Hatrack River Writers Workshop: Anyone here critique poetry?

This is topic Anyone here critique poetry? in forum Fragments and Feedback for Short Works at Hatrack River Writers Workshop.

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Posted by oliverhouse (Member # 3432) on :

I'm no poet -- which is okay, since I'm no writer, either, if professional credits are what's important -- but I've written a poem for a cool speculative fiction magazine's pirate issue, and I'd appreciate feedback on it. (The Web site doesn't reflect it yet, but apparently Cap'n Adams, who is assisting for this issue, has agreed to look at pirate poetry.)

Here are the first 12 lines. (Formatting for poetry apparently isn't the same as for short stories, but to keep electronic rights as my own, I can't put out much anyway.) The full poem is 50 lines. If anyone's interested, I'll email you the full thing.

-----
Food in cans, they say, will save your life.
I say, count the cost.
For every life it saves, it kills a pirate,
A future pirate,
And sneaks a weakling in his place
To grow around a pirate's bones.
Scurvy's done, it's true, but more's the shame.
Not a wag aboard the _Shimm'ring Star_
Has spit up blood or fainted dead
In nigh a year.

Ne'er will I trust a man, aye, ne'er
Until we sail as mates on the ocean's back
-----

I couldn't help it. The notion of a pirate issue was so weird to me that I couldn't get it out of my head, and then, in a dark and peculiar mood, this is what came out.

Thanks,
Oliver

Edited to make links work.

[This message has been edited by oliverhouse (edited October 07, 2006).]

Posted by wbriggs (Member # 2267) on :

I read it through a couple of times (the excerpt), but I still don't know what it's saying. In some way, using canned food harms future pirates, but I don't understand how.

Posted by oliverhouse (Member # 3432) on :

Well, blast.

The reference is to the fact that tin cans dramatically reduced the incidence of scurvy aboard ships. The pirate is displeased because the whippersnappers have gotten soft by not having to put up with the stuff that he did. If what I've written is that obscure then I'll have to rethink that first stanza.

I'll wait for more feedback -- never make a decision based on a statistical sample of one if you can help it -- but you've just dampened my enthusiasm for it.

Another reference I use is "I hauled a lad like that across my keel". Does that paint a clear picture of what the pirate did, and do you have an idea of why pirates and other sailors did that?

Thanks,
Oliver

Posted by Corky (Member # 2714) on :

If you look the words up, it means something:

quote:
To discipline by dragging under the keel of a ship.

But the definition implies that "across" is not the best choice for your preposition.

Posted by LaceWing (Member # 3957) on :

I got the scurvy, and I got the idea of this stanza just fine. I did not quite like "a future pirate" but mostly for the rythm, although it just may not have been surprising/poetic/arresting enough. The bit about wrapping a weakling around a pirate's bones is really, really nice. Overall this is a an appealing idea in attractive, revealing language. Note that I would expect to see something about "the cost" and a pirate's treasure somewhere in the poem. Nice work.

BTW, you can get more lines in by using "/" to represent line breaks.

This idea, the voice and the imagery would make a nice hook for a story, too.

Posted by Elan (Member # 2442) on :

Um... scurvy is a Vitamin C deficiency. I've always heard the thing that sailors used to battle scurvy was a little vinegar each day.

The canned food thing didn't suggest a cure for scurvy to me.

I'm not much on poetry, mind you, but this one really didn't make any sense to me at all.

Posted by oliverhouse (Member # 3432) on :

I'm happy to take criticism from people who don't "do" poetry. This should be at least moderately accessible to casual readers.

quote:
Um... scurvy is a Vitamin C deficiency. I've always heard the thing that sailors used to battle scurvy was a little vinegar each day.

Okay, you've made me go out and research something that I thought I knew. I discovered that I'm right: Being able to preserve fruits and such in cans also helped the sailors* consume the right amount of Vitamin C, which caused a dramatic drop in scurvy. It is, as I understand it, the major factor in reducing the incidence of scurvy worldwide.

Being right is small consolation, of course, because apparently a poem that relies on this bit of information will have some trouble. It looks like I'm batting 1 for 4 on Hatrack; the ratio's about 3 for 4 among some other acquaintances. Bummer.

