James C. Horak's E-Mail Address: jchorak7441@sbcglobal.net

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Poem Title	Poet Name	Critique Given by James C. Horak	Critique Date
The Vacancy	Mark Andrew Hislop	Chuckle,chuckle...(chuckling into my closed fist.) A lesson well learned, young fellow? A poem whose substance justifies its break with most modern poetic demands, even that of slightly mocking form. You've left a practitioner of the black arts, I hope, with a loss of monthly stipend. Again, a chuckle. Self-discovery can be rebirth, only this time with a coming-out suitable for the stay. Where looking around is just not the play of light on things (so to have various things stuck into one's mouth seen,) but a stage upon which to forment real thought. And now we're dangerous...and hardly able to be stifled. JCH	2009-09-08 09:37:32
Jester of Life	DeniMari Z.	Your poetic vision is shown, along with a native ability for poetic language. When we replace connection with imagery, demands are made on selectivity and that's your strong suit. This poem requires but one change and that's in your last two lines. Otherwise I would have voted it quite high. You have now, over Dellena, become the most improved poet on TPL. JCH	2009-09-08 09:22:48
View In Your Eyes	DeniMari Z.	Don't let anyone tell you that you can't quite properly arrange your verse anyway that implements or enhances the read. And you exploit this well. Good title, with meaning reflected back on it. The slams you take at materialism wrapped in dress are excellent. Your logical perplexity found in the short verse, "We are here, But.../not noticed is/ obviously clear" is quite forgiven as it takes your reader up in the quandary that is appearance versus substance. But what shines and illustrates your talent for lyrical worth is the verse: We are visible We are seen We are not illusions swaying down the road in a dream Excellent and will be in my esteem when I vote. JCH	2009-09-07 00:26:56
Yoyo	Dellena Rovito	An interesting flair for parallelism found here. In the comparisons in life found with the "motoring" of a yoyo, so you've found aspirations of all kinds. The illusion you create in the lines, "my exploits churn like this simple toy./I tightrope walk and hope for joy". is nothing short of astute euphemism. Spectacular in that it captures both illusion and euphemisim fully. The lines work out well in meter and rhyme as well. I'm glad you've taken poetic license with syntax, "It rollick walks...", it shows you growing as a poet. JCH	2009-09-06 01:00:46
Back Flash Bright	DeniMari Z.	Needs slightly more connection to meaning. When articles are left out more vision must be given to imagery. Making this more like a story than the smattering of a display. Reach down and find something like what playwriters call, a dramatic core. Something that gives your poem direction or drive. Very good title. Make the poem live up to it. You have the substance, deliver it. JCH	2009-09-01 09:19:28
Peer Pressure	DeniMari Z.	There was once an astute who knew he was under constant surveillance. One day he began to scold his phone. Jabs like, what kind of man does this willingly, a voyeur? Someone that would break in and pilfer women's underwear...smelling them that night? Days of this, everytime he came near his phone. Finally one night a faint reply was heard, "I just do what I'm told." You poem is a search into what drives people to think of evil as duty. A difficut thing to do and to prevent the austere and unattractive air of judgement. To acutally enter into another's head. I like the broken syntax for it impacts back on what must be broken thought...meant to avoid more than to forgive self. Yes, such things are the consequence of succumbing to peer pressure...the first passage into the abyss. You might enjoy a fantastic movie I recently saw, The Lives of Others. Sometimes there's a break with the horror. A poem with its own significance. And that esteemed. JCH	2009-08-31 00:12:39
Watermelon	Dellena Rovito	An enjoyable lark and hope you've had some help loading up those overgrown goards. JCH	2009-08-07 21:47:31
Inner Sanctum	Thomas H. Smihula	I would prefer images, Thomas, AND more about the source of the voice behind these acquired revelations. Power is in the instant and not in a platitude of it. We reach to touch another in our poems of such a grasp at understanding and in that "touch" is the defining difference between poetry and prose...not lyric, not rhyme, not structure at all. Bring this poem in to "touch" its reader. Certainly the meat to do it is here. JCH	2009-08-07 21:36:01
