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11/25/2018 9:16:31 AM Indiana Shaw Posts: 4	CHRISTMAS MOURNING Not for all, is Christmas day a happy time Some like he, wake up, to just another day Alone, curtains shut, blocking out the world Christmas cards on the table, remain un-opened In the distance, he can hear the children play Other times he would be quite happy to hear But not today, this Christmas mourning day Left alone now, not even a cup of tea to share Times like this can just be too much to bear Thinking on happier times with a wife to care Nothing grand, a day in front of the Telly Enjoying old comedy programs, Morecambe and Wise But the fun of happier times, now brings on sad emotions Of a house once happy and warm, now all of this is gone The curtains remain closed, the hearth remains cold He affords himself a trip to kitchen to make a cup of tea Settles; wrapped up in old bath robe, aged old slippers His eyes settle on the photo’s upon the mantel piece His wife, his children long gone, all smiling in happier times Eyes glazed, he wonders on it all, with shaking hands he slips his tea Silent tears caress his sunken cheeks, this Christmas mourning day edited by Indiana.59 on 11/26/2018
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12/1/2018 4:21:59 PM Jack Webster Posts: 255	I think you have a lot of good concrete details, know which details are effective in communicating implied emotional content. I think the poem gets muddled by the overt statements of emotion (ex), and syntactic inversions (ex). I would strive to write with conversational phrasing, and allow the imagery to speak the emotion. It's tempting to doubt the effectiveness of our images, that the reader is really getting it, so sometimes we say it after we show it, but it's unnecessary. The riddle of the images is what draws the reader into the poem, the anticipation of where the author is headed with the poem, the conviction of knowing what the author feels even though they have not truly said it all deepen the poem and make a space for the reader to become a part of the poem, to compelete the poem through the act of emotional recognition. I would condense a number of points together, for instance the sound of children, the shutting of the curtains, as well as the cold hearth and the picture of the wife/ family on the mantle. Ex: He kept the curtains shut as if it could keep out the sound of children playing in the snow. [reminiscent of Oscar Wilde, The Selfish Giant, or Dr. Seuss The Grinch] (or) The laughter of children playing in the snow woke him. He shoved his sleep-warm feet into cold slippers and went to shut the curtains. (and) On the mantle, above the empty hearth, was a picture of his wife, beside her a picture of his children their eyes as bright as snow, their mouths open in laughter he could not hear. The mind forms free associations. You don't need to say his wife and kids are long gone; they are absent in the poem, and you can describe other things associated with family like the hearth being empty. Something I've tried to illustrate in the example is the opportunity to emphasize the loss of the speaker by contrasting the laughter of the children outside that he does not wish to hear and the absence of the laughter of his own children that he does wish to hear. There is no need to say his family is gone or that he misses them, it is felt by the way the details are arranged within the context of upset, and absence. I would remove the entire first stanza. It is a valid point, but the entire purpose of the poem is to illustrate that point; it does not need to be introduced or explained, just tell the emotional truth and the point is made simply by allowing the reader to experience it. DO KEEP the detail about the unopened christmas cards, the sound of the children playing, and the idea that his reaction to the sound is specific to Christmas. I would remove the last line of the poem. The first line of the second stanza might be better stated as the image of a tea service set only for one person, maybe there are rings on the service where other cups once were set. Juxtaposing a tea service set for one person with the photographs of his family on the mantle together tell the story his family is gone, without saying a word about it. The second line of the second stanza may be true, but the trick is figuring out how to show it. The unopened cards, the shut curtains, not being dressed, escaping into the television, all successfully illustrate someone in denual/depression/pain, not wanting to be there. I think the second to last line of the poem captures, in a delicate way, that it is unbearable. A detail that's not in your poem, for your consideration, would be a christmas tree. The traditional icon of the Christmas tree is full of lights, ornaments, tinsel, a bright star, presents underneath. What if he had a tree but it was small, dry, unwatered, the star about to fall off the top, no lights, maybe one or two ornaments as if he tried to make a christmas for himself, but stopped; instead of packages beneath the tree are duscarded beer cans/ bottles that haven't been thrown away. I think showing he tried to make a Christmas for himself but couldn't face it shows the struggle also, a quiet intensity that he lost an inner battle for life. Losing the battle for life has more intensity in it than simply describing someone that has already given up. thank you for letting me read your poem. I hope some of my suggestions prove to be useful. edited by superlativedeleted on 12/1/2018
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