musing & bitching

Senna Jawa

Literotica Guru
Joined
May 13, 2002
Posts
3,272
this is the thread where U can relax, where U can spill your guts out, where U don't need to be selfconscious... unless that's your wish, then indulge yourself. Yes, Karmadog, U get another WORD, indulge.

I am posting way too much on this board. I am impressed that I don't hear everybody being sick of it. Perhaps my hearing went down the drain.

If it were not for a small system trap, a very useful one(!), I would post twice as much. But every other time I close the window before I hit the submit button. I preview my post about twenty eight times or up to eighty eigh, and then I am happy, I close the window and my screen is easier on my eyes.

So much for now,
 
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I'd like to bitch. As soon as I think of something to bitch about. (this is a first for me.) Oh, I know. I'm not getting enough attention on this board. No one reads my poetry. No one votes on my poems. I don't get any feedback. No PMs. I don't feel the love! :heart:
That felt good. :D
 
WickedEve said:
No one reads my poetry. No one votes on my poems. I don't get any feedback. No PMs. I don't feel the love! :heart:
That felt good. :D
I know this isn't true, as I read them, and I vote. When I've got time and a little creative juice flowing, I even send feedback (though I tend to do it anonymously if it's at all critical--big chicken that I am, I don't want to piss anyone off!).

Wait, maybe I'm misunderstanding...how many votes is "enough?"
I've got poems that are months old now with only 4 or 5 votes each, so my expectations may be considerably lower than yours. ;)
 
RisiaSkye said:

I know this isn't true, as I read them, and I vote. When I've got time and a little creative juice flowing, I even send feedback (though I tend to do it anonymously if it's at all critical--big chicken that I am, I don't want to piss anyone off!).

Wait, maybe I'm misunderstanding...how many votes is "enough?"
I've got poems that are months old now with only 4 or 5 votes each, so my expectations may be considerably lower than yours. ;)
Don't ruin a perfectly good bitchin', Risia.
As I was saying, I don't feel the love!!!

By the way, thanks for reading. :D
 
poetry & brain

A poem is like a pleasure trip by a car. The goal is to admire the view. The author's brain is the engine. It should be powerful but quiet, discrete, U don't want to hear it. The goal is to admire the view, not the engine. When reading a poem we should not be distracted by a brain noise. Don't get intimidated or snobish about the brain noise in poetry. Such a noise is unpoetic, alien to poetry, not artistic. Insist on enjoying the view.

(Poets who have truly sharp brain know better than to show off their "brain power", they let the poems be poetic. U know about their brain only indirectly, because the poem is so great, not because some great thoughts r spelled out).

There is also the other side of this coin. Author, don't offend the reader by explaining anything, by saying: this because that. Just say: that, this. Don't play a philosopher. Philosophy is not poetry. Compared to poetry philosophy is nothing. If U want to be a philosopher then get a position at a philosophy department. And remember that your reader might be a better philosopher than U. Leave philosophy to readers.

Your reader might be a better poet too but that's ok, U honestly r writing a poem, up front. Don't sneak any of your philosophy on readers because that's cheating. A reader who is looking for poetry should not get philosophy instead. And it has to be instead, U can't have both. To induce philosophical thoughts in a reader's mind is perfectly alright, even outright great. But don't put any of this disgusting stuff into your poem. Yes, both poetry and propaganda exercise the communication skills. But they r two disjoint activities.

Sure, I am simplifying things (not much). But then I am just musing, I am not writing a megabyte treatise.

Regards,
 
going in circles (is it time to quit?)

I have just found out that it was not the first time, here on Literotica, that I suggested a beautiful name which just so happen to abbreviate to that acronym F. U. C. K. Over six years ago I suggested that FAQ for rec.arts.poems will be named:

        Frequently Used Careful Keywords

Twice is two too many. Never again :)
 
salad preparation

A poem is like a salad dish. An author is the host and readers r the guests. There r two ways to serve salad. One, less common among poets, is to provide fresh vegetables and fruits. Another method prevails, and U may judge which one, as a guest, U prefer. The other method works as follows. The author-cook takes a slice of a fruit or of a vegetable into his/her mouth, chews on it, spits it onto the plate and glues a label to it: SWEET. Another vegy spit goes with a label DELICIOUS, another with DELIGHTFUL, another with SHARP, then another chewed piece with a label CRUNCHY, another spit with still another label, and so on.

