PL's Peak: Guide to Poetry and Critique (feedback/discuss!)

Why are you here?

I'm here for the poetry guide!	45.1%	[ 594 ]
I'm here for the critiquing guide!	18.8%	[ 248 ]
I'm here because someone else pointed me here.	6.1%	[ 80 ]
I'm here for the gold. Didn't it say it had a poll?	30.0%	[ 396 ]
Total Votes:			[ 1318 ]

[Poetess Laureate]

mahoganycow

Grimaldi

I guess nobody has any objections to anything I said?

Actually I just don't think anyone read it.


@PL-THIS HELPED A LOT. Particularly the section on linebreaks, but the part about symbolism/metaphors/similes was also a big help.

Heh thanks. Enjambment and spacing are techniques -- which is part of why I pretty much always see centering a poem as a negative; it takes out that entire possible dimension.

[Grimaldi]

mahoganycow

Grimaldi

I guess nobody has any objections to anything I said?

Actually I just don't think anyone read it.

I can take out the punctuation and vowels if that's what you're used to.

[Poetess Laureate]

Grimaldi

mahoganycow

Grimaldi

I guess nobody has any objections to anything I said?

Actually I just don't think anyone read it.

I can take out the punctuation and vowels if that's what you're used to.

This is not a place for cattiness.

[Uncle Moth]

Grimaldi, I read what you wrote three times.


And I still haven't got a clue what you're actually saying, other than IMAGES GOOD. confused

[[BombazineDoll]]

Uncle Moth

Grimaldi, I read what you wrote three times.


And I still haven't got a clue what you're actually saying, other than IMAGES GOOD. confused

I read this about a week ago and I had few to no objections then, nor do I now. My eyes are burning too much for me to go back and read it in depth right now, but my understanding here is that Grimaldi is making a case for not so much "show, don't tell". It's a convenient phrase that we in the OP/L use, for sanity's sake, in addition to things like "read the stickies".

What human beings will always come back to is writing that encapsulates the human experience. In her opinion, there are times when writers are so focused on using imagery to convey a feeling that we ignore the myriad of other devices available to us. What we mean by "show, don't tell" has slowly developed in "tell with imagery, don't just tell". Emotion and experience can be expressed through so many things in life. Touching an object can conjure up a memory, smelling something can transport us to a place in time and space. Why must that be different in poetry. In making imagery our most utilised poetic device, we have ignored the other four senses precisely because it is much harder to convey them on paper, a media relying on sight.

For instance, last week I wrote a poem that I intended as a microcosm of the ocean. While I used ocean and water-based imager, I also made the conscious decision to use couplets in a form where each succeeding couplet included a piece of the previous couplet. In my rationale, I wanted the reader to be hit again and again with the emotions conveyed in each couplet, the way waves hit the shore.

When I was younger, I wrote a poem about two peoples' unconsummated summer relationship. Because these two people never touched, I was forced to examine their feelings through their physical exchanges: letters, gifts, notes, &c. without weighing the poem down by expressing what was actually in the notes. As writers, we can wield as little or as much power over our reader as possible. This does not make us immovable dictators, however, because each reader possesses a free and rebelious mind and poetry is the farthest thing from the art of subjugation. We must both control the reader's train of thought while allowing themselves to consider various possibilities. In order to do that, we must postulate and anticipate what those possibilities are.


What I think Grimaldi is getting at is, in using the grandest and wildest ideas as basis for our imagery (see: millions of dying alien babies) we are losing readers some, because we have at last failed to consider the recieving end of our poetry: the reader. Consideration of the reader is a must, because we in part, seek to direct their minds and their thoughts for at least a little while. Above all, yes, imagery = good and it's what most obviously makes a something poetic, but a poem is a delicate confection of wording and images and smells and noises and all sorts of things.

Above all, I think she's saying that a poet needs to be extremely judicious about their choices in the construction of their poetry.

[Uncle Moth]

Ahh. I see. Thanks, Bombie, that does make sense. Reading it again, I feel a lot less stupid. xd Lot of things to think about there.

Mmm. Reading over my poems, I refer a lot to how things smell, taste, and so on. I have slight synaesthesia issues outside of my writing, anyway, so I think that carries over quite a lot. Generally I use 'imagery' as a blanket term to refer to all the senses rather than just sight, simply because it's never really occurred to me before that sight is separate. When I see something- even if I'm in no way thinking about poetry- I don't just see it, I also imagine all the associated sensory experiences- what it feels like, tastes like, smells like.

[Poetess Laureate]

While I agree with what Bombie is saying, I came away from the other post with a sense of 'imagery good' (as others have) and 'use graspable images that aren't too opaque". Important, but fairly self-evident.

