Thanks Bob
I have to agree that the first couplet is my least favourite and may be
first for the chop when the revision comes...I just don't quite know how to
get to stanza 2. I need some way of expressing the sense of thoughtlessness
and subsequent alarm.
To be honest, I'm not sure I like the second couplet either...
Glad you like the language games.
Terri
-----Original Message-----
From: The Pennine Poetry Works [mailto:[log in to unmask]] On Behalf
Of Bob Cooper
Sent: 03 February 2004 13:04
To: [log in to unmask]
Subject: Re: New sub: Operation February
Hi Terri,
Welcome back! Canny to read yr lines again!
I'm not sure about the first 2 lines! In fact, I am sure, I don't like them!
Couldn't you get rid, maybe start with lines 3 & 4 (and another couplet
following them?) Not sure about the last stanza either! But here it's just
the 1st line! (Is it you've been dead keen to create an ABAB rhyme to end
the poem off - and the 1st line, which isn't needed, is determined to squat
there like an older sister at a party and ruin everything else?). The blend
of language games (gardens & health/disease) is fun! Bob
>From: alderoak <[log in to unmask]>
>Reply-To: The Pennine Poetry Works <[log in to unmask]>
>To: [log in to unmask]
>Subject: New sub: Operation February
>Date: Sun, 1 Feb 2004 17:29:42 -0000
>
>I've been a bit busy lately, so sorry for not posting for so long.
>
>
>Operation February
>
>
>I almost missed the season's call to arms,
>deafened by duty, making future plans,
>I did not hear the birds that spurned my seed
>to raise their young on less neglected land.
>
>Now needled by the seriousness of dawn
>I'm driven out to scan my cankered bed,
>choked by a dying back of tangled weeds,
>their lobules milked, no telling where they've spread.
>
>I track the bindweed's blind lymphatic roots,
>the cancer that my ruthless fork reveals,
>then scar the soil with compost, raked well in.
>Dug deep enough each year a garden heals.
>
>This time I plant perennials, the kind
>that flower despite these cold foreshortened days.
>Though shadowed by the hazel, from the vale
>sweet sorrow-scented lilies will amaze.
>
>I pray that when the darkest weeks are done
>next year my son will find these cyclamen
>and by the twisted tree I'll hold his hand
>to hear him say 'My mother planted them.'
>
>Terri )O(
_________________________________________________________________
Tired of 56k? Get a FREE BT Broadband connection
http://www.msn.co.uk/specials/btbroadband
|
