ABPA - Australian Bush Poets Association

This poem fails on a number of levels to be true to bush poetry.

1. Metre and stresses are not consistent
2. The rhyme schemes vary. Verse one has an ABCB rhyme.
3. Verse two has AAAB
4. “No hybrid this one - pure still. (Inverted rhyme)

And yet it’s one of my favourites. I enjoyed writing it and I enjoy reading it. Strange???

Dingo

He raises his head to a redolent breeze.
No hybrid this one - pure still.
Athletic grace enabling him
free roam cross rock and ridge and rill.

Across parched plains instinctive urge
to prowl from desert to forest verge,
to hunt and kill. Small creature’s scourge
in a hard and hungry land.

He pads with soft and silent feet.
With ears erect and eyes intense,
to where his lifetime mate sits still;
awake, alert in every sense.

Her pups not yet of age to feed
alone. He meets their every need.
Descendant of uncertain breed
in an ancient sunburned land.

Familiar sounds - a waking world.
The tender dappled light of dawn.
Uncertainty his closest friend,
acknowledged each precipitous morn.

Once he ruled this land so wide.
No reason day or night to hide.
But now no turning back the tide
of man in a changing land

Four thousand years at least, he’s trod
this canvas God has painted.
This once wild wondrous land of Oz
that hand of man has tainted.

And still he roams the untamed face
of a wild and wonderful wilderness place
and I pray that we’ll never deny him the space
to live free. His birth right. Dingo.

I like it. The ryming scheme of 3 sets of abcb followed by aaab is consistent through the six verses so don't see a problem with that, just give the rest of a bit of polish - borrow some of Zondrae's , and it will shine

You could try something like -

He raises his head to a redolent breeze.
No hybrid/cross-bred mongrel; pure genes still
have imbued guile and grace in him
to freely roam 'cross ridge and rill.

I enjoyed the read Mate - thank you - IMO worth a bit of extra effort to get it just right, it is a worthy poem

Cheers

Maureen

Reason 2 and 3 are the same reason.

I don't understand reason 4 - and why didn't you close the inverted commas?

G'day

How come the judging comes before the poem.
Didn't your Mum tell you not to advertise your faults?
After reading the errors I almost didn't bother to read the poem.
May I suggest you edit the post and put your self critique at the end? what do you think?

I would not put the " Faults " up at all just post the poem and ask for comments ?

There are plenty here who will tell ya where to go Wazza


Oh if you know the errors why not do a Rebok and fix em " Just Do It "

Liked the read and story and sentiments mate.


Bob

Wazza, it's your poem. If you like it, leave it.

Heather

Thanks Heather. Had already decided to leave it as is. It's not going any where else and I still like the way it reads, in fact it's one of my favourite pieces.

Why did I put up the faults I was aware of? Simply because I was aware of them. I guess just demonstrating some growth in my writing. Time was when the only thing I worried about was rhyme.

Stephen. Missing inverted commas? Just an oversight.
Inverted rhyme/inverted phrase ... whatever.
"He could fence and shear and timber cut." Of course one would normally say, " - and cut timber." But that would bugger up the rhyme -or metre, or something - so I do it the easy way.
Ellis Campbell

Anyway, warts and all, I'm still working my way along the curve.

Cheers all ... Wazza

I agree with your decision, just leave it as is.

I think it is a good idea to decide why we are writing. To comply with some supposed correctness or to be expressive.
I think it's a good idea to master the forms, but if a departure from the strict format gives better expression, I reckon go for it.
Too much slavish so-called consistency can lead to stiff and dull verse, too much departure from the form leads to what Robert Frost called " playing tennis with the net down " somewhere in between I suppose, we have to judge the place.

I think we have to make sure that tweaking the form looks like choice not error.
How do we do that. THAT's a good question.

Not having a go at you Wazza. I can't agree with you that your piece fails.

Neville ... In retrospect 'fails' was probably too heavy a word. Just didn't dot the eyes etc re bush poetry ...and I knew so.
Thanks for your response.

Wazza