02-17-2017, 10:17 AM
Lizzie, your comments have been very useful. Other people who have looked at the poem said similar things about the end. The problem for me is that the end sounds and feels right to me, so it is hard for me to change it. I tend to be more explicit in my poems than most modern poets, who imply a great deal more than I do. I have a tendency to just come out and say it. The question is whether there are others who have similar feelings about poetry, or whether I'm alone. It has always been a struggle for me to know whether I should hold to my own vision or bend to the prevailing sensibility.
Your comments on the other lines were useful too. You were the first one who thought that "floated" might apply to the speaker. Changing "on" to "in" is a good suggestion. I thought "fly heaven" was clever; I'm trying to show that the speaker is realizing, now that he has killed it, that it was only a fly. I may remove "I feel ashamed".
I'll see what I can do about the ending. I wasn't trying to speak for all of mankind in the poem, just a foolish person who has a silly battle with a fly and then realizes at the end that he is the same as the fly.
What about:
Poor fly. Doomed fly. All of us flies.
Your comments on the other lines were useful too. You were the first one who thought that "floated" might apply to the speaker. Changing "on" to "in" is a good suggestion. I thought "fly heaven" was clever; I'm trying to show that the speaker is realizing, now that he has killed it, that it was only a fly. I may remove "I feel ashamed".
I'll see what I can do about the ending. I wasn't trying to speak for all of mankind in the poem, just a foolish person who has a silly battle with a fly and then realizes at the end that he is the same as the fly.
What about:
Poor fly. Doomed fly. All of us flies.