You're Only My Friend........When	DeniMari Z.	Well then, we'll forgive this poetic venting. (Still better than the forlorn love-sick wailings we get from time to time.) All points well taken too...I've a whole family that fits your characterization. Alas, family can be the worst. Always, trust is to be earned...gainsay. Now really though, you weren't all that surprised at being so deserted...were you? Sorry to take so much amusement...but I have earned it, my dear. JCH	2009-08-07 21:16:35
Leftover Pieces	Dellena Rovito	Gerunds are good to use sometimes, Dellena. Try, understanding "no comfort" in order to break up the too prose-like syntax. Try this poem without the statements. "Ornament" with the imagery I know you can find. I sometimes use "And" at the beginning of a line for my own emphasis for reflecting back on former content. Don't use it in short poems where it will not work for this sort of use...it merely becomes an encumbrance. This poem is well worth a rewrite. JCH	2009-08-07 09:50:14
By The Lake In "Yardville"	DeniMari Z.	One time when a foot-note works for a poem. The images flash panoramic-like, just as child experience would with innocent context. Subtle rhyme, very good internal rhyme, gives this poem more high-light to imagery causing it to flow in ways the more contrived would not. Although I'm one to talk, I'd suggest a little more adherence to form and to place the lines more in keeping with each other on the score of meter. Not perfectly (we get back to that contrived thing again,) but just enough to tighten things a bit. You have a fine way with image-making, rely on it more instead of completed sentences so much. Articles like, "a", "the", "from" can be used more sparingly. Then this poem could be even more magical. JCH	2009-08-07 09:32:51
Either Way	Dellena Rovito	In finding our way to a successful poeming we find a poignance in ourselves. It takes a mastery to write a poem such as this...clearly your most polished. "In then out chest inflate" is wonderful offering every poetic device in a subtlety uncontrived and natural as breath. To adopt hope with this profoundness and to share it is poetic ideal realized. And places a duration upon longevity only the word, love, can portray. A beautiful poem. JCH	2009-07-29 20:55:39
"HE"	DeniMari Z.	In anticipation of divine intervention we muse over many a circumstance, ominiscience not being at all what it's cracked up to be. Does God observe some Prime Directive of his own? And does our self-perfection under fire play that much into all of it? The adepts would say the question earns the answer...may even be more important. Your poem is an astute acknowledgement of the quandary all face in our personal travels through life and how we grow seemingly less certain by the examples of all that "encased in frozen air". While we look for signs, and they do not come, like "The cloud", "glued to the sky" duration itself becomes our greatest trial. Even worse, with the failings to actually perceive karmic balance, "Forgiveness stilled/Forever, we have come a long way in retaining soul substance to be able to say, "I wonder when, but never why." Grand.	2009-07-26 09:47:18
Squatter	Dellena Rovito	Very attractive and amusing poem. But it makes its mark profoundly by how we grow through accepting what we have no point in warring with. The second line of the second stanza should start And instead of "An"...but no biggey. Well devised lines, "Skulking travel under/Night's deep dark cover". The light resignation in, "Perhaps then you'll be gone" is delicious. JCH	2009-07-10 14:41:44
The Squatter	Dellena Rovito	Only when I read Mark's voting choices did I realize I had missed this poem. I feel, since I've already declared my vote, somewhat obliged to keep to it, but I would, of course, have given far more favor to this one than I had some others in my own voting. It would please me, Dellena, if you would repost it this month. Then I will give my best effort at a critque and the voting weight it deserves. In the mean time please accept my apology for being so remiss. JCH	2009-07-07 15:45:18
