Buildings ........ Double Blind poems

[greenmountaineer]

Wrap Around Porches
greenmountaineer

On Monday through Friday after school
Bobby and I delivered The News,
he as black as the projects were
from broken street lamp shards of glass

on "step on a crack, break your mother's back"
sidewalks that led to dead bolt doors
and stray dogs Bobby couldn't keep
because no dogs were allowed.

He gave what he earned to this mother
for cardboard boxes of Hamburger Helper,
two pounds of meat to last through the week,
and the rest for beer, two booze, mostly root.

Bobby knew how to fold each paper
before you could say Jack Robinson,
and none of them ever fell apart
he tossed as a test for Mugs to fetch

while I told him all the dinnertime jokes
Dad liked to tell Mom, Kate, and me
with Sunday's pot roast, carrots, and peas
I promised Bobby he could come to some day

and wouldn't have to tell his mother
if we made money mowing lawns
where houses had the finest front porches
that wrapped around Sycamore Street.

Tonight on my wrap around porch
with two smooth fingers swirling in ice
while Dexter fetches a sycamore stick,
I wave to Mr. and Mrs. Wright,

sitting on theirs across the street,
who wave back to me, the wife, and two kids
before Sunday dinner always at six
with pot roast, carrots, and peas.

Mags and AH, as I recall, thought the use of "Bobby" in the original overdone; GP and Mer, not so. In the end, I pared the use of it back some because I wanted the poem to be a retrospective, and I don't think an adult would say "Bobby" as much as his 12 year old friend would.

The brief description of the mother in the original as a selfish person upon further reflection was a distrcation to the intended theme that the racial divide still exists. Bobby never did come to dinner.

Thanks, Annie, for hosting this. I always get something worthwhile from these challenges.

 

[legerdemer]

Stones
...
...

As I mentioned elsewhere in the thread, it took a long time for inspiration to strike me for this challenge. When it finally did, the cadence and some rhymes in the first stanza seemed close enough to a sonnet as to try to at least maintain that impression, though I couldn't do it consistently; as AH pointed out, I entirely gave up on the idea in the original second stanza. I submitted it as it struck me because time was running out, but Annie hadn't yet slammed the door shut. I let her decide to include it or not - thank you kindly, ma'am.

I rarely write forms, but because this one was already sort of halfway there, I took it as a challenge to both fix issues of repetition and make the second stanza conform, as much as possible. I don't think it passes muster as a strict sonnet (it does not have the AH stamp of approval, but my thanks to him for his feedback), but it was as far as I was willing to go. I made one last tweak in the penultimate line

I'm glad some found it likable. I have to let both versions go for a while and see which I like more; probably neither - maybe some other iteration. I hope I did the place a bit of justice - it is both historic and magical.

Thanks to all all who read and offered their comments, and many thanks to Annie, who ran such a challenging challenge.

 

[rawsilk]

Belmont
rawsilk

Home was built one thirty years past
Small and gracious farmhouse.
The etched red glass surrounds front door,
lacy edged veranda bows.

Entrance hall is papered gold'n
- Pre-Raphaelites adorn.
An island in a sea of land,
the sounds of sheep, forlorn.

A kitchen garden flourished fine.
Grating o' windmill heard,
along with nature's calls from wild,
Magpie, crow and bell bird.

Throughout the years good times they had.
Family growing bigger,
more walls, red roof, new boards went on,
with style, grace and rigour.

Bow windows holding on to walls,
flooding the rooms with light.
Garden growing tranquil beauty
flowers' gay - blooms delight.

Warm and welc'ming place inside,
fine entrance greets the guest.
To the left a large lounge room,
with blazing fire is best.

The Family portraits grace most walls,
large leather chairs around.
The warming, kitchen welcomes you,
blue willow plates abound.

Grand dining room inviting you,
gleaming marble fireplace,
enormous sideboard carved ornate,
fine dining here with grace.

Place for twenty at the table,
now the family fourteen.
The wars and conflict took some sons,
marr'age of girls was seen.

Old parents dying caused great woe,
just leaving single son,
burden of all the work was his.
So hard for only one.

Dick and his dog carried the load,
last it got too heavy.
He clutched his chest and passed away.
Drank his final bevy.

Abandoned, alone, deserted
no laughing people there.
The house was slowly robbed of grace,
falling to disrepair.

They sold it for development,
at last, its fate was sealed.
Such sadness felt to see it go,
no island in the field.

Sentences in bold need revision.

