Re: a comment on Market Day in Al-Karak, South Jordan by zodiac	26-Oct-04/6:03 AM
Sorry. But this poem exists only because I thought it would be fun to write a poem using the word blunderbuss.
Re: a comment on One True Instant by Dovina	26-Oct-04/12:55 AM
The [White House] aide said that guys like me were "in what we call the reality-based community," which he defined as people who "believe that solutions emerge from your judicious study of discernible reality." I nodded and murmured something about enlightenment principles and empiricism. He cut me off. "That's not the way the world really works anymore," he continued. "We're an empire now, and when we act, we create our own reality. And while you're studying that reality—judiciously, as you will—we'll act again, creating other new realities, which you can study too, and that's how things will sort out. We're history's actors ... and you, all of you, will be left to just study what we do." - Ron Suskind
Re: a comment on A Better God by Dovina	26-Oct-04/12:41 AM
I am a Milwaukee Jerky Baron with a philanthropic streak. You are a relic of the Victorians. I'm Christopher Reeve's character in the film "The Remains of the Day". You're Christopher Reeve with more hair and not dead.
Re: a comment on A Better God by Dovina	26-Oct-04/12:38 AM
In all seriousness, can you see the differences between the following: a) "discover all that I’ve made quite pleasing and right"; b) my simplified example, "discover a dog friendly"; and c) the structure in your comment, "discover what god has made and find it pleasing"? In the first two, "discover" is performing the action which results in "pleasing and right"; in the last "find" is. I see now you meant to use "discover" as a synonym for "find", which of course it is, but not in the sense that you can "find grammar difficult", you see? Why not correct it by simply saying something like "My creatures will find all the things that I've made quite pleasing and right etc etc". As far as "not a technical writing on science and religion" goes, what do you mean? And why shouldn't a poem hold together somewhat logically, grammatically, philosophically and so on and so on and so on. I don't know if you read poetry, or what kind of poetry you read, but I dare you to find me a famous poem that's not pretty consistent in these respects. At least, I can't think of any at the moment. Hey, thanks for listening.
Re: a comment on A Better God by Dovina	25-Oct-04/1:55 AM
Could you kindly be more specific. Please, God, say you at least understood #s 2, 3, 6, 7, 8 & 10?!
Re: a comment on Muslim woman at the office by zodiac	25-Oct-04/1:51 AM
This poem is the only true thing I've ever written :(
Re: A Better God by Dovina	24-Oct-04/5:03 AM
And then, because you always make me feel kind of furtively generous, here's some real criticism for your poem. It's more and better than you've done for anyone else here in recent memory. That's the whole fucking point. Check out this hook: 1) "with great beauty and wit" is poorly phrased and an innaccurate description of how you'd set up a world. If "with great beauty and wit" is how you'll be acting while you're setting up the world, then beauty seems kind of out of place. If the world is going to have the qualities "great beauty and wit", even before you've made people in it, then wit is out of place. You might consider changing it. 2) "discover all ... quite pleasing and right" is an innappropriate use of discover. You can't or shouldn't, for example, "discover a dog friendly". You might consider changing it. 3) I don't understand why you're not "leav[ing] about" ancient texts, when you just said you'll "show them... how their world was formed" etc. Aren't those pretty close to the same thing? You might consider changing one of them. 4) What are you on about "self-made diseases"? That's all kind of pleasing and nice, but if you're going to believe in a God, you pretty much have to believe He made diseases, too. Oh, right, you're not going to be that kind of God. Well, you might consider changing it so people don't think you're just taking a super-easy way out. 5) In fact, there's no kind of conflict here, except the half-alluded-to one with the real God, which isn't really enough and isn't fair since God can't answer. Besides, almost everybody in the world besides you and me, practically, thinks God IS exactly like this poem. As it is, this poem is just kind of a daydream and fluff. You might consider doing something about it. 6) The places where the rhythm is off make the rest of it - the rhythmed part - seem kind of jumpy and weird. You'd do better to either loosen up the rhythmy parts or tighten up the non-rhythmy ones. 7) Stanzas 2-4 just repeat the same idea, sometimes contradictorily. The last stanza, particularly, doesn't pack very much of a punch, mostly because it's already been said. You might consider adding some more ideas and condensing these to one stanza. 8) Other than an inconsistent rhythm and the big honking central conceit, there's not really a lot of poetic phrasings or devices (like bits of simile, metaphor, alliterative words, or original ways of describing things.) You should consider adding some of these. 9) By the start of the twentyfirst century, this is all kind of old hat. The only part that makes it not old hat is that most twentieth and twentyfirst century writers have figured, probably rightly, that their worlds would have all sorts of problems, too, while you haven't. 10) If you say this isn't criticism because I haven't added some, I don't know, praise-thingy on the end here, well, sorry, that's not my idea of criticism, and I guess I should have a pretty good idea about it by now, shouldn't I? Well, ta-ta! Yours truly, zodiac in Karak Islamland
Re: a comment on A Better God by Dovina	24-Oct-04/4:58 AM
It's easier than -=Dark_Angel=-, P.I. makes it sound. If "insults slammed at poets and poetry ... form no part of the quality of those people or their work," then what difference does it make if someone calls your poem, say, "a Fiat's-rooftop-displayed stool of incoherence"? None, unless you're a giant suck. Personally, I mostly agree with you. And I'd go on to say your typical meaningless dribbles of praise have nothing to do with useful criticism or evaluation, either. But you're not really having any of this 'it doesn't affect my true sense of self worth' stuff anyway. That's the whole fucking point. Besides, if I said what was horribly wrong with your poetry in an inoffensive way, you'd be forced to find some other reason to disregard my advice or, maybe, have yourself a good cry over it and then find yourself a new way to feel good about yourself like hanging with Goths or being a really great porn star specialised in interracial sodomy. Trust me, it's better for both of us this way.