If I kill the first stanza (my poor darling!), the next lines are these:

-----
Ne'er will I trust a man, aye, ne'er
Until we sail as mates on the ocean's back
With blistered hands and weathered faces
Trading an hour or two anon
Of heaving out our sorry guts amidships.
We see our own faces on our deathly mates,
And as they stand we ourselves rise up.

Not so the younger school.
So smart they are, preening, speaking,
Lashed to their books as if the Tempest cared
About Empedocles or Bonaventure. Indeed,
She dispatched their cherished Odysseus
Long ago.
-----

The title, by the way, is tentatively "The Death of a Pirate's Life".

Thanks,
Oliver

* And, it turns out, soldiers. According to one source, more of Napoleon's soldiers were disabled from scurvy and hunger than combat. I don't know the proportion of hunger casualties to scurvy.

[This message has been edited by oliverhouse (edited October 09, 2006).]

Posted by LaceWing (Member # 3957) on :

"Being right is small consolation, of course, because apparently a poem that relies on this bit of information will have some trouble. It looks like I'm batting 1 for 4 on Hatrack; the ratio's about 3 for 4 among some other acquaintances. Bummer."

I want UNcommon associations in poetry. I say write for the eyes and ears first. If you want them to see cans, let them see cans.

Posted by Grijalva (Member # 3295) on :

I would love to take a look at your poem, and provide whatever insight I can. I wrote a fair amount of it myself, even been published and paid a couple times for my stuff.

I personally found that starting off with second stanza instead of the first made things a lot more clearer and interesting.

Posted by oliverhouse (Member # 3432) on :

On its way, from my work address. Thanks!

Posted by kinh (Member # 2772) on :

Your poem illustrates an industrialized interpretation of Darwinian theory being perverted by man's suppression of the natural inclination toward survival through exposure to the elements and subsequent evolution. I like it. It rings sarcastic as it mocks the "innovation" of man versus the intution and fortitude of both the human body and the human condition. Pirates, for all the enmity we apply, are still symbols of man's intuitive nature; to work toward being the fittest to survive. The weakling that sprouts up is the antithesis of all that. Can I read the rest?

Posted by Elan (Member # 2442) on :

I have a hard time getting excited about the concept of canned food causing the decline of pirate life. I cannot envision Errol Flynn's swashbucking as he wields a can opener instead of a sword while facing the Dread Pirate Roberts.

[This message has been edited by Elan (edited October 15, 2006).]

Posted by TMan1969 (Member # 3552) on :

I read this poem, with my pirating voice..and it didn't seem like what a pirate would say. Not to say that they weren't intelligent, but I think most of their feelings come from the gut. Life on the edge, on the rolling oceans and hungry sharks.

I felt like saying...

"Food in cans will save your life.."

Bah, give me a half starved rat
and a pirate
you will have, not fodder for Davy Jones
Locker.

Half starved and hungry
sharp eyed and wary, waiting like
a predator - ah what a pirate

Full bellied and a mind filled
with song, nothing wrong to be sure
but can he endure, the rigors of the
sea

something like that..sorry if I strayed.

Posted by oliverhouse (Member # 3432) on :

quote:
I have a hard time getting excited about the concept of canned food causing the decline of pirate life. I cannot envision Errol Flynn's swashbucking as he wields a can opener instead of a sword while facing the Dread Pirate Roberts.

LOL Sounds like a _great_ image... if I'm writing for Monty Python.

I guess what I'm going for is the side of a pirate that you don't typically see. They were entrepreneurial ship captains, and as such had to deal with recruiting, paying, and retaining their crews just like any other business. (Okay, not _just_ like any other business...) Keeping their crews healthy would be an important part of their lives in between all the swashbuckling.

Although Kinh's level of formality is much higher than I would have used to describe the poem, the interpretation is on target. (It was sent to you a few days ago, by the way, Kinh.)

TMan, I understand where you're coming from, and that's not bad -- but it's also not my pirate.

It's funny. I'm not a poet, as I've said, but I've gotten feedback from people who "do poetry", including one poet who has published a few anthologies in the small press, and they all like or dislike different parts of it, and for different reasons.

In general, the feedback from people who do poetry has been much more positive than the feedback I get from people who don't -- which makes me wonder whether there's a lot of breathing of one's own exhaust there that wouldn't translate effectively to a broader market. It makes me question whether it makes sense to try to sell a poem to a predominantly short story market.

Something to figure out eventually...

Thanks to you all for your comments.

Regards,
Oliver