# Exit



## Gofa (Feb 7, 2020)

When I hear the knock 
The sirens song
Who will answer 
Measure right and wrong


Which me will stand 
Arise to that door 
Stepping away
Body on the floor 


Alas poor Yoric
My turn on this spot
In my heart I grieve
Cause I knew me not


This string of happenstance
I’ve called my life
Just a series of notes
In the key of strife


Moving towards stillness
Here as I type
Im embarrassed in truth
As i fade to night 


A mind full of chickens
All screaming and shrill
Will it take my death 
To have learnt to be still


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## Pulse (Feb 8, 2020)

Gofa

There'a a lot in this poem!  I am impressed by the way you suggest to us in yur first stanza that the voice of the poem is alienated from a sense of responsibility.  It is as though someone else is expected to judge.

I am not sure I am reading the first line of your second stanza correctly; 'will stand' would make more  sense to me than 'with stand', assuming 'stand' is a verb rather than noun.

The chickens in your final stanza demand attention and offer reason for embarrassment in the penultimate verse.  Your last two lines appear as an unmarked question that distill unlearnt lessons in life.

Alas, observer.  I knew this way too.


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## Gofa (Feb 8, 2020)

Katrina
thank you  yes will   Not with  and measure not measured 

my close friend’s father in law was dying as i wrote and passed some 30 minutes after i posted this 

i started with him and ended up with me I guess

poetry to me is discussions, arguments or celebrations regarding life with God whom occasionally manages to put a word into a my busy conversation

peace in our time 
peace in my mind 

lines from another poem 
neither seems simple as of yet


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## Irwin (Feb 8, 2020)

Gofa said:


> Lived with a mind full of chickens
> All screaming and shrill
> Has it taken my death
> To have learnt to be still



I like the imagery of this stanza... a mindful of screaming chickens. That's a great metaphor!  

The first line seems too long, though. Maybe rewrite it something like:

Lived with a mind 
full of chickens all shrill

or you could actually leave out "Lived with"

A mind full of chickens
All screaming and shrill

The reader would still get the gist of what you're saying.

Or you could leave it the way it is.


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## Gofa (Feb 9, 2020)

Keep it simple yes 

A mind full of chickens
All screaming and shrill

less is more “I've lived with” basically redundant 

thanks


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## Gofa (Feb 9, 2020)

Just an aside
honestly 
how do you unthank someone 
there is a poem in that thought alone


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## TL Murphy (Feb 14, 2020)

Though written in quatrains, the poem is, essentially, heroic couplets, a form that is inherently comic, but the subject matter here is tragic.  What to do with such a  paradox?  Scream with the chickens? Laugh at poor Yoric?  Weep with the absurdity of it all?  A good knee-slapper at the end would light this poem on fire.


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## Gofa (Mar 1, 2020)

TL   additional verse as requested  with knee slapper 

For in Death’s kitchen
diced chickens on slate
When Death throws the party
Its best bring a plate


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## Octopus (Mar 2, 2020)

Gofa said:


> When I hear the knock
> The sirens song
> Who will answer
> Measure right and wrong
> ...


I like the beauty of the poem! You got something here! Interesting writing, I think it's quite honest and beautiful at the same time, but where are the periods, commas, and the like?


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## Tirralirra (Mar 2, 2020)

Greetings eight-legged one.

You will see much modern poetry unpunctuated, and often with the first word of the line uncapitalised. The lack of capitalisation just formalises the elimination of a convention which had no effect on the reading.

The lack of all other punctuation introduces possibilities of alternative attribution of qualifiers, double meanings and general ambiguous mayhem. Ambiguity to the poet is as the fog of war is to the general.


