09-10-2024, 10:20 PM
Hello degrees-
Some in-line comments follow.
The last look a blur, first person, so far. A brief image of the 'last thing you see'
a swift sweep of laughter the auditory sense seems out of place
after the fan of her fingers
on her knee caught
the rest of her
quite still— third person 'her' pulls me abruptly out of the first person experience
she was dead third person does work here to describe the scene
by the time she hit
her head on the floor
How the poem reads for me: a woman stroking out at a gathering (gathering suggested to me by 'laughter). It is an interesting subject- the last thing someone may see, and the millisecond of retinal persistence capturing the last moment before death.
Below, I removed 'her', and rearranged lines to maintain first person in the first stanza, and third person is only present in the second stanza. I moved 'laughter' to the second stanza since it indicates the presence of an observer, or observers. The only word I changed was 'knee' to 'knees'; the only words I added were 'stopped’ and ‘as’; some words subtracted, no others added. Just trying to fix the 'person' issue, but it's your poem, of course, and there are plenty of other options.
The last look a blur,
a swift sweep of the fan
of fingers on knees
laughter stopped
dead
as her head hit the floor
ps- This one kinda, sorta reminded me of Randall Jarrells's 'Death of the Ball Turret Gunner'. His poem is first person, until the final line, when we find out that the N was already dead..
Some in-line comments follow.
The last look a blur, first person, so far. A brief image of the 'last thing you see'
a swift sweep of laughter the auditory sense seems out of place
after the fan of her fingers
on her knee caught
the rest of her
quite still— third person 'her' pulls me abruptly out of the first person experience
she was dead third person does work here to describe the scene
by the time she hit
her head on the floor
How the poem reads for me: a woman stroking out at a gathering (gathering suggested to me by 'laughter). It is an interesting subject- the last thing someone may see, and the millisecond of retinal persistence capturing the last moment before death.
Below, I removed 'her', and rearranged lines to maintain first person in the first stanza, and third person is only present in the second stanza. I moved 'laughter' to the second stanza since it indicates the presence of an observer, or observers. The only word I changed was 'knee' to 'knees'; the only words I added were 'stopped’ and ‘as’; some words subtracted, no others added. Just trying to fix the 'person' issue, but it's your poem, of course, and there are plenty of other options.
The last look a blur,
a swift sweep of the fan
of fingers on knees
laughter stopped
dead
as her head hit the floor
ps- This one kinda, sorta reminded me of Randall Jarrells's 'Death of the Ball Turret Gunner'. His poem is first person, until the final line, when we find out that the N was already dead..