Needless to say, the great majority of the readers prefer the second kind of a dish becasue such a dish is easier to digest, easier to appreciate, to understand, while on the other hand such a dish is IMPRESSIVE. And with the help from the labels U can say easily some smart things about such a dish, and then U look good.

Bon appetit! Enjoy your meal!
 
creating versus selecting

Both approaches, named in the title above, can give wonderful results in poetry. Nevertheless selectings the more noble approach and ultimate. And much harder too.

I don't feel like expanding on it. With all the talk how poetic discussions are important to us, we have virtually none. Oh, shooting the breeze is fun too :)

Regards,
 
I can't believe it!!! Krrr brrr vrrr ghrrr

Somehow my "san jose blues" poem got replaced by "San Jose". Most likely I did it myself when I was changing font for a larger one. I hate all these mishaps! Ghrrr...

It should be ok within a day or so.

(A bunch of my poems posted earlier still is in a micro font. I fixed that only for a few so far. Oh, well).
 
Creating versus selecting

Both approaches, named in the title above, can give wonderful results in poetry. Nevertheless selectings the more noble approach and ultimate. And much harder too.

Please expand!

Sweetwood:p
 
Sweetwood said:
Creating versus selecting

Please expand!

Sweetwood:p
Sweetwood, U create when U make up things which r not quite realistic. Perhaps U can make up things in a consistent way, so that they will have their own life. One of the greatest poets anywhere ever, not second to anybody, Boleslaw Lesmian, was very fond of creating and offering to readers his own fantastic worlds, populated by all kind of characters, yes, they had full character to them, including the subtle differences of the ways of talking. Lesmian got on this poetic orbit (and it was not the only one for him) high, high, high (and there was still so much more to his poetry).

Nevertheless, poetically, I still value selection higher. U select from life, from scenes... U select three dots from a scene and the reader will see the whole thing, each reader a bit (or a lot) differently or some of them even in more than one way. U select and U cause readers to see things which they overlook, to see them differently, or they get a large scale panorama, or U zoom on something, U associate things which obviously should be associated, of course, except that nobody did it before U...

Nature and humanity r so rich that the distinction between creating and selecting is somewhat blurred, especially that even when U select U still stamp the selected elements with your, author's signature, and hardly anything ever in poetry is literal, most of the time U modify, U substitute, and U... select :).

Blurred or not, there is a distinction, these r two different approaches. Du Fu and other great Chinese poets of the Gold and of the Silver Period of the Chinese poetry were selecting.

Regards,
 
Thanks for the expansion

SJ,

Thank you for your comments. It is a very interesting viewpoint.

It is like tracing the outlines of nature, the world with your thought when you are selecting. It is somewhat like what the eye does when it perceives. The eye does not perceive the object but rather the outline and the movement gives recognition rather than the form.

However, the words creating and selcting are misleading I think. The reality is that even a selecting poem still transcends the simple description of the object. Why do we recognize something as trite or cliche. I believe it is because they do not transcend. They have not in the process of selecting created something new. Rather they have indulged in pure tracing. It is too familiar. Thus, the reader simply falls into the known instead of stepping into the unknown.

Likewise the danger of creating carries the danger of being too private. It is like stepping into a world, where the concepts are ungraspable. It is as if the eye is not engineered correctly to perceive. If that is the case then the reader will be left "blind" and the perception now from the other end will lead the reader into his own world, the known world.

While selecting in it's best form will transcend it's object, creating will in it's best form transcend it's subject. If you look at the poem of Rilke I have posted in the wotcha reading thread, you will find an example of how Rilke transcends both object and subject. Selecting and creating.

