30 minutes of 2007-01-03: Struggling to get it right

elliot — Sun, 04 Feb 2007 17:40:34 -0600

This is a rewrite of a poem I wrote a long time ago. I submitted it to Urbis, and got a couple of comments, and thought I'd take a crack at taking them on-board. Most of the comments centred around it being too verbose, with too many irrelevant details, so I pulled it to pieces for about 30 minutes, and still wasn't happy at the end. I thought it might be interesting to show the two pieces together, which perhaps gives some idea of the process I went through. The new version isn't finished (that's why I'm struggling), but I am happier with it than the original.

One Picture (original from 1993-08-15)

With a pad of paper against her knee
(The writing smudged) she looks at the camera.
He inhabited this room for three months
With American footballers on the curtains
(Although he was 21).
She visited twice, once bringing shepherd's pie
He upset her perhaps this day
By not walking her to her car.
She is looking at the camera, seated on the bed,
With him taking the picture in black and white:
Her smile is almost goofy
Above a hint of double chin;
One eye slightly askew, just to the left.
No one saw this but him.
The time spent with her is extrapolated from here,
Her blonde light grey hair untidy,
Her blue green dark grey eyes like wounds,
Her white teeth like half a melon skin.
With these tools, he tries to make rooms
She isn't in.

One Picture (rewritten 2007-01-03)

He captures an image
of her on the bed.
Later,
he sulks;
won't walk her
to the door.

The image
polarises:
sheaves of straw-blonde
light-grey hair;
wounds of blue-green
dark-grey eyes.

townx - 30 minutes of 2007-01-03: Struggling to get it right - Comments

30 minutes of 2007-01-03: Struggling to get it right

One Picture (original from 1993-08-15)

One Picture (rewritten 2007-01-03)