Quote:
Originally Posted by Ashley Bowen
Hi, Jim,
I like this a lot, how it does so much with so little.
If this were mine, I'd drop the title and title it "A Thought Slips Past," making the title an active one in the poem. My thought behind this is that, doing so, makes the one rhyme in the poem less obvious (or it does to my ear). The only other thought I have is to put a dash after L4, giving a little more pause for those incredible last two lines.
Thanks for posting.
|
Hi Ashley,
Thank you much for your kind assessment. I have waited making further response on this while mulling title changes. The title seems to be where nits have surfaced. I am perplexed a bit by this piece, not by its content, but by its reception. It is a small poem of not many discretely specific images. Many of the main words border on abstraction or generalized entities or concepts such as thought, there, where, place, space, clutter, lost, be, not be. There are no strong verbs. Slips as a verb is almost meaningless except it is presented in the idiom "slips past." It seems though that the poem can spark some readers' imaginations in some way. I am reluctant to make many changes because I don't want to lose that capability. It has a couple obvious rhymes, there and where and space and place, and I am worried that if I de-emphasize them I will lose something. The play of words seems key to me. I don't know. For the same reason, I am reluctant to change the three couplet structure by allowing the title to be the first line. I think that is what you are suggesting, or are you suggesting a repetition of the title. (no need to respond—isn't it becoming obvious I am reluctant to change this because I don't want to lose what I didn't know I had?) I did add an em dash to try it out. Lately, when they come at a line break, I have been putting them at the beginning of the second line rather than at the end of the first. Again, thanks for the help. Oh, I do want to add that usually I am perfectly willing to use someone else's words or changes if they offer them and I like them.
Jim