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.

Bats Say It Better

Bats sing better harmonies, outside my window
Mouths slick with the pulp and juice of our orange tree,
they screech to each other in E minor,
D flat and A sharp, calling
‘the fruit is here!’

My mouth is always dry,
exhausted of trying to speak of things post-lingual:
these emotions, something other than elated, destitute or sad.
Doing it better,
the bats still manage to sing.

Style / type: 
Free verse
Review Request (Intensity): 
I want the raw truth, feel free to knock me on my back
Review Request (Direction): 
How was my language use?
What did you think of the rhythm or pattern or pacing?
How was the beginning/ending of the poem?
Is the internal logic consistent?
Last few words: 
I'm extremely sorry for my late replies to all the critiques this poem has received! Here is another revised draft taking on most of the critiques from everyone:)! My issue now is with the line 'the fruit is here', it's been suggested I could find something more appropriate or exciting for the bats to say, any suggestions? It was also suggested I add more of my own situation in between : "than elated, destitute or sad/ doing it better" I'm not certain on this, but I will leave this up to everyone else's digressions!
Editing stage: 

Comments

I like the poem's theme very much, I especially liked the second, line. But I felt that the poem is missing something, as from line 4 onwards it reads a little like prose, to me.

Maybe you could say something like,

My mouth is parched,
exhausted, trying to speak of things post-lingual:
emotions that are something other than destitute .
The bats do it better,
and manage to sing.

Of course these are only suggestions.

Lou

Stand tall, be proud to be who you are, give the world the finger!!!!

A poem without imagery is often a sterile thing. In writing, don't just say the bats sing , say How they sing :"They still manage to sing in their silent way"; Don't say my mouth is dry, tell me how dry. I think if you will go back over this and add some descriptive content you Will have a very good poem. Please keep in mind this is merely the opinion of a new writer .................scribbler

"exhausted of trying to speak of things post-lingual:
these emotions that are something other than destitute or sad."

I was compelled to think about what can't be communicated that's "post-lingual". Clearly, there are pre-lingual states that are hard to communicate and beyond-lingual states (e.g., transcendant experiences) but what would be a negative state created by language? Would it be the felt distance, separateness between two people that's highlighted by the shortcomings of language? I don't know but I do feel that a communication tool can highlight the limits of connection as well as enhancing connection. I take away from this poem the idea that there might be something of value in this essential alientation, i.e., "the fruit is here". Like Scribbler, I do take away a sense of sterility but feel it's an intended sterility and wouldn't change it. I enjoyed the poem, think its one of the better ones I've read although I would have punctuated it differently--but that's voice for you.

Thankyou so much for your very insightful comment:).

I think the idea I was trying to get through with 'post-lingual'was the idea the Symbolist poets had in that language falls short of describing our emotions and too actual understand each other we need to join into a 'physic'or sub-conscious 'stream' .

But that obviously doesn't come through, I will have to have a think about how to rephrase that.

Again thankyou so much for your critique :)!

author comment

there seems to be a dry humour in it, very Aussie, very smart.

And such a treat to have a piece composed of ideas with nary a simile nor metaphor in sight.

Maybe not everyone's cup of tea, yet I see a scene strongly-
horrid, silent-screetching, piss-on-self bats viewed with wry amusement by a poet deeply self-consciously aware of their own existential angst.

Oh, just read your "Last few words". Hmmm. All I can think of to suggest in answer to your questions is to expand on "something other than destitute or sad" with added juxtapositions to bat behaviour. But I like it as it is.

Personally, I can seldom make appreciably more of a poem after second draft unless I leave it to ferment for a considerable time and re-write it with a new perspective.

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

I apologise for the extremely late reply.

Rats are so cute ^_^! Their noses are very similar now that I think about it!

author comment

Michelle, aren't we bats an interesting species?

I like the poem as is. I'm sure any change would be good too. You're that kind of poet.

~~

but thank-you so much Kailashana :)!

author comment

I am glad I came and discovered this, there is a sense of the Australian humor in this. I loved the title and considering even where I am in Melbourne I see these creatures at night flying past, this was amusing to read. Your brevity and free form is very very good.

Chez
"The perfect woman perpetrates literature as she does a small sin: as an experiment, in passing, to see if anybody notices it - and to makes sure that somebody does." - Nietzsche

Thankyou CC :)!

Only the Aussies here seem to understand the humour here, let's make it an Aussie inside joke :p.

author comment

Thankyou JC:)!

But I'm sure there is still lots of room for improvement xp.

author comment

Thank-you for your honest opinion. I will take your critiques on board and see where I end up. Hopefully I'll make the standard eventually:)!

author comment

"this is the sweet"

we humans say
this is sweet
but bats are a "flighty" lot
had to put a lot of thought
into this because I like
your writing style and talent
and dont want to dimish
this effort

forgo Wagner to see that one instead..
our little bats are suffering with fungus or is it mould
like the honeybees

mankind has touched the magi
and the mirage wavers

I love bats

Delicious Dell

the sounding
of something found
like an echo

be yea bat or ship
searching or avoiding

we are illusions
hungry for our recognizance

Thank You!

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