Poetry Forum

I don't see a way to read the issue; it must be a print publication.

Congratulations, Ray.

Into the Wilderness (version 2 -- free verse) As a hedge against damnation, the preacher made himself the strictest of the strict interpreters of precious texts, so to convince God of his impeccable faith; but men who hedge their faith are men who feign. When his reckoning came, God discerned his s...

Thank you. I'll see what I can do to get rid of the explaining.

Did I manage to improve the poem at all?

In my opinion, "deaf ears" is a bit of a cliché. I would go for something a little different:

Even though he is still alive I talk
about him in the past tense,
to myself, mostly, and to those
who never learned to listen.

Thanks for the suggestions, guys.

Believe it or not, I think the poem does need a little trimming, if only because phases like "symbolic meaning" aren't particularly poetic. I'll work on it, but I'll probably come up with something a little different.

The James Wright poem is interesting.

Thanks, Tony!

It may develop into something a little more.

Unwrapping the Truth (version 3) The thumb print on the dust jacket of Alicia Stallings’ new book tells me more than that the Amazon clerk forgot to wash his hands after a lunch of fried chicken; compared to such blossoms as I find inside, my efforts are oily smudges, and my pride a grease trap fro...

I gather that Clay is a character in the Bible, right? I suspect there is a story in there that would make the meaning of this poem more apparent.

I like the poem, John, but I'm too tired to critique it.

I love the last stanza. The rest of it feels like it needs work. I'm not experiencing your usual excellent flow. I haven't scanned the meter, so I don't know if that's the problem. The rhyme, as you know, is uneven. It's interesting how writing poetry works. I was writing a poem once and the languag...

Thank you, John.

I tried cutting it down but decided that the story was in the details. I'll look at it again.

The Matchmaker (a bit more concise, but not much) My co-worker wants to be a match-maker. What she gets from it, I don’t know, some masturbatory delight. She has a gay friend she wants me to meet. I say no, and then no again, and then again and again and again when she won’t shut up. I know how the...

Thank you, John. I agree. On the other forum, someone suggested another ending mentioning a bandage (not the one I inserted here), and I wanted the opinion of this group, which seems to be more focussed on life-death issues.

I am knocking this to the top because I now have two one-line endings, and I'd like to know which one the group prefers. Thanks!

Thank you, guys. I'm aware that it is okay to write about the Big Issues (life, death, etc.), but I do want to bring something new to it.

Hope There are some things I can’t fathom, like the mother who sat by her sick and dying son for forty years, and was consumed by grief when he finally passed, but not by relief, and immediately sought out other sick people to care for. He’d become so feeble that he couldn’t move from his bed, coul...

Stranger, I noticed that you hadn't gotten any responses to this poem, so I thought I would say something. I don't see a lot of artistry in it. The whole idea of poetry is to write what you are saying in a way that makes the language itself appeal to the mind. This poem sounds like a prosaic rant to...

Thank you, John. The contrived conversation on that site is a little hard to swallow, but I get the point.

That's a gorgeous poem, John. You certainly have the knack for writing beautifully. I am putting that in my file of other authors' beautiful poetry.

Is "stamping grounds" another way of saying "stomping grounds"?

Thanks again! I visited a bunch of grammar sites. Most of them said both were right. I'll be using "whom".

Thank you, John!

Sorry I haven't been participating much recently. I had a huge blow-up with a government agency to the point where I started to search for an attorney. My tension level was off the charts.

Which one is right, who or whom? Some grammar sites are telling me that both are okay.

Of Love, Caring and Cuts “Thank you for caring for those you love.” That’s what the lid flap says on this box of Band-Aids. It doesn’t say, “Thank you for loving those you love” or “Thank you for caring for those you care for.” Those would be redundant. Is there a poet working at Johnson & John...

That's a wonderful poem, John. Truly. Very nice ending.

I flamed out at Amethyst, not surprisingly.

I'm also writing more in iambic tet, although my meter is looser than yours. I'll restrict myself to 8 or 9 syllables and let the beats fall where they choose to fall. However, I don't seem to be writing much lately. Hopefully that will end soon.