Thanks, Doug, hearty thanks!
You say, "It's how the concentrate works" . . . hmmmm....... a nice
brain-lunch you've handed us.
Now let me stretch our thread some more.
I've three aims in continuing this thread: to find out how to write pomes;
to open-out the writing process for poets' feed-in; and---most
important---to show poetry-lovers how to "work" poetry and how poetry
"works."
Now three folks (whose poetry I deeply respect) have jumped into the game,
and they sport the same view: kill the backstory; it's dragging on the rest
(my paraphrasing, natch). The kill (oh, my precious baby!) wouldn't have
occurred to me, but Joanna suggested it---so I did it immediately and
decided not to analyze its effect until I got feedbacks.
One gifted poet thought it valuable to keep the backstory. hmmmm.....
Though most folks don't publicly offer their thoughts (anywhere, anytime,
any issue), many of them think as wisely as those who do offer thoughts
publicly. Here's what I'm after: some of those privately-held
thoughts---because then we'll get a real mix. And I think that wider view
will be astonishing!
You might have a pome you want analyzed, adored, attacked, plagiarized (o
strike that). Well, then, here we are . . . poetryetc.
Feel free to backchannel if you're a bit shy; you know my email address!
Grateful Judy AKA Ella Gant
----- Original Message -----
From: "Douglas Barbour" <[log in to unmask]>
To: <[log in to unmask]>
Sent: Thursday, June 30, 2005 10:43 AM
Subject: Re: the new Bamboo
> In Answer to your question, Judy, & with reference to this piece in
> particular, Yes, more power in less backstory, & usually that's the case,
> too I think...
>
> Mind you, some very concentrated work still takes up a lot of space; it's
> how the concentrate works...
>
> Doug
> On 29-Jun-05, at 3:35 PM, judy prince wrote:
>
>> SB, thanks for newly returning me to the truncated version of "Bamboo"
>> that Joanna Boulter had suggested.
>>
>> Again, I've a question for you and any others who'd wanna jump into the
>> game: Is there more power in less "backstory" (i.e., the first few
>> stanzas I chopped off)?
>>
>> And I can see, SB, that killing the pome's last line MIGHT strengthen
>> the context, hence the entire pome. My striving's toward the
>> sensual/spiritual, so it wouldn't have occurred to me to drop that image.
>> And I'm weighing whether more power's in dropping the last line . . . .
>>
>> Judy
> Douglas Barbour
> 11655 - 72 Avenue NW
> Edmonton Ab T6G 0B9
> (780) 436 3320
>
> -- bring lust into the library
> or it is hell.
> Lisa Robertson
>
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