Todski's Trivial Thoughts on

i think tess' first stanza sums up the physical appearance of Walter by letting us fill in the blanks around the words 'effort'. 'doctor's orders' and 'leans on his cane'.
She throws in that single word 'rebels', which tells us - or, again, allows us to flesh out - something of his character. There's a little bite left to the old dog. I'd question the punctuation surrounding 'he is no voyeur'. Those last 6 lines could use a tickle to make them read just a hint sweeter, maybe just a touch of readjustment to where words sit... something like 'About to turn back/he glances over the lake;/no voyeur,/he cannot pull his eyes away,/leans on his cane/afraid to blink.' or 'he's no voyeur/but cannot pull his eyes away,/leans on his cane/afraid to blink.'

His lonely walk takes effort,
oppressive heat,
no shade or breeze.
Doctor's orders, still he rebels.
About to turn back
he glances over the lake,
he is no voyeur,
cannot pull his eyes away
but leans on his cane
afraid to blink.

Breathtaking,
pale against dark ripples,
she bends, splashes a hand
as she wades. Water consumes her,
knees,
thighs
and, as it laps at her buttocks
she turns to reveal a dark triangle
and chill-sharpened nipples.
Eyes blissfully closed she falls

Everything neat, not overworked, lots of sibilance for the water theme. Love the break between 'falls' here and 'backwards', accentuating that moment of space in an almost slow-mo moment. Neato!

backwards, submerging
then surfacing, her hair slick.
He realizes she is unaware
of an audience, aches to join
her in cool youth.
Seconds it seems, he is naked too,
knee deep, then at her side
in a lazy crawl
he hasn't done for years.
She smiles, unsurprised.
Swims beside him
easily.

Personally, I don't find too much of an issue with 'cool youth' as i find it brings the vestiges of Walter's age-awareness to meet with the beguiling temperature of the lake water in a contrast with the heat and oppressive nature of his enforced walk.

"I hoped you'd join me."
"You saw me then?"
"No I felt your presence,
your need." She dives.
He gasps
as her lips find him,
a sucking sea-thing.
He is sinking,
dreaming, swimming gill-like above her.
They break in turmoil
both breathless,
he hasn't felt this way,
perhaps for ever.

the 'sucking sea-thing' embraces the naiad concept, despite the lack of a physical tail although there's room for the reader to add from their own expressions, perhaps, 'a bit of tail'. I really like that 'gill-like' image, as though she's sucking air through him, as she sucks his force.

His hand explores, a thick,
throbbing dowel grows
from his groin.
Her hand is there,
guiding him, warmth gloves him
in sweet softness as her legs wrap him.
He bucks her mulishly,
every muscle, joint
and part working as it should,
as it could in younger years.

Best lines of the piece, for me, for their solidity (ouch) and easy deliverance: His hand explores, a thick,/throbbing dowel grows/from his groin. Also like Tess' choice of 'bucks', again with its connotations, sound links to what the reader mentally links it with.

They swim and float as one,
he rooted in her,
she nurtures his desire until,
with a howl of submission,
his release echoes over still waters.

Very much like the 'rooted' and last 2 lines of this stanza. It all works for me; it's primal and reaching, yet the word 'submission' gives it a twist that this is not so much just about sexual desire and release but her taking something from him, a willing victim, granted.

She sinks now,
below and away,
he can see her smile
so clear is the water,
until she twists
fish-like and is gone.

Very clear visuals, and, if it weren't for the undercurrents of her almost stealing something from him, could be romantic-erotic. Since it's about eroticism, the unexpected, the water-play, the urgency and deep release and not really about romance, it works exactly as it should.

