[Philip Quinlan]

I remember this, and who wrote it.

The last line is plain and strong.

It's a sonnet that doesn't take huge risks, but the content sits comfortably in the form.

I suppose my main nit is there is little sense of a turn until the last line. Otherwise it feels like a list of things that happen.

Philip

[Richard Meyer]

I also remember this poem. It is a proficient and well-packaged sonnet. There is much merit to the various responses, both the compliments and the perceived weaknesses.

Richard

[Pedro Poitevin]

I also remember this poem, but have forgotten who wrote it. I favor a different fix for L10: Their children's children scuffle on the floor. The bit about "bored now" doesn't seem to add much to the poem, I think. Like Catherine, I don't like the capitalization of each line, but I don't think this is a major nit-- it's just that this flows gently, and the capitalization of each line calls too much attention to itself. (Though this may be because I read Catherine's comment, and was already predisposed to paying attention to it, who knows.)

I don't mind the repetition of "away" because I think of "put away" and "going away" as very different actions. Unlike Philip, I love me a good late turn in a sonnet, and this one delivers a lovely one.

Craft set aside (and this poem is very well crafted, in my opinion), this poem moves me, and this matters to me. Excellent sonnet.

Pedro.

[Roger Slater]

I don't understand why the last line can be considered a turn. As I commented earlier, it seems to me to all little to what's been said or strongly implied earlier. But the word "turn" helps me make my earlier point. I'd like to see a stronger and somewhat more surprising turn in that last line.

[Jim Burrows]

It never gets as good as "frieze of fallen men" again, and that's too bad, because it sets expectations high. "alive and well" and "blown away" are clichés that felt like clichés when I was reading them, and "blown away" has a connotation that couldn't be intended here. I agree that "strength" is not the mot juste, but it's no more vanilla and general than the preceding 12 lines. It's almost as if the writing is plain out of respect for its subject. On the other hand, it did capture something fascinating and heartbreaking about dementia: the sudden changing, the being here, completely present and lucid, one moment, and being somewhere far away the next.