Round Three- Mary Moriarty

One Art is a poem with a very loose structure and rhyme. The poem adopts a short and concise theme with only 3 lines and many enjambments for the sake of maintaining a rhyme. The poem uses contrasts between good and bad to create a unique view on losing. "The art of losing isn't hard to master" uses "art" and "losing" in the same line, which makes me imagine a juxtaposition of being good at something bad. Occasionally, the poem doesn't rhyme when it seems like it should, such as with "fluster" and "master", which gives it a less serious tone.

Monochrome Life

I always wake up lying in bed

And as I stay there for a while

I'm glad I'm not so quite too dead

But no matter how much food I chew

or how much I sweep the tiles,

I always wake up lying in bed

And there's still so much stuff to do

At least I'm not a crocodile?

I'm glad I'm not so quite too dead.

After I say the goodnight cue

And let the sleepy night beguile

I always wake up lying in bed.

Everyday there's more to rue

with work piled high on little life isle

I'm glad I'm not so quite too dead

But of what others do, I live in lieu,

And after all of the difficult trials

I always wake up lying in bed and

I'm glad I'm not so quite too dead.

In The Back Seat of My Mother's Car, the most noticeable thing is it is rare to find a sentence that is not broken into two lines. In the first line, "We left before...comfort you", the line is split between "time" and "to". After arriving at the second paragraph, the whole poem becomes visible in that it is a perfectly eloquent mirror image of the first half of the poem. The lines are in reverse, but still flow smoothly such as with "half-dark. I wanted..." and how both sentences after it made perfect sense. While the first poem ends on a vivid cliffhanger, the second seems to carry a heavier atmosphere.

In  Fatherland and Track Photo, the author seems to be describing pictures in detail with stories. There is more action and feeling than description, such as "he flicks away the simplest memory". In Track Photo, what Susan Comninos said about enjambments can be seen to really have the full effect with short lines. When one line seems to be saying one thing, it can mean something else, such as with the "urn pushed / into a stone wall"

Bored Out of His Mind

Thoughts escape

from his inner self as

he collects himself 

in a neat 

and vapid fashion,

wondering why he is

here with a pseudo smile

looking into nothing

and he hopes,

as he can only hope,

that nobody really has the telepathy

to read his mind, cursing

this terrible

time wasting past-time.

1/10 Speaker = 5*****