Sorry Harry had to

Alternate Libation
Poet HarryHill

starting the poem with downward decent, adding "long before eyes opened" puts in a dream like quality


I walked down the hill today
long before eyes opened

sat under cedars, gives a sense of scale to the trees, without being descriptive of them in general, for some reason I have taken note of colours a lot in poems of late, "limestone blocks of grey" give it a kind of off kilter pitch,
"spring house walls", and "water runs sweet, indicate to me that this is a happy kind of dream, in the first stanza. there is so much happening in this sonically long "Oo" in roof, through, roof's, ru-ins, "Ee" cedars, beside, sweet, retreat, the words just resonate with each other adding a musicality that is subtle but adds depth.


sat under cedars
beside limestone blocks of grey
spring house walls, roof long gone
where water still runs sweet
through ruins of roofs retreat

Looks like we have looped back to the start , the change to 'fore dawn' adds an element of foreboding that this time things aren't as sweet as they seemed, the switch to archaic is a second line of off kilter word choice but for me highlights a change.
deep basin filled with silt, for me shows the "sweet water" is gone,

the link of balls, for a man generally is a direct link to his masculinity, like an internal challenge, so if the N could just clear it then sweet water is going to flow again

balls, crawl
claustrophobic walls, harsh a sounds that hammer a point home, the word claustrophobic brings to mind compression, like the walls are going to crush the N
which is re-hashed with "press of stone found there" the rhyme scheme with raised hackles in my hair nearly does that to me sitting in my chair, as if those walls might just crush me.

I walked down the hill 'fore dawn
to a deep basin filled with silt
knowing I could clear it all
if I just had the balls to crawl
inside those claustrophobic walls
knee deep in mud and scoop
but the press of stone found there
raised hackles in my hair

final lines address that it was actually a dream, but not a good one, cold sweats, from all that stone, crushing, compressing, final line says it all, even if it is a mis-spell (butters) no one likes fluoridated city water, but if it keeps us away from those god damn blocks of death then I'll drink to that

woke me up, chilled, feverish
craving a tall glass
of fluorinated city water

(hope that wasn't too painful Harry)

Those were interesting thoughts, tod.

Some questions about sounds:
Does the 'e' in 'cedar' sound like 'ee' in sweet? What about the 'e' in 'besides'? In my mind, it sounds like the 'a' in 'way'.

About the poem. I was thinking whether I should try to understand this. Sometimes I feel like I'm prying. But, anyway... The first part:

I walked down the hill today
long before eyes opened

It tells me that the first stanza is a dream. So the scene that comes after it is imagined:

sat under cedars
beside limestone blocks of grey
spring house walls, roof long gone
where water still runs sweet
through ruins of roofs retreat

Perhaps this person is remembering a place from the past. What came to my mind was a childhood's playground. After the pause, he once again walks down the hill, so this time, it's supposedly in real life, as if he had awoken with a sense of purpose and decided to visit that place from his dream:

I walked down the hill 'fore dawn
to a deep basin filled with silt

The scene isn't nice anymore, it isn't as he remembers, no more cedars, or spring walls, or sweet water. Only dust and claustrophobic walls. He knows he could make this place as it was in his dreams / past:

knowing I could clear it all
if I just had the balls to crawl
inside those claustrophobic walls
knee deep in mud and scoop
but the press of stone found there
raised hackles in my hair

However, the "press of stone" (the thought of crawling in there) stops him. Here he "wakes up", and you can think that this was also an actual dream, but perhaps it is a proverbial dream, and he "woke up" in the sense that he realizes he's not really willing to crawl in there. He craves "city water", that is, to return from whence he came:

woke me up, chilled, feverish
craving a tall glass
of fluorinated city water

I think.

damn you and your fancy italics
any one is welcome to opinion here, I ask all poets before I post these up, to make sure they are ok with people discussing their work, your thoughts add different perspectives, we don't always see the same things or have the same opinions, so it helps to have others voicing theirs in the idea of creating a better understanding of poetry in general, plus I miss things and if someone points something out I can, ohh and ahh too lol

for me cedar is pronounced cee-da, be-sides it is more the e sound running of the first part of the word, there again it may also be dialect and accents that change these sounds around not to mention you are dealing with an oversized monkey

todski28 said:

for me cedar is pronounced cee-da, be-sides it is more the e sound running of the first part of the word, there again it may also be dialect and accents that change these sounds around not to mention you are dealing with an oversized monkey

Click to expand...

