To see you

[Manna]

You're funny, Mat.
My intuition is that your version of Merlin's laugh is a put-on.

As for V's poems, if she wants critique, I would say that it might be good to find more precise or descriptive ways to say things like most handsome, so well dressed and such a smile. While she may have a clear image in her head of what those things mean, she doesn't give the reader much to attach to it. If she said, "He stepped onto the street as if out of a GQ magazine," then I would have a better idea of the kind of handsome/well-dressed she's talking about. I'm not saying she should use that line, though, because I don't know if that fits what she's trying to say.

A good line:
warmth coming back off the summer footpath,
I like the rhythm and assonance between back and path. There are enough fs and ths to make me think I've heard an internal rhyme, and it also says something in an interesting way about the memory of walking together. At least that's how I took it.

These things should come out in the writing and don't need to be stated:
you were my happiness,
you were my love.

This is good:
And over there
is the field where we made surreptitious love
and behind it
the deep black river.

Also, she's fallen into a pattern, and if her writing continues to be this same poem which goes like this:

lovey
sweetness
kisses
thighs, yum yum yum...
stab!

then I am afraid she'll be a one trick pony, and I'll stop reading her poems. I said it meanly the first time, but let me say it better now. You can write about the same thing over and over; I've written my share of love poems, poems about my daughter, poems about my friend, but it might be worth trying another format.

[mat james]

You're funny, Mat.
My intuition is that your version of Merlin's laugh is a put-on.

You're right. I'm a fraudulent fakir.
'It's come to this,
...and wasn't it a long way down'

But back to V. I'm sure your comments on her poem above are valid in a cat-claw-scratchy sort of way.
And feedback is usually valuable, even when it leaves a rash.
I noted that you suggested a few topics for V to consider writing a poem on.
You're a bit of a scientist, so in the spirit of topic-al suggestion....
What about you writing one on 'estrogen's feline Moon' ?

Cate did one about the 'fertile moon' which I really enjoyed. ... ... (ah, that's better. No more put-on smiles for MatbbgJ).

MatbbgJ

[Cate]

Cate did one about the 'fertile moon' which I really enjoyed. ... ... (ah, that's better. No more put-on smiles for MatbbgJ).

Mat - are you suggesting that the smiley face originally attached to my poem was in fact a put-on one, a just to be nice, a just for show one!!!
I am deeply hurt and offended. (joking )

Manna's critic didn't sound Catty to me - She listed things that worked for her and gave suggestions for things that weren't working for her (by her I mean Manna). Personally this is the type of critic I like - something you can learn from.

[Manna]

Dear Bbg,
I don't think all of your laughter is fraudulent, just the Merlinic ones.
That's because this is reality, and you do not have magical superpowers, though I know you desperately wish to.

If my review was catty, it's because I am a shape-shifter and was just then morphing into Finian the Cat. There was a moment when I wasn't sure if I were Finian the Cat or Manna the Poster. There's always a hazy crazy moment there- the identity crisis moment. And now I am off to another dimension. I'll see you in four or five decades, though it shall be but a day or two to you.

:>:...POOF...:<: