> Hello Bob,
            Re. `luminescent´, here in Finland that moment between sunset and the onset of real darkness is known as `the blue moment´ ( `sininen hetki´, it sounds rather good in Finnish, but it´s out of bounds for Finnish poets nowadays, sadly, though pop singers make frequent use of it....which is why it´s out of bounds) But if my memory serves me, `blue moment´ is not a cliché in English. It might offer you an alternative, or some variation on it, in place of `luminescent´, which I have recently seen on one of those lists of `banned´ words along with lozenge, shard, dappled, heron, blood (ye gods!) and moist surprisingly. There are a lot of people in That sceptered isle who don´t know that `moist´ is over-poetic. They think it means a little bit wet.


Best wishes,   Mike





> 
> Hi Bob,
> Hope you and everyone else had a good Christmas. I'm going to try to ease my
> shock at coming back to work by catching up on some posts.
> I'm not sure whether there's much I can add regarding this poem that hasn't
> been said already, but here goes anyway.
> I liked the original form. It probably is a bit forbidding, such a dense
> chunk of text, but I think it suits the stream of consciousness content of
> the poem, so I'd keep it that way. I didn't have a problem with the first
> couple of lines either, because they set the conversational tone for what's
> to come.
> The only bit I'm not sure about is "luminescent". On the one hand it works
> well because it immediately called to mind the sort of sky that I think
> you're talking about, but on the other hand it does stick out like a bit of
> a sore thumb, because as you say it is very latinate whereas everyhting else
> sounds pretty Anglo-Saxon (in the best possible sense!) But on reflection,
> maybe that's one of the reasons it conjured up the image so well - because
> it's the only word you could have used.
> "Such a loud claim on what matters for such a small bird" is fantastic, and
> I really liked the ending.
> Great poem, IMO. I feel better already!
> Regards,
> Matt
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> -----Original Message-----
> From: The Pennine Poetry Works [mailto:[log in to unmask]] On Behalf
> Of Bob Cooper
> Sent: 24 December 2004 14:34
> To: [log in to unmask]
> Subject: This is the only moment
> 
> 
> Hi! Hope you're starting to have the kind of Christmas you want and like --
> and if you've got any space over the next few days and want to give a poem
> some C & C, a good looking over and talking to, then here's your chance!
> 
> 
> This is the only moment
> 
> yet it appeared last night when I'd met Chris outside Kwiksave and we
> chatted and laughed for ages, the light hesitating moment when the sickle
> moon just hung there in the luminescent dark and a van's headlights dazzled
> so a blackness lasted in my eyes even as I stared in my bag in the kitchen,
> not seeing my milk or cans, and tonight, when the waning moon has thinned a
> little more, so, when Venus suddenly appears so bright alongside it, the
> lilac blossom by the post-box holds the light so close to itself as I slip
> in my letter to you, like a tongue into a mouth, so confident, the only
> moment, as when clothes fall so slowly again, gently as my envelope onto the
> layers of post, and just now, like me, the blackbird on the gatepost, such a
> loud claim on what matters for such a small bird.  But how will you know of
> all this, all that's as secret and trusting as the briefest revealing of
> grace?
> 
> Bob Cooper
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