Aren't we all? We try to disguise it. When I shave (babyface), I can almost fool myself looking into the mirror. Almost.

Thank you for explaining the sounds.

Cedar sea dur

gleaning
Poet Greenmountaineer

I have neglected thoughts and commenting for too long now, so back to work

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gleaning first a definition that I needed to unlock the poem, without it I was totally lost.

According to the Holiness Code and the Deuteronomic Code of the Torah, farmers should leave the corners of their fields unharvested, and they should not attempt to harvest any left-overs that had been forgotten when they had harvested the majority of a field.[2][3][4] On one of the two occasions that this is mentioned by the Holiness Code, it adds that, in vineyards, some grapes should be left ungathered,[5] an argument made also by the Deuteronomic Code.[6]

These verses additionally argue that olive trees should not be beaten on multiple occasions, and whatever remains from the first set of beatings should be left.[7] According to the Holiness Code, these things should be left for the poor and for strangers,[3][5] and the Deuteronomic Code commands that it should be left for widows, strangers, and paternal orphans.[4][6][7] The Book of Ruth features gleaning by the widow Ruth to provide for herself and Naomi, also a widow.[8]

New Testament[edit]

Jesus and his disciples practiced a form of gleaning as they walked through grain fields breaking off heads of wheat to eat.[9]

The expectation to glean rather than beg, steal, or covet is a basis for Paul's seemingly harsh injunction: "Whoever does not work, neither shall he eat."II Thessalonians 3:10[10]

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

GM basially explains what it is in the first stanza

Sam wouldn't harvest to the edge of fields
to monetize more fertile property
and profit his last will and testament.

his use of subtle internal rhyme sets a tonality that is engaging and leads you into the poem
for me the i's and e's are so prominent that it creates a good sonic impression

the whole first stanza seems to sets up a thought pattern regarding a farmers relationship with land, government and god.

(the first stanza your focus seems to be on the land itself, with the other thoughts as undercurrents)
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

He looked outside at omnivorous men,
collecting snap peas and carrots at dusk,
taking perhaps what the government gave
before they took all they could from others

the straight forward explanatory narrative, seems to overlay the initial stanzas three dimensional thought pattern,

"omnivorous men"
seems to come from archaic speech to link with "testament"

snap peas and carrots the land

obviously government is the third but pointed out directly

is where my main focus was in this stanza everything else to me is set below the surface,
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

"Or maybe they didn't," he said.

"There are no coupons for fresh vegetables,"
Sam was thinking maybe to God
he thought existed, maybe not.

He warmed his farm feet before the fire
and took off socks to darn tomorrow.

government seems to drop out of the narration here, and it turns to god and land,

"or maybe they didn't"

dismisses the government element to the narration as a secondary thought process,
"there are no coupons for fresh vegetables"
takes the land and places it as a tertiary thought process,
leaving

God, and the questioning of his existence,

the final line the use of darn with multiple definitions leave you wondering which interpretation is being used, is he going to "darn" them by fixing holes in them, is he going to darn them by putting them back on, or is it

he took of his socks to darn tomorrow

that his lack of faith in god means he will darn (be damned tomorrow)
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

sorry to gm if I have made a total mess of meaning, interpretation and comments, but this is where my head went in depth to the piece.

any others comments, thoughts interpretations etc are welcome and appreciated

5 senses poem

Snowblind
http://forum.literotica.com/showthread.php?p=54542954#post54542954
poetess Desejo

this whole poem to me reads as if it shrouded in a blizzard, the title gives me an immediate linkage to the poem and drives it as if filtered through snow

Mountains stencilled faint
Misted in blizzard white
Steam exhales plumes
slow last breaths
From Untasted hot chocolate
hands Clenched in ceramic prayer

the first lines begin the hazy effect of what I imaging looking through snow would be like,
there is no direct mention of a person but the line

"slow last breaths" is devastating especially in conjunction with the word blizzard,
the use of misted and steam exhales adds to the smoky element,

