[continued from previous message]   
      
   Again, this is torturous prose.  It should be "If I awake some morning."   
    In your line, the speaker is pondering the consequences of his waking   
   up a morning.   
      
   "Here," again, is superfluous -- where else would you be expected to   
   wake?  "There"?   
      
   >>>>>  trying to find some reason to return   
      
   At this point, your speaker is babbling incoherently.  One doesn't wake   
   up in the middle of attempting to find a reason for doing something.   
   One wakes up from sleeping.   
      
   And, you have yet to identify who this person being addressed is.   
      
   This is another earmark of a Will Donkey poem -- addressing various   
   pronouns (you, he, she, it, they) without identifying them to the   
   reader.   
      
   >>>>>  if I see things denied   
      
   It's impossible to tell if this line relates to that preceding or   
   following it.  It doesn't make sense either way.   
      
   Is he seeing things he once defined denied?  What did he define?  For a   
   person to "define" something would mean that he was the perfect symbol   
   of that particularly quality or characteristic (Joe was the definition   
   of courage).   
      
   Or is his waking contemplation of the possibility of returning to...   
   some unidentified thing (a relationship?) being denied by the   
   unidentified someone's actions?   
      
   You need to learn how to convey information to your readers.  Language   
   is about communication.  It is the means by which we pass on   
   *information* to others.  When your poetry hints at vague relationships   
   with unidentified pronouns, it is failing to express anything.   
      
   Vaguery can be used to a poem's advantage -- but the *entire poem*   
   should never be incoherent.   
      
   >>>>>  I once defined   
   >>>>>  a life just passed me by there   
      
   Where's "there"?  If the life "just" passed you by, it would have done   
   so just a few seconds ago, so "there" should be "here."   
      
   But earlier in the poem, you'd said that someone else's life had just   
   passed by.   
      
   Which life was it?  The speaker's life?  Or the unidentified "you" he is   
   addressing?   
      
   >>>>>  slipped through my fingers   
      
   This is just another way of saying "passed me by."  If a line doesn't   
   add anything to the poem, you should cut it.   
      
   >>>>>  everything here now is real   
      
   WFT?   
      
   Was everything not real a moment ago?   
      
   More importantly, *what* has become real?   
      
   >>>>>  so wait.   
   >>>>>  That portion of the finish   
   >>>>>  never comes.   
      
   I'm guessing that you were stoned out of your senses when you wrote   
   this, and that it all made perfect sense to you at the time?   
      
   Are you telling the unidentified "you" (whose life had passed --   
   implying that they had died) to wait?   
      
   Are you telling yourself to wait -- as your train of thought jumps   
   tracks?   
      
   Or are you telling the reader, who you haven't been addressing, to wait?   
      
   And why use "portion" rather than "part"?  It just sounds false (like a   
   child attempting to use "big words").   
      
   And just what part of what finish are you referring to?   
      
   Everything has suddenly become real (even though you had given no   
   previous indication that it was false, and even though you've failed to   
   even hint at what "real" and "everything" relate to), is meant to be a   
   false finish that never comes (and is, therefore, not a finish)?   
      
   That would sound vaguely profound if it actually had any intelligible   
   meaning.   
      
   >>>>>   
   >>>>>  Now that the lights are going so low   
   >>>>>  the dimming glow   
   >>>>>  falls on my ego   
      
   We have now arrived at the point in a Will Donkey poem, when I'm   
   inwardly screaming out "SHOOT ME NOW!!!"   
      
   How does the dimming glow of some lights affect your speaker's ego?   
   Does he feel inconsequential at dusk?   
   u   
      
   >>>>>  now that I'm falling   
   >>>>>  into my morning   
      
   So your speaker is still lying "here" (or, perhaps, "there") waking up   
   from contemplating returning to someone or something, and the lights   
   have suddenly dimmed?  Was there a brown out?   
      
   >>>>>  here I am gazing into those   
   >>>>>  reflector eyes   
      
   Is the (supposedly deceased) "you" he's been addressing actually lying   
   on the floor with him (not having "passed by" him at all)?   
      
