Thread: Brachiopods
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Unread 11-26-2024, 08:08 PM
Hilary Biehl Hilary Biehl is offline
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Join Date: Jul 2024
Location: New Mexico
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Yes, this is good. I want to highlight the movement of the first few lines - the (somewhat generic) image of the woman in a blue summer dress, suddenly turned sideways by her playfully shocking statement that the N is a "cliche perv who likes girls in summer dresses," followed by the vagueness of and apparent indifference to his own attire. The whole poem has a similar movement as one line flows into another like waves, modifying what came before. I'm not saying this well at all, but it's meant to be a compliment.

I have one suggested change, stemming from some grammatical confusion on my part.

Where you have:

"as we said our vows and I read the silly passage
from Joyce as you looked at me, accepting my constant foolishness
as the woman, the temporary friend neither of us can name,
read the legal blah [...]"

I would suggest changing one (or maybe two) of the instances of "as". Perhaps something like:

"as we said our vows and I read the silly passage
from Joyce and you looked at me, accepting my constant foolishness
while the woman, the temporary friend neither of us can name,
read the legal blah [...]"

I'll admit I initially thought this passage meant that the woman being married was accepting her husband's foolishness in her capacity as a woman ("as the woman"), rather than that she was accepting his foolishness while another woman - the friend - read the legal stuff. It took me a few rereads to understand. Just changing the preposition would clarify that, I think.

Last edited by Hilary Biehl; 11-27-2024 at 07:11 AM.
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