This is fun. Good thread.

Sweetwood:p
 
I could submit a frolickin' story
but I can't submit my frankin' poem

The system does not let me.
What about U? U can?!
d y s c r i m i n a t i o n ! ! ! ! ! ! !

This reminds me how a friend of mine used to ask people around to clinch their teeth and to say: I can't bite on a hard nut. They would and with his teeth clinched too he would tell them: then bite on soft shit.
 
LMAO

Ok I must bitch. I absolutely loathe people who spend all their time wondering what others think about them or their poetry. I say if can't take some good old fashion critism without changing to conform, then you are just pitiful anyway.
Oh and I hate the color pink. It's foofy. :p
 
Re: LMAO

christcat69 said:
Ok I must bitch. I absolutely loathe people who spend all their time wondering what others think about them or their poetry. I say if can't take some good old fashion critism without changing to conform, then you are just pitiful anyway.
Oh and I hate the color pink. It's foofy. :p
For a contrast, years ago a rec.arts.poems participant sent me email, in which he mentioned that I had never commented on his own poems but nevertheless he often blushed reading my posts. It was a very nice letter. I am sure that he was able to improve his poetry. Indeed, U may gain from comments on poems by other people not less, possibly even more than when it is your own poem discussed.

it's different here. As the result of the recent discussion someone reading this board voted 1 on a few of my poems. It was done in a lazy way which told me that it was not an outsider. Funny and cheap. Chessplayers are often mean too but they don't go, like here, to the tournament table to "vote". The things r decided over the chessboard. I wonder if the next time someone will blow up my neighborhood. Should I alert my neighbors? Hey, guys, watch out, because Literotica has just flared with a new discussion! Oh, it flares up so easily over nothing :)

Regards,
 
Senna Jawa - Y?

Just curious. I C U of10 use "U" & "r" in Ur posts. I h8 2 ask U, but Y? :)

Regards, Rybka
 
Re: Senna Jawa - Y?

Rybka said:
Just curious. I C U of10 use "U" & "r" in Ur posts. I h8 2 ask U, but Y? :)

Regards, Rybka
U went further, U'r following Prince, except that Prince for years goes under no name. He had also "4 U" and "b4" (I think), etc.

I find "U' and "r" aesthetic. "U" completes English well, providing a singular form of "you". The upper case is consistent with "I", and also polite, shows respect.

Someone else, I don't know who. came up with a gender transparent form of s/he and their derivatives:
  • E stands for "he, she".
  • Eir stands for "his, her"; it's singular of "their".
  • Eirs stands for "his, hers"; it's singular of "theirs".
  • Em stands for "him, her"; it's singular of "them".
This was a great invention, which should be widely adopted. I've promoted it for years but without any overwhelming result. Anyway, now the singular pronouns for a harmonious trio:

                I   U   E

In poems I try to avoid anything alien to poetry, in particular any eyesores like punctuation, often any gramatical mindsores like pronouns(up to a point), etc. .

Best regards,
 
Thnx 2 U

Thnx 2 U 4 the in4.

i don't agree, but respect Ur . of view. :)

i find it an affectation in any1 beyond my 9 year old niecphew, and even e only uses e in he/she-mail.

i do use emoticons with online communications, because written words cannot always convey the nonverbal cues present in face-to-face communication. Beyond that i do not wish 2 B P. C. nor affected.

De gustibus non desputandum.

High regards, Rybka

ps: i know what U mean about over-reviewing Ur messages B4 posting. :D
 
Re: Senna Jawa - Y?

Rybka said:
Just curious. I C U of10 use "U" & "r" in Ur posts. I h8 2 ask U, but Y? :)

Regards, Rybka
I used h8 in Chess haiku legitimately, as the name of one of the corner squares on the chessboard. One of the participants of rec.arts.poems made a comment about the possibility of the "hate" pronounciation of h8. I think that in this case it is only a distraction, that there is no poetic advantage to such an additional moment. I prefer in this case that U read h8 in the standard way, as "aych eight".