Desejo manages to link each line in this stanza in what appears to be thematic couplets
which allows you to build the narrative interlocking and imprinting it. the themes I saw I list below

mountain stencilled
blizzard white

steam exhales
last breaths

hot chocolate
ceramic prayers

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

In an hour, maybe two
Dogs will howl and
Dig, tunnel, uncover
A glove, a hat
His forehead

the dogs allude to a search party going out to a rescue,
the narrative is perfectly developed and gives me a sense of a dig taking place as each element is uncovered

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
a second theme ran across a stanza from

his forehead uncovered too,

how it burned once
Under her hand
How he kicked off blankets
Even when sleeping

Do his feet now kick
a blanket too heavy to move
Is his forehead cold

this impacts so heavily as it brings to mind a mother contemplating his past, of fevers and pain that a mother helps to heal,
the theme of blanket being kicked off
and the allusion to a blanket of snow collide the images together bringing past and present into focus, is his forehead cold the allusion of death.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

He smelled of pine
When she whispered goodbye

instantly the first line brings to mind for me the cliché of being in a pine box or coffin, but it is done with a scent, it brings the cliché to the fore with out stating it.
you build all the other details of who these people are and how/why what happened etc, powerful writing in my opinion.

http://forum.literotica.com/showthread.php?p=49449266#post49449266

thoughts on this piece soon

Tristesse2 said:

And thank you both for your considered observations.

I used the "cool youth" line to reach several points...

1. Walter's longing for youth and "coolness" once more.

2. to emphasize the age discrepancy.

3. to re-enforce the heat of the day and the delicious cool of the lake.

I stand by it still, I like the "oo" echo and it precedes the slow crawl as W swims to her side.

Click to expand...

points taken, re: "oo", susssstain it, the audience is a moooron, sometimes you have to drill it...
1 and 2 seemed obvious, use of it tends to the sarcastic, sure you want?
further clarification
re: further clarification 10,000 ways to read 'em and I am wrong about half the time (I should clarify this also)
re: subjective opinion (do I hear an echo in the house) is arrived at by a set of assumptions, sometimes that set is next to null and it will not contain much, where it has value is where it begins to overlap with yours *see venn diagram.

re: assumptions
The most common assumption of poetry is that it must rhyme. *foot note needed
The second most is probably that is doesn't reach the end of the page.

*footnote - fuck it, I lost the paper years ago.

Keep in mind, you define the your circle of the Venn

todski28 said:

gleaning
Poet Greenmountaineer

I have neglected thoughts and commenting for too long now, so back to work

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gleaning first a definition that I needed to unlock the poem

................

any others comments, thoughts interpretations etc are welcome and appreciated

Click to expand...

Pretty insightful, Tod, IMO, although I might add it matters little whether God is or isn't. He did it because it was a good thing to do no matter whether those omniverous men stole from the government or not (as if a welfare cheat was ever going to get rich.)

If there were a subtitle it would be Voluntary Simplicity.

twelveoone said:

points taken, re: "oo", susssstain it, the audience is a moooron, sometimes you have to drill it...
1 and 2 seemed obvious, use of it tends to the sarcastic, sure you want?
further clarification
re: further clarification 10,000 ways to read 'em and I am wrong about half the time (I should clarify this also)
re: subjective opinion (do I hear an echo in the house) is arrived at by a set of assumptions, sometimes that set is next to null and it will not contain much, where it has value is where it begins to overlap with yours *see venn diagram.

re: assumptions
The most common assumption of poetry is that it must rhyme. *foot note needed
The second most is probably that is doesn't reach the end of the page.

*footnote - fuck it, I lost the paper years ago.

Keep in mind, you define the your circle of the Venn

Click to expand...

I welcome all opinions, assumptions and criticism no matter how opaque. My thanks for reading it at all. I hope my foot didn't do a Venn on yours.

todski28 said:

Snowblind
http://forum.literotica.com/showthread.php?p=54542954#post54542954
poetess Desejo

this whole poem to me reads as if it shrouded in a blizzard, the title gives me an immediate linkage to the poem and drives it as if filtered through snow

Mountains stencilled faint
Misted in blizzard white
Steam exhales plumes
slow last breaths
From Untasted hot chocolate
hands Clenched in ceramic prayer

the first lines begin the hazy effect of what I imaging looking through snow would be like,
there is no direct mention of a person but the line

"slow last breaths" is devastating especially in conjunction with the word blizzard,
the use of misted and steam exhales adds to the smoky element,
ceramic prayers

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

In an hour, maybe two
Dogs will howl and
Dig, tunnel, uncover
A glove, a hat
His forehead

the dogs allude to a search party going out to a rescue,
the narrative is perfectly developed.................

