Being James Wright

[Tzara]

aka "Help Me with My Homework"

Hi, y'all.

I have signed up for a poetry writing class. (Yeah, yeah, yeah. I know. It's about friggin' time!)

Ahem.



Anyway.

The first assignment is about image in poetry and has us write something closely modeled on James Wright's Lying In A Hammock At William Duffy's Farm In Pine Island, Minnesota.

It's kind of an interesting exercise, trying to write something in the style of someone who is much better than you. My recommendation is try it sometime. It's fun and you learn something. Besides learning that your model is waay better than you'll ever be.

So.

Here's my first revision:

Climbing the Redoubt at American Camp,
San Juan Island, Washington

The path turns up, to left, to right,
the switchbacks marked by spiders' webs
dew-bright in morning sun. Clinging
grasses whisk our legs, trail
damp and sticky seeds
on jeans and shoes. In middle distance
a freighter tracks the strait away
from dawn, heading for the open
sea. In this cold clear air my view
is all the way to Canada. Here,
below, on the thin gravel beach,
a yellow dog runs down a stick
thrown by its solitary master.
There is no afterlife.​

Be the first to help me cheat my way to an undeserved grade! Go ahead and tell me what I'm doing wrong or could do better.

I have to rewrite this later, so I may sandbag the comments and shock the bejesus out of the poor underpaid MFA candidate who is teaching the course.

Or, alternately, join in the fun and write your own pastiche of someone else's work.

Merci, et allez...

 

[Reltne]

Unfortunately I cannot load the site with the original poem, so I cannot comment on how well you have done. But FYI below are some changes I might consider. Hope this helps, or at least doesn't hurt.
Red= yours; blue= mine

aka "Help Me with My Homework"

Hi, y'all.

I have signed up for a poetry writing class. (Yeah, yeah, yeah. I know. It's about friggin' time!)

Ahem.

Anyway.

The first assignment is about image in poetry and has us write something closely modeled on James Wright's Lying In A Hammock At William Duffy's Farm In Pine Island, Minnesota.

It's kind of an interesting exercise, trying to write something in the style of someone who is much better than you. My recommendation is try it sometime. It's fun and you learn something. Besides learning that your model is waay better than you'll ever be.

So.

Here's my first revision:

Climbing the Redoubt at American Camp,
San Juan Island, Washington

The path turns up, to left, to right,
the switchbacks marked by spiders' webs
dew-bright in morning early sun. Clinging
grasses whisk our legs, trail
damp, and sticky seeds
on jeans and shoes. In middle distance
a freighter tracks the strait away (Like the pun. Is there a similar one in the original?)
from dawn, heading for the open
sea. In this cold clear air my view sight
is all the way to Canada. Here,
below, on the thin gravel beach,
a yellow dog runs down a stick
thrown by its solitary his (and I don't like solitary) master.
There is no afterlife. Don't like this final line. How about something like "There is only now." "Now is all there is." "Only now is now (or "here")."​

Be the first to help me cheat my way to an undeserved grade! Go ahead and tell me what I'm doing wrong or could do better.

I have to rewrite this later, so I may sandbag the comments and shock the bejesus out of the poor underpaid MFA candidate who is teaching the course.

Or, alternately, join in the fun and write your own pastiche of someone else's work.

Merci, et allez...

 

[Tzara]

Unfortunately I cannot load the site with the original poem, so I cannot comment on how well you have done.

Here's the original, and I think wonderful, poem:

Lying In A Hammock At William Duffy's Farm In Pine Island, Minnesota

Over my head, I see the bronze butterfly,
Asleep on the black trunk,
blowing like a leaf in green shadow.
Down the ravine behind the empty house,
The cowbells follow one another
Into the distances of the afternoon.
To my right,
In a field of sunlight between two pines,
The droppings of last year's horses
Blaze up into golden stones.
I lean back, as the evening darkens and comes on.
A chicken hawk floats over, looking for home.
I have wasted my life.​

Thanks, Reltne, for the comments. I quite like the first two suggestions. As you can see by Wright's poem, the last line is supposed to be jarring.

Merci beaucoup.

