Response/Inspired by Poem -- is it any good?

I will come back to this poem.  
Worthy. Great sound words!
Easy to follow, but....
What kind of bag?  I need to see if my picture matches yours.  Backpack? Is it in a hand?  
More later.
I think Birma with Lucidity is going to get the poem I actually wrote this morning for you guys.  It needs critique.  
Later, with a poem, I hope.
Pat

Renee

I really like the tone of this poem.  This is a nice, fresh approach for you. 

I would change "breaks" to "brakes."

I would cut the last line.

Maybe cut "she didn't make it" since that could be the reason for "slows down huffing . . . ."

The last tercet is WOW, I mean WOW!

Todd

Oops! I meant to spell “brakes.” Thanks for catching that. I cut those lines. What do you think? Thanks for the praise! I wasn’t expecting anyone to like it this much. I just loved the image that the blogger created, and I wanted to practice turning prose into a poem. I’ve done this with a couple other poems I hope to share in the future.

About the bag— the blog that inspired it described a bag slung across her shoulder I believe. It doesn’t specify whether a backpack or one of those bags with a flap and one strap (can’t think of what they’re called.) I had an image in my head, and I thought the reader can let whatever image comes to mind work. Thoughts? Should I specify more?

Some Days, the Bus Does Wait
Inspired by Heather Holleman’s blog “Some Days, The Bus Does Wait”


A campus bus stops too far away

Book bag slung over a shoulder
banging side to side
Bound to leave a bruise
but worth it if －

The bus begins to pull away

She slows
still huffing and puffing

The brakes squeal
The bus exhales

It’s waiting

Waiting for her
giving her a different kind of morning
No missed classes, exams, or labs

________________________
Renee V. Barger
February 25, 2020

Another question for Mr. Todd (or Pat too):
I don’t know if I see how my tone is different. The poem felt different, but I can’t see what I did that’s different. Would you mind explaining it so I can try to improve my tone in other poems?

Thanks so much!
Renee

is light and airy. Like when someone is outside and reaching for more.
I think the spacing helps this. 
Movement is happening.
We are observers....
I esp. like It's waiting
and on the next line:  waiting....
Beautifully done.  
Thanks for helping me with the bag. 

Renee

Is this a found poem or your words?

I wish I knew how to capture magic with every writing.  I guess that is why we keep on doing it.  Magic sometimes occurs and we get to say, "Yup.  I was there when the poem showed up."  It doesn't change our work but it is a form of reward.

Todd

I had to look up the term "found poem." I had seen other people write them but have never written one myself... or if I did, I didn't know that's what I was doing!

I don't know if this one classifies as a found poem. Here's the blog I read: http://heatherholleman.com/2020/01/some-days-the-bus-does-wait/

I picked out many of her words, but the message is still pretty much the same. I just thought the story and image were so beautiful, I wanted to see the poem version. 

I have also done this with some stories I have read in a book about the North Platte Canteen during WWII; I'll plan on sharing  "Pink Slipper Shoes" next month.

anywhere, anytime.  Makes me smile.

I am reading a book on Confederate plantation women.  Oh my!  It may take a year to read.  I get so angry at them and their pampered ways.  Sad.  Helpless.  They were so unprepared for the war.  No one was prepared, of course. Mentally, it broke the men and the women. PTSD everywhere. But the focus is on the women. PTSD:  They didn't have that word then, of course.  My husband has told me to put that book down!  So I am writing poems that come to me after reading a chapter. I can't read a chapter but once every few weeks:  it upsets me: women could not bear arms, but they were in charge of a plantation! Not that I know anything about guns, but my husband does.  Maybe I need to target practice with him just to say I'm able to use one if I had to. We have wild hogs that create havoc!  I guess it's found or creative non-fiction poetry I'm writing now and then. I'm learning to put the name of the book under the title as an epigraph. I wrote one I totally made up and sent to Last Friday a month or two ago.  I think it's my therapy after reading the chapter.  It's a history book used by my son in college 25 yrs ago. (His notes are fun to read too!) 

Renee, I know you have a little one, but Lucidity Poetry Retreat would be so fun for you someday.  Usually in April of each year. Hard when you have children. You have found poetry much earlier than I did.  I was an English major, but.....  I was not pulled in the slightest toward writing poetry unless I wrote one for somebody I cared about.  I didn't seriously learn much about the craft until I started reading poetry and going to groups and that retreat which Todd and I both know about.  Just know teachers are out there:  Todd is one of the best. 

All this to say, you are actually ahead of the game!  I love that you ask questions.

Renee

I wonder if you can send the blogger a note and the poem.  When I did so, the blogger was very encouraged and posted my poem on her blog.

I wonder if an epigraph might encourage others to visit the blog and be encouraged too.  I think your language is fresh and maybe not all a "found poem."  Pat????

Todd

I remember that poem, Pat! I wondered what sparked it. I would love to see more of those poems. That's such good therapy while reading it too.

That poetry retreat looks fun and reasonably priced! We have family that I'm sure would watch our little guy, so maybe one of these years, I can make it!

Thanks for all of the encouragement, Pat. Honestly, Sukany's class was what made poetry make sense for me. Up to that point, I had a favorite few poems, but overall, I thought poetry was weird and confusing. Sometimes it still is. I'll keep asking questions as long as I don't bug y'all!

I actually did message the author. She and I are friends on Facebook after she hosted a book club with Compel. I shared the poem on my blog: https://reneebarger.wordpress.com/2020/02/26/response-poem-some-days-the-bus-does-wait/

So another question: I included "inspired by HH's Blog The Bus..." With a link. Is that an epigraph? If not, can you give me an example?

How great that you contacted the writer!  

Ask Pat Bland Durmon to become FB friends.  I can then share the Lucidity info with you. : )   It's on FB.  Or go to my Pat Durmon, writer, poet page and scroll down.  I think it has a photo of a wheat field?   

Here's one I'm sending to NFSPS:
Hoping it does well in a contest.  
Epigraph included.

It's a narrative poem: I guess I'm a storyteller! Some of us do this via poetry.  I can't seem to get away from it!
It may look double-spaced here, but it's not.  I just always have to fix that in The Last Friday venue. 


21. William Stafford Memorial Award

 

           Finding Brother Doggett

 

            The Truth must dazzle gradually

                     Or every man be blind.

                                ---Emily Dickinson

 

       In other years

the woman sat on a stool in the kitchen

in front of the radio listening to Brother Doggett

tell the town who’d died in the night, the forecast,

what was being served in the school cafeteria.

Somehow it helped her to know her place

in the family of things.

 

       But this morning

with mist in her old eyes and an ache in her chest,

she tells us Brother Doggett has gone away,

that he no longer gives news and weather.

“Don’t have a clue what happened to him.

Been gone for months.” Dropping her head,

she mumbles, “I sure do miss him.”

 

       My husband

looks at her but says nothing. Instead, he picks up

the phonebook and leaves the room. When he returns,

he has sweet explaining lips. “Brother Doggett is fine...

just spoke with him. For real, Mama, everything’s

the same, no changes.” She watches her son hover

over a little radio and adjust the dial to 93.7.

 

       When his mama

hears Brother Doggett’s voice, she sucks in breath

and her mouth flies open. A holy hush.

It’s like her best friend’s been resurrected,

like Elvis really is alive!

 

       After breakfast

she says, “That makes me mad. There, all the time.

I just couldn’t find him.”