I rather like the bookishness of the epigraph, but think it could be shortened. Also, it would help if it were formatted differently to keep it visually from competing with the poem. Perhaps that visual element has contributed to what seems its lopsided quality. Hence, shortened and re-formatted...


The Baby and the Bathwater

"...the lord of his household would bathe first,
followed by other men, then women, then children—
with the unfortunate baby being plunged last into sinfully
black waters. ”
....................—Elizabeth Pollard Thistlethwaite

Let it go, let it all go down the drain—
The forest ashes where a witch was burned,
Dirt from the cellar where a queen was slain,
No heir escaping death, and nothing learned,

The crescent moons of darkness under nails,
Ditch-digger’s drops of sweat, the blood from soil
That sprouted fingertips, the slick from snails
Where the butchered peasants were left to spoil:

Let it swirl, let it all swirl down the drain—
Let murderous grime be curlicues to gyre
Around the blackened mouth, let mortal bane
Be gulped, and waste be drink for bole and briar.

Here's a new-washed babe; marvel what man mars,
The flesh so innocent it gleams like stars.


This is by far my favorite of the batch, the only one with consistent surprises to my sensibility as a reader. For me, too many of the sonnets chosen are too similar in tone and subject matter--it seems a domestically lopsided ten and I found it hard to wax enthusiastic for any of them given their appearance all in one group. To put it frankly, I felt bludgeoned by tender nostalgia. Even the Mower's Song, which I like, doesn't rock my world in the monotonous company of the others.

My only reservation with this one is the construction around the word gyre, though it seems worth it for the rhyme with briar.

Nemo

Once again, our taste matches, Nemo. Love what you did with the epigraph. Couldn't live without gyre. What a poem - can't wait to see who wrote it!!!

This isn't a perfect sonnet (the epigraph isn't necessary, for example) but it's the one that I read and thought "I wish I had written that" and the one that I read and thought "I want to read more of this person's work."

It has an exuberance of language and a vividness of sound that I admire, and it isn't bound up in a rigid, pared-down, passionless sensibility.

Julie

Mary, I thought it was yours. I like what Nemo has done with the epigraph.

Pedro.

Well - ahead of the final result, in which the tide is clearly running elsewhere, I cannot resist having one last 'say' on this wonderful sonnet. This was a piece of sound theatre which stood out for me, as for you Nemo, not only by its language but also for its subject matter and tone. Apart from the witty "Calypso" and the less effective (for me) No. 3, I don't know if I felt "bludgeoned by tender nostalgia": I think my experience was more like being damply smothered by it - and this was such a purging contrast.

I did have one tiny 'nit'. Line 8 felt awkwardly stressed by the "the" before "peasants" and this definite article also seemed out of line with the generalities so far expressed which have moved from a specific witch to "a" queen, to whole categories, "soil" etc. So I would have preferred something like...

Where butchered peasants were still left to spoil:

However, a mere quibble amongst a sweep of the sonorously splendid - "gyre" especially included. The whole event was justified by this memorably wonderful poem alone. My respect and thanks to its author.

Interesting to consider the visual element and other factors as they might impact selection. Yesterday, when the sonnets were presented as a group, two of the ten (which were not in my top three picks) caught my attention more, not so much maybe that I would have placed them higher, but my assessment certainly changed a bit.

With a different title and no epigram, this can hold its own anywhere.

IMO, the present title and epigram only distract. But the poem is strong and bold and though it took me a long time to digest it, when I finally got my mind around it, I was shaken.

I like to think I would have grasped the essence earlier if not for the confusing title/epigram. That may be because it is a common expression in Swedish and I couldn't make the poem fit what the proverb means. So others may not have the difficulty I did.

To "throw the baby out with the bathwater" means to throw out the good with the bad, and the origin of the proverb is dubious, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Throw_o...the_bath_water

Janice, this is also the proverbial case in English.

Without wishing to anticipate the results, I think it's clear that this poem won't quite make it to the position that some of us think it (almost) deserves.

The first twelve lines are perhaps the strongest of any of the 10 finalists, but I think the final couplet is a bit of a let-down, and the title is disastrously off-putting - it sounds as if it's going to be some kind of jokey poem, which is far from the vividly grim reality.

Actually, Nemo, the epigraph was supposed to be in italics, but I
couldn't get them to work, and hoped the small print would be sufficient to set it off from the poem.

Janice, as I revise my poems over the years, your crits often prove true, though it takes me a while to see it. I think you might have a very good IMO here.