Re: Women by Bakar	23-Oct-04/6:40 AM
It's a riddle. The answer is: you!
Re: a comment on Youth by thepinkbunnyofdoom	21-Oct-04/5:31 AM
Don't give in so easily. He probably meant "tokin'", like what you do to a marijuana cigarette. Besides, in order to be "quite literally...doing" token, he'd probably have to be participating in some wacky obscure "fad" dance involving lying under-foot, alternated with rolling around in various slots.
Re: A Lovely Cog by Dovina	21-Oct-04/1:06 AM
I posted a poem full of grammatical and other errors. Why don't you ever comment on mine? This poem is just too simple. That's all.
Re: a comment on To Leave a Trace by Dovina	21-Oct-04/1:01 AM
Anybody knows they're not towels. They're tableclothes.
Re: a comment on Lufituaeb by Phaiyne	21-Oct-04/12:59 AM
We know. That's not what's wrong with this poem.
Re: a comment on To Leave a Trace by Dovina	21-Oct-04/12:57 AM
Stop overfilling your comments with ridiculous groundless assumptions. And your poetry is still utterly artless.
Re: a comment on To Leave a Trace by Dovina	20-Oct-04/7:34 AM
Don't be so self-righteous. Everyone knows your true identity. It's Dan Garcia-Black, with a capital G. Why you still bother with this charade, hiding yourself behind an undercapitalised pseudonym is beyond me, though maybe it has something to do with being unable to "hack" even a reasonable conversation, to say nothing of poetry-writing or hiding your somewhat ill-informed and offensive notions on almost any subject. No, wait. I suppose the appropriate thing to say here is: No, wait. I'm not hiding! To prove it I'll meet you on Santa Monica Pier at high noon - I'll be the one smoking two cigars. I'm registered at the Long Beach Motel Six under the pseudonym "Up Johndike". Get over yourself. Of course we're all hacks here. Why the hell would anyone else hang out in this dump? The only difference between us is that I have two articles - one on Emily Dickinson fascicles and one on the rhythmickal and syntacktickal structures in oral/street/performance poetry - currently being vetted by respectable lit journals, which of course doesn't mean anything except that I happen to be good at at least one of my jobs, while you're not even a very good shoeshine. Also, you think I looked all these words up in a thesaurus and care whether or not people look things up in thesauri, though I didn't and don't. And I'm not gay but you are. The "Islam/Western Pragmatism war" is just great, by the way. PS-I teach Adult Islam Retards, not children. PPS-Whatever.
Re: a comment on To Leave a Trace by Dovina	19-Oct-04/4:15 AM
You too. Way to make sense. The way you went from "I'm always let down when someone who I will never meet insults me" to "not in some towel haired nation" was like fisting an elderly pedestrian from a moving Hyundai.
Re: a comment on To Leave a Trace by Dovina	19-Oct-04/4:12 AM
And you ought to have been here long enough to know I'm married. To a woman.
Re: a comment on To Leave a Trace by Dovina	19-Oct-04/4:11 AM
Where'd you get any of these ideas? I'm outsourcing myself because someday I'll be able to write a great tell-all book about why Islams are really so impossibly dull and stupid, made timely and bestselling by whatever current or continuing so-called crisis there happens to be at the time. PS-Colossal dimtards put unnecessary apostrophes on plurals. You fail. And hey, congratulations on saying so many interesting and original things! Your Hollywood readings bit was singular! PPS-Everybody here except for you already knows who I am. I'm John Updike. You fail times two.
Re: a comment on ... by Jezabele-In-Hell	17-Oct-04/5:23 AM
What an extraordinarily gay comment. And wrong. And you also fall prey to saying someone's logic falls prey to something, which makes you a first-rate practitioner of Parmesean Bummingtonism in my book. Conclusions: There is no "you", just a funny-shaped knee-hat in Harris tweed.
Re: a comment on Damn you, Feeling. by Rollsoftoiletpaper	17-Oct-04/5:17 AM
Why? Do you think people keep getting more dramatic with age until they explode?