The main thing to note in all this is that I have made over 2.5k posts on this site.

Doesn't that say something?

For all the niggles I have had, I have had many more positive experiences.

I was almost entirely a FV poet when I came here - ask Janet.

This place gave me heart to explore the possibility of writing, as well as reading, metrical poems.

I would almost certainly NEVER have attempted the classical dac-hex, and other meters, without this site.

So I owe the place a great deal. And I would NEVER deny it.

It's all to do with the conflict I feel between a need to do my own thing, AND still remain part of a community.

Sometimes it makes me go all prickly.

Weird double post. Sorry.

[This message has been edited by Janet Kenny (edited November 17, 2006).]

Janet,

I was mostly just looking for an excuse to use "pwn" some more. God, I love that word!

Quincy

Mark,
I've used several poetry workshops, and while people often give me their opinions very frankly about my work, and where it could be improved, I have never had anything INSIST that I take their suggestions and revise accordingly. No, never, not ever.
And I've never seen anyone insisting that someone should revise in this or that way. Why should they? As Carol says, it's no skin off anyone else's nose what you do or don't do to your work.
Do you lie awake at night, tossing and turning, because J. Osmund Winklaker doesn't correct the rocky IP in the last sonnet he posted, or Desibelle Crump hasn't substituted 'blithe' for 'gay' in her villanelle, as you advised ? Of course not. You've got more important things to worry about, and so has everyone else.

Regards, Maz

But it's always that simple if you want it to be, Mark.

There are all kinds of reasons to be gracious regardless of the feedback here, but to pick a few,

in a real world where you could walk down a crowded street in any corner of the globe on a hundred consecutive Sundays, throw a dead cat each time, and not hit a single person who wouldn't first point to their throat when asked to identify a trochee, you've found a place that's open 24 hours a day with people who know what you're talking about, care about it, and volunteer their time on your behalf to think about work you're thinking about.

If every single one of them is convinced your line breaks suggest an immediate need for a CAT scan, and all of them are dead wrong, you've still gotten rapid feedback from people who think about this stuff on a regular basis, with no obligation to use any of it, and every freedom to yell at the screen about what mouth-breathing knuckle-dragging half-wits they are in the comfort of your own home. What a deal.

And speaking anecdotally, since I've yet to see a response to a negative crit persuade the critter to retract a suggestion for an immediate CAT scan, there's little point in bickering.

So it's that simple if you want it to be: post, be gracious, and keep going.



[This message has been edited by Ethan Anderson (edited November 17, 2006).]

Thanks, Ethan, and Maz,

As you can see on Metrical, I am back to posting.

You are quite right, it's all up to me.

Come scan my CAT!

Of course every first draft I post is perfect and posted at TDE only to overawe all you mortals. Then it gets shredded and begins a long process to publishable imperfection.

I told Alan about this thread and he said TDE died because HE'S BACK.

As I have previously said, I don't think there is any longer much qualitative diff between the Metrical Boards. We don't have subliterate idiots on either one, and at one time we did. I mean, you can't believe the number of times Alan just said "Go away" when he was starting TDE.

I think when we've got offerings as good as Jan's and Jim's and Maryann's latest, we needn't worry about TDE.

Cat got your fingers?
Kitten teeth are stingers,
but CAT's can make you shrill
at the hospital bill.

Robert Meyer

If you believe, don't let TDE die, c'mon, clap your hands, boys and girls!

Desibelle Crump, Maz? I had not heard that Michael Cantor was workshopping under his real name. Where was this?