Reaching	Nancy Ann Hemsworth	Nancy, you have a way with illusion. Share this more broadly, moving more outside the self into the world about you. Poe was the last poet successful with such keen introspecting upon self alone. We, the readers, need comparison and contrast...your plight with that of others. You can take this to the next level by finding universally attachments to that of others. We are, after all, gardeners in a nursery of the minds and thoughts of others. Dispose yourself to this and the interest of your poetry will grow proportionately. Very pleasing lines, "We are as the flowing stream/Tumbling swift, or so it seems". Now let's start off by NEVER placing the pronoun "me" in any poem not intended to be a ditty. Do this one little thing for me and you'll be amazed at what happens. JCH	2009-07-07 08:41:20
Regal Anger	DeniMari Z.	A beautiful way to illustrate a side of power lust (not just attributable to the feminine.) Either worn of pathological narcissism or rigid self-righteousness, those so driven imagine not their capacity to do harm. Just finished viewing a movie, The Virgin Suicides, that illustrates this "nicely". JCH	2009-07-07 08:27:43
Rainbow Blues	DeniMari Z.	Thoughtful and compelling but full sentences far too much like an essay. Try and draw the start of meanings but allow images to complete them. As you work towards the ending of the poem you seem to realize this more but still you have a way to go. The best line, "instead of holding fragments crumbled in your hands" is pure poetic language and succeeds for having such deep and rich inference. "In a sense of accepting less is more" is far too discursive and your reader will suppose a lecture is coming instead of an approach through the senses, with meanings struck newly. Rewrite and I'm certain you'll obtain beauty. JCH	2009-07-05 01:33:43
Subject To	Dellena Rovito	Well, a minor correction, travail instead of "trivail". A good and novel title, mindful of the song, Compared to What?. The process of life, to remain worth living to any cogent thought of value, must introspect, becoming "Subject To". A movie I recently viewed presented this, among other things, incredibly well, The Chumscrubber. The risks we take to enhance these self-perceptions are to be carefully gauged. Not every taken in despair or fits of mood. When reasoned they are the delectible part of life. When not, they become the bane. Your poem is a thoughtful excursion into these realities. JCH	2009-06-25 11:02:58
My Votes For Poems in Order	DeniMari Z.	Thank you for such kind regard, DeniMari. Some discerning choices you've made and well justified. The breadth of our consideration in evaluating anything of another's should be so informed. We refine only when we begin to grasp the difference between a floor mat opinion and one earned. That's just as important to any poetry community as the poetry itself because good poetry would go unrecognized without it. JCH	2009-06-25 09:01:07
Sunday Afternoon	Dellena Rovito	In the last line of the first verse, "hills sway" must be, hills that sway. I'm one to talk, but your last line could be improved to be more in keeping with the rest of the poem's rhyme scheme. A poem like this needs, as well, a more powerful or unifying last line. Besides connection to all around you is already adequately inherent to your poem. Some really well crafted lines, neat illusions, the "Air burst potent" is a wonderful sublimation of blossoms and, "The worlds (I like world better) unto itself in me" would be a much better last line than you have. JCH	2009-06-25 08:50:27
My May Votes	Duane J Jackson	I agree, I just wish he'd stop using the first person. Perhaps I discounted too much for that. Guess I'll just have to accept him as rustic-poet-in-residence. Thank you for your generosity shown towards my very own. It's good to see we agree on DeniMari's progress, easily the most improved poet of late. JCH	2009-06-07 09:22:08
Char-Cold	DeniMari Z.	I'll tell you something, DeniMari, all the well formulated, contrived rhyme in the world is not worth that found in subtlety. Like yours found in, "...consistant through/unmissed diaries written." Trading the power found in intense meaning for simply jumbling words around is no gain, but loss to any reader searching your intentions and far more induced by your imagery and word precision. Superb illiteration in, "shades shaking fading..." "Portrayal of luck - Or lack of." juxtaposes fortune (as does life) and offers an inverse play on words while the parallelism found in posing seasonal expectations with that of fortunes in life, deepens the value of this poem and broadens its appeal outward (rather than inward,) the mark of good poetry. We are struck by our Muses oddly, for it is sometimes a thought striking mind differently, sometimes a vivid scenario from dreams, sometimes bits of the past reflecting facets they haven't before. But we take up the pen most often best to penetrate into ourselves before we have actually found what we wish to share. In that, poetry finds its unique difference with prose. Nothing else. Some people do this well, while others are looking for novel wall paper. A muse to them is a good dinner they they had the day before or a fine bottle of wine that made the duck more enjoyable. But not for you. JCH	2009-06-04 09:40:53
