comments on "snow on snow on snow"

I sent "a rest of six beats" off to Global City Review. It is unlike anything I read in the magazine. Thus I do not think they will choose to publish it. In my experience people seldom like something that is unlike what they have up to now liked. However, I sent it because I wrote it for Global City. The first version is more like what they publish, I think, but the first version is dead. The version 4, just below, is only slightly different from the version I mailed. Most significant change? Changed "corners rounded" to "figures rounded". The other poems I sent along with "a rest" are more conventional in their syntax & presentation. Maybe they'll like something. Who knows?

"snow on snow on snow" version 4

a rest of six beats



in cloud, in rest, in abyss

crystal caught crystal


white-limned white

six sides


tires

the snow sleeps


corners rounded

a softening, a baffling

"snow on snow on snow", version 3

crystal caught crystal

a wheel locked

the snow tires

the snow quits

sleeps

a drowse over, arrest of

a softening, a baffling

a rest of six beats

six sides

corners rounded

lines elide

white-limned white

comments on "snow on snow on snow"

I don't know about you, but I'm getting tired of this poem. Plus which if I'm writing it for a certain magazine I'd better wrap it up soon cuz the deadline for the theme issue is May 1 and I've gotta mail it so that means allowing for the neither-rain-nor-snow-nor-dark-of-night crowd to get it from this coast to that one. Besides, I can't send just one darn poem, right? Gotta find some others that are vaguely "knittish". Pheh. This little resolution is heading toward no-fun-ville. Let's say I have to print out and mail the batch by next Friday. That'd be the 20th. That will give the 'velope a whole week to plod across the nation (getting high on rocky mountains, oaring through the amber waves) and heave itself smelly & exhausted into the too-late pile. It's a plan.

"snow on snow on snow" version 2.9

crystal caught crystal

a wheel locked

the snow tires

the snow quits

sleeps

a drowse over, arrest of

a softening, a baffling

a rest of six beats

six sides

corners rounded

lines elide

"snow on snow on snow" version 2.8

crystal caught crystal

a wheel locked

the snow tires

the snow quits

sleeps

a drowse over, arrest of

a softening, a baffling

a rest of six beats

six sides

corners rounded

comments on "snow on snow on snow" in progress

November was declared National Novel Writing Month (NaNoWriMo) by a group in Oakland. I toyed with the November novel, but couldn't get it going. I completed the three-day novel a few years ago (there's a competition; I didn't win).

Some poets, feeling left out, or inspired (or both), decided since April was already National Poetry Month, why not make it NaPoWriMo? Write a poem a day! There are those who write a poem each day and post it to their blogs.

I've written a poem a day before. It's a useful exercise. It gets you past the feeling you don't have anything to say. Cuz you gotta put a few words down anyway.

But I think I've learned all I'm going to from the exercise. Plus I find that a pause in poetry writing actually recharges something. If several days have gone by since I wrote a poem the poem I write is often lively. Enforcing a silence is about as silly as forcing a noise, that is, one can learn from it, but hopefully one of the things you learn is you own best rhythm.

Rather than write a poem a day this month I decided to write one poem, each day one line. (Yes, I missed the first few days but things are going right along now.)

"snow on snow on snow" version 2.7

crystal caught crystal

a wheel locked

the snow tires

the snow quits

sleeps

a drowse over, arrest of

a softening, a baffling

a rest of six beats

six sides

"snow on snow on snow" version 2.6

crystal caught crystal

a wheel locked

the snow tires

the snow quits

sleeps

a drowse over, arrest of

a softening, a baffling

a rest of six beats

"snow on snow on snow" version 2.5

crystal caught crystal

a wheel locked

the snow tires

the snow quits

sleeps

a drowse over, arrest of

a softening, a baffling

"snow on snow on snow" version 2.4

crystal caught crystal

a wheel locked

the snow tires

the snow quits

sleeps

a drowse over, arrest of

"snow on snow on snow" version 2.3

crystal caught crystal

a wheel locked

the snow tires

the snow quits

sleeps

"snow on snow on snow" version 2.2

crystal caught crystal

a wheel locked

the snow tires, the snow quits

"snow on snow on snow" version 2.1

crystal to crystal, a wheel locks