[Duncan Gillies MacLaurin]

I’ve been quite impressed with the sonnets so far, but this one seems very weak by comparison. It's what I would call a McPoem in sonnet form. It claims awesomeness without earning it. It’s like: “Wow, you’re standing beneath the stars and you’re only five years old! And you saw Sputnik soon after its launch. Well wow!” The poem never rises above this level. It deals in cheap nostalgia and nothing more. We’re being told to feel the power of the word “Sputnik” just because the narrator was young when he/she saw it and because it means a lot to the narrator. I wouldn't dream of suggesting that it doesn't mean a lot to the narrator, but poetry has to be more than this, surely? In short, this poem does nothing more than milk a world event. A McPoem.

The supposed drama of a celestial object that moves is underlined by a repetition: “That moves”. Well, if something isn’t working once, why repeat it? There’s a really yukky, childish, “Wow” thing that is being milked here, and I’m running for serious cover.

If N could somehow relate this event to something personal in his/her own life, then I might be drawn to the poem, but there's absolutely zilch beyond the cliché of father/child memory.

Duncan

PS I see Lance claims a deeper philosophical symbolism for L6-10. Well, if we're really looking, then yes, maybe. But it's like you have to be told this is a good poem first in order to go looking. On a first couple of readings this jumped well off my radar.