The Last Friday

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The Last Friday

The Last Friday is a poetry editing group. Once a month, we post a poem and then offer feedback to the other poems on the Forum. We're a friendly but honest group. We value each other deeply and desire for every poet to be published or become famous.


3 posters

    Just looking for weeds

    tsukany
    tsukany


    Posts : 924
    Join date : 2011-05-21

    Just looking for weeds Empty Just looking for weeds

    Post  tsukany Fri Mar 25, 2016 11:47 am

    The audience for this poem is very small but I'm seeing what doesn't make sense to real readers.


    Elegy for a Hyphen

    David, technology lets me
    listen to you read your words
    and I’m not alone.  Hundreds
    can click and scroll through
    your elegy, affirming their
           expectations
    of a dying America.  Thank you
    for including First Lady Reagan.  


    A walk through the graveyard
    behind the old Methodist church
    south of Hwy 215. Rain like shoe polish
    shining off old headstones can’t fill
    the gouge of a lifetime, span  
    between birth year and death.  
    All of us have to live those days,
           one at a time.  


    David, join us, all of us,
    whoever the us of US is,
    drop your shovel, throw
    your flowers and a handful
    of soil into the hyphen.

    --Todd Sukany 14 Mar 2016
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    Dennis 20
    Guest


    Just looking for weeds Empty A weekend for tombstone thoughts, this

    Post  Dennis 20 Fri Mar 25, 2016 8:56 pm

    Todd,  I like what you have pictured here. I don't know if David is important to what you said. His name doesn't resonate with me. The Lady Reagan line led me astray. I was looking for the poem to go in that direction. Is her name thrown in necessary?  I think you need to "clean up" the shoe polish on the headstones picture.  I know what you meant, but I had to read it a couple of times to see that the rain was shinning on the headstones and not the polish. Maybe just a little rearranging will work there. I love the last stanza. How wonderful to be able to say us of us of us of US.  And then the finale with the handful of soil in the hyphen, how profound. Good poem.
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    Pat


    Posts : 1162
    Join date : 2011-09-12

    Just looking for weeds Empty Profound.

    Post  Pat Sun Mar 27, 2016 10:53 pm

    And I'm smiling.   I love the hyphen.  I'd throw dirt and flowers there.  : )   I also like the name at the beginning.  It is a poem to someone.  Like a response, giving feedback.  I know we just lost First Lady Reagan:  is she symbolic of a dying America?   Like shoe polish, black and shiny is my guess.  Gouge is strong and appropriate for a lifetime.  Do you know the poem "The Dash" by somebody?   S 2  line 5, I'd put the before span because I wanted to use span there as a verb.  Just flagging it.  And then you pull David into it again.  : )  So America has died and here's the elegy for American life as we knew it.  It's over.  It's dead.  Let us remember her and throw soil into the grave.   I get it.  Nice job.  Oh, this is soooo sad to me.
    Karen
    Karen


    Posts : 320
    Join date : 2014-10-25
    Age : 70
    Location : North Little Rock

    Just looking for weeds Empty Re: Just looking for weeds

    Post  Karen Mon Mar 28, 2016 7:50 pm

    Well, phooey.  I feel thick as a whale omelet.  I don't know who David is or understand the hyphen reference.  Is it to do with current events or am I woefully uneducated in general?  I do admit I turned my TV off last April and I don't read the paper very thoroughly.  I understand and appreciate the poem's tone, but I can't get past not understanding those two references.

    Honestly, my feelings won't be hurt if it's common knowledge but not to me.  I really would like to know.
    tsukany
    tsukany


    Posts : 924
    Join date : 2011-05-21

    Just looking for weeds Empty FROM DEWELL

    Post  tsukany Wed Mar 30, 2016 12:07 pm

    Confounded FORUM won't let me back in since Sunday PM.
    MADDENING!
    Then finally on Wed. AM I got partially in only to have
    my efforts scrambled!
     
    Elegy for a Hyphen
     
    Weeds?  No, it looks like others have sprinkled it
    with a generous supply of WEED-B-GONE.
    There is quite a jump between S #1 and S#2...
    took some doing to span it
    Is David David Muir of ABC?
     
     
    Are we discussing our ability to govern ourselves?
    If we have lost that politically then who?  Military?
    Technology?
     
    This poem forces this reader to think, think...
     
    Thanks for sharing this "space between two dates"...
    Dewell
    tsukany
    tsukany


    Posts : 924
    Join date : 2011-05-21

    Just looking for weeds Empty Revealing David

    Post  tsukany Wed Mar 30, 2016 3:58 pm

    http://www.rattle.com/elegy-by-david-miller/

    I needed your feedback, knowing you'd not have enough info to process the poem.  I wanted to see how to make it work for those who wouldn't trace the poem's roots back to "elegy."

    Thank you for your feedback and patience.

    Blessings to all
    Karen
    Karen


    Posts : 320
    Join date : 2014-10-25
    Age : 70
    Location : North Little Rock

    Just looking for weeds Empty Re: Just looking for weeds

    Post  Karen Wed Mar 30, 2016 5:32 pm

    Thank you, Todd.  Sometimes I butt my head over and over against a wall I don't understand, unwilling to just appreciate the beauty of the wall.

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