[Jim Moonan]

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Originally Posted by W T Clark

There is some very sweet and melodic phrases, but, Jim, it feels too long at the moment, too heap-like. I'm not quite seeing how the music-riff and the hand-riff come together: and at times there seems an almost intentional vagueness which allows the poem to arrow in its chains of metaphor, but not quite for the metaphors to come together. If you only had 12, 10, 14 lines: what would you keep, what would you twine?

Hope this helps.

I see James beat me to responding to this. I get a distinct sense of pain emanating from what you call "very sweet and melodic phrases". In terms of brevity, James's take that "just because you can cut, doesn’t mean that you should. You may well be correct, or on to something here, but I’m way too close to this now for such an overhaul" is my take. In this case, I'd think twice about cutting parts out of what is a fragile, vulnerable and beautiful whole. (Although the hypothetical question you ask is one I should ask myself every time before I post a poem here.)
It may very well become stronger through attrition. The art of compressing a poem to its essence can be a treacherous task, especially with a delicately imagined poem such as this.

When it comes to critiquing a poem, I tend to be a counterpuncher. For example, in response. to Matt's completely logical crit that:

"...given "lyric" and "notes" and the implication of a musical instrument, maybe they are songs, or poems, that he wrote about the beloved -- but then why fold them, which is more suggestive of letters that have been sent or at least placed in envelopes to be sent?"

—I must say I absolutely love the merging sense that I get embodied in the letters-being-lyrics-being-songs-being-folded-being-sung-being-discovered-being read again. It just makes sense to me. I want my poetry to play with logic. I want it to be led by emotion and harnessed in authenticity. I feel the confusion you feel, Matt, but contend that any confusion in the reader's mind stems from the N's confusion that is the heart of the poem. It, too, is confused. I just go with it.

Matt: "I wonder why reading his own letters brings the beloved back more than reading the beloved's letter would?"
I would give a million dollars to have back the letters I wrote over a two-year period to a woman I was in love with long ago. As it is, I don't even have her letters! So this poem reminds me of how I ache for that literary correspondence/evidence of love that is irretrievable. (Actually, I'd have to beg, borrow and steal a million dollars — Ha!)


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