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## clark (Mar 3, 2020)

Free verse is the dominant form in contemporary poetry and integrated use of enjambment is a necessary by-product of the elimination of end-rhyme. An arbitrary capital at the head of each line retards enjambment and is nothing more than a typographical practice from the past. There is no reason for it. Punctuation is more properly used to block off 'units' in a piece of writing, or to assist in lineal development of ideas. . .again, essential in prose, optional in poetry. And, having made those points, a handful of contemporary poets still write in traditional formats and are at total liberty to do so. Poetry is a broad-shouldered form of Art: there is ample room for many different formats, forms, styles, and subjects of poems. None is "wrong". Some will have a tiny audience, but that is no matter. Audiences for poetry are fickle and change with the times. Current audiences have but slender appetites for the traditional forms, but those who wish to read traditional forms in the current era have every right to seek them out. And poets who wish to provide, are of course welcome to do so. A Veteran member of WF, James Hercules Sutton, has written hundreds and hundreds of sonnets, including sonnet sequences. So do not ever feel compelled to adopt the open-ended free verse form that is in current favour. If you aren't comfortable there, find a Form that works for you.

So from all that, it follows that there are no rigid "rules" in contemporary poetry. I am fond of saying that contemporary poets must re-invent Form with every poem they write. Often, when I begin a poem, I have no idea of Form. The poem-abuilding has not yet advised me where it wishes to take me. Gradually, as the piece emerges, a Form takes shape and I just let it go. Those are difficult moments, because as the words come, the rational mind starts to percolate below the surface, wanting to impose pattern and line-length and convention. But I persevere, let the words take the bit in their teeth and run with it. I try to see it thru without imposing my will on the flow.

No rigid rule, but we have expectations of the poem as poets. And readers have expectations as readers. Both groups want heightened and expanded language, _rhythm,_ music, imagery, metaphor, mystery, alliteration, assonance . . .and much more. Not every element in every poem. Of course not. But it is the balance of these kinds of elements with each other that leads to Presence and epiphany, for ports and for readers. DEFINE this balance? This Presence? These strange "epiphanies"? I can't. I question the wisdom of even trying.

God help me, I'm turning to a fucking _running shoe_ to close this post:  JUST DO IT!


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## RHPeat (Mar 3, 2020)

Wow! Is that guy a smooth talker or what? Yeah I said or what? I'm writing him in on the ballot come November. I actually want a Canadian for president.
Hey, like he says: There are no rules. 

a poet friend
RH Peat


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## clark (Mar 3, 2020)

Actually, I'd make one helluva President! That's probably one doozy of an idea. Every country in the world has to have a foreigner as Head of State. Yee--hah!


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## RHPeat (Mar 4, 2020)

Clark

Did I hear you say: "What you doing out there Waldo?" I'm writing you in. You'd make a bette president than the Big Elephant's Ass we have now. 

a poet friend
RH Peat


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## Gofa (Mar 4, 2020)

Hi Octo  Tirra has it  i dont like punctuation   I just talk on paper 
when talking I dont say comma nor like to pause for effect
plus my ipad wont capitalise i 
and i wont if it wont 
think thats called a reverse behind the bike sheds

thanks Clark   To me punctuation focuses too much attention on the type of brush used by the painter  

further a poem is like an incantation  at its end magic should appear or some state be evoked


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## RHPeat (Mar 4, 2020)

*Octopus*

There is something contradictory in the form/content musically. He doesn't need punctuation when he's using versification as breathing and stanzas as quatrains for long pauses between grouped thoughts. It becomes obvious he's not concerned with a melodic sound in the rhymes that he's using. That the poem has a hard sound and it lacks linear flow as a melody through the lines and rhymes because of the hard stopped lines rhyming or not. 

He's also capping every line which puts that hard stop at the end of every line. Each line has a hard stop on it. None of this is new in poetry for those that don't realize that the page is a score for the written poems music and it's breath pause connected to the poem's sounds; they are carried by the line itself. It is typical of someone without the knowledge of how the music in poetry is written on the page. Just breaking lines is not really versification. Without enjambment there is always a hard-stop on the versified line in free verse; which is kind of weak on a rhyming poem, for it breaks the melody of the lines into hammered-blows. The lines are: *boom boom boom boom*  space, *boom boom boom boom * space, *boom boom boom boom * space with heavy accented beats on the end of every line rhyming or not. So he's actually breaking the rhymes apart the way the poem is written on the page without realizing it. He probably reads it out loud differently than what he is writing on the page. Or when he reads it out loud he is only accenting all the rhymes with that hammered blow while the other un-rhyming are written to be accented aren't accented. It gets difficult to sell this to publisher. 

