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guilt stained palm
hard against the rough
leather hilt, grinding
a desperate plea stifled
by gaunt gray eyes
dead with hoary frost
ignorance amplifies
grievances beyond reason
he who could've been
a brother dies
AvariciousApathist Originally Wrote:a guilt stained palm drives
hard against the rough
leather hilt, grinding
a desperate plea. stifled
by gaunt gray eyes,
dead with hoary frost,
ignorance amplifies
grievances beyond reason.
he who could've been
a brother dies.
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Interesting. Lots of ideas swam around in my brain. My final thought being that this refers to hand-to-hand fighting from ages past - (sword hilt?) perhaps in the Crusades. And certainly echoes what I always feel when I hear of friction between races, religions, political opponents, neighbours whatever. It is all so stupid, causes loss of life and achieves nothing.
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ignorance amplifies
grievances beyond reason.
he who could've been
a brother dies.
Really like these lines and the way you have expressed them- I think the line breaks are just right to give depth and layed meaning.
Not that dislike the reast of the poem, but these lines resonate particularly.
It is a powerfully written piece, hard and violent without glory. I have no suggestions for improvement.
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Jill,
You're so right about racial violence and other stupid wars that are being fought constantly. This was indeed part of the inspiration at work here. Thanks for reading and for your compliments.
Ca ne fait rien,
Do you have a preferred nickname? The part you highlighted probably worried me the most. I want to be understood on a broad scale, but unlimited in interpretation. Thanks for reading and for your kind words.
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Ca ne fait rien,
Do you have a preferred nickname? The part you highlighted probably worried me the most. I want to be understood on a broad scale, but unlimited in interpretation. Thanks for reading and for your kind words.
[/quote]
People call me Stef.
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Cool, Stef. You can call me Mark or AA or whatever. It's nice to meet you.
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09-28-2011, 11:19 AM
(This post was last modified: 09-28-2011, 11:20 AM by billy.)
hi
it reminds me of a section in the tv series game of thrones.
feels very feudal. drives doesn't feel needed for me on the first line but other than that i like it. it's arthur and the templers and the romans, it's full of testosterone and sadness (doesn't happen often

) i like it a lot.
it's been talked about already (grammar) and of course the poet writes as he/she will. personally if you use periods in the middle of a poem it makes sense to use a cap on the next word. (just a suggestions )
thanks for the read mark
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Billy,
What you're saying makes sense. Before coming here, I always capatalized all the first lines, but I quickly noticed no one here was doing that and I liked the way it looked, so I stopped as well. When the question arose as to whether or not to capatalize after the full stop in this poem, I just didn't. I'll take a serious look at it.
In L1, 'drives' wasn't originally there. After I was happy with the poem, I looked at in in reference to Todd's post: 'The Line.' He was talking about each line being able to stand alone and I felt like nothing was happening in the first line to garner enough interest so I reworded so that I could have a little action in the first line. The title is kind of an 'old hat' expression so I wanted the first line to be a good one. That being said, it might be an unecessary addition and I will give it some thought.
Thanks for taking a look at this and offering your opinions, sir.
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a guilt stain palm
i think it rocks, first off i thought of christ.
it's a great image all on it's own, of course your the boss who decides what's what

if anything i think drives is what makes it a less of a stand alone line..
the title works well. isn't death the ultimate persona non grata
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You definitely have a point

I'll look at it soon. I am heaped up in dactyls right now

I might even cut L1 down to 'guilt stained palm' . . . still not sure. Either way, I appreciate the advice.
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Did a small edit. Thanks for all the help guys
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i like it as 2 stanza
and the 1'st line for me has a lot of depth.
have you thought about extending the piece?
i think a few more stanza with some imagery would wok well.
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Thank Stef for the two stanzas. Although he didn't actually suggest it, his comments lead me to the decision to split it up. Thanks for noticing

and for the suggestion with 'drives.' Without it, 'hard' gets to do a little more work and (to me) proves a more ambiguous choice to bear the load. I haven't thought about adding to it, I am so afraid to go on too long until I get better at this.
Thanks for your help Billy.