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

He smelled of pine
When she whispered goodbye......

Click to expand...

Somene once what you stand for has a lot to do with where you're seated. Although Alzhemer's disease may not have entered Desejo's mind when she drafted the poem, it did for me because my wife and I are dealing with it literally next door with her mother.

greenmountaineer said:

Pretty insightful, Tod, IMO, although I might add it matters little whether God is or isn't. He did it because it was a good thing to do no matter whether those omniverous men stole from the government or not (as if a welfare cheat was ever going to get rich.)

If there were a subtitle it would be Voluntary Simplicity.

Click to expand...

the most important part is this, that his charity is of noble intention as opposed to simply doing it because he had too, thanks for the addition and the permission to take a look at this piece.

greenmountaineer said:

Somene once what you stand for has a lot to do with where you're seated. Although Alzhemer's disease may not have entered Desejo's mind when she drafted the poem, it did for me because my wife and I are dealing with it literally next door with her mother.

Click to expand...

one of those ah, ha moments that helps to bridge the personal interpretation of poetry, where I responded to the lineation of the story, you have found a metaphor and if you take into account the entire poem it really can be interpreted in that manner, the psychological imprinting of loss is so powerful in this piece that when you pointed out the metaphorical attributes I realised you could equate this to so many other things where loss is the central theme.

\thank you gm for helping me see

todski28 said:

http://forum.literotica.com/showthread.php?p=49449266#post49449266

thoughts on this piece soon

Click to expand...

apparently soon is six months later any way here we go,

I love the opening line of this piece, the cliché used as a set up that links with a mini mart, giving it the clichéd meaning "small potatoes" and also a literal sense of examining small potatoes, the way the piece zooms out to a larger picture, so succinctly described as to really draw you in. then looping back to small potatoes as if it's all just not worth it.

I love the repetitious "p" sound it's almost like some one spitting in the gutter in disgust.
(thanks to a 1201 poem and his comment on it I noticed this)

It's small potatoes
mini mart off a boulevard
never mind where America is

full on nondescript pass you by
in a gritty blink bodegas
and cracked pavement plastic
bags that dance in the whoosh
of passing cars.
It's small potatoes

____________________________________________________________________________
the introduction of Jack and his hunger, its raw hold, I love the use of "fucking rain" the weight placed perfect. as if it's said looking at an overcast sky, not in anger but in acceptance of how hard it is, it may as well be raining. the interlink of hurts behind the eyes/blinding sun is good juxtaposition.

but Jack is hungry itch and ache.
You know the kind that drags
you down in mucky malaise
hurts behind the eyes
blinding Sun or fucking rain.
____________________________________________________________________________

this next bit I just love how so much is expressed in so few words and for me could almost stand as a poem in its own right. how much simpler it would be to just be eyes closed lapping up some sun to get you moving, and the use of heat after showing us rain cements how much better life would be. I feel the key into the next stanza is "how easy this life would be"

He'd rather be asleep.
He'd rather be a lizard
on a rock drinking up heat,
eyes closed dreaming
of nothing at all.
____________________________________________________________________________

bang of an ending, interplays

gun/bam
tracks/train/long whistle

love the rhyme of what and pops,
then red and fed the final lines state it all and leaves me feeling the life over, the true waste of it all, mom falls red is an interesting phrase and hits the emotion button hard for me.

Life is hard. A gun is easy
money bam and out
like tracks follow train.
It doesn't matter one long whistle.
It doesn't matter anymore.
So what if Pops screams NO

and Mom falls red?
So what? Is Jack sated?
Hunger fed? No.

Simply over, simply shit
on shingles.