 

[Tzara]

grasses whisk our legs, trail

Hey, Reltne:

I didn't notice this suggestion at first. I assume you mean the comma here should be elided.

I know the sentence is kind of a comma splice, but I'm trying to treat it like parallel clauses. If I take it out, I think it makes it worse.

Is it grammatically better with it missing?

Thx.

 

[WickedEve]

Hey, Reltne:

I didn't notice this suggestion at first. I assume you mean the comma here should be elided.

I know the sentence is kind of a comma splice, but I'm trying to treat it like parallel clauses. If I take it out, I think it makes it worse.

Is it grammatically better with it missing?

Thx.

I'd keep the comma, because they are parallel clauses.

 

[Tzara]

I'd keep the comma, because they are parallel clauses.

Thanks, Eve.

But I am puzzled. Do you have weird doorknobs in your house or should I be having a hormonal reaction to that photograph on your sig line?

I am so confused by life!

 

[WickedEve]

Thanks, Eve.

But I am puzzled. Do you have weird doorknobs in your house or should I be having a hormonal reaction to that photograph on your sig line?

I am so confused by life!

No. Don't have a hormonal reaction to this one.
I don't have doorknobs. I have slide and push. I like my life knobless.

 

[Reltne]

Hey, Reltne:

I didn't notice this suggestion at first. I assume you mean the comma here should be elided.

I know the sentence is kind of a comma splice, but I'm trying to treat it like parallel clauses. If I take it out, I think it makes it worse.

Is it grammatically better with it missing?

Thx.

I didn't eliminate it, I just moved it.
I just thought that (spacing removed), "Clinging grasses whisk our legs trail
damp, and sticky seeds on jeans and shoes." made more sense than, "Clinging
grasses whisk our legs, trail damp and sticky seeds on jeans and shoes." (You could do something with that "and" if you thought about it. )

You also said about the last line, "As you can see by Wright's poem, the last line is supposed to be jarring." maybe it's because I am older, but I don't see it as "jarring". To me it is a wistful realization that the author has wasted his life by chasing after what is actually not important. He never "stopped to smell the roses". Life's meaningful things are those he has just spent the afternoon really "seeing" for the first time. Perhaps the insight in the last line is epiphanetic, but surely not "jarring".

 

[Tzara]

I didn't eliminate it, I just moved it.
I just thought that (spacing removed), "Clinging grasses whisk our legs trail
damp, and sticky seeds on jeans and shoes." made more sense than, "Clinging
grasses whisk our legs, trail damp and sticky seeds on jeans and shoes." (You could do something with that "and" if you thought about it. )

Yeah. Maybe I could. I didn't originally notice the "red" comma, and really didn't notice the "blue" comma.

I hope there is no political significance to the color selection.

Well, even if there is, they are good suggestions. I am unsure now and will think about this. (insert here the "think" icon).

Language. Damn flexible and ambiguous medium, ain't it?

Nice suggestions. I am thinking.

May save these to surprise my MFA tormentor.

You also said about the last line, "As you can see by Wright's poem, the last line is supposed to be jarring." maybe it's because I am older, but I don't see it as "jarring". To me it is a wistful realization that the author has wasted his life by chasing after what is actually not important. He never "stopped to smell the roses". Life's meaningful things are those he has just spent the afternoon really "seeing" for the first time. Perhaps the insight in the last line is epiphanic, but surely not "jarring".

Well, if we're talking about Wright's poem, I think commentators are pretty mixed about it. I'd try to link something in here but it didn't work before, so I'll just without reference blandly say that most commentaries on Wright's poem focus on that last line as, well, kind of weird and disjunctive.

I happen to think of it as being very in character with the poem as a whole. But, hey! I like to integrate things.

On my poor imitation, though...

I'm trying (incompetently) to say that the narrator has looked at these various things and realized (yep, epiphanically) that this is what life is and there can be nothing else that is life.

You might guess that I am not a strong believer in the traditional Christian church.

The problem is that Wright's line is, I think, jarring. My line follows on too prosaically. May I say, uh, "help?"

Oh, and you may be older, but probably not that much older, sir. Lots older? You'd be dead. You're cleverer, perhaps. I'll give you that.

I like clever.

