Wednesday, April 20, 2005

Saving the World by Saving My Words

I recyle my

newspapers
bottles
tins
old clothes
cardboard
plastic

I reuse what I can
marmalade jars hold spices
plastic takeaway cartons do service in the fridge

and I realised that when I'm at my computer
editing a document
I hate to delete a faulty line
and then retype it

it would be faster but
I painstakingly move text around
move from word to word
inserting a letter here
deleting one there

so that I don't
clutter the planet
with my

wasted words

3 comments:

Leon Wing said...

I must commend you, particularly, on your 3rd stanza from the last, the one starting with "it would be faster ...".

You sound a bit out of breath in the 1st line. I read "it would be faster" very swiftly, without pausing for any stresses, as they are all unstresses anyway. "faster" pauses the reading at "fas" (stress syllable). And the next two syllables are unstresses. However the "but" there is such a strong run-on, it could be promoted to a stress.

The next line with "I painstakingly ..." is so adroit. I like the way my tongue goes over "painstakingly", doing it very carefully, like I'm doing tongue tip-toeing.

The third line has very broad vowels, like you are moving with deliberate steps.

The last two lines of this stanza with "here" and "there" rhyming is a nice ending.

Congrats.

bibliobibuli said...

Leon, thanks sincerely for this. I didn't really take this piece too seriously, hadn't even thought about reworking it. Just liked the silliness I caught myself at. But I have realised that if there is anyone I want to run the drafts of my poems past it's you. Be warned!

Leon Wing said...

A bit of a mistake there in my comment:

I read "it would be faster" very swiftly, without pausing for any stresses.

Should be :
I read "it would be" very swiftly, without pausing for any stresses.

"Faster" has a stressed syllable there. I read the line so fast, as intended I guess.

Looking forward to more poems from you! Would love to read the drafts of your poems!