Hi Mike,
This is where "the poem" starts for me:

"The sky was a bell, the hard earth
a sounding board and the air like crystal
where every note rang twice
with its immediate echo.
The sound that surprised you,
which you couldnīt at first place,
was a leaf dropping through branches,
brushing its steadfast neighbours
which had been transformed to reds
and yellows, blues and orange,
each leaf fringed with crystals
that the white sun could not melt."

And then the whole tone changes... You've got me in the forest and now 
you're changing the tone and telling me something (with a Persian, not a 
Finnish reference!) that hasn't any drama in it's telling:

And for just a few days the coloured hillsides
and valleys will glitter like Aladdinīs cave
as they patiently wait in silence.

I mean why tell me (again) that the hillsides are coloured? Why distract me 
with a Persian Cave? Is there anything I've missed in the poem, so far, that 
Aladdin connects to? And the words you use seem to take me right away from 
the experience - the words disappoint me! Instead of being shown things it's 
as if I'm not trusted to discover anything anymore, so I'm going to be told 
them instead!
I think it may have been Pushkin who said, "a poem is drama or it is 
nothing!" and I guess I'm trying to say where the drama is in yr writing. 
If, in mention "active" or "passive" language I couldn't make that clear I'm 
sorry. For me, listening, is a very active, intense, experience!
So I can go along with the stillness of the ending, if that really matters 
(and I guess it does!) but it's how I discover that stillness in the poem.
I mean why do you want the long introduction, and the ending, to be part of 
the poem?
If the whole of Lappland matters more to you than the intensity of conveying 
the feeling found in the forest - which conveys to me something I feel is 
unique to this poem, something unique to Lapland for a few brief days - then 
it may be that a bigger title still is needed... But "(the) Ruska In 
Lapland" may work OK.
Bob








>From: Mike Horwood <[log in to unmask]>
>Reply-To: The Pennine Poetry Works <[log in to unmask]>
>To: [log in to unmask]
>Subject: Re Ruska -  Barbara and Bob
>Date: Thu, 12 Dec 2002 11:20:16 +0200
>
>Hello Barbara and Bob,
>                       Many thanks for your comments on this piece. It 
>seems that you both agree on the failure of focus here and I can certainly 
>see your point. You may imagine, though, how unwilling I am to lose that 
>long introduction. I wonder if my problem here might be with the title. By 
>specifying the season so precisely I have created an expectation in the 
>readerīs mind and then Iīve started writing at length about something 
>different. If the title were `Laplandī do you think you would respond to it 
>differently? Would the start still feel like a long ( too long ) intro, or 
>would the whole feel homogeneous?
>Your point, Bob, about the end being too passive is a bit of a puzzler. 
>That atmosphere on a still September morning in Lapland, when you really 
>can hear a single leaf fall, is so much the opposite of active that you 
>might believe time had stopped. Were you very bothered by the stillness of 
>the ending?
>
>Best wishes,   Mike


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