BTW, I never cared much to publish my poems (in one case I have explicitly forbidden a publisher to publish my poem, twice! I had to write them twice. After the first time they sent me the proof!). When some Internet publishers asked me, then I agreed, and on occasions I would provide them with more (in the early Internet days they just posted, without asking :). I was annoyed only about one poem posted on more than one page, because a preliminary version showed up instead of the real one. Very frustrating). Anyway, I believe that "Chess haiku" is my only poem which has appeared in print (on paper).

Best regards,
 
mishaps

Rybka was right about Literotica and titles. They do not "correct" titles anymore by switching to the upper case. Thus earlier it was some kind of carelessness rather than getting drunk on power over the helpless poets. Unfortunately the most tricky thing to correct in a submission is title.

Recently I made a typo in the title of one of my new submissions. I caught it soon enough, made the correction and followed the title by "EDITED". I also supplied a note to the Literotica editor about fixing the title. The result was a whole day long confusion, or longer, during which nothing had happened (while my other concurrent submissions were already accepted). And then, with one extra day of a delay the poem showed up with the title looking as follows:

    <title> EDITED

Well, at least formally, I made a procedural mistake. The poem didn't show up on Literotica yet at the time of my correction hence there was no need to add "EDITED". Mea culpa, my fault.

Now what am I supposed to do? In other cases one would submit a correction by sending "<title> EDITED". But here it is the same title! For my peace of mind I even tried it and promptly got a message that I have already submitted a poem with such a title. There was really no good fix hence I hoped for a human intervention. I've submitted my poem under title <title>, and I supplied a note explaining what had happened. The note was ignored. Now the poem is listed twice, under title: <title>, and under title: <title> EDITED. Both versions scored so far nothing but fives. But of that you guys will take care of course, no sweat. After all, each discussion here, where I discuss poems, ends in uncalled for personal comments about me from some of you, who are socially so mature, and my poems get sprinkled with votes 1-2 -- you guys are so predictable and indeed, you are charming, you do not even use any vulgar language when you make those wonderfully sharp indirect and direct comments and noncomments, and you have sense of humor, not like me. I envy your imagination. Others are moved by trucks, sport cars, space ships while you take a piece of ugly, unwashed plastic (toy car?) with no single moving part, and you FEEL moved deeply, you claim that that piece of plastic owns the Universe and all Roads. Bon Voyage!
 
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Is Las Vegas accepting bets on Literotica scores?

RisiaSkye said:
[...]Wait, maybe I'm misunderstanding...how many votes is "enough?" I've got poems that are months old now with only 4 or 5 votes each, so my expectations may be considerably lower than yours. ;)
Funny, what is Risia bitching about?

I have 13 submissions on which nobody voted (to be precise, I voted on 12 of them, but nobody else. I left one without my vote on purpose, to keep it pristine). Five of these poems, including the pristine one, scored over a hundred views (124 122 113 106 106; also 98 92 etc).

Five of these 13 poems were posted as far back as May. (And another 2 on June 6).

Either way the numbers go, it's fun. Nothing to bitch about. Numbers talk, they tell you a story.

Betting on Literotica scores should be a reasonably good business. Any bookmakers out there? For instance, there is a recent poem (of course it has sooo attractive, "sexy" title, that I wasn't even curious about the thing), which got into the top 100 most viewed poems and is already on 68th place, with 1989 views! It was posted only on 2002-06-15. Crazy, huh? About 26.5 views per day, day in and day out for 75 days. How high will it get by September 10? ... by September 20? ... Sept. 30? Will it catch another "quick gun", posted on 2002-04-20, which with 2193 views is on 61 place? If "yes" then when?

Who said that Literotica poetry is boring?! Shame on you,
 
Scores

The Magic eraser has been by again. Why does it negate the "5 fairy" and not the "1 monster"? :(

Regards, Rybka
 
never mind

I want to get rid of one copy of the same message mistakenly posted twice. I have no idea how this has happened. (At least I can bitch about it too :)).

Regards,
 
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