Grandpa's garden

[Sweetwood]

Another childhood memory. Please comment

Grandpa’s garden

Tiny naked feet stroke lusciously
Into the moist brown blanket
Covering the early summer garden

Summer echoes through her hair
As crumbs of warm velvet
Giggle between her toes

Grandpa, laughed loud
By his hawaien shirts
His face rich with smiles

Hands clasped behind her back
She asks: are they ready yet?
Face eager with anticipation

Picking the spring heavy bulb
Of the kohlrabi the dirt flies
Caressing her legs to freckles

Both sitting on their haunches
They savor the kohlrabi
And the moment - together

(c) MCD 2002

Sweetwood

 

[Rybka]

A childhood memory. Please comment

Sweetwood, I like your memory. My comments follow.

Grandpa’s garden

Tiny naked feet stroke lusciously
Into the moist brown blanket
Covering the early summer garden

. . . blanket covering. . .
the earth IS the garden, not a cover.

Summer echoes through her hair
As crumbs of warm velvet
Giggle between her toes

Really like these three lines, except
maybe for "velvet". Velvet doesn't
come in crumbs - if it is soft and squishy-
perhaps chocolate?

Grandpa, laughed loud
By his hawaien shirts
His face rich with smiles

"hawaien" or Hawaiian?

Hands clasped behind her back
She asks: are they ready yet?
Face eager with anticipation

Picking the spring heavy bulb
Of the kohlrabi the dirt flies
Caressing her legs to freckles

Do you need the first "the" in
the second line, and must it be
kohlrabi?
Love the third line. It reminds
me of the final line of Liver Spots:

Brown earth shows through melting drifts of frozen snow ...
Liver spots on the hand of Old Man Winter.

Both sitting on their haunches
They savor the kohlrabi
And the moment - together

This poem may probably be to simple for many of the poets who comment on this forum, but it creates the type of "word picture" I enjoy. - Having gotten the words you want I would then try arranging them on the page, like colors and forms in a painting:

Both
sitting on their haunches
They
savoring the kohlrabi
And
the moment
together


but that is just me [and you can't do much with online formatting restrictions. - Consider the 2nd, 4th, and 5th lines inset to start one space after the end of the single word lines, and "together" to be placed so that the "r" would be on a straight line drawn through the final letter of the 2nd and 4th line.].

Let us see some more memories.

Regards, Rybka

 

[Rybka]

"I hate when I do that!"

"to simple" should, of course, be "too simple".

Self-deprecating regards, Rybka

 

[WickedEve]

Very nice poem, sweetwood. I don't really have anything to add; I think rybka covered it all. I wrote a poem titled uncles garden, so when I saw the title of this one I was curious to see how you handled your poem. And you handled it very nicely. I look forward to more of your memories.

 

[Sweetwood]

Thanks for the feedback

Rybka said:

This poem may probably be to simple for many of the poets who comment on this forum, but it creates the type of "word picture" I enjoy.

The simplicity of the language was deliberate. The trouble with some of the poetry is that it uses often language that is inappropriate to the voice used. I very specifically wanted to have the voice of the little girl emerge, rather than a treatise on little girl's feelings from an adult perspective.

. . . blanket covering. . .
the earth IS the garden, not a cover.

Have you ever walked barefeet through the freshly tilled spring soil of the garden that has a high organic matter content and a pH of close to 7? *smiles* It rises like bread in the oven and feels like thick crushed velvet underneath your feet. That's why I chose blanket. What would you suggest here?

Velvet! Crumbs from a velvet crumb cake maybe? Or the crumbly texture of the crushed velvet stretched tightly over a woman's ass?

Hawaiian of course! Growing up in the german language we don't defer to nation's names. So I always stumble over the capitalization of names of countries. And of course misspelt! OOOOps.

Do you need the first "the" in
the second line, and must it be
kohlrabi?
Love the third line. It reminds
me of the final line of Liver Spots:

The "the" is not necessary and will come out. But yes it must be kohlrabi. Simply because that little girl and her grandpa ate kohlrabi that day and loved it.

I appreciate the time you took to read and comment. I have started to write these vignettes for the competition Sizzles etc.

I really do think that "voice" in poetry is an important thing. It distracts from the credibility of a picture in words if language and gimmicks are used that do not reflect the content of what is being shown. Does that make sense? I find this a very interesting topic. Sometimes you find poems that are very good but the words used are out of sync with the content.

Thanks again for your time Rybka.

Thanks Wicked Eve for the mention too.

Sweetwood