Skip to main content Help Control Panel

Shakespeare's Monkeys

Infinite Monkeys. Infinite Typewriters.

More in The Poetry of Kevin John Dail

Last Night

I was a staggering reveler
and you my faithful hound.
we roared through the night,
shattered with broken glass
and empty shouted lies.
no ambition but to imbibe
an ocean of inebriation,
with no thought of tomorrows
painful, regretful awakening.

Laura doom - on Jan. 24 2009

Hi Kevin - a few thoughts regarding punctuation. If you feel the need to use full stops/periods, then for the sake of consistency, they should be followed by capitals.
When reading lines 3-6, I encountered some ambiguity. Was it 'we' or 'the night' that was shattered? The comma suggests a break, suggesting that 'we' were shattered, whereas the context suggests that 'the night' was shattered. Perhaps that part would be better as 'through a night/shattered by broken glass'.
Another ambiguity occurs in the last two lines, where 'with no thought of tomorrows/painful, regretful awakening' allows the reader to consider the lines as discrete descriptions. An apostrophe (tomorrow's) would clarify the meaning (assuming  that's what you intended).
Incidentally, lines 1 & 2 incorporate an ellipsis, where the verb from the first line is implied in the second. However, that is a solecism (an error in syntax) because the second line would read 'and you was my faithful hound', rather than 'you were my faithful hound'. Sorry to be such a pain here, but I've been re-reading Ryan Wilbur's stuff on tropes recently, and my obsessive compulsive has commandeered my keyboard :>

I also wondered about the reference to the 'faithful hound'. That allusion infers something about the nature of the relationship between the two 'protagonists', but there is nothing beyond their introduction to develops the relevance to what follows.

Apart from that, the consonance works well, but I feel there ought to be more here. Just my opinion.


Kevin Dail - on Jan. 28 2009

Thank you for your wise critique. I reall appreciate the time you took with my piece. I apologize for my late reply.

-----
"Subtle, clever brain, wiser than I am, by what devious means do you contrive to remain idle? Teach me, O master." Play - William Carlos Williams



"Subtle, clever brain, wiser than I am, by what devious means do you contrive to remain idle? Teach me, O master." Play - William Carlos Williams
Laura doom - on Jan. 29 2009

No worries Kevin - I appreciate that staggering revelers take a while to recover -- I didn't mean to hound you :>


Share
* Invite participants
* Share at Facebook
* Share at Twitter
* Share at LinkedIn
* Reference this page
Monitor
Recent files
Member Pages »
See also