Poetry / Your Dark Liquor (Analysis)

It has a good flow, great imagery, and some interesting use of words. However, the line “kick in the nuts” kind of ruins the effect this poem was going for and it really slows it down. I like how its seemingly randomness, but there is a method to the madness. Your sense of irony is great.

The wording is smooth in most verses, but your rhyming is hard to follow in places.  Also your verse pacing 3,4,5,5 isn’t something I’m used to seeing.
I like the style of your piece somewhat, but I’m confused by your use of language.  ”Thine” and “concubine” are inconsistent with modern terminology, which you use everywhere else.  Picking a more specific lexicon might help with putting the reader in the right frame of mind.

Is the subject of this piece intoxication or authority?  I fear that I may have gotten your meaning completely wrong.  Between “liquor” in the title, pet porcupines, dual references to death and ashes, “rule and divide” (which made me thing of the police’s “protect and serve” in reverse), and a “kick to the nuts”... it isn’t easy for me to follow your train of thought.  Work on clarity, and offer your readers a device somewhere to help them keep up with your thought process.

Setting your criteria with “amuse/entertain/warm..hearts” also left me baffled.  Is this supposed to be a humorous piece?  Did I miss the joke?  

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August 27, 2008

by Charley_Groth

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28	M	Cedar Rapids, IA	October 22

It’s meant to baffle with strange images.  Sorry, it may  may have baffled you to the point of irritation.

August 28, 2008

by Deadsage

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27	M	Springfield, MO	November 19

Not irritated so much as unfulfilled.  I feel let down knowing that I looked too hard for meaning where none was intended.

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its a really good idea. and the words you use are colourful and very discriptive… but it doesnt work in the concept that you have written it… you try to force in too much rhyming, where you dont need it to make a peom work… and the use of the word thine is a little overdone…

i still like the poem though. it is very prommising and it could be alot better with just a little bit of work done on it.

thank you for letting me review this and goodluck!

xl13dj13x

I like it.  Good sounds, good images.  Haven’t a clue what it’s about but “ashes of ashes of ashes of mine” fairly sings.  And I have a soft spot for porcupines.  Good job.

Nitpicker’s list:

“Sweet” in the third line robs some of the effect of “sweet” in the second.  I think you’d strengthen this by changing the word in one line or the other.  

Second verse—perfect.

Third verse—for meter’s sake, I’d change the “I’ve” to “I have”.  Read it aloud.  It sounds better that way because you maintain the rhythm.  

In the fourth verse, the third line gives me a little trouble.  Now since you’ve introduced the methaphor of violence in verse 3 and revisit it in verse 4, are you talking about time for “thine” in terms of spilling the guts of the other?  It’s a bit ambiguous, which is okay, but if this is the case “and spill some of thine” holds to your established meter while the original wording strains it.  

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August 20, 2008

by Charley_Groth

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28	M	Cedar Rapids, IA	October 22

Thank you for the great review!  This poem was really quickly written and rearranged with some fun in mind, and I really don’t know what it is about.  That 3rd line in the last verse is troublesome.  Your other observations were also very helpful.  Thankyou

August 20, 2008

by Howard_Bushart

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58	M	Seabrook, TX	November 19

You’re welcome.  It’s a nice work.

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This makes me think that you were drunk with the liquor of the sounds of the words together. Very interesting first stanza. I’m still unclear as to what is being divided and ruled. Nice use of personification with the dead porch swing. I still like S1 the best. But.. the reference to the kick is intriguing!

Wow, I enjoyed it a lot.  It kind of reminded me of the stuff that I write; kind of doesn’t make sense to a general audience but still beautiful and strangely eloquent.  I was jarred by the fine english:

(The future of ashes of dead concubines,
Sweet valentines, and thine
Allow the sweet master to rule and divide)

and then the quick transition into slang and beat.

(Flashin’ light flashin’
The fourth of July
Fishin’ and splashin’
My pet porcupine)

Very interesting.  Very good.  I like that it doesn’t follow a set of rules or rhyming pattern or stanza grouping.  It’s all over the place.  And that’s cool.  :D