What can I say? I verily enjoyed this poem. It would be futile for me to praise this poem since others have done it, but let me do it again, for this poem cannot receive enough praise. Your use of imagery is very unique, especially given the shortness of the format you utilised. It is very unique and personal. The diction you used is also impressive and quite accurate for the theme of this poem. Well done on an excellent poem. Keep it up!
Sems to be all about the intoxication of being young beautiful and healthy with a world vision that cannot accommodate death and old age. Makes them sem a bit lazy or something too. Seems to be a bit too minimal though. I felt like it was a lead up to describe something more. Alternatively you could have played around with the structure so that we would be confused as to where the description of the frisbee and the fickleness of youth seprate and clear evrything up in the last line. Sometimes with short poems you can be really ruthless whenit comes to presenting a straightforward narrative (provided of course that it is straightforward by the last line). I mean to say you could have played mor eon the leading us on and then backstepping to hit us with the message.
All this is technical mumbo and jumbo and as such you will get a never ending barage of where you should have dotted your i's and crossed your t's -lol
Anyway
I liked
to the next
This sweet bird of youth that thins in mid-air to roost gently
on another hand
the most... elgant and simple words drawing the most out of an idle frisbe being thrown to indicate more about the fleetingness of youth.
I disliked
These students are happy and green as their May afternoon.
perhaps more the first line. Its just a technical point of floweriness I gess. I thing I wanted to se something more than the word students. I think the shorter the poem the more careful you have to be with words, particularly repetition.
Sorry seems like I can't get off this technical problem trip -lol
Selina, I thought it was about time to go over one of your poems since you have obligingly done so with a number of mine. Kazam - so here I am! Lol, anyways...
Have you noticed that you have the word 'youth' twice in this poem? I like the phrase 'sweet bird of youth' so I would personally favour ditching the last line for something else that means roughly the same thing. I also wonder upon your use of the word 'hedonistic' - it seems a bit of a mouthful to close your poem with... but if it is central to your theme, then by all means, keep it. I just feel that the phrase 'hedonistic youth' isn't as strong overall as it could be.
Your first stanza has four lines compared to three for the rest... now I'm just anal but I notice these things and I was wondering if you wanted to make it more symmetrical?
'Roosting' then 'floats' later on - your tense is a bit awry, have you noticed?
Ok, I did a bit of playing around and basically re-edited this. And as you know, these are only overall suggestions.
Students concentrate as a frisbee is thrown from one unclenched fist
to the next
This sweet bird of youth that thins in mid-air to come roost gently
upon another hand
Happy and green as this May afternoon are these students
with joy in their steps/ with joie de vivre
I would give a few other suggestions for your last line as the ones that I came up with probably don't suit... but I think you get my point. I'll leave it up to you to come up with something more suitable for yourself. If you want to keep 'hedonistic' I would definitely drop the word 'youth' as I stated before.
And as you've probably noticed, I separated this out into three line stanzas with one liners in between to let the reader linger upon them more... as end statements to each stanza, I guess. You could also italicize the singular lines, whatever takes your fancy.
I dropped the line about the doves because I found that to be a bit overused... I dunno, it didn't sit well with me personally.
As I said, these are just suggestions and probably really crappy ones at that. But I've tried lol.
This is so lovely you seem to have caught a moment in the lives of these young students. The flight of the frisbee is described in wonderful detail as it passes from one hand to another. The sweet bird of youth – their youth – passes all too swiftly but for the moment they are ‘happy and green’. I really like this. Love and peace Comradenessie
allo Selina thought I drop by here and check out this one
ok second line seems like it should be “Frisbee” as opposed to “frisbe”
first I didn’t know what to think but I’ll show you my process: I have to say this one really took me for a spin! I started think about Frisbee leaves like from a tree then I was wondering the unclenched hand is God or some force of nature who knows….then why is it described as a sweet bird of youth and thinning the air?, I tell you I was very lost. then I was really stumped on the going to one hand to the next then landing made me scratch my head even more, I ask myself what the heck is going on how did I get so lost here? I went back to the Frisbee that is the key well more like the word leaves. leaves not like on a tree like leaving (motion) aha! then the rest so beautifully fit in place. it’s a simple piece where I had traveled down the wrong road of thinking one way from one word. I can’t imagine how many times I have done that in the past. very nice work and I’m going to kick myself now ,
to be young and innocent and free of care, even if but for the moment...nothing to add or subtract here. It is what it is and a wonderful thought at that...frisbee only really works when in sync with others
love the open hand vs clenched fist symbolism. You say a lot with few words
Wow...I'm really excited to be reading your stuff because you have this wonderful ability with imagery and I've come across some good stuff before but yours seems inspired in places so that the phrase "a picture paints a thousand words" seems trite...yours speak volumes.
Students concentrate as a frisbee is thrown from one unclenched fist
I might read part again and again and go back and forth but my gut instinct is that you have over emphasized the point.
I felt you were trying to show a moment of spontaneity set against the transition from man-child to adulthood. In that respect the concentration of the students on play was a nice touch. Later your describe the unclenched fists and that brought to mind rebellion and determination which are serious things, also it hinted towards unity..."one unclenched fist to another" which embues a sense of purpose on this group. So, given that that's where the words took me, I felt that the "concentrated" part was surplus to requirements and would have liked a more subtle approach or word choice like "congregate" though that would require some slight rephrasing.
to the next
This sweet bird of youth that thins in mid-air to roost gently
on another hand
Ugh! This is just amazing imagery...the flight of the frisbee transforms into the loss of youth...and its passing...
lol...don't be put off by my summary since I know exactly where you were going. It's hard to decribe and yet all I need to do is quote that passage back to you...which really is a testiment to your ability and a rare quality.
Submission Name: Green May
