The Crossing Place

[r.magnay]

...Rossie POO?...oh no, there goes my image....

[warooa]

[Bob Pacey]

Neville mine says ?????

to pack or fill completely; cram

2. (intr) to eat large quantities

3. to force, shove, or squeeze

Now I'm totally confused ???


Bob

[Heather]

Bob, that is "stuffed" not "stuff"

[Vic Jefferies]

There's a lonely stretch of hillocks
There's a beach asleep and drear
There's a battered broken fort beside the sea...hmmmmmmmmmmmm!

Love the poem and I like the ending as it is.

[Neville Briggs]

What we write Vic, doesn't come from nowhere. Never has, never will. Building on what has gone before is the time honoured practice of the arts from time immemmorial.

[Heather]

Vic I am still learning, learning, learning. I have only ever written poems with AABB or ABAB rhyme and have wanted to step away from that because frankly I'm finding it limiting and I'm ready to move on. I read some of Leon Gellert's poetry and love it. In Anzac Cove I admire the varied line lengths and the "sound" and "feel" that gives the poem.

My poem started out as an exercise to see if I was able to use similar line lengths and rhyming scheme - and learn from it. Although I have started some lines with the same word, the words are mine and the story is mine and I hope it gives a sense of mystery. Whereas Gellert has cleverly altered the metre and syllable count midway in his poem - quite deliberately I am sure, (something he would no doubt be criticised for in any bush poetry competition!), I have used consistent metre in my poem. Leon Gellert showed me the way to do that and I think I have learned something from a very talented poet whose writing I admire.

I hope to write more poems with this pattern and vary the words more as I find my feet - because I like the sound and feel it gives a poem. The other thing I admire about Gellert's poetry is that they are mostly short poems and I find I am not alone...

I once wrote a poem where I thought I had used a pattern that was unusual - only to later read a poem by A.B. Paterson that had the same pattern and I thought - well, if it's good enough for Paterson, it's ok for me to write like that too.

Another time I read a poem by our own Keats with internal rhyme and the "tune" stuck in my head and I ended up writing several poems with internal rhyme because I could hear Keat's poem in my head (It's Christmas O'Leary - thanks Keats! ). For me it's often about what I "hear" that stays with me - poetry is much like music to me.

Heather

[Stephen Whiteside]

I wouldn't worry about using Gellert's rhyming pattern, Heather. It is, as you say, a little more complex than ABAB or AABB, but not greatly so, and he can hardly copyright it. He probably copied it himself.

Your comments about shorter poems and more complex patterns strike a chord with me. I like to use a car analogy. Fancy cars are great for short trips, but if you're planning a long journey you're better off with something very basic and reliable. Complex patterns become harder to maintain the longer the poem, obviously. C. J. Dennis seemed to have been able to maintain complex patterns in very long poems, but he was a genius.

The other thing Dennis did brilliantly - which I very much struggle to do myself - is create an expectation in the mind of the reader for the purpose of confounding it.

[Heather]

I'm not worried I promise you Stephen. (The pattern isn't exactly the same because Gellert varies his and I haven't). I saw something I liked and wanted to have a go at it myself. I'm sure it has been used by other people - it's not a complex rhyming pattern - just something I haven't done myself before. I remember the first time I ever wrote a poem with ABAB rhyme (The Last Post) and how hard I thought it was at the time. That poem went on to be my first and only winning bush poetry poem.

I've got a couple of poem ideas that I haven't been able to write and I think it's because I haven't found the right "sound" for them yet. This one was perfect for what I wanted to write about Alice Walton and I think it will work for other ideas I have. I find am inspired to write again because I have found a way to do it. Yay!

[Stephen Whiteside]

Good.