Joe, okay, I’ve changed “fell over” to “enveloped” and am preferring its sonics, too! So, thanks.
I’ve also adopted Susan’s revision for the S2 lines you cite. I’m not sure why “shift sprang up” was the suspected tripping point for you, but it’s gone now.
You’re right about “sleeptime,” and I’ve never liked it much, for the same reason. Thanks for the idea of personifying the shrouds—I wouldn’t have thought of that! I’ve gone with “dozing” for something a bit more unexpected, and for the sonics.
As to the clouds, yes, I’m really a lush for atmosphere, so I’m glad you enjoy it, too.
Jim, yes, I like digging in—I’m rather an all-or-nothing type.
Yes, "atmospheric" is much of what this is about—yet that atmosphere also sharpens into an idea, a metaphor.
For now, yes, I’m inclined to stand by “boldened.” I think that part of the point of poetry is to offer a vehicle to say things that make sense on a heart level even when they don’t seem to line up on a reason level. I try not to get carried away with doing this, but I think that if placed within a sturdy foundation, the occasional indulgence of this sort can make poetry pop.
I’m glad this poem is holding up for you, and I’m hoping you like some of the recent revisions even better. May this poem sharpen over time just as the spectral scene it describes!
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It makes me wonder if S1 should as well. An exclamation point would work… I don’t know why. Just wondering.
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Eh? That would interrupt the sentence in a nonsensical way.
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I’m responding to this using my phone so I’m beginning to feel claustrophobic. If I have to come back I will : )
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I would love it if you would come back and answer the several questions that I put to you in my last reply. I’d also love to hear how you feel about the metaphor I described, and how much if any of it you’d picked up on before. If you can, if you want.
David, I’m surprised at the comments I’ve gotten about “in rumples” seeming novel. “Rumple” can be a noun, so it just seemed common sense to me to say “in rumples” just as you'd say "in tatters" or suchlike. I admit I’m attached to the phrase here, especially how it works sonically with “rambled.” I could say “all rumpled,” but that sounds clunkier to me.
I’ve gotten rid of “subtly,” thanks to Susan, so now there are no worries for me about how each individual reader might take it, syllabically—even though I might get lucky in cases such as yours.
Yes, "full-blown Romantic"—up until the couplet, I guess, as Tony pointed out. You seem to have a high tolerance level for my archaic excursions—before, you astutely identified a piece of mine as rococo—or at least it sounds like you’re expressing acceptance here. By "closing question mark," I guess you mean the one at the end of S2?
Jan, I broke the octet into two stanzas because I realized that there were really three, not two, basic stages in the scene I described: the sleeping, the waking, and the rising. It felt too jammed-up with the first two together; it failed to emphasize the shift in the narrative that occurs between them. And yet I did not want a strict delineation between the first and second four lines, either—I’d had one for a long time and had found myself incredibly agitated by the sense of artificial separation and the pat, singsongy feel of these lines—until I enjambed. That seemed to set everything free and get just the feeling I’d been craving. I could care less about stock rules for poetic forms for their own sakes; in my mind, the forms were made for the poet, not the poet for the forms. I take what works, leave the rest, and then forge ahead with my own ideas. However, formal expectations aside, if you think that the poem is actually less effective for my departures, that’s another matter.