The Poets' Graves Workshop

Agree with Ray. Intriguing though

Thank you all! May have to kill that owl!

I quite liked this. Maybe it does sag a little in the middle. I enjoyed the end.

R

Eira, thank you!

Nice! I feel like I should not like simulate but do.

Only one the in s1 would be better?

I’d definitely jettison hanged. I wouldn’t care that it was ‘correct’.

Best

R

Redraft - thanks all!

Hmm, yes. I see what you mean. Thanks Ray!

Thank you both. The detailed crits are really useful. I’ll have a think.

R

I like this, it’s playful and mysterious. Could you get rid of the gerunds? Just a thought, but not sure it matters.

V2 My heart fills up, a flooded room of you. Its silence is the Chapel where I saw you last. A shroud of heavy blankets turned down reveals your face; a floating photograph, the background fading first. A chance to kiss your hair the nurse had brushed, and stare at your nose pulled to an owl-like ho...

David,

I like the end. It’s a nice idea/memory for a poem.

I’d like to see you abandon the tentativeness of the first stanza. And the neat form carries forced line breaks. Try more natural line breaks, and less structure? Trim just a word or two, I think.

Nee bugger can really skate on a pond!

R

David,

I’m not getting the title. Given that they are not Coevals. Nor is N. Am I missing something?

The last stanza is delish. Very gently melancholic.

R

I'm with James, I think. Evocative as far as it goes but a bit too fragmentary to be more satisfying.

R

Thanks Luke. I'm not sure there is a great deal to say about the hat: it's something N has left behind for his child, something that echoes (not the right word but you get the idea I hope) his presence; it's empty; its turned over in the manner of someone asking for something but not receiving. JJ -...

Oh, thank you very much!

I wonder if this deals with the problem....?

English, in the half words, that you
um um um, an upturned song, a broken one.

Best

R

Your mother told me you were asking after Dadda in your weh weh English, in the half words, that you um um um, an upturned song, a broken one. You are your own, an empty sense but full of music and there will be words eventually. For if I leave without a splash in the papers or the Ocean, know I wil...

I love the economy and the rhythm of this. I went away and looked up the story and re-read it. It worked even better. I know tastes differ on this, but I think you might want to explain at the outset: Alice Glass and was the youngest child hanged in England or something like that. It's cold, that's ...

There are lots of evocative, nicely drawn phrases here. I'm struggling a bit to see the whole, to take away some kind of story or message. I wasn't sure that "you" in each of the verses was referring to the same person. The "you" seem to become quite specific later on. I'm generally a bit wary of ar...

Really good. Lovely idea and well executed.

Yup, good. I like it. Not sure about possesses. Something less domineering about the presence on the sky might work better. Am mystified in a pleasant way by the champagne glass. Powerful ending. Nice work.

If it helps, I'm more of a groaner than an offeror of insight.

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R

Seth, I especially liked: Draw a line down the middle, top to bottom: sameness on each side. and the end... grow an extra ear, a foot, at least a tiny toe, or have the grace to stand sideways." I don't really understand what its about, but i didn't feel like it mattered, because I sensed I half unde...

I'm struggling to comment on this because I can't see what you is

It's nicely executed. I don't much like the new title. I'm not sure it carries me into the poem, as I am now looking for an insight on Blake or innocence I can't see.


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R

Ray/not,

Thank you both. It's a poem that's been rewritten quite a few times over a week or two. Needs more work, I know.

Best

Richard