The problem is I have to try and do it the way he did, without duplicating him, if for no other reason than because that's how he did it.

Pain in the butt, but an interesting problem, nonetheless.

O, poetry! What a fun and frustrating medium!

Thanks, man. You rock!

 

[flyguy69]

Oh, I hope you have a good teacher for this class! I remember a similar assignment in a lit class in which we had to rewrite provided pieces of text in the style of the authors we had studied. I was profoundly disappointed when I discovered that all the prof wanted was for me to substitute new nouns for old ones. This can be a wonderful learning technique!

I find your poem more "poetic." The dew-bright webs and "whisking" add a descriptive layer that I don't feel (as strongly) in Wright's. Your later images are simpler-- I would make them all so.

I have never read a critique of this poem, but it seems that the final statement flows well from the inactivity of the hammock. Yours is full of effort, yet then turns equally contemplative. Without saying this is a weakness of the poem, I think it is a weakness in your response to the assignment.

I should warn you I got a "B" in that class.

Good luck.

 

[champagne1982]

<snip>The problem is that Wright's line is, I think, jarring. My line follows on too prosaically. May I say, uh, "help?"</snip>

<snip>I am so confused by life!</snip>

Thus, you've already written the final line of your poem. I think it would work.

 

[Tzara]

Oh, I hope you have a good teacher for this class!

Me too, of course. I don't know yet. It is Independent Study, where you periodically send things in and some bored grad student grades it, comments, and sends it back.

We'll see how well that works.

I remember a similar assignment in a lit class in which we had to rewrite provided pieces of text in the style of the authors we had studied. I was profoundly disappointed when I discovered that all the prof wanted was for me to substitute new nouns for old ones.

Geez, I hope that's not what they're looking for: Replace "hammock" with "lawn chair"; replace "butterfly" with "collared moth." What do you learn from that?

This can be a wonderful learning technique!

I find your poem more "poetic." The dew-bright webs and "whisking" add a descriptive layer that I don't feel (as strongly) in Wright's. Your later images are simpler-- I would make them all so.

Thanks. That's a good suggestion. I'll go back and look at that.

I have never read a critique of this poem, but it seems that the final statement flows well from the inactivity of the hammock. Yours is full of effort, yet then turns equally contemplative. Without saying this is a weakness of the poem, I think it is a weakness in your response to the assignment.

I was trying to write more of a variation on Wright's poem than try and copy it. He's lying still, I'm walking around. He links images by colors, I'm trying to do it by concepts (path/marked/trail/track/runs down and the concept of "capture"--spider web/clinging grass/ship's hold/dog fetching stick).

Another good suggestion, though. I'll have to re-read the specifics of what they're asking me to do.

I should warn you I got a "B" in that class.

I have a degree, so I'm not worried about the grade. I'm more interested in trying to learn something about basic technique.

So I'll just blame you when I don't pass with an "A".

Good luck.

Thanks. And thanks for the comments.

 

[Tzara]

Thus, you've already written the final line of your poem. I think it would work.

That's an interesting suggestion, Champ. Thanks.

It certainly would be me stating a truth!

 

[twelveoone]

aka "Help Me with My Homework"

Hi, y'all.

I have signed up for a poetry writing class. (Yeah, yeah, yeah. I know. It's about friggin' time!)

Ahem.



Anyway.

The first assignment is about image in poetry and has us write something closely modeled on James Wright's Lying In A Hammock At William Duffy's Farm In Pine Island, Minnesota.

It's kind of an interesting exercise, trying to write something in the style of someone who is much better than you. My recommendation is try it sometime. It's fun and you learn something. Besides learning that your model is waay better than you'll ever be.

So.

Here's my first revision:

Climbing the Redoubt at American Camp,
San Juan Island, Washington

The path turns up, to left, to right,
the switchbacks marked by spiders' webs
dew-bright in morning sun. Clinging
grasses whisk our legs, trail
damp and sticky seeds
on jeans and shoes. In middle distance
a freighter tracks the strait away
from dawn, heading for the open
sea. In this cold clear air my view
is all the way to Canada. Here,
below, on the thin gravel beach,
a yellow dog runs down a stick
thrown by its solitary master.
There is no afterlife.​

Be the first to help me cheat my way to an undeserved grade! Go ahead and tell me what I'm doing wrong or could do better.

