[Mark Allinson]

HA!

(Wendy, if you ever have the time, I would love to see the poem Suzie posted.)


I do feel for Suzie, since I too have had work published in impotent magazines.

[wendy v]

Dear Mark thank you for you're interest in my poem. I see you are from Austria. I once read a book and it talked about Austria and it had recipes to. I hear the food is really intresting and I would like to visit their. anyway hear is my poem.

crash slam bang goes my soaring vearing silver
flying airplain of distress and woe
on to the runweigh of darkness and unhappiness and sadness and lonliness becaus you called me a hoe
(this part might be hard to under stand but I really like it because its about God) and I landed in the soft loving tarmac of heaven lo
and behold all around me was insents and peace and
other kinds of oh
how my spiritual vesel flies and soars and spreads it's evervesent wings so.

``````````

thank you.
also I should add that I am not really a hoe.
keep writing every body!!!!
All my love
Suzie

[Terese Coe]

Muggy,

You said, "This just goes to show what a moron you really are. I do not mean this as an ad hom."

Did anyone ever tell you what a moron you are? I hope the mods get you.

You said it first, so I was just defending myself.

[This message has been edited by Terese Coe (edited July 04, 2006).]

[Jason Kerr]

Hugsie,

You said

I'm not sure I understand the image of the monkey flinging poo at the heavens.

Hugsie, I would defintely appreciate further comments when you get the chance to take a closer look. For now, I wonder if you were maybe reading another poem at the same time. The closest referent in my poem was, "I fling my poetry at the heavens."

Thanks for taking interest all the same,

Tundra Boy

[Terese Coe]

Hi Marvella!

Have you heard this one?

Do you know why they call it "PMS"?
Because "Mad Cow Disease" was taken.
--Unknown, presumed deceased

[Lightning Bug]

Terese,
That's hilarious. I showed it to my wife. We seemed to find different parts of it funny, though. Odd, eh?

;O.)

Bugsy

[Rose Kelleher]

Egbert: I'm sorry you find my poem "a heap of pointless babble." Here's what I was thinking (though of course, if you failed to see this in the poem, then I must have failed to communicate it clearly enough for your type). The train wreck represents the speaker's failed relationship. This is what's known as a metaphor. You can read more about metaphors in Ted Kooser's "Poetry Home Repair Manual," which I highly recommend.

Octavia: You are right to observe that the ending does not explicitly say whether or not the relationship can be repaired. I left that up to the reader's imagination. An imagination is a part of the brain some poetry readers have that allows them to visualize things in their heads without every detail being provided for them. Another term for it is "Negative Capability." Keats (a famous poet) thought Negative Capability was a good thing, but perhaps he was an idiot.

Leander: I'm sorry you feel my meter is "bumpy." Yes, I suppose you could say the first foot of Line 5 is "backwards." I used a trochee there instead of an iamb. In one or two places, I also used anapests instead of iambs. Those are what's known as metric substitutions. Some poets who are considered masters of meter, such as Swinburne, used substitutions quite frequently, and their readers have been somehow able to cope with it. But perhaps you are right, and metronomic tick-tock is much to be preferred. I'll take it under advisement.

[Rose Kelleher]

Rose: Don't be silly, you're not dense at all; in fact you're very perceptive for someone who went to night school. I'm actually quite pleased you found this poem frustrating, arrhythmic, and, to use your delightfully candid phrase, "utterly without payoff." You have perfectly summed up my intent here: to convey what it's like to be a grad student hopped up on No-Doze by writing a poem that no one wants to read. I want this to be confusing, jarring, and generally unpleasant. I want the reader to scratch her head and say to herself, "Why did I just spend five minutes of my life reading this?" Let the blue-haired old ladies write pleasant, treacly, melodic lullabies that package life's uncertainties in tidy little boxes topped with bows. I'm trying to do something more with my poetry than provide an escape route from reality. 99% of real life is confusing, jarring, and generally unpleasant. If, as you read my poem, you felt as if you were waiting in a very long line at the bank, while suffering from schizophrenia, nausea, and neuralgia, then I have, if I may humbly say so, succeeded.


[This message has been edited by Rose Kelleher (edited July 17, 2006).]

[Jerry Glenn Hartwig]

Rose

That's not original. I've seen that used before.

Unfortunately the person was serious!!!