of development of this poem. Both seem to me to capture an essential quality of finding oneself unexpectedly lone just when one has become accustomed to being together.

I also liked the semi-generic quality of much of the imagery early in the poem: love makes us discover how much we are the same as other people, usually at the same time as it is making us feel unique.

I labour over I walk down California : I'm not sure what 'down' means in relation to an entire state, and I'm also concerned that it sounds like it might be a very long walk.

That is a relatively minor niggle.

I have a great deal more trouble with the echo of George Herbert's The Collar in the closing line. I can't make the reference augment the poem in any way, nor can I get the Herbert out of my head when I read this.

Christopher, I take the phrase "I walk down California" as referring to a street with that name, not the state. One of the streets in Santa Monica, California, that runs down to the bluff overlooking the ocean is called "California," and I imagine there are streets with that name in many other beachfront communities.

Best regards, Bruce

Oh, I love this one. Tumbles forward breathlessly like love or the sea and then turns and directly addresses the breath. A beauty.

Again, coming to this late, I find that the comments already made cover most of my reactions. Here is what I have to add.

I like the opening metaphor and its comparative, the blind sea touching land.

The transition in L5 is good, but the one at "instead" in L8 seems too abrupt. I read N as inside the apartment and trying to do things there when I'm presented with a different scenario.

I sort of like L13, but I don't think "windily and wild" really withstands a rhyme-driven check against "windily and wildly".

John