I have to rewrite this later, so I may sandbag the comments and shock the bejesus out of the poor underpaid MFA candidate who is teaching the course.

Or, alternately, join in the fun and write your own pastiche of someone else's work.

Merci, et allez...

A corpse stops to write on a crappy life, while waiting by the river

When horseshit turns to coprolite
I'll get a MFA paper, shinning like alabaster
then who cares just what I write
You'll still have call me "Master"

Oh, wait, Oh wait, I am dead?
Next time can I come back as a child?

 

[twelveoone]

Wright's seems a little overdone. (he's dead)
I liked your's a little better. (you're still alive)
I liked mine best ('cause I'm coming back, I hope)

 

[twelveoone]

Here's the original, and I think wonderful, poem:

Lying In A Hammock At William Duffy's Farm In Pine Island, Minnesota

Over my head, I see the bronze butterfly,
Asleep on the black trunk,
blowing like a leaf in green shadow.
Down the ravine behind the empty house,
The cowbells follow one another
Into the distances of the afternoon.
To my right,
In a field of sunlight between two pines,
The droppings of last year's horses
Blaze up into golden stones.
I lean back, as the evening darkens and comes on.
A chicken hawk floats over, looking for home.
I have wasted my life.​

Thanks, Reltne, for the comments. I quite like the first two suggestions. As you can see by Wright's poem, the last line is supposed to be jarring.

Merci beaucoup.

Blaze up into golden stones.

Tzara, does this line bother you?
its position seems to be regretable

 

[bogusbrig]

Blaze up into golden stones.

Tzara, does this line bother you?
its position seems to be regretable

I nearly spat my coffee out once my brain jerked into gear. It is a little unfortunate and hilarious if you read it the way I think you mean.

 

[twelveoone]

Tzara,

Why speak of poetics?
-To sing as the boring birds in spring
warbling words to the beat of a baby's heart
though lips that bleed in tweed.
-You are-
beyond those things.
It is paper, and as paper it shall be shred.
Come,
sing as steel does becoming dulled
as we stand in fragments of wood and lead.
Let us be as reckless bloody missles,
hurdling* in unguided night.
Come, brother
under the black flag with me.

Your friend in peace, love, and understanding.
Тэмүүжин

*mispronounced Hur dle ling

 

[Tzara]

A corpse stops to write on a crappy life, while waiting by the river

When horseshit turns to coprolite
I'll get a MFA paper, shinning like alabaster
then who cares just what I write
You'll still have call me "Master"

Oh, wait, Oh wait, I am dead?
Next time can I come back as a child?

Hey you're already il miglior fabbro. What else do ya want?

Sheesh.

 

[Tzara]

Wright's seems a little overdone. (he's dead)
I liked your's a little better. (you're still alive)
I liked mine best ('cause I'm coming back, I hope)

Isola di San Michele

per il doge, con i miei rispetti

Lo, I am a zombie writer,
resurrecting rotting phrases
from Modernity's graveyard.

Why do you turn your cheek away?
Your severed ears cannot smell
the stench of imitation.

I mimic only the best words
the world has offered. That gyre
spins both out and back. I tire,

racing spiral path in futile search
for Calliopic muse. My only wish to grasp
that final hard and tender mère.

Ah, Pound, I do so long for you!
I am my Master's dog at Kew.
Pray tell me sir, whose dog were you?

 

[Tzara]

Blaze up into golden stones.

Tzara, does this line bother you?
its position seems to be regretable

I nearly spat my coffee out once my brain jerked into gear. It is a little unfortunate and hilarious if you read it the way I think you mean.

Ah, you two! Tch tch tch.

This is but the cold stone d'or
thro' which all poetry must pass.
That it be coprolitic spoor,
what matter, if not be from ass?​

You guys pay too much attention to the fact that this is a porn site, sez Blip.

 

[Reltne]

So when do we learn what your "instructor" thought?

 

[Tzara]

So when do we learn what your "instructor" thought?

Sometime after I do, I guess.

Independent study class--looong time line.