05-08-2016, 07:39 AM
Having been passed by the heavy hitters, stet on the verse structure 
.
-- Multiple hits on "Vietnamese." To me, unlike "Vietnam" which is always ./ , "Vietnamese" can be
../
(which is the bad meter you're hearing) or
/./
which is what I was thinking, depending on surrounding words. @ellajam may have the best solution, changing to "Japanese." Looking for trading partners present which were enemies past and (it seems some days) future, I naturally picked "my" war.
-- Split decision on been/yin. Nothing in English is actually going to ryhme with the tonal yin properly pronounced, but I plead dialect: in my part of the US, "been" rhymes with "sin" rather than "keen." So stet on "been" for now - it would almost be easier to replace (or transpose?) "yang and yin," then work backward.
-- @ellajam, yes, V1 smells of the lamp. I think it's mostly the very first line, which, frankly, stinks. I need to come up with something simple and descriptive - shoot, it doesn't even have to rhyme
just set the scene and cadence strongly.
-- @Achebe, darn, I looked up the types of wood but not the type of tea. I drink mainly white, chamomile, or lapsang souchong, myself, but "green" would seem to be indicated here. Moral: If you're going to insert irrelevant details for versimilitude, Get Them Right.
Thanks to all. I'll wait a day or two for further critiques, then post an edit.
.-- Multiple hits on "Vietnamese." To me, unlike "Vietnam" which is always ./ , "Vietnamese" can be
../
(which is the bad meter you're hearing) or
/./
which is what I was thinking, depending on surrounding words. @ellajam may have the best solution, changing to "Japanese." Looking for trading partners present which were enemies past and (it seems some days) future, I naturally picked "my" war.
-- Split decision on been/yin. Nothing in English is actually going to ryhme with the tonal yin properly pronounced, but I plead dialect: in my part of the US, "been" rhymes with "sin" rather than "keen." So stet on "been" for now - it would almost be easier to replace (or transpose?) "yang and yin," then work backward.
-- @ellajam, yes, V1 smells of the lamp. I think it's mostly the very first line, which, frankly, stinks. I need to come up with something simple and descriptive - shoot, it doesn't even have to rhyme
just set the scene and cadence strongly.-- @Achebe, darn, I looked up the types of wood but not the type of tea. I drink mainly white, chamomile, or lapsang souchong, myself, but "green" would seem to be indicated here. Moral: If you're going to insert irrelevant details for versimilitude, Get Them Right.
Thanks to all. I'll wait a day or two for further critiques, then post an edit.
Non-practicing atheist