My voting	Dellena Rovito	I can always tell where your poetic yearnings are going, Dellena. It is an emotional strength thing. Although many feel "emotional strength" is obtained only through repressing feelings, the real strength is in being able to employ them wisely. And you do. JCH	2009-05-31 08:49:00
My April Votes	Duane J Jackson	Again, I am flattered by your regard. Only wish Mr. Schanne had shown the consideration to have at least replied to some of his critiques. That verges on the indecent. Just as no one can justify giving a critque, any critique, less than a 10 when they give no critque to the poems of others. There's an arrogance here... or worse, an unwillingness to grow and develop that part of poetic discernment, an ability with the critique. Duane, if you agree with me, please consider sharing this with the forum since I can't. Thank you again, JCH	2009-05-31 08:32:05
Heal - To Trust Is Bliss	DeniMari Z.	Interesting poetic language and interesting imagery, DeniMari, but, like a treatment of metaphysics, too removed from that which any immediate sharing of experience is allowed. That could be obtained by relief, at least to bring something in of more personal down-to-earth telling, even some literal example, either of yours or anothers, moving the reader more to an empathetic read than one of discourse. Else we just say, yep, you could look at it that way...instead of something coming to cradle in the soul. Take these fine euphemisms, methapors and illusions, perhaps more sparingly, and give them the impact of personal experience...not just attitude, in other words. And you will have a powerful poem. JCH	2009-05-29 12:05:51
Body Count	Dellena Rovito	Dellena, until the mindless masses grasp the greatest and most honorable intent (patriotism) is demonstrated in expressing concern and challenge over what has placed the flower of our youth in harm's way, instead of simply rejoicing they're there, poems like yours will continue to go unheralded. Poetry, however, can do no greater service. No matter what ANYONE says in muttering undertones, in little side whispers and unseen jabs to the stomach. The earth has seen father's and mother's deluded to fantastic extremes, even throwing sons and daughter's to altars where their hearts were taken, being told their blood would enrich barren soil or keep the sun in its place, giving them up in droves. For all we pretend, we ultimately are no better when we so easily delude to unquestioning obedience, when in the balance hang lives. In so many cases, in so many of these wars recently fought, "killed in action" has been nothing more than murder. I applaud your poem. JCH	2009-05-28 09:44:11
Weakening World	DeniMari Z.	Lending form to a reflection on meaning was a taboo when I first arrived on TPL. Happily those days are passed and we've seen more and more creativity replace the rigidity that once ruled. Broken lines reflect on the world's fragmentation strangely under a yoke supposed to unity. The verse beginning with, "Deep pockets" carries a Joycean stream of consciousness, again, the old newly looked at. Just as the interesting inversions (of meaning) for inflation found in the lines, "A hundred dollars in one bill/More pleasing than counting them all" and the lines, "Sizes change in every range/Everyone wants small" remonstrates the self- adopted of diseases, like bolemia and pathological narcissism; the reader is more able to introspect what society has otherwise accustomed him/her to. Alarming is the implication of, "Falsehood, mothers cry..." in the context of the growing number of child murders at the hand of mothers. Weakening World has found the way to breach the placating constructs society helps us to erect in order to escape the untenable of what is inevitable. Poetically. JCH	2009-05-25 09:04:28
