The Poets' Graves Workshop

Great work, Ray, with a lovely mixture of description and character. I like the frequency image, although does it need the combination follow - up? I'm not sure a correct frequency can be called a combination? I like the eyes down line.

Richard

Hi,

I think this is quite a difficult theme to explore, especially post-Hughes etc. I like your handling of repetition but not sure it's really adding anything. I felt the 'wavegust' was good though, more Hopkins-esque and engaging the senses than the rest.

Best,
Richard

Hi David, Here are my thoughts for what they are worth: That God hath fixed His canon 'gainst self-slaughter she would have known, if not in just those words. German was her thing, but even if she never knew the Tieck and Schlegel version, in the employ of the SPCK it must - you'd think - be in her ...

I liked it too, lovely echoing and plangent mood. My only nit would be the underwhelming 'is' on the penultimate line of the first stanza, but read against that its simplicity could be what helps make it work. More an opinion than a not actually...

Yours, drenched,
Richard

Hi, I liked it too but agree that the final two stanzas are the strongest. Is 'elaborate' used as a verb or an adjective by the way? Again, I think the last line is ott but I like the summer fruit line, fits with the other imagery and is more subtle. Do you need a comma after toe in final stanza, an...

Bright, breezy and funny poem. How about 'phonic' rather than 'sonic'? I know they are similar in meaning but the 'ph' sound goes well with the 'b' of bonding.

Yours,
Rich the Snitch.

Thanks for the comments. Hi David, good to be back - I'll try and be more habitual poster and critic. Jackie, thank you, I'm glad you feel it has more legs. Hi Pat, I think we may be at odds on this one, politically. I was only five at the time of the first one so not au fait with the rhetoric of th...

Hi JJ,

Thanks for your kind response. It's difficult with this kind of topic to not just moan, isn't it? The language of the Leave campaign needed more scrutiny at the time.

I wonder if this will make sense in a year's time? I hope so but doubt it, I'm afraid.

Thanks again,
Richard

Hi Ray, Thanks for the comments. I was at an Open Mic the other day in Winchester and three-quarters of the poems were Brexit poems! This one steals an image from a piece in the Guardian about the consequences of using anti-immigration rhetoric. I agree about the pruning and the last lines are too m...

You know how this works, right? Never mind, I’m sure you’ve seen how it’s done - you only have to hold the reins and whisper the right words. It’s a hell of a ride. Just don’t look too closely at the company you keep - close your eyes if it helps. This is definitely a heart-over-head experience, and...

Hi David,

I like this very much - the longer version for me. Hill's essays on poetry from his days of Oxford professorship are very interesting about language and religion. Vindicate comes from a sense of avenging and claiming, which I think is appropriate for Hill.

Best wishes,
Richard

I like this - a beautifully handled sonnet. It feels Wordsworthian at times - perhaps the 'exalted' etc. but that is a good thing; it fits the poem well. Crits: Could the 'now' go earlier in the line to avoid 'narrow now'. You would still have your rhyme and although the metre would be a little chop...

Thank you for all your comments - very useful. Glad you like it. Ray, good point - I think you're right: it was the over analysis that lead to the loss of my daughter's natural empathy so your point make good sense. David, I think a 'the' would work as well so will put in. Moth, thank you for the ki...

Each week mum would put a bit by - for life assurance, the Christmas Club and, of course, the encyclopaedias: ten volumes bound in faux red leather. It was the start of it all, an education. I liked the solar system, myths and legends, and animals, especially the insects. There were clear acetate sh...

HI, Some lovely lines here so overall, thank you for sharing this. Some crits though: not keen on the line endings always. Especially 'splintered / wood' - never keen on the adjective noun separation. The blindfold feathered is good. I'm sorry but I also totally agree with Seth and Ros on this one. ...

Hi Ray, I liked the first verse too - good extended play that reads really well and I bet would be excellent to listen to. The German car and the parking ticket material isn't as strong for me though. I think the first bit could be the start of an excellent travelogue poem. It needs that energy of t...

I thought there were some nice things going on but my overall impression was that it was too long and overloaded with portent. Perhaps it was aping the rather overblown Victorian poetry that probably accounted for a fair few neuroses. What I did like: 'the busy broom of the minute hand'; 'grand matr...

I think it just is what it is. Some have skeletons on the, um, loft, and others are working on their murders!

Hi Ros, Thought I would pop by again to see you good folks. I thought the first line held a promise that isn't quite fulfilled. Is 'squat' too easy, perhaps? I'm not keen on 'Time' either. I didn't want the narrator like granite, I wanted them to be granite. I like 'hard-flecked' and the the feet lo...

I liked this but agree that there are quite a lot of images crowding, (rucking?), here. I think it's the transition from handkerchiefs to hieroglyphs that is too big a jump for me. The crow bit is okay and the last part is funny, but lacks the impact of the first half's impression. I think the first...

Hi Geoff,

I should have put the context into the original submission. Sorry for handling that clumsily. 'Blueprint' might work, yes, but the actual thing looks more like a blueprint than this blue print suggests. The doubling of refuse - absolutely right, needs to change.

Thanks for this,
Rich

Hi, Thanks for your comments and thanks especially to Geoff for resizing the image. This is perhaps more of site-specific piece as it to be displayed alongside the artwork, and the artwork itself is more than the image suggests as it's a cynotype pinned down under glass to give it quite a three-dime...

Sorry, it's so big.

Just to give some context that would be with the poem and artwork. The picture is of a blueprint of Winchester Cathedral onto which Russell has marked all the visitors with a pin and the exposed the lithographic paper to the sun, making the bird-like effect. The paper is pinned down on a board and d...

As the marks resonated, did they sound true? Could we tolerate margins of error or latitude? Is there strength in that built by blue ink? It is hard to see without certainty. Why have they flown, gathered, shrouded? Is the date significant? A memorial? Or is it white noise reverberating, striking pa...