Join the Neopoet online poetry workshop and community to improve as a writer, meet fellow poets, and showcase your work. Sign up, submit your poetry, and get started.

Winter Leaving

A touch of white on the red dirt -
the last snow - a page lost
from a diary written
by a careless hand on the day
when wind was stronger than words.

Winter knows her lines.
Three-finger footprints,
tink-tonk of the branches,
black seeds on the snow,
squirrels and crows are her poems.

She writes and leaves them to melt
on steaming slopes of the days,
when warbler is singing
and rocking the branches
in drunken fox-trot.

No leaves yet if not for a few light-green,
almost transparent, and sticky ears
standing up, listening to winter leaving,
her shuffling steps and tears
running on the back of her throat.

Last few words: 
I am not sure yet that idea is stated clearly and the meter is not complete. You are welcome to cut the ending and suggest alternative. On the back of my mind is that the page might have a message from winter asking why she has to leave. O. r maybe I just have to leave it as is. It is a new write, just made it up for your workshop. I like it. I think the way she hides tears is good metaphor. What are your thoughts, my friends?
Editing stage: 
Workshop: 

Comments

Good poem to bid adieu to winter and welcome spring. I think it could have been in two stanzas with "No leaves yet" beginning the second stanza. This could also separate end of winter and beginning of spring.

I especially loved the lines
No leaves yet
if not for a few light-green
almost transparent and sticky ears
standing up listening to
winter leaving,
her shuffling steps and tears
running through the nose
so nobody sees it.

Yes..."Winter asking why she has to leave" would give her a voice to express her reluctance. As for meter I am not qualified to make any comment since I do not have any handle on it.
...........................................

raj (sublime_ocean)

Thank you Raj, you are always there. Do poets sleep in India? And if yes, when?

IRiz

author comment

I can only say I do not sleep walk..:)

raj (sublime_ocean)

Hahaha

IRiz

author comment

I often don't feel I've read a poem till I've read it aloud. And this one needed it.
https://vocaroo.com/i/s1BsoD2GFazU

And I'll tell you a secret. I always copy the poem into Word and remove all the line breaks and replace stanza breaks with line breaks. So it looks like a page of prose and the words have to make their own pacing,cadence, meter, caesurae or whatever. Knowing that listen to it again. Parts of it like-
Steaming slope.
River banks.
Thicket, filled with warbler, rocks. [does that mean thickets filled with a type of bird called a warbler?]
No leaves yet

Are just list words, they play a disruptive part in the poems voice.

A toch of white on the red dirt [touch]

"running through the nose
so nobody sees it."
Eh? I think it is graphic. Everyone notices a runny nose. Eeew.

I think the poem is no so much unfinished as needs some work, it has the potential for a gentle, wistful musicality.

cheers,
Jess
A new workshop on the most important element of poetry-
'Rhythm and Meter in Poetry'
https://www.neopoet.com/workshop/rhythm-and-meter-poetry

Always a pleasure to hear your voice, Jess.
I am mesmerized.
To me if poem needs work it is unfinished.
I never have half written polished write.
Those short sentences are to describe the scene, not simply a list. I need them so I can start talking about the leaves listening.
About the ending.
You are right you see running nose but not tears. That is the key. If running nose is graphic then what do you say to the poets here who write about vomiting, killers and gutters?

IRiz

author comment

redid the whole thing

IRiz

author comment

To create "winter asking why she has to leave" you may consider a minor expansion to the line "winter leaving" with

winter leaving
with heavy steps [or feet]
...............................

raj (sublime_ocean)

thank you

IRiz

author comment

I unfortunately see the poem as quite finished, needing some tweaks (below). But the idea of the poem, of idea that winter crying to herself as the early leaves perk up their ears is fantabulous.
I would fix this a bit, and consider it done.
for an unfinished workshop, you'll have to do better.

- a typo- i suppose touch of white, not toch (which i looked up to be sure )
- I would make something like the wind to be the cause of the lost dairy page, as if it blew away
- i would omit "Stone walls keep the warms" I don't understand this line
- i would put it as "Thickets filled with warblers, rocks.
-New stanza starting, no leaves yet

'''

Eumolpus
I'd rather learn from one bird how to sing
than teach ten thousand stars how not to dance
ee cummings

cool comments, thank you very much, I edited the original unfinished version
I used your suggestions and developed parts that were not clear.

IRiz

author comment

Full on revisions. Yet I think you kept what you wanted to say, just said it a lot better.

cheers,
Jess
A new workshop on the most important element of poetry-
'Rhythm and Meter in Poetry'
https://www.neopoet.com/workshop/rhythm-and-meter-poetry

My last line! What do you think of it?
I could revert to the nose version, not sure.

IRiz

author comment

I can handle dismemberment and vomit, cannibalism and amputation, even great gouts of blood, but not runny noses!

ok, how about 'running down the back of her throat'?

cheers,
Jess
A new workshop on the most important element of poetry-
'Rhythm and Meter in Poetry'
https://www.neopoet.com/workshop/rhythm-and-meter-poetry

Thought of it and feel it is excesive.
You make me laugh with your peculiar choices of what to tolerate. It is a nervous laughter though. On the bright side, I know how to scare you now. Apcheeeee!

IRiz

author comment

Wow, great editing job. The poem is now far more coherent, and different parts now connect in an easy flow. I felt it listed incongruent parts originally, Now I feel a smooth logical flow. In my opinion it went from choppy to beautiful, just like that. Bravo.

T

The most powerful reaction
of mind on mind
is transference of sight

Tyro, thank you very much for going through the revisions with me. I think that is a part of workshop to show raw and unfinished and then polished and more defined work.
I am still debating the last line, whether I managed to say that she hides tears.
Can you see it clearly? Have you experienced something like that when you swallow tears?

IRiz

author comment

and I think all agree a better one. I like the form of stanza's and the rich physical development of the central idea in word play. I like the longer lines in these versions, 5-7 words which give a line a chance to develop, add richness and images. I think the poem is right lenght, too many poems I've been seeing lately are too short. 20 lines is perfect.
Essentially both the original and revised follow the same poetic idea, a strong central theme. Love the personification of winter as a her, as opposed to 'old man winter' which is in our culture the image I grew up with.
...

Eumolpus
I'd rather learn from one bird how to sing
than teach ten thousand stars how not to dance
ee cummings

What a pleasant comment! Thank you, Mark.
It was a tough day, finishing up a science project, driving in DC and thinking about leaving my job for my beloved nature, books and writing.

IRiz

author comment

Marvelous revisions on two counts. One because of making the poem marvelous and two for continuing to make me marvel at your poetic skills. Personally the last line was like a crack in a beautiful vase...
...........................................................

raj (sublime_ocean)

Hello Raj,
I know what you mean, i meant it to be noticed.

It is really strange how you all react to a simple thing I mentioned about running nose or tears on the back of a throat. Why other can write about gutters and vomit and I can't?

IRiz

author comment

Sorry friend ...i didn't realize that it would upset you so much...surely was not intended...it's your poem so you are free to go with what you feel is right..
..............................................

raj (sublime_ocean)

No, you misunderstood. It did not upset me.
It is okay. Lol. Don't worry. Have a great evening.

IRiz

author comment

Thank you for reading my poem.
I know you are an artist, some of your poems are vividly standing in front of my eyes like oil paintings.
For example your storm in a small tropical town.

IRiz

author comment
(c) Neopoet.com. No copyright is claimed by Neopoet to original member content.