Ne'er Paragon _/Revision W/Spelling Corrections	DeniMari Z.	Yes, now it clicks. The reading of a poem colors it like a first impression...sometimes overly. Sometimes obscurity works well, as your use here of "Dusk" but the typos never help. Lora's last poem, Masquerade, is an interesting comparison with yours here. I am delighted they are almost together. In a book on "insights into women", one might place them in the same chapter. It seems in the hysteria that is rapidly becoming shared over the plight of the planet thought antagonized by man, a madness is brewing. In the lovely poems such as this one and Lora's a calm return to more reasoned and sane aspects of our species is won. Muchly appreciated. JCH	2009-05-19 09:26:50
Ne'er Paragon	DeniMari Z.	But one suggestion, to change "In per portion" to in proportion, and "pentacle" to pinnacle. Carrying an illusion throughout a longer poem without resorting to refrain is difficult, at best. But then if we observe that illusion is about something so multi-faceted as humanity-at-large or, as I prefer, womanhood (I never tire of discussing that mystery,)it can carry itself with your talent. Juxtaposing "we are not" with what "we are" has the kaleidoscopic effect of contrast, enriching your imagery and the unified illusion. My favorite line is, since I'm so fond of the magical instrument that is the violin in well-placed hands, "Vexed dander's in violin music/Screeching to the highest pentacle (pinnacle.)" To ultimately parallel your illusion with simile in the final unifying line (of what we are) and that reflecting back on music, is wonderful and serves the device you've made of illusion beautiful. Just a little trimming around the edges and this poem sings. JCH	2009-05-17 08:51:54
Spaces	Dellena Rovito	One thing first, would, nearer this reality can be, be better than, "Nearer this reality can't be"? Almost a marriage between emotion and metaphysical reality, this poem has a depth not easily passed over. Your last line, "Is everything effect of the same illusion" has both interesting syntax and the effect of pausing the reader. Followinq the wonderful illusion found in, "As time disappears through the fingers", we are treated to a broad appeal of extended perception. This is so much better than the practice of the English Romantics towards the simplistic sublimation that trended more to exaggeration than euphemism. An elegant poem, Dellena. JCH	2009-05-01 20:03:41
Mother's Boy	DeniMari Z.	Quite a lovely poem of remembrance. With an interesting stylizaion, you've gone back to subtle rhyme and found a beauty in "doubt" with "out". Flows wonderfully. "Salted air" with "salted skin" holds the reader to look for association. It gathers our senses and makes us apply more sensual participation, a device the French decadents employed marvelously, Baudelaire in particular. One suggestion, by no means a correction, think about, A mother's son, instead of "My son". JCH	2009-05-01 19:51:05
The Blossoms Eye	James Edward Schanne	Very good, accomplished poem and a, pleased to meet you. Only one suggestion, change "breathe" to breath and "till" to til. Obviously you're familiar with the elegance poetry can be and perform it. Your final line has a novelty adding power and a reflection back on the verse before it. Seemingly abrupt its sublimation of astonishment creates its own imagery. I like the at-first-seeming admixture of "collector and burier" and find it wonderfully in tone with "animated denizens who stump...". Then the excellent enjambement. "Blossoms Eye" is an original and interesting title that creates an expectation of things to come which you well fulfill. Looking forward to more of your work. JCH	2009-05-01 19:38:16
See Yourself Found	DeniMari Z.	You have something worth saying. You've a natural ability with subtle rhyme, illiteration and poetic language...BUT none of that's here. Ever wonder why so many poems of structure end in a final verse wholly devoid of any structure...like yours here? Because, DeniMari, when you try to really say something, as opposed to shaking a rattle at meaning, you want power and not sing/song, striking at the heart of the matter and not contrived to a two-line rhyme scheme and meter count. I know we have some people that seem to think all poetry should be "lyrical". Hell, some people even still think the earth is flat. Even today, if you can hear the lyrics to some of the most popular songs, they've abandoned structure. To opt for POWER. Do we really want to sing/song to a final verse that alone breaks us out of defeating enhancing meaning? Or do we want what's suited just as much to the mind as it is to the ear? Throw this thing away. You have and will do much, much better. Focus on imagery. JCH	2009-04-26 10:28:41
