Hi Vivek,
I wonder about the wisdom of posting unfinished work to the list-- but I guess that might be a matter of taste. I also don't intend to be insensitive, but let me speak my mind clearly: these seem like notes for a poem much more than a poem itself: the energy flags and picks up, then flags again, in a manner which suggests that the writer is not necessarily paying attention to where it works and where it doesn't.
Yes it is a matter of taste so you don't need to wonder about the wisdom of posting unfinished work...besides I did not find it written anywhere in the group policy that it is forbidden to post "unfinished work".
Glad to know that you did not intend to be "insensitive", for that is exactly what you are being...sorry for speaking my mind so clearly in turn.
These may be notes and these might not be...maybe after a month's revision they would become more of a poem to your taste; but I am not posting for your pleasure only. Yes indeed I did not pay attention to how energy flags, but if you had paid attention in turn, you could have seen that I said it is "barely poetic". Where is it written that a poem in free verse should follow archaic conventions? I wrote this poem or piece because I felt the need to do so. And I sincerely believe that it conveys the pain I felt...if you are blind to it then I regret that.
There is a crisis of subject in this poem-- what is it about? The heart of the poem-- ie. to me the most interesting and meaningful thing about it-- is the lost baby brother, but this is also what the writer seems most afraid of engaging with. To say that "imagination pulls a break" ["imagination makes a break"?] seems like a copout; the poet's duty is not to admit defeat but press the imagination for answers.
You say there is crises of subject in this poem you amaze me it is about death and suffering and if you fail to see that then I cannot give you more obvious explanations.
The heart of the poem is not my lost baby brother . You are hopelessly wrong sir. He died 21 years ago. I mentioned him because his death is the closest example I have of losing someone I loved. When I was writing this piece, I was trying to imagine how it must feel to loose a loved one. To me his memory at times can be distressing even now, then what must be the feelings of those parents who have lost their children just a few days ago?
You say you are not single in your bio do you have kids? Try and imagine their death, let's say in a similar way as the earthquake victims. You know squashed like some bug, bleeding and broken, barely recognizable. If your imagination can work that far, then I must say I am impressed by your courage. For I lack such courage. I cannot think beyond a certain limit of gore. My imagination indeed "pulls a break".
I guess I personally would extract the baby brother part, then try to build a *tight* poem around it, making use of some of the other stuff in the poem, such as going to school etc only if one can has space for it in the new structure.
You may do personally whatever you like and believe me I would not pounce on you the way you did on me. And the school going kids is a major issue with me I would never make them a side issue as you intend to do. I am not writing about my brother, as you clearly fail to see, but about the earth quake victims, so they come first.
I as a reader would want the revision to be deep revision, and not superficial.
Instead of putting up a blunt demand, why don't you illustrate your point with an example, like Mani does.
That would mean taking things like word-choice very seriously. But I have another question for you, on all your work, and I honestly mean it as a question because you do seem to be someone who has read the best of modern poetry in English: what do you see as the status of cliche in your work? My sense is that "cliche" works much better, say, in the South Asian languages, where it is not so much a cliche as a convention, played in tandem with received forms such as the ghazal, where it signals and stays in dialogue with the history of those conventions and forms. Even then, the most major modern poets in the South Asian languages such as Faiz do seem to be able to take conventions such as the "beloved" and recast them with radically new meanings and gestures. In English however, the convention always seems rapidly on the verge of degenerating into cliche, and has become very hard to handle. Someone like Agha Shahid Ali worked with conventions but had to really overhaul their music before they started to work for him. In the work of Plath and Heaney, which you have cited, the main energy comes from a complete avoidance of cliche and predictability [in different waysPlath raises the volume to heavy metal levels while Heaney lowers it to ambient music] and a restless dedication [both of them were/are hardcore revisers, and you can see traces of that immense blood and sweat effort in their work] to keeping the language fresh.
To the above barely understandable tirade I have this to say. First of all, I do not presume to have read all of "the best of modern poetry in English". My knowledge is limited and I am still in stages of infancy as far as writing is concerned. Your "sense" would make more sense if you would care to illustrate your point with constructive criticism instead of a blunt attack. I site the work of Plath and Heaney because I have read them it does not necessarily follow that I should copy them.