Thanks for the [permission top look at this angeline. if anyone else has any thoughts on this or any other piece in here please join in.

Thanks for sharing your thoughts on it tods.

Six months later I think it is a decent poem but I don't like the last two lines. I know I can come up with something better than that! This is why I rarely consider a poem finished. You take some time and your perspective changes on what does (and doesn't) work.

Angeline said:

Thanks for sharing your thoughts on it tods.

Six months later I think it is a decent poem but I don't like the last two lines. I know I can come up with something better than that! This is why I rarely consider a poem finished. You take some time and your perspective changes on what does (and doesn't) work.

Click to expand...

heh, with a final line change you can affect the whole final emotional impact of the piece, as it stands now to me it is resignation, as if it is simply the way it was always going to end, flat and leaves a sense of his life being nothing more than a bird shit on the roof.

could be shifted in a lot of different ways. if you ever feel like editing it id be interested in seeing it. for some reason I still love the raw first draft.

todski28 said:

Simply over, simply shit
on shingles.

Thanks for the [permission top look at this angeline. if anyone else has any thoughts on this or any other piece in here please join in.

Click to expand...

Simply put, simply shit
on a shingle.

as I understand it "shit on a shingle" is a creamed something or other on toast
"put" adds the P and T sound, "over" lacks, I changed to singular to solidify that food linkage

http://www.cooksinfo.com/shit-on-a-shingle-recipe
I gather this may possibly be what you were referring to 1201?

where as I took it to be shit on a shingle i.e a concrete roof shingle, to tie in with the theme of scaling back to look at America as a whole then zooming in to a scene of finality or a bird shit on the roof.

mini mart off a boulevard
never mind where America is

full on nondescript pass you by
in a gritty blink bodegas
and cracked pavement plastic
bags that dance in the whoosh
of passing cars.


In either case I think "put" has the sound reference for either

http://www.literotica.com/p/prison-break-2 by trixareforkids

this piece is such a jumble that I have been struggling where to start breaking it apart for analysis, part of it's strength the way it flows through ideas and concepts like liquid anger. it is very worthy of its E in my opinion.

from the very first word it grabs you, Shut Up is a strong start celine creates the curiosity to read on who is Celine? kindly shut the fuck up, is interesting an can be read two ways, in resignation or in aggression, I'm remembering for me sets the tone as resignation and flips a switch on the piece for it to be read as an interior monologue.
I assume the song is by celine dion? only because I wish she would kindly shut the fuck up too
I three times but it doesn't sound over done in a short space and is absorbed for me as part of the structure of it being "interior monologue" I like the distance between the rhyme song/along, muse-ick really emphasises the ick sound and may or may not be overplayed I'm undecided but it certainly highlights and emphasise the distaste.


Shut up Celine, kindly shut the fuck up
I'm remembering, remembering why I hate
that fucking song why I never listen to it
or the background voices that tag along
why I always stop the muse-ick,

---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

The sonics in this when read aloud are magic, the a's in away bounce off the a in page,
B-lank starts the B sound rolling
the B-urn and D-amn B-ook
though and know
can / and
locking-going-steering, before the break of the ing sound just before it gets too much and adds momentum, placing it in the present tense
road and unknown

I can feel my chest locking down and my (I feel the and in this lines breaks the rhythm a little) then start the my on the next line so

I can feel my chest locking down
my jaw going tight

there again all the and's help to give it a frenetic feel, so I am unsure of this change, it may fix that section but break the interior turmoil the run on sentence type structure gives you.

then the sense of scaling out to encompass the whole world from a satellite picture.


step away
from the blank page and burn the damn book
it's there now though and I don't know
that I can do it this time and oh fuck
I can feel my chest locking down and my
jaw going tight my fingers they itch
they itch for a pen and a steering wheel
an open road that leads into the unknown
the more my ribcage contracts the more
my mind expands from a street view to
a satellite picture

---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

it's beyond aerial it's
galactic, inner space and outer space
combine and separate focus shifting from
micro to macro and I stand here reeling
a thousand frames a second and I just
want that fucking song to stop playing
I want to get out of the time stream and
back to reality, back to the here and now
but it's too late baby, it's too late though
I really did try to make it,

have to finish this later........................