Blur of Rapture	DeniMari Z.	This poem has several stunning lines. But those spelling errors hurt, DeniMari. Some people can't look passed them. It's essentials and exaggerates. "Differences take reign over precise" is poetic language at its best. "Beyond each season and reason in life" is both that and splendid in internal rhyme. "Take flight and shine...." is ear pleasing. I want the first of the poem brought up to this level. "Lustrous bring new to view" is tawdry rhyme and not anywhere in keeping with the second half of the poem. Chunk it. More imagination than "Yellow in unique patterns" (you have room left over in the line.) And then this could really be a something special poem. JCH	2009-04-22 23:38:14
Scan........(Revised)	DeniMari Z.	DeniMari, your natural way with subtle internal rhyme and illiteration is a quality typical to your work. I don't like one cumbersome line, "Bank on answers safe and true...rather than push to improve" Not pushing to improve would have sufficed. Always use adverbial modifiers sparingly. "Eyes spy/Cracks in the walls (should be wall) near an exquisite painting" are inspired lines. As with other abstractions this tugs at imagination to picture the implied image of an interesting juxtapositioning of beauty posed with stark reality. In the last verse is a well conceived unity of what the rest of the poem is truly about. Perhaps art indeed begins in the artist as a conception to perfect the flawed. Finding that impossible, the gifted artist gives us an escape to alternative perception in which we might find significance to interpretation and the collective joining with the thoughts of others. Diminishing, perhaps, to the darkness of those "dark places" though not ever "erasing" of them. Herein we might define art as growth around obstacle rather than any fixer. Just as a poet cannot leap by explaining. JCH	2009-04-21 10:11:14
Tale of the Bouncing Bunny	Monica ONeill	Quite a lark, Monica, I think you've found your poetry niche. You're ascribed with a long tradition of the poetry humorists, people like Don Marquis, Ogden Nash, even Lord Dunsany. Good company indeed. Timely, entertaining, and quite appropriate fare for the non-denominational at Easter. Kind of like the way I've enjoyed in the past sending my Jewish friends Christmas presents with all the trimmings. No, not, "usually (not) this funny!" though. Now don't let that bunny be mistaken for a basketball so long out of season, I might have to incorporate him into another Briar Patch Saga just when things are getting calm around here. See where infectuous humor can lead? My best, JCH	2009-04-18 15:56:07
March Vote!	Dellena Rovito	Dellena, thank you for your kind consideration of my poem and I must say your choices virtually mirror mine with only slight exception. Standards do exist but it is up to each to develop the discernment required for employing such fairness. People's efforts deserve no less. When there are obvious disparities, I find it obligatory to challenge them in order to give our being here some meaning besides "stroking". Some of us have established a base of operation for obtaining that integrity. It's not that choices must agree but that they must be supportable. And part of education's responsibility is to teach an advised public that debate and challenge are not bad things but that they exercise mind, spirit and intellect. Without them, there can be no literary society of any kind. Just a frigging quilting bee. God knows, the internet has enough of those. JCH	2009-04-11 10:40:31
My March Votes	Duane J Jackson	I am indeed flattered you thought so well of my two offerings this month, Duane. Although, were I to have voted the entire field with mine included, Sleep would still be my preference. There were a number of poems this month that were still in rough draft stage. More attention needs to be placed on polish. Mr. Chapman and Mr. Bird are the worst offenders, although they certainly don't like constructive criticism, do they? Which is what we've all tried to move away from, writing critiques to "please" instead of promote growth. Sometimes even, a good kick in the pants does a better job of that than anything else. In the end, if we are about growth (that being the only intelligent point of being here,) there should be no hard feelings. But why am I telling you this? Cheap opportunism, my friend, cheap opportunism. You in particular, listen well, read well...sensitively, one might add, and those are tools that poets need. JCH	2009-04-06 10:23:57
