Before a poem is published, it should be finished, not just a wandering beginning followed by a bunch of notes and random lines suggesting how the poet might proceed. I look forward to seeing the final draft.

It's clear where she stands on the prairie dog issue, though, which is the only real thing in the poem.

Alex, I’ll take White horses for $200 please.

Conquest: Carries a bow with no arrows and wears a crown (symbolizing a non-violent rise to power).

Advise to Oscar. Beware the apocalyptic hippos leukos! If you are truly “nearly always happy” you have received your fair portion of the holy light.

Happiness is really keen, though for some of us so very fleeting.

…oops! Advice, not advise (sorry, Oscar). Spelling errors are like prairie dogs, always popping their heads up and wrecking things. Creating ruts for the reader to trip over.

I like rhyme and meter. Not everyone does, which I (grudgingly) accept. However, there is one point where I will defend form to the death: when games with line breaks, indentation, and other forms of cleverness are taken away, what's left is that you have to actually write something.

This weeks poem didn't get that far...

Foobs: About this weeks poem I am inclined to agree.

Rhyme and meter caught my eye. I like it also. You are much more tolerant of those who are intolerant than I.

I'm feeling a little dizzy here. Games with line breaks, indentation, rhyme, meter, and other forms of cleverness all seem to me to be form - having to actually write something seems to be content. I'm probably over-simplifying...a bunch of very bad poetry has something to say. So, are there "forms" vs "forms of cleverness", one of which is cooler than the other...or are rhymes part of when you "actually write something"...is a form a form if you make it up?

Now for example, I really enjoy Richard II, which rhymes, but I think Hamlet, which mostly doesn't, has as much claim to being poetry. If, however, your insistence that poetry rhymes and that's that is what inspires you to continue composing your verse posts, please disregard this message.

...ahem. :)

There's a reason I keep saying this: form follows function in effective poetry. Get the function worked out properly -- that is, "actually (conceive) something" as your goal -- and the choice of form usually will take care of itself.

By that measure, "Ranch" is not half bad (as free verse works for conveying naked thoughts in a way that rhyming and metrical verse never will) -- although I agree that the poem should've adhered at least to normal grammar and syntax (making the poem more, not less, powerful in its expression). Its line breaks and indentations do serve a worthwhile purpose (for once) if you let them lead you to the changing (and again for once, realistic) mental and emotional state of the author. The more one prefers rhyme and meter, the harder one will find this to do -- yet this week the job is simple compared to what one has faced in so many of the arcane, obscure and often pretentious poems we've been given on Tuesdays.

In sum, I agree with those that say that this poem deserves a rewrite, but not a one-way trip to the wastebin. (Where are the editors of published poems when you need them to demand rewrites from authors?)

wr ()()