[Matt Q]

Hi Alexandra,

On the revisions,

I'm not sure I prefer the new L2. "And twists the night" maybe? Or "And turns the night"?

Actually my original thought on L2 was just to cut it, so I'll also float that now, especially now you have the tet line. Shorter, the line is "tighter". More impactful/dramatic too, I think.

I think "chasmic" improves on "trackless", and has the benefit of sounding a bit like "cosmic"

I think the tet line works well. Also the semicolon to colon change.

"loon dog" is nice, getting lunar on the madness/lunacy. And an echo of "moon dog" (a mock moon).

I find having the Persied's light swallowed a little less dramatic, and a bit more like factual reportage, than the Perseids themselves getting swallowed, and I get less of Greek myth vibe, too. Maybe something like, "the searing Perseids get swallowed whole" would up the drama (though at risk of stock phrase in "swallowed whole"). You'd get a rhyme of sorts with "howl".

Continuing my dislike of "get", maybe just "are" if you keep the current construction -- still generic and passive, but somehow, to my ear, and possibly my ear only, better than "get". More immediate somehow, maybe? Or add in the actor: "Moonlight swallows up the searing Persieds", for example, or some less expected way of saying "moonlight", and then there'd be a clearer image and you'd lose the passive construction. Though you'd lose your slant rhyme with "howl" (though I didn't notice it until you pointed it out).

Yay, to losing the endnote! I definitely prefer not to have the poem explained. I get enough of a sense of what's going on from the poem, and explaining why it is how it is takes something away from that. For me, anyway.

I think the "super" and the date in "Full Sturgeon Supermoon, 2022" loses something of the power and sheer weirdness of "Full Sturgeon Moon". Maybe the title could be "Full Sturgeon Moon (Supermoon, 2022)", if you think it's important for us to know which moon, and when? Actually, why not have something like "Supermoon -- August 11, 2022" in italics on another line, positioned like an epigraph? Like Nemo does when he writes, e.g. "8 June, 1994 -- Kuta, Bali" right offset and italicised under the title.

NASA says it was a "marginal supermoon", and something about it being on the margins, on the edge, seems to fit with the poem. So maybe even "Marginal supermoon -- August 11, 2022". That said, maybe "marginal" also deflates the "super" part.


best,

Matt