I'm not gonna chime in on the technical aspects of this poem, but i felt a connection through the music references and the feel of hands clenched tight to a steering wheel, driving a stretch of road at 2am.
I do my most intense thinking and arguing with myself while driving, making believe the impossible, and for some damn reason, we never turn the radio off even though we don't want it on. And songs are triggers.
In the middle of a thought, we hear~
It's too late baby, it's too late, though we really did try to make it.
And we grab the wheel even tighter.
Once we get out of the car, it all mostly goes away, and we get on with playing the game. Celine shuts up.
That's what this poem was to me.
I would have written it differently, broke it differently.
But who cares, i felt it intensely.
So the poem wins

todski28 said:

http://www.cooksinfo.com/shit-on-a-shingle-recipe
I gather this may possibly be what you were referring to 1201?

where as I took it to be shit on a shingle i.e a concrete roof shingle, to tie in with the theme of scaling back to look at America as a whole then zooming in to a scene of finality or a bird shit on the roof.

mini mart off a boulevard
never mind where America is

full on nondescript pass you by
in a gritty blink bodegas
and cracked pavement plastic
bags that dance in the whoosh
of passing cars.


In either case I think "put" has the sound reference for either

Click to expand...

previous lines:
Jack sated?
Hunger fed? No.
dual use- probably tastes the same anyway

The five senses thread by Lyric_Calli

It was our summer
beach days
baseball games
that damned cap
took years off your face
Did I look twice your age?
It was only one little decade

Smooth satin sheets
(bought for me?)
perfumed with sunscreen
didn't stand a chance
against the sand
or the gingersnaps
you'd reach for after

It's a little hazy
like the sun
that filled those days
glorious
thundering
down the road
speakers blaring
"She's the One"
my hand on your thigh
you sang along

------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Todski's trivial thoughts

It was our summer
beach days
baseball games
that damned cap
took years off your face
Did I look twice your age?
It was only one little decade

simple opening line, with an immediate break which forces the reader to move along, there isn't time to get bored or flit off, the declamation of "it was our" sets the tone as an interior monologue, which is a useful start as it gives context and personalisation to the write.

followed by two simple things

beach days
baseball games,

they are so much a part of summer that the reader is immediately in to the summer theme
, with as little effort as that, the near rhyme of days and games, gives it very nice sounding sonic play that drives the pace of the read.

that damned cap,

is such a human thought, lends personality to the narrator and an empathetic reaction that you drive home with the final lines of the stanza you also bring in the emotional content of human thought and expression by having self doubt

"did I look twice your age"

------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Smooth satin sheets
(bought for me?)
perfumed with sunscreen
didn't stand a chance
against the sand
or the gingersnaps
you'd reach for after

smooth satin sheets, this is a silky phrase that turns the piece immediately semi erotic, with it's alliteration and sizzling sibilance, bought for me in () is interesting it flits the piece between reporting and interior monologue, your sound play is devine,

me, sunscreen,
stand, sand,
chance, gingersnaps

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------


It's a little hazy
like the sun
that filled those days
glorious
thundering
down the road
speakers blaring
"She's the One"
my hand on your thigh
you sang along

the first line of the final stanza, adds a melancholy twist and sets the above as a fond memory, reinforcing the first line,

"it was our summer"
the use of hazy hammers home the heat of summer and keeps your theme perfectly, it is well timed,

glorious
thundering

keeps your reader interested and highlights everything before it eliciting an empathetic response and allows room for your reader to personally interpret the glory, no spelling it out you force us want to connect.

also sounds here are very well done,

thundering, blaring

and the final three lines

the one

and

sang along

sound so good together and leave the poem echoing after its read

Thanks for taking the time to give your anything but trivial thoughts. It's interesting to see it through someone else's eyes, and you pointed out things that I wasn't consciously aware of doing. Some things just sounded right to me, so I went with it.

I'm tickled and still surprised that it got such a nice response.