Scan	DeniMari Z.	Very thoughtful, I want more indistinctness (which grants the reader to search implied meaningss rather than direct text,)though. Now this may seem awkward but let me show you something. You can make of [the] garden something far more expansive, even euphemistic, if you leave off "the". I want you to search for more serviceable adjectives than "dull, ugly" after the first reference. It's not a poetic refrain so it seems redundant. You don't want that. "patches of scratched" is internal rhyme and illiterative both, clearly a triumph. I want more of this. Once I can see you able to do it, I thus have a right to expect it. Now get hopping. I want a rewrite. If you need any credits I'll give them to you. No excuses. JCH	2009-04-02 09:56:41
What Do They Know	Nancy Ann Hemsworth	Camus was the first to assualt mankind's presumptions on the dead and the righteous expectation made upon mourners in his, L'Etranger. It is amazing the self-righteous are, at the same time, the very first to decide upon finality. The kind that indeed DO cry for themselves (what else is left?) Those who would be more, able to see beyond "finality" are looked narrowly upon as was Camus' Meursault. In this poem you are "Meursault". Just stay away from beaches for a while. JCH	2009-03-10 12:22:27
Spring Spirited	Dellena Rovito	Making a poem of Spring eupehmism to the hopes for all mankind blossoming is just about as grand as it gets. "Warm filled days splayed with purpose" is my favorite line, forgiving the rather rustic reference, "Tummy's rich with garden's foodstuff". Capturing the image of the first uncut crop of grass, "Kids romp with pathways yet to cross" is exceptional not just in its mental picture but in its tie-in with the larger euphemism. As you improve, the first mark of improvement is shown in the crafting of the expression, "Seen are the dreams" where you utilize inversion skillfully. Mature and accomplished poem. JCH	2009-03-10 12:13:35
Feb. Vote	Dellena Rovito	Thank you for such high regard for my poem, Dellena. Bugaboo, however, was the most entertaining poem in the mix. It deserves a special award. We see Lora again justifying the high regard I've always shown her imagery. DeniMari has given us a very thoughtful piece that strikes accord with all people who possess both conscience and social consciousness. If one were to combine it with Duane's, Poverty Woman, wouldn't that be something?! Discerning choices. JCH	2009-03-10 12:04:26
My February Votes	Duane J Jackson	My gratitude, Duane, for the regard you've shown my poems. I am equally gratified to see MAH's poem shown regard and Dellena's,Bugaboo. Poverty Woman is the most significant poem we've had in a long time for WHAT IT SAYS, but people can validly claim other measures for deciding than ours. Most of all what has gratified me is to see you and Dellena grow in your poetry, proud examples of how sustained effort realizes unanticipated gains. I've spoken before about how giving things close reading is paramount to everything. Something that shouldn't really have to be said. It is simply sad that our whole society needs to be told that, more and more each year. And that's becoming inargueable, isn't it? Discerning choices. JCH	2009-03-10 11:56:39
Bugaboo	Dellena Rovito	Damn, I love your style here. This is comical and entertaining and builds an illusion that promotes for men a better understanding of the female repugnance for the "creepy crawly". And "Unborn or long moved on..." is great in rhyme, assonance and illusion. Very, very good. JCH	2009-03-06 11:31:50
The Balloon	Dellena Rovito	This, of all this month's offering is the poem I best liked for personal reasons. It was all I could do, to work against personal prejudice, not to vote it #1. But it has, needlessly, too many direct statements and you can make it better. I know I sound like a nit-picker this month but I really want to be absolutely truthful. You and Duane make me proud though, and I wish I could express that better. But this is a poem I would love to see you rewrite and represent us. JCH	2009-03-06 11:26:51
