[Nick McRae]

The Alcoholic

Cigarette at the window
Smoke drifts into the city
And another, a drink
Radio singing a spanish voice
The man she loved fifteen years ago
Sits on a silver throne
Six streets away
His brown haired children walk to school

Cigarette at the window
Smoke drifts into the city
And another, a drink
Her ruby eyes close, and open
She looks back and sees
Shoes she bought so long ago
Then the spanish singer turns to french
And indifferent cars howl below

[Matt Q]

Hi Nick,

I like the body of the poem. I think the repetition works well with the repetition of her drinking.

However, as a whole, it would work better for me with a different title. This one gives too much away. We know from the outset that the woman is an alcoholic, which removes a lot of the mystery -- the unfolding of understanding as we read.

You might look for another modifier than "indifferent". We generally don't expect cars to care, we already know they're indifferent. So it doesn't seem to add much except a rather "telly" steer on how to interpret the cars. As with the title, maybe leave the reader some work to do.

Best,

Matt

[Jim Moonan]

.
I too like the repetitive start to the two stanzas. The poem feels like a time-lapsed tableau.

Some Thoughts

• Is the woman still in love with the man? The N says she used to be but all signs point to unrequited love.
• Maybe another word for what the radio is doing? For example, "plays" or "transmits" vs. "singing" (sings?)
• I can't picture "sits on a silver throne" in the context of the poem — unless six blocks away is Buckingham Palace.
• The only punctuation are the commas in S1L3 and S2L3. I think the poem would be "cleaner" without them. Could you simply say, "And another drink"? and then add "Her" to start the next line in S1L4? So S1L3/4 would read:
  
  And another drink
  Her radio sing[s] a spanish voice
  
  
• I think "howl" feels off as a verb for the sound of cars below. Maybe "moan"?
• Are ruby eyes meant to depict bloodshot eyes? If so, "ruby eyes" sounds strangely attractive.

And I agree the title is too telly.

.

[Ashley Bowen]

Hi, Nick,

I've come back to this several times and I think I have something, possibly, useful to comment (though maybe not).

I don't like the title, which others have also expressed some concern about as well. I'm not seeing too much in the poem that really needs that title, and I wonder if it might be too limiting.

I think my foremost concern about the poem is that I got tripped up a lot by the "Smoke drifts into the city / and another." My dense mind didn't read that as smoke drifting from one city to another. That's probably me, though.

I didn't understand the "silver throne" line.

*IF* this were my poem, I'd make a couple of adjustments:

Alcoholics

Cigarette at the window.
Smoke drifts into the city
then to another. A drink.
The radio sings in Spanish.
The woman he loved fifteen years ago
sits on a silver throne
six streets away.
Her brown-haired children walk to school

Cigarette at the window.
Smoke drifts into the city
and to another. A drink.
Her ruby eyes close and open.
She looks back and sees
a blouse she bought so long ago.
The radio changes, Spanish to French
and different cars crawl below.

Forgive my tinkering.

Also, I don't like "drifts" as a verb for smoke. Too common.

Thanks for letting me read and respond.

[Nick McRae]

Originally Posted by Matt Q

Hi Nick,

I like the body of the poem. I think the repetition works well with the repetition of her drinking.

However, as a whole, it would work better for me with a different title. This one gives too much away. We know from the outset that the woman is an alcoholic, which removes a lot of the mystery -- the unfolding of understanding as we read.

Thanks Matt.

I really appreciate this suggestion as it's a little more on point than those who've responded realize. For the most part I don't really title my poems at all. That is, actually think about the titles very hard. Usually they just get labels so I can find them on my computer. But I really should be thinking about this.

In the book I put out a few years ago I did a really bad job at titling a few and it came back to bite me on an early draft.

You might look for another modifier than "indifferent". We generally don't expect cars to care, we already know they're indifferent. So it doesn't seem to add much except a rather "telly" steer on how to interpret the cars. As with the title, maybe leave the reader some work to do.

Thanks for this. I generally wouldn't think of cars as indifferent, so didn't expect this reading. The intent was to use the word to evoke the careless world she's living in. I'll have to think on this a little.

[Nick McRae]

Originally Posted by Jim Moonan

.
I too like the repetitive start to the two stanzas. The poem feels like a time-lapsed tableau.

Some Thoughts

• Is the woman still in love with the man? The N says she used to be but all signs point to unrequited love.
• Maybe another word for what the radio is doing? For example, "plays" or "transmits" vs. "singing" (sings?)
• I can't picture "sits on a silver throne" in the context of the poem — unless six blocks away is Buckingham Palace.
• The only punctuation are the commas in S1L3 and S2L3. I think the poem would be "cleaner" without them. Could you simply say, "And another drink"? and then add "Her" to start the next line in S1L4? So S1L3/4 would read:
  
  And another drink
  Her radio sing[s] a spanish voice
  
  
• I think "howl" feels off as a verb for the sound of cars below. Maybe "moan"?
• Are ruby eyes meant to depict bloodshot eyes? If so, "ruby eyes" sounds strangely attractive.

And I agree the title is too telly.

.

Thanks for the suggestions, I'll note them for future revisions. My intent with ruby was to evoke age, that she's not young.

[Nick McRae]

Originally Posted by Ashley Bowen

Hi, Nick,

I've come back to this several times and I think I have something, possibly, useful to comment (though maybe not).

I don't like the title, which others have also expressed some concern about as well. I'm not seeing too much in the poem that really needs that title, and I wonder if it might be too limiting.

I think my foremost concern about the poem is that I got tripped up a lot by the "Smoke drifts into the city / and another." My dense mind didn't read that as smoke drifting from one city to another. That's probably me, though.

Thanks Ashley.

I didn't expect that read. 'And another' refers to another cigarette, and a drink.

I didn't understand the "silver throne" line.

*IF* this were my poem, I'd make a couple of adjustments:

Alcoholics

Cigarette at the window.
Smoke drifts into the city
then to another. A drink.
The radio sings in Spanish.
The woman he loved fifteen years ago
sits on a silver throne
six streets away.
Her brown-haired children walk to school

Cigarette at the window.
Smoke drifts into the city
and to another. A drink.
Her ruby eyes close and open.
She looks back and sees
a blouse she bought so long ago.
The radio changes, Spanish to French
and different cars crawl below.

Forgive my tinkering.

Also, I don't like "drifts" as a verb for smoke. Too common.

Thanks for letting me read and respond.

Silver throne mainly just evokes that he was victorious, that he reached the goal that she didn't and ended up living the life he wanted to.

It's interesting to know how it's being read, so thanks for responding and the suggestions.

[Nick McRae]

I'd meant to add another comment to my last string of posts about the backstory of this poem, which is worth a read for those with time to kill.

When I was a kid, not sure of the exact age, but maybe between 7 - 9 I was visiting a relative in Toronto and standing in a hallway of her apartment building. I could hear music coming from one of the nearby apartments, and someone we were speaking with told me that an alcoholic lived in the apartment, and would listen to music by herself.

Even at that age the image of a woman sitting in an apartment alone came across as poetic to me, and I never forgot the moment. It came back to me this year and this poem was the result. I'm not sure how I feel about the poem, but it finagled itself into this shape and I can't seem to wrestle it out of it's form.