Response 2, Week 15

Response to Candis's "Free Write, Week 15"

Candis,
I like how the oxymorons were able to fuel your draft. I caught them throughout, such as "adult children," "little big," "baggy tights," etc. However, I think that sticking with them so strictly is limiting this piece's possibility. Expanding on the phrase "balancing insanity," trying to portray the act of balancing insanity instead of saying it outright, will allow for more concrete imagery and specificity. I suggest asking questions of all the oxymorons: How can people be "genuinely fake?" What does it mean to be "dysfunctionally functional?" I believe that this will help you create some surprising imagery that you may not have gotten without the oxymorons, but that you also cannot achieve with moving past them.

Response 1, Week 15

Response to Sydney's "Improv Week 15"

Sydney,
I respect the openness of this piece. It does not shy away from a taboo conversation; instead, it presents it in a calm, matter-of-fact way. I liked the male only speaks in cliches, but because of this, I think more of the poem should be devoted to non-cliches. The things he says dominate the piece; I felt like there should be more otherwise. What was the speaker thinking or feeling? Why does she believe him, or does she? Maybe you could borrow from the style of Old's poem: she documents this sort of time-line of the first weeks, detailing a span of feelings and responses. That could incorporated into this piece too, giving somewhat of a before and after along with a glimpse of thoughts throughout.

Calisthenic, Week 15

Recursivity Redux (p 216)

I started with:
"Do you remember my name?
The hornet gasps under misted glassware,
aware of the feeling of waking up.
Leaves, maroon ad always waxy,
seeping, fleshy green. Floorboards
strewn with marigold seeds; encen-
dedor, they call it. Enthendedor.
Bring up the anklet, the envelope, the
well-polished package with ocelot, ocelot,
ocelot feathers. Dancing on chardonnay,
born sea-borne blues, hand-me-down
arithmetic expecting the pyres, away tucked
away in the girl with the full let-down braids."

and generated:
A marigold-girl picking leaves off the
ground, arranging them in misted
glassware strewn with paint;
segmented hornets she puts in
an envelope, sends them to ocelots,
feathers, places of chardonnay
and waltzes. The arithmetic expected
to burn the pyres bares their blues, sings
sea-borne hand-me-downs, tucks away
fleshy green wax and better knows the
feeling when waking up on a dock.

Junkyard Quote 4, Week 15

"Serving size: 1/3 bunny" -nutrition facts for a chocolate bunny

Junkyard Quote 3, Week 15

"like a kid loves candy and fresh snow" -"Oh" by Dave Matthews

Free Entry, Week 15

I make lists, decide the way
my thought fall in lines. How
to expose oneself to the irony
of architecture? Something important,
something to be done.
A shiny black beetle
flexes spindly legs;
wings splinter on concrete.
Little insect struggles. Little insect
strangeness. Words tumble.
Battles, naming crystallizes
the whiteness of melody deflates.
Moving back and forth, the aristocrats
can't miss it. Qualify the question.
You are in this: floundering
on the page, crushing concrete.

Improv., Week 15

from Derek Walcott's "Sabbaths, W.I." (p 79)

"the burnt banana leaves that used to dance
the river whose bed is made of broken bottles
the cocoa grove where a bird whose cry sounds green and
yellow and in the lights under the leaves crested with
orange flame has forgotten its flute"

the great salamander wings that always laugh
the windy-house birch that plays with crushing seagulls
the surrender dove in a church with bells that teem and
thunder and with whose right, tell it to thieves, bested witth
rushed fame split asunder the roof

my dear fedora felt with pictures light
and heavy, with gears all numb in waxen brightness
and linoleum on a floor cut out from straw with
plastic, forget the stars, beg in a skirt, and leave by
bus route back apparently hit