So to bring us back to conversation: What are some good litmus tests for whether a piece/line/image is working well or whether it's shutting out the readers? Sometimes it's obvious, and a critique highlighting the confusion finds the response: "It's about *fill in event the writer and person they had in mind while writing shared together*"

Do we have any advice to avoid that beyond the obvious "make sure your audience will get something out of this"? How does the writer make sure their audience will get something out of it? All I can really think of is exercise: have someone completely outside read the piece (and since we're on a critique forum with many people, what better place?)

[Poetess Laureate]

Cute_Mini_Keet

I was recently almost the victim of a major scam involving my poetry. This is from a company known as the "Famous Poets Society" that also goes by different names.
These names are:
Hollywood's Famous Poets Society
Celestial Arts
F P S
Famous Poets Society
New Jersey Rainbow Poets
New York Poetry Alliance
Texas Poetry Alliance
Free Poetry Contest
International Library of Famous Poets
Quarterly Poetry Contest
Reno Fine Arts Institute
Florida Literary Guild
If you go to their website Famouspoets.com they have an entry form for poems.
After you enter your poem, they will usually email or snail mail you with ridiculous offers such as the following gems:
An anthology of poems with yours included for $50.00
An invatation to a convention where you will recieve an award for over $1000.00 eek
If your don't go to the convention you can get your awards for a shipping charge of a ******** $300!!!
And finally, you can get to be on their newest TV show! Which they neglect to mention the name of!
Convinced yet? Well here's some more stuff...
The "Poetry Editor" goes by the name of Lavender Aurora
The man behind all this, John Campbell, goes by many different names.
They talk of a man named DR. Kenneth Fan. If you try to look him up on the internet, he comes up as a freelance photographer, not a "distinguished Poet Laureate of the Republic of China."
Any poem, regardless of how stupid or bad (as long as it's under 21 lines) is eligible for an award.
I feel stupid for almost falling for this. I want my poetry out of their hands. And you know what really hurts? I believed this for a moment. The poem I gave was one of my most precious, because it described my innermost feelings after my first bird's death. I though someone appreciated it. Someone who was worth my time, not like this scum. So please, don't fall for it like I did.

Websites: http://www.badbusinessbureau.com/reports/0/004/ripoff0004506.htm
windpub.com/literary.scams/famous.htm
www.scam.com/showthread.php?t=1037

[Aged Cherry Twizzlers]

what happened to the stickiness?

[Poetess Laureate]

Aged Cherry Twizzlers

what happened to the stickiness?

Not to worry! Simply a quick edit of the first post (which cannot be edited by me without un-stickying) so that I can shift around the table of contents and things likely to be edited. It'll be re-stickied soon.

As a side note, that scam list will end up being a fun place to point people to who stand on them as credentials. >_>

[Follow My Lied]

Poetess Laureate

As a side note, that scam list will end up being a fun place to point people to who stand on them as credentials. >_>

I dunno.

They sound credible.

That'd be like giving someone with a headache a placebo

then laughing about it.


Or something. xp

Maybe?

[Poetess Laureate]

Follow My Lied

Poetess Laureate

As a side note, that scam list will end up being a fun place to point people to who stand on them as credentials. >_>

I dunno.

They sound credible.

That'd be like giving someone with a headache a placebo

then laughing about it.


Or something. xp

Maybe?

Hahaha. No, I meant we can point to proof their big credential is a scam. I am cruel.

EDIT: I should mention I am referring to the "you suck for critiquing me because I am published" people. Not the nice ones who just happened to get taken in by a scam I happen to hate because it plays on people's hopes.

[Follow My Lied]

In some other dude's thread

you said something like: "You pick up a rhyme scheme, but then lose it half way. Don't do that. Either keep one or don't."

And I thought to myself: Why?



so...


Why?

[Poetess Laureate]

Follow My Lied

In some other dude's thread you said something like: "You pick up a rhyme scheme, but then lose it half way. Don't do that. Either keep one or don't."

And I thought to myself: Why? so...

Why?

Heh heh. As with any 'rule', it has exceptions.

Basically, any time you set the reader up to expect something, deliver -- unless there's a reason not to. A rhyme scheme is a pattern; the reader expects it to continue. (Similarly, while incidental rhyme can be very cool, if the piece overall has no pattern to its sound, we don't expect it to suddenly pick one up for a stanza or two.) When expectations are 'foiled', it's jarring, plain and simple.

That can be a good thing, or at least appropriate, to signal a shift in voice, tone, tense, theme... to herald some big, dramatic, change. The impression is, "Oh, I was prepared to be shaken up a bit, and now I'm shaken up a bit. Cool."

But overall it tends to be done just as randomly as the piece itself now becomes -- and that makes the craft seem slipshod. Now ('now' being times there isn't a clear point to the change) the impression is "Oh, the writer couldn't maintain the pattern they started. How disappointing." 'Couldn't do it' implies lack of ability, and that's definitely negative. If we go back to 'poetry and craft are about eliciting the response you want from your readers', I think it's safe to assume that isn't the one desired.