   >>>>>  morning light   
   >>>>>  is blasting my head clean too.   
      
   "Too"?  Too implies that he'd already told us about something else that   
   the morning light was blasting clean.   
      
   So... basically, the speaker had gotten drunk and/or stoned, passed out   
   either here or there, woke up contemplating whether he should return to   
   someone or something, rambled incoherently about how his life (or the   
   life of someone else) passed him by... until the morning lights dimmed,   
   blasting his head clean.   
      
   Got it.  NOT!   
      
   >>>>>  Morning's clearer   
   >>>>>  I've been forgetting it.   
      
   Donkey, Donkey, Donkey [shakes head], always with the pronouns.  The   
   speaker has been forgetting what?   
      
   And how can morning be "clearer" when it had never been described as   
   being "unclear"?   
      
   >>>>>   
   >>>>>  Your thoughts seem to stream   
   >>>>>  like a highway   
      
   Light streams.  Highways don't.   
      
   Who is the speaker addressing?  Himself?  The morning?  The unidentified   
   person whose "uncaused" and "untraced" life had passed him by?   
      
   >>>>>  dimming lights seem to streak   
   >>>>>  like hitch-hikers.   
      
   "Hitchhikers" is not hyphenated.   
      
   Why would morning lights be dimming again?  Usually the ambient light   
   increases as the sun continues its ascent.   
      
   And why are the hitchhikers streaking?  I realize this was written in   
   the 70s when streaking as still a thing, but I don't believe that the   
   two (hitchhiking and streaking) went together.   
      
   And even if there were dim streaks of light in your "here" (or,   
   possibly, "there"), how does dim light recall a hitchhiker (naked or   
   dressed)?   
      
   >>>>>  When does this dream end?   
      
   WHEN DOES THIS GODAWFUL POEM END???   
      
   I'm not joking, Donkey.  A poem needs to grab, and hold, the reader's   
   interest. Since I have no idea what you poem is about (other than your   
   waking up still feeling the effects of the previous night's drugs), I   
   have *ZERO* interest in it.   
      
   I don't know who is speaking.  I don't know who he's speaking to.  I   
   don't know what he's prattling on about.  Hell, I don't even know if   
   he's here or there.   
      
   And, as a consequence, I cannot invest any interest (much less feelings)   
   into his (non-) story.   
      
   >>>>>  When do I get on up the road?   
      
   "Get on up the road"?  That's not even decent backwoods slang.  When   
   speaking about reaching a destination (literal, spiritual, etc.), one   
   says "down" the road.  "Up" the road implies back to the start of your   
   journey.   
      
   >>>>>  The light sped out   
   >>>>>  like a fire-fly   
      
   "firefly" is not hyphenated.   
      
   So the dimming, streaking, hitchhiking light is now a hastily departing   
   firefly?   
      
   Pick ONE metaphor and stick with it.   
      
   >>>>>  like gravestones   
   >>>>>  never noticed   
   >>>>>  never seen.   
      
   OMFG!   
      
   Now the dimming, streaking, hitchhiking, hastily departing firefly like   
   light has turned into unseen gravestones???   
      
   I can't wait to discover what the morph into next.   
      
   >>>>>  Like marbles   
   >>>>>  spilling from shattered minds.   
      
   There it is!   
      
   They went from dimming, to streaking, to hitchhiking, to hastily   
   departing fireflies, to unseen gravestone, to marbles spilling from   
   shattered minds.   
      
   And this is the end of the poem?   
      
   What was the topic?  The speaker lying in the "Here" or "There"?  The   
   unknown person he was addressing?  Someone's life having passed -- or   
   passed by?  Contemplating returning to... something?  Or the bizarre   
   transformation of the morning light?   
      
   I would like to say that this is bad, even for you, but it's really just   
   par for the course as Donkey poems go: incoherent, incompetently   
   written, and terminally uninteresting.   
      
   --   
      
   --   
      
   --- SoupGate-DOS v1.05   
    * Origin: you cannot sedate... all the things you hate (1:229/2)