Monday, July 31, 2006

Deleted Poem

deleted

8 comments:

scavella said...

Glass, Rob, and hands.

Interesting what floats to the surface when we're writing, huh?

Glass, hands, and war.

ufukhati said...

Rob,

you see the bombs,
you hear the crying,
you write the poem,

[you're not the true poet],

ufukhati said...

Rob,

the last line should be read :

[you're the true poet]

Sorry for the error.

Anonymous said...

I like your poem.

Eloise said...

Now that is impressive, making hotmail seem romantic. "my contact list lengthening like a shadow,".

This is lovely, a real gut-puncher.

"there is a child. I know that soon there will be a hand
stretched out, and the camera will focus in, as if misery
is only misery when it squares up eye to eye
with an impassive lens."

wow...

Eloise

Rob said...

Thanks everyone.

Larry said...

Hi Rob,

This needs much clipping and some rebalancing to keep the tv calamities from seeming self-serving. There is a lot of rambling esp. in S3, the repeats sound melodramatic to me, and I'm not sure switching your location from indoors to out and back again is a good idea.

Here's a stripped down version; check if you really find the circular rambling style effective to convey passive guilt or perhaps more important to give charge the pictures with more strength and unspoken rage.

Mute

If you train a telescope on my house from the zoo’s high hill
you will find me through some window or other, placed like
an exhibit in an IKEA showroom
as bombs crash down like collapsing stars on some distant
city in the dark.

There may have been children crying beneath the rubble.
It’s hard to tell from this distance, with the sound
turned down. The bombs float
like balloons.

Rob said...

Larry
Your edit is interesting. It certainly has impact and I guess - given its length - it would be easier to place in magazines. It gains something on my original. It also loses something too of course, particularly in terms of distinct voice. I'll probably do some work on the poem in a few weeks' time, when I've got a bit of distance from the draft. Thanks for the ideas.