[Jim Moonan]

.
The Taco Bell Quarterly? I give up : )

I think this is well-told, but rather prosaic in its telling. I like the conceit of childhood drama played out in the backyard, but feel you could cut this down by half and leave only the key imagery that will lead the reader to experience what the poem now goes to great lengths to tell them. In other words. Less show and tell, more show. Still, it's very well imagined. Childhood is a treasure trove, if only we can retrieve it!

PS: As happens often in this realm of poetry workshopping, my recent poem "Jam" is also about a knife. Poems are kinetic in that regard, I think. Your poem has also resurrected a memory of a game we used to play with our jack knives called "Split". I won't go into details, but I don't know how we survived it without injury, but we did.

.