Noddy's comments

I read this poem previously on the daily featured poem and commented then what a wonderfully crafted piece of work it was. On reading it again, I’m further taken by its subtle craft (the exquisitely chosen and deployed adverbs for instance), and the manner in which, to borrow from Joseph Conrad, it “makes you see” in ways that you likely hadn’t before. Indeed, the poem itself is “round,” folding back on itself in the concluding roundness of moon and dinner plate. Impressive indeed and more so as it grows on you from successive readings. Thank you for the privilege and I look forward to seeking out your work in the future. more »

Karl: You are most gracious in your comments, and it’s at a time like this when I wish we were sitting having a beer or whatever and discussing your point about poetry as polemic my “conservative “ views of what poetry is. As a lifelong student and admirer of Walt Whitman I’m kinda with the pushing of the boundaries view. But no matter. It’s apples and oranges. All I wish is that all of us keep on keeping on at this wonderful avocation we call the poetic calling. Warmest best wishes, Robert aka Noddy more »

Karl: With respect, I fully understand the power of this polemic, but poetry isn’t polemic, especially polemic that is very prose-like in its presentation. It doesn’t mean that poetry shouldn’t engage with current events, it should. But I struggle to find where the poetry is in your piece. Perhaps we are coming at what poetry is or might be from different perspectives; if so, then please ignore my comments and accept my apologies instead. more »

Now this is what I call a poem! A perfect blending of object and emotion (Eliot’s objective correlative), with a wistfulness that at times raises the hairs on my arms. Even that clitoral earlobe is so delicately introduced and described. A poem full of craft, language choices and sentiment not sentimentality. Stands out from 90% of the poems on this website. Brava! more »

Hi, Interactive user. “Not bad” is as Shakespeare put it, being “damned with faint praise.” A more nuanced response, perhaps pointing out a couple places where the poem doesn’t work for you would have been really useful in helping me to improve, but thanks anyway for taking the time to read it and respond at all. more »

Initially I worried about some of the more flowery diction (I think I still do), as well as the unfortunate lines with internal rhymes (strong…along; flight…light; symbol bright…light) which I believe detracts from what otherwise is an accomplished piece. I say that because it is one of the very few entries whose command of iambic tetrameter is virtually flawless. When this occurs this reader feels immediately in safe hands and can then pay closer attention to the subtleties of what the hummingbird is made to represent. The fragility of the bird with the heavy symbolic weight it is being asked to bear is a major part of the risk/reward of the poem. A thought-provoking poem that shows some deft craft. more »

I voted for this poem because of its nearly flawless use of iambic tetrameters and because a subject that could so easily have turned maudlin and sentimental in the worst way, was always held in check. As a result, the poem is effective and evokes real sentiment and emotion without teetering over into sentimentality.
The iambic tetrameter is the “Hallmark Card” meter of choice, and can become very quickly too sing-song and undercut the message. The poet here shows some skill in keeping those horses under a tight rein. more »

The poem clearly demonstrates how effective a well-considered short poem can be. Not only do we get a clear picture of the father as person and physical being, but the final line asks us to consider wider issues of what gets passed on and down from father to child. Its brevity is its meaning and its charm. more »

This charming poem traces the journey from one state of nature to another by a subtle lesson in English grammar. We watch the physical change mirrored in the changing parts of speech, from one noun “thing” (chrysalis) to another noun “thing” (butterfly) stopping along the way by means of adjectives, participle/gerunds, a transitional series of nouns (transformation being a tad abstract for this living list), then ironically reversed until the noun “thing” of the butterfly emerges.
It’s a small tour de force really, simple yet profound, artful and crafty. Admirable work. more »

With respect Mr He, your obscure and overwrought poem lost me after stanza one, and I have graduate degrees in English Literature. Who might your audience be for such a poem? Is obscurity a marker of profundity? Not for this reader. more »

You are more than welcome for the comment, sincerely meant. It is a fine piece of work, all the more so for the art that conceals the art. Look forward to more. Best, Roy Graham

Many reasons.
From the arresting first line, uncapitalized, hinting at either a struggle with, or a loss of an identity, the poem is sentimental in the best way, exploring the inner conflict occasioned by the multiple societal expectations around the female body.
The craft is here with the near rhymes ( imposter, smaller, water) working as they do with assonance to give iambic 4s a solid backbeat.
In fact, when I read the poem out loud as a rap, it worked perfectly, since much rap also trades on a similar rhythm with its rhymes and near rhymes.
It is with the capitalized last line that the impression is created of someone who is moving on, hopeful, has seen the body shaming/shaping for what it is. The poem has given us a testimony, a personal glimpse into both the mental struggle and the toll taken in trying to “move beyond” certain aspects of the continued body-messaging.
I want to thank the poet for the craft and the courage. more »

