We all want to help each other improve our technique, but disagree a bit on how to help. Telling me how exactly how my pony rides does definitely help me improve my technique, as I learn what works, what doesn't, and why. Emotion is just one area of the ride, but this kind of feedback is all about technique. Specific technical suggestions, rather than just feedback, can also help sometimes.

I agree there are no fences here.  At least I don't intend to jump any because there are none in my eyes.

This is what I have a tendency to do: "In other words, their concentration on technique and craft stifles the emotional content."--and that coming from Milner, an excellent poet, so I have a tendency to understand what he's saying to me, specifically--don't allow my struggle for 'good writing' stifle what provoked writing the poem in the first place.

cheryl

I like this; it's exactly what I often offer in responses to poems.  It's what I need, as a poet, to know about my own work -- if the connection is there to an unknown reader out there in the world.  I like work that pricks me, for good or ill.  

I like Packard's checklist as well.  And Milner's question: Is this boring? is one I don't ask myself in re: my own work often enough.  

Will also say that I'm often moved by a poem in one way or another and "consequent" edits to the work 1.) make the poem even better than I would've thought possible; or, 2.) remove whatever it was that initially moved me (connected to something inside me) by becoming more technically correct.   It's a slippery slope, this creative writing stuff.  What works splendidly in one area, may well fail in another.  For me, whether looking at my own creations or those of others, the line is very fine between craft and that spark of intent/creation.  [Just thought about the amazing fingerpaintings my five-year-old granddaughter made; how beautiful they are framed; how full of color and discordancy and immediacy].

Yes.  I like this thread.  I like the checklist.  Applying a rule, to see how it fits, can't hurt.  An edit made one way can always be reversed if the result is not what the poet intended.  And I like emotional responses to pieces.  Yes.

Maggie, your prĭm'ər became a prī'mər! Was a great idea. Tom

I broadly agree with efforts to improve feedback, but to concentrate just on the technique without including feedback to the poem as art, including emotional response, is limiting, and I believe tends to an academic model of review.  It can be very mechanical. 

The resource that we have in poetry circle is variety...because we have so many readers who are commenting, the work is exposed to variety of response.   One person may have a very fine ear for sound, another a sharp eye for misplaced puncuation,  another may be new to poetry circle and just wish to record that they liked a particular line...and that in itself is useful for this writer.

Sharon Olds' approach is to comment in detail on emotional aspects of the poem. This is from my notes made at her workshop...

When giving feedback be as specific as you can.  Speak about what you liked about the form, rhythm, rhyme or lack of it, metaphor, clarity, the shape of the piece, ordering, wit, musicality or images.  Say how you felt as you heard it, report any emotional responses or bodily sensations as you heard it. 

Since we often write poetry prompted by emotion, or wishing to evoke emotion, it is very useful to be told in feedback that, for example: "this moved me to tears", or "I didn't see the twist coming," " my hair stood on end at that point," or "you could be drifting into sentimentality here."

That is enough from me for now.  I will continue to watch the discussion develop.

thank you for posting that mags, i'll keep it in mind when critiquing :)

I agree.  It is possible.  And there may be "craft" in applying gesso, but what comes after the gesso is often aided by craft, practice, innovation.  Even the gesso itself may need sanding and reapplication.  There is a certain beauty in the flat gothic paintings of times past, but Caravaggio [sp?] took shadings etc. to another level.

–verb (used with object) 9. to make or manufacture (an object, objects, product, etc.) with skill and careful attention to detail.

What a wonderful thread. Nothing posted here that isn't of use to all of us. Maggie, I read the Packard checklist when I joined EP, printed it off and it's been here on my desk, always within reach, ever since.
I absolutely agree that emotional responses are important, but to dwell on that seems, to me, to miss Maggie's intention when she started the thread. Currently, the majority of reviews/responses to poems on the site are based on an emotional level. I think what Maggie is trying to do is encourage us all to think more about craft and the technicalities of writing. And even if we don't "apply" Packard's checklist to every poem we read/write, it certainly won't hurt to have it in the back of one's mind.

Great thread, long overdue methinks.

B.

I think I finally see (partly, I hope, anyway) the distinction Maggie's making, and what we are "arguing" over in the thread. When she says "talk shop" in original post, and "talk to each other as writers," as she has said elsewhere--she means give feedback not as readers but as writers, workers in the same craft.

What others and I myself have been adding (a la my father-in-law in #3 above) is that we value is feedback from PC'ers also as readers, so we can figure out how our writing actually reads.

So I see this distinction now, anyway. Both seem valuable, but as Tim said somewhere recently, we could potentially get reader feedback elsewhere; probably Maggie would agree that PC is a unique opportunity to "talk shop" instead.

Since I don't get much reader feeback elsewhere, I really value getting that here. And I just love the shop talk too. So I would like to add my voice in encouraging the latter, without trying to curtail the former. Tom

Since I don't get much reader feeback elsewhere, I really value getting that here. And I just love the shop talk too. So I would like to add my voice in encouraging the latter, without trying to curtail the former. Tom

[/quote]

YES! That's just what I feel.  increase the shop talk but don't exile the rest. I would add that the reader feedback you get here is more trustworthy than that given by many sources outside of the forum. 

Thanks for the support, Brian. You summarized my thoughts better than I did.

You get it, Tom, and you do, too, Sue.

This, paraphrased, from one of Ginsberg's lectures: Don't write for your mother's eyes, or your wife's or your best friend from childhood days. Write your poems 'to' the one or two people you know will tell you straight to your face that they suck if they suck. The word 'suck' encompossing many meanings.

When he sat down to write, it was with his father and Kerouac in mind.

That's what Tim does, Tom.  The people he sends his drafts to are some of his best ciritics.
(And, oh my God, you should hear him read!!)

I'll be putting up something from Ginsberg in the next primer.

Thanks for sharing your thoughts.

Maggie

Looking forward to it.

B.

I'm moving this back up because it's a good thing to read.

Rick

thanks for moving this back up rick.  i agree with tom. while i do post my poems in other workshops, i feel my true test as a poet is this pc crowd.  this is where i feel the most vulnerable with my work, only because i know i have other writers reading my poems who have been writing longer than me, write in other genres than me, and have most likely been published far more than me.  it's with this in mind i read every comment and crtique carefully and take them to my writing.  i enjoy other writer's throwing in their two for word choice, stanza arrangement, tone, style, etc.  not only does that provide me with their insight foremost as a writer, but a reader as well.