For example,

It was a small but gracious farmhouse built back in the 1800s
with etched colored glass on either side of the front door.

Now, that's the extent of my desire to point out every aspect that I think should be rewritten, because I think the whole thing it too darn long to begin with. By Stanza 6, my attention began wandering and I was wondering when something other than a history tour was going to happen.

Yes, took all you said on board and tried to move it away from feeling like a history tour in the re-write but wanting to keep its essence of history still intact.

Agreed a LOT of editing needed so it doesn't read like a short story with line breaks.

...edit, edit and more editing, floor totally littered after the scissors were used.

I have to agree with Mags and Annie on this one. I found my mind wandering about a third of the way through, and I had a difficult time with the way it's written. Each line seems to be set up to read as one or more complete sentences, so it's jarring when they're not complete sentences.

Chucked the whole thing and began again with the story as a template, hope it reads better now.

A large holding of Merino sheep.— why does this have a full stop at the end?

Too many full stops, and a bit of variety in punctuation might be helpful, but at the end of sentence fragments like the above, it's particularly noticeable and takes me completely out of the poem.

I understand, or think I do, that I'm meant to be sad that this house met its demise, but I never got a feeling of affection for it. A family lived in it, but I have no feeling for them either.

Not sure if I was able to create a feeling for the family in the re-write, too hard for me to judge. I kept your comment in mind during the re-write.

I do think that "Belmont" suffers from tl;dr and is rather prosaic. I read to the end, waiting for a punch line which never arrived.

Took this on board on the re-write. I hope the punch line was obvious enough in the re-write.

Belmont (rawsilk?) – too prose-like, in need of severe pruning. I, too, couldn’t engage. Length? Subject? Distil, distil, until you have the essence.

Great comment, loved it...'distil, distil until you have the essence.'
This advice ran through my head the entire re-write.

Some tidbits here and there. (Unfortunately for me, I've been too scarce.)

I agree with GP on most of her comments, so I'll try to keep it brief and different.

#1 - Belmont reminds me of a travel brochure for a stately house, but does too little and much too late to shed light on the people living there.

Thank you, taken on board and tried to address this with the new one.

Just A Little House

Another one that suffers from too much grand tour. I wanted to know more about the owner and why her last house was desolate. That was where the real story was at.

The rhyming is forced, especially with planted and wanted. The stanzas don't adhere to a strict rhythm, so I felt thrown from the horse at the deviations.

I added this from Magnetron even though it was about A Little House. I still took this on board when re-writing 'Belmont'. I hope all those throws off the horse were not too painful! Hopefully the new Belmont won't buck you off quite as often.
The rhyming being forced I didn't take on board as I had been referring to the style of the classic poets and their rhyming was forced in the same manner, so I thought, meh what is good for the late great is fair game for me.

As for Yoda speak, that is what poetry sounds like to me, except for the ones that sound like the murmurings of those in the arms of Morpheus.

Edit: Thank you very much for everyone who took the time to comment. I found all comments to be constructive and helpful. They were all most appreciated.

 

[Magnetron]

@ Legs: Among The Living was 100% pure me, no Stephen King this time - though I did slip the title of his latest short story collection in the revise.

It was an experiment in trying to get readers imagining a House of Wax without going into great detail about a House. Or Wax. The critiques helped a lot.

 

[legerdemer]

@ Legs: Among The Living was 100% pure me, no Stephen King this time - though I did slip the title of his latest short story collection in the revise.

It was an experiment in trying to get readers imagining a House of Wax without going into great detail about a House. Or Wax. The critiques helped a lot.

Well done, Mags - I liked your revision a lot; the atmosphere managed to be menacing and funny at the same time.

My bad about the King reference - I need to bite the bullet one of these days and read something by him. I just can't hack horror. I understand he's written some sci fi also.

 

[legerdemer]

Just a quick blurt: I've really enjoyed everyone's revisions. Well done!

 

[Piscator]

Just a quick blurt: I've really enjoyed everyone's revisions. Well done!

Seconded, the building muse passed me by but y'all found her.

 

[Magnetron]

Well done, Mags - I liked your revision a lot; the atmosphere managed to be menacing and funny at the same time.

My bad about the King reference - I need to bite the bullet one of these days and read something by him. I just can't hack horror. I understand he's written some sci fi also.

Bad? No.Your good. That was perhaps the most flattering comment I've ever received.

 

[AlwaysHungry]

Mags and AH, as I recall, thought the use of "Bobby" in the original overdone;

Not overdone -- just a clue to the author's ID, in my case.