I suspect of all the contestants, I’m the only one who, having grown up in Scotland in the 1950s, has gone through the experience the author describes. There are I’m sure for many puzzling allusions that are drawn from the Scottish/Glasgow culture of the time. But I’m not voting for the poem because of its recognition factor or its nostalgia.
In this narrative, the poet shows him/her self as a skillful manipulator of iambic tetrameter in the service of creating this myth-like person The Ragman. With his dented bugle sound echoing in the streets he is the Pied Piper and more. This walking purveyor of dream-balloons barters cast-offs and rags for the excited poor, a momentary stay against their straightened circumstances.
But the poet and his ilk cannot join this merry band of dreamers. He has nothing to barter, and The Ragman in retrospect comes to represent dreams deferred, if not indeed denied.
It’s a poem that works by sharp imagery and the lilting tetrameters draw us into that world and support the wistful tone of the poet as s/he comes closer to understanding the personal and symbolic importance of that long-ago event.
For me, the poem transcends its specific historical and cultural moment to grapple with issues of cross-cultural importance. Kudos and thanks to the poet. more »

One comment made about Wordsworth’s poem that I clearly recall when we discussed this in a poetry group at the local library was: “This is only maybe one step up from a Hallmark card.” I still disagree, but I now find it increasingly easier to acknowledge in what ways it might seem so to some modern readers.

I think it’s the ta tum, ta tum, ta tum, ta tum of Wordsworth’s iambic tetrameter lines that have been copied endlessly over time and to less skilful effect. The Hallmark card comment should offer a note of caution to all of us who might want to explore using this meter ourselves in our own poems and have us re-read Wordsworth who shows us how it’s really done more »

Frost does revel in ambiguity, language that like that fork in the road, can be taken at least two ways. That’s why I always find his final verse so intriguing. What’s with that sigh? What kind of sigh? And he knows already he’ll be telling exactly what ages and ages hence? And what kind of difference has the choice he made back then had on his life? Does the sigh mean he wishes he hadn’t made the choice that made all the difference? I don’t know.
But I’ve read myself into the poem at various times, high and low, in my life, and depending on how I’m feeling the poem “means” something different. more »

In its apparent simplicity the poem actually is deceptively complex. From ‘wild mustang’ to ‘wild wild mustang,’ from the half rhymes ‘restrained, tamed’ to the sense that it’s not a horse that’s being addressed at all but a person, it’s a memorable image and a subtle poem. more »

I admire poetry whose apparent simplicity often conceals, like the pond, hidden depths (think William Blake). The poem is for me at once a fable and a vehicle for some important musings on relationships, death, intuitive knowledge and the discovery of surprising sources of meaning. It can stand (withstand) several readings, and with each one I noted yet another detail, another subtle change of tone and voice that added to its haunting ending. It’s crafty and artful both. All we can ask. more »

You are of course correct about the folks on the website in every respect, their motivation and their poetic preferences. Where we part company I think is over the issue of what you call technicality and I’d prefer to call craft. I truly believe we can have tears and technique. The so-called judging criteria that gets dutifully attached every month nudges us toward taking tears and technique into consideration when we’re responding and I tried to do that when responding to your poem. That it came off as heavy-handed to you I regret. I simply subscribe to the notion that every writer/artist has to at some time get to grips with the craft involved in any creative act. It’s clear to me from many readings of your poem you yourself were striving for craft. We’re not so far apart really.
My thanks for your honesty. We can keep the conversation going any time you like! Cheers  more »

Although the poem is at odds with itself both rhythmically and metrically (the abcb slips up in the second verse, recovers and just hangs on; the 5 3 4 3 iambic pattern also slips up in verses 3,4 and 6) and could use another round or two of revisions, for this reader the poem was engaging on a visceral level.
The central metaphor of a legacy, a “carrying forward “ as the poet puts it, that sense of unfulfilled potential finally brought to fulfillment, of debts paid in the very person of the son and his willingness to pick up those”shreds”(shards?),“sedentary” (sedimentary?) aspects of a life less lived than undergone, is forcefully captured in the overall wistful tone of the poem.
Although the momentary lapses of craft cause the poem to stumble and intrude slightly on its overall success, these are more than redeemed in the strong imagery and the elegiac quality of the whole. Ah yes, mothers and sons. more »