Stormy Weather	Dellena Rovito	It is gratifying to see how your poetic language has progressed, Dellena. You're finding more and more how to bring the depth already there to the surface in your writing. Your moral core, especially, something I've always regarded highly in you. I'm not going to discuss my intentions saying the next thing, but allowing you'll find them yourself... change the last line. Experiment. It's the only contention I have for this poem. Here, however, is an idea for your work of late. Although the times are bad, hope is a precious thing. Never write a poem that does not offer either remedy or hope. It's like carving in stone a form of doom. JCH	2009-03-06 11:05:04
Contribution	Thomas H. Smihula	Very interesting device, Tom, to refrain each subsequent verse from a line of the first. Like fare ordered by menu. We do suffer at the hands of misfortune the spirit of childish adventuring so precious to discovery. A thing for which we should never grow too old. But the mystics may trade even eyesight for the inward path they promote. A thing that hardly seems more than resignation to me. But we do have times to "hermit" from the world, hopefully to draw in better perspective than the maddening crowd allows. At least I hope none of us succumb to more lengthy hiding. We all need each other, one way or another. And no better thing exists than to help a man or woman bear their cross more easily. We either feed the inner beast of gregarious yearning or we are fed to it. Take that from a former hermit. JCH	2009-02-18 16:32:39
Says Who?	DeniMari Z.	Well, of course the richness of your thoughts here, DeniMari, could not well be addressed confined to imagery and to the less than direct message of good poetry. But then your passion does convey illusion and, just as one finds it difficult to discern condemnation for prostitution, or acceptance; one finds an equally compelling challenge to define what's poetry and what is not. Something must happen to the young girl early on to mark the choice she later comes to make regarding a "working girl" career. I would suppose some kind of abandon (demonstrated entering a car with a perfect stranger in the middle of the night,) to be involved, something going beyond the usual inbred desire to please social conventions. And to fall from the supposed graces of more pious women...all too ready to condemn her as a potential oasis of sorts for their own men. Oh, there are all kinds of commonly chosen labels and formulations for dealing with these ladies of the night, just as there are drugs. And all are empty, actually devoid of value and meaning. Too large a segment of mankind seems to need them, obviously even the most pious of men from time to time. Recently I reviewed a movie, Monster, where a prostitute turns the table on men, more than slightly over- compensating. I was moved by her story (taken from an actual account)and amazed that the actress (who won an Oscar for her performance) could decline so much from being so beautiful to being "street". It is doubtful anyone in their sane mind would bring a child into such a setting. Lenny Bruce's mother was one, yet she still gave the world one of the most brilliant and creative comedians on record. How this must complicate their life is beyond my imagining. Yet many of these ladies came to be the mail-order brides for those settling the West and their compassion among themselves is legendary. Were any man to disregard them more than the men and systems that feed on them, I feel them to be worse in every respect. So did, we are told, Christ. If this is not poetry, it should be AND good to have you back. JCH	2009-02-17 09:41:25
Into The Sun	Michael Bird	Mr. Bird, imagery is the redemption for poems of forlorn love. You have a couple of similes and use an ages- old euphemism (the sun) for this six verse poem and that's about it. And, unlike as with Poe's, Annabel Lee, you give us nothing tragic about this drolling whine which elevates it any higher than a drolling whine, something one might take to a bar to get over, not "immortalize" in print. Now, we had sometime ago, a certain lady that gave us such a shopping list of woe and that was bad enough, but you are a man, pardon my gender bias. You can get over this, it's unseemly to be advertising it and you could probably do better with your romantic attentions...you can certainly with your poetic endeavors. But if you do persist in this vein, put more emphasis on the object of your loss and far less on yourself, the difference between whining and opining. JCH	2009-02-14 09:39:31
Poem Title	Poet Name	Critique Given by James C. Horak	Critique Date

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