Which might be what he wants. Accenting every line is kind of boring, but to each their own. Poems don't need to be punctuated. But the lack of punctuation does have an effect on the written word and the versification. For the line breaks themselves become critical to the understanding in any group of lines as a thought process of lanuage. They can be easily misread, so they have to be worded carefully for deeper understanding. Rhyming is always better with or without a meter with a strong forward flow of content/form. That means it has to be written into the versification in some way that pulls the readers forward. Versification itself is another rhythm within any poem beyond the rhymes and the language's cadence. The length of line can vary if the cadence is held at a forward pace in the flow of the poem intent. Some of his stanza are pretty good concerning cadence without end-stopping the lines the way the poem is written. But end-stopping all the lines is working against the forward flow of the lines.  

Musically there are many things he could do to make the poem more sound oriented. Like the same number of syllables in each line would help to some extent. The use of feet would help, but it's not really needed; it's just another option. The softening of the hard line endings would improve the flow of the poem greatly. And any lines that could be enjambed could offer far more flow to the melody within the rhymes. They wouldn't all end-stop. 

I like that he says he doesn't say comma when he's talking and he's talking when he writes. The thing there is that he takes breaths and pauses when talking and that also gets shown on the page through stanzas and versification as well as caesuras in the mid-line of the poem. Breathing is part of the music of poetry — in a very big way. Poetry is meant to be Aural more so than Oral; that it deals with an Aural tradition that's passed down at one time through generations. That means it is to be heard above just speaking. So how it is heard; becomes real important to the poems music. 

So actually in his statement he has a good attitude concerning the sounds of poetry. He's listening to the poem. Right on, I like to hear that.  I always read the poem out loud when I write. I want to hear it, not just speak it; because for actual form/content is auditory and not orated. I know this sounds contradictory, but if you think about it awhile; you will realize what I'm saying. This is why poetry exists in all cultures and all languages. It is the voice singing the poem as auditory language that breathes as well as announces. It is meant to evoke the listener into their own feelings to realize the writers feelings. That's pure magic right there. In primitive cultures it was part of the dance and the drum rhythm as well. Poetry is meant to be musically heard. 

A poet friend
RH Peat



==========================

*Gofa*

The power of your language is there; learn to represent it on the page. The poetic feelings are there, but they not being communicated on the page.
You would be better off not using any Caps at all to begin lines. You can set the program to do this. Are you using Microsoft word? There are people here that can help you with that if the machine is doing that.  

a poet friend
RH Peat


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## Gofa (Mar 7, 2020)

RHPeat
First and foremost thank you I spent my time reading your words and nodding in acknowledgement at what you are explaining. I recognise the truth when i hear it even if i have little understanding at first pass

this is why i write as you have written 
It is meant to evoke the listener into their own feelings to realize the writers feelings. That's pure magic right there
yes it is  sharing, communing, walking a mile or a meter in anothers shoes  

The power of your language is there; learn to represent it on the page. The poetic feelings are there, but they not being communicated on the page.

i use an ipad and often bring writing here as a copy paste from the pages program 

thank you for pointing out things that are instinctual to me that i might add crafting to them 

that said i am a story teller and it is within and for the story that i grasp and wrestle

best said i am the teller of stories i just think they are mine while i am telling them 

thank you again  and for naming your self poet friend to me


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## Gofa (Mar 7, 2020)

repeated post


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## Chiefster (Mar 22, 2020)

Your poem encapsulates existentialism. I do not have much of a critique for this was executed well and apparently thought through, I hope you find usefulness in my rating. 10.3/10.5 from me.

If you relate at all to your character, a tip for mindfulness: take on the form and the complexion of the dead.


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