I guess I'm saying that I don't see that in your work, and what it sounds to me often is cliched, both in terms of word-choice and in terms of sense perception/ideas.
Now I am very sorry if my work fails to impress you, but like I said before, I am not posting for your pleasure. If you like it, well and good. If you don't then I am sorry. For you see, I am a beginner, just a novice. I don't even pretend to be a poet, let alone impress someone. But you clearly see yourself as an expert and a professional. There is a difference of ten years between us. Now if you wish to teach, why don't you preach less and be more generous with helpful advice. What you have written in your mail is just a malicious attack, nothing else. Believe me I will try to learn if you are willing to do it sincerely.
A second point: perhaps you might experiment with your line breaks a little more, try breaking them in different places? As in the poem below, you almost always break your lines at the end of a clause (where there would be a natural pause anyway) and where the rhyme falls. Letting an end-rhyme chime away, remember, does not absolve you from attention to the integrity and "alive-ness" of the line.
This is the only part of the whole mail that has seemed constructive to me I have tried to understand your point and some of it did make sense. Why don't you, again I repeat, illustrate your point with an example. I would be very grateful to you.
Regards,
Farah.
--- In [email protected], Vivek Narayanan <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
>
> Hi Farah,
>
> I wonder about the wisdom of posting unfinished work to the list-- but I
> guess that might be a matter of taste. I also don't intend to be
> insensitive, but let me speak my mind clearly: these seem like notes for
> a poem much more than a poem itself: the energy flags and picks up, then
> flags again, in a manner which suggests that the writer is not
> necessarily paying attention to where it works and where it doesn't. The
> reader's (at least this reader's) eye tends to wander around the poem
> rather than getting pulled into it. There is a crisis of subject in this
> poem-- what is it about? The heart of the poem-- ie. to me the most
> interesting and meaningful thing about it-- is the lost baby brother,
> but this is also what the writer seems most afraid of engaging with. To
> say that "imagination pulls a break" ["imagination makes a break"?]
> seems like a copout; the poet's duty is not to admit defeat but press
> the imagination for answers. I guess I personally would extract the baby
> brother part, then try to build a *tight* poem around it, making use of
> some of the other stuff in the poem, such as going to school etc only if
> one can has space for it in the new structure. Of course, there could be
> many other options for revision, too, but any way you go, I as a reader
> would want the revision to be deep revision, and not superficial.
>
> That would mean taking things like word-choice very seriously. But I
> have another question for you, on all your work, and I honestly mean it
> as a question because you do seem to be someone who has read the best of
> modern poetry in English: what do you see as the status of cliche in
> your work? My sense is that "cliche" works much better, say, in the
> South Asian languages, where it is not so much a cliche as a convention,
> played in tandem with received forms such as the ghazal, where it
> signals and stays in dialogue with the history of those conventions and
> forms. Even then, the most major modern poets in the South Asian
> languages such as Faiz do seem to be able to take conventions such as
> the "beloved" and recast them with radically new meanings and gestures.
>
> In English however, the convention always seems rapidly on the verge of
> degenerating into cliche, and has become very hard to handle. Someone
> like Agha Shahid Ali worked with conventions but had to really overhaul
> their music before they started to work for him. In the work of Plath
> and Heaney, which you have cited, the main energy comes from a complete
> avoidance of cliche and predictability [in different ways-- Plath raises
> the volume to heavy metal levels while Heaney lowers it to ambient
> music] and a restless dedication [both of them were/are hardcore
> revisers, and you can see traces of that immense blood and sweat effort
> in their work] to keeping the language fresh. I guess I'm saying that I
> don't see that in your work, and what it sounds to me often is cliched,
> both in terms of word-choice and in terms of sense perception/ideas.
>
> A second point: perhaps you might experiment with your line breaks a
> little more, try breaking them in different places? As in the poem
> below, you almost always break your lines at the end of a clause (where
> there would be a natural pause anyway) and where the rhyme falls.
> Letting an end-rhyme chime away, remember, does not absolve you from
> attention to the integrity and "alive-ness" of the line.
>
> Yours,
> Vivek
--
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