The Chop Shop

Well, first off I have to say that trying to read this in less than two minutes at Round Table definitely did not do it justice.

I like this poem. It echoes Marianne Moore in its tone and obtuseness. It is definitely obtuse, but this is not a bad thing. I will have to print out a copy and make notes. Usually I say this and then never do it. I will do it this time.

If I had to make any suggestions they would be to remove the lines that lean towards the pedantic/didactic. I will be more specific later, but I 'm not sure if you need every reference to God. The last four lines are definitely extraneous. Try cutting the God lines and the last four lines and read it out loud (preferably in a grocery store or bathroom, or both).

ok. this could get lengthy.
HEY AMBER!
HEY GUYS IT A GIRL!
seriously it really is good to have you here. A new voice that we all respect. we are only inviting people we want to help, people we respect and people who's poetry we like. not that we are elitist (we are) but we just want this to be the best it can be. ok enough welcome-mushy-poet-crap. on to the fun part. tearing up poems!

First general comments. In reading this poem it comes off as a little wordy and redundant. we have discussed cutting some lines, but exact ones might be hard to point at. i still am a big fan of picking the ones you love the most, the ones that sound most like poetry and getting rid of them. this is a great way to distance yourself from the poem and take a good critical look at it. then if in the end those lines creep back in then at least you know they fit and are not too sentimental.

ok.
i like the title, it gives a good setting for the poem without giving away too much.

* in line 2 get rid of "yet"
*line 6 and line 16 say the same thing. seems redundant. you are adding nothing new and slowing down the poem
*i like how you use awkward to describe the beautiful butterflies, it subverts our expectations.
*lines 10 and 15 both talk about the butterfly dance. consider cutting 15 and 16 altogether.
*line 17 seems to echo some of the smoke sentiment in line 5 and other places.
*line 23- dantes inferno? it seems like you could say it without saying it. but i like the allusion
*line 34 and 35 are AWESOME. my favorite in the poem. i think they should be inverted, it would read better and add meaning. like asking a question and answering it.
*while we are on the subject, i am wary of asking so many open ended questions in a poem. it just seems, well i don't know, weird. don't get me wrong, i am a philosophy major, i love unanswerable questions, but i feel like we should at least try to venture an answer or at least point the reader in the direction of the answer. i know that IS what you are doing with this poem but with so many questions i feel like we cannot answer all of them in this poem alone.
*in line 40 and 41 you say "tangled mess". and in line 41 you say "tangled tangled". i think you should omit it from line 40 and leave it in 41.

*lines 56 through 59 could go, like josh said.

all in all a really good poem, one worth revising and making phenomenal! i know you like it because you said you have held on to it and keep revising it. i hope we can help you get it there. good job.

lets see what professor Scoggins (anthony, you will find out why we call him that soon) has to say about it. cant wait to read more.

My friends call me Tony, but Garth can call me Dr. Scoggins...there's a good lad...

In response to Josh's comments, I would agree a bit on the obtuseness; then again, as he states, obtuseness is not so bad, but only if you are eating a Maui Zowie at the time. I would also agree on the didactic message he refers to (more on that later).

ok, now it's time to dismantle everything Garth wrote (the Doctor is in)...

- I am not crazy about the title: it may fit the universal message you are sending, but an empty sky is a very large message that seems too broad.

-I agree about line 2: yet seems out of place
-6 and 16 are a bit redundant
-like Garth, I also love the awkward butterflies in line 10: not crazy about the "strange" in "sexless tango" in line 11 (It seems implied already to be strange if two insects are not dancing sexually-oversexed butterflies especially)omit "strange": seems unnecessary.
-agree on the cutting of 15 and 16: repetitious.
-line 23: either the omission of "inferno" or Dante" will help the allusion without the clutter.
-line 34 is good: like the exclamation of the presence of God. line 35 seems obvious, and slows down the poem; consider omitting.
-Garth has a good point on the broad questions involved in the poem: it is hard to narrow down all things into one poem, and that is probably my main concern with the title and the poem's themes. You are dealing with several difficult
problems all at once, and they all seem to be blurring into each other. It would be helpful to narrow down your universal message.
-"tangled tangled" in line 41 is one part I really like: sounds like what it means (where is the extra "tangled" in line 40,Garth? I don't see it).
-agreement here for omission of lines 56-59: I agree with Josh and Garth, and not because they pay me to write this stuff, because they don't.

But they should.

ok, now on to some overall stuff: I like your use of stanza breaks and could learn something from that. Examples: between lines 3 and 4 "vain" and "still" have a nice cut, while line 24's "and yet" breaks off nicely as well. With Josh's structure, Garth's charm, your stanza breaks, and my ...you know... we could take over this literary world, and we can...
...and we will. La Raza!

Pero lo siento. Es mi culpa. I would watch out for abundant usage of alliteration in the poem: some seems a bit contrived (39) while some seems to work for me (27). Also, some lines border on cliche, such as line 38, "the walker is too exhausted to go on". I would advise caution against something that sounds somewhat overused.

One last thing. Ok, I am lying. Maybe a couple more things. The speaker's voice is very didactic, and seems to attempt to lead us to his point a bit too overzealously: watch out for preachiness. Although I love line 46: a bit on the cliche side, but good usage of the root word of "meaning".

-And that's it. Oh, did I ever say "welcome", by any chance, to our elitist group of pseudo-dead poets? No "society" here just yet: we are still working on that. You are a welcome addition to the group, and I appreciate you going all the way back to "Sweet Factory" and giving me comments. It's good to have you.

ahhh... the good doc proved me right. he reigns supreme. although he just agreed with me alot, except for the title. maybe i should be the doc? nah, too much pressure. viva la raza!

Viva la revolucion!

I would like to propose using "yesterdayís news/amashed unceremoniously in unsatisfyingly empty holes" as the next subtitle. We'll keep them in rotation, maybe I can make it so they're randomized, but they'll always be lines from our poems...

I really did print this one out, Amber, and I will make comments soon!

Thank you all for your comments- I took the name of this site to heart and completely dismantled this poem. It hurt. A lot. But I think its good, and hopefully it will continue improving after I go back over it with Dr. Scoggin's suggestions. I'm bringing my revised version complete with red-inked markings tomorrow.

Viva me.