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Milo Winter's Poetry is Bad · Rachel Oates

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Hey everyone, welcome back and I am finally making another video
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about poetry. You guys have been asking for so
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long and I'm finally doing it. Today we're going to be
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reviewing a poetry collection called Altar Life by Milo
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Praser, who you may know from his first novel, Age of
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Scorpius, which was published under the pen names Milo Winter
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and Audra Winter. Age of Scorpius.
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Oh, there's a lot of drama around it, and I was going to
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make a video a while back, but I kind of just more and more like
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tick tock videos kept coming out and there was a lot of stuff
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going on and I kind of got a little bit confused myself and I
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never even got around to reading the book.
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But what I do know is there are a lot of negative reviews about
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it and we're kind of going to be touching on it in the last
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section of this video where I kind of talk about how it ties
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into this poetry collection. This poetry collection though,
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all to life. It's only just come out in the
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last couple of weeks. I think it was just before
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Christmas it was released and I have a lot of thoughts about it.
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Is it the worst poetry collection I've ever read?
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No, not at all. Does he show promise in a couple
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of places? Yes, absolutely.
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Would I recommend you go buy this book and spend your time
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and money on it? Probably not, no.
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The biggest problem with this collection is that it's simply
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just not ready to be published. Milo still hasn't found his
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voice yet as a writer. And I think that's very, very
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clear in the in this collection. It feels like he's mimicking
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what he thinks a poet should sound like rather than what he
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sounds like. So I'm hearing him trying to
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mimic the voice of others. I'm not hearing his voice.
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And so because of that, a lot of his writing often comes across
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as pretentious book confused. There's nothing that feels
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authentic about this collection. And that's my biggest criticism
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of it. The lack of authenticity, the
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right in itself from an objective level, if we're
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talking about like grammar and syntax and so on is just not
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very good. There are there were so many
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moments when I was reading and I was asking myself like, what
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does this even mean? Like, what is he trying to say?
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And I genuinely thought this was an issue with me because a lot
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of, you know, is my health issues and stuff.
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I've been having a lot of brain fog and memory issues over the
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last year. And I thought maybe maybe this
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is a me problem. Maybe I'm just not getting this.
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So I ended up giving it to Alex. I mean, like, can you read this?
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Can you tell me what you think? And even he was like, what, what
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is even trying to say? This doesn't make any sense.
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He's not using these words correctly.
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And that's like, oh, thank God, it's not just me.
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He, he packed me up as well. In the author's note at the end
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of the book. This one line in particular
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really stood out to me. I've decided to publish my
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poetry at the foot of my creative gravestone, my answer
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to the artist's wrath that I found walking through a cemetery
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in Oslo at midnight in the snowy Nordic valley I'm in right now.
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What is he even trying to say there?
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I mean, I kind of get it to some degree, right?
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I think the at the foot of my creative gravestone bit is in
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regards to him being cancelled online and his first novel
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heavily critiqued and getting a lot of bad reviews, right?
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I think that's what that refers to.
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But the rest of it, I mean, there's some literal bits like,
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you know, he was in Oslo when he wrote some of this.
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OK, but what the hell does my answer to the artist's wrath I
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found walking through a cemetery even mean?
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It sounds like pretentious nonsense with no substance.
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It just bothers me a bit, and this is a theme that we're going
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to be looking at and noticing throughout the poems, which
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we're going to be looking at in detail in a moment.
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I'm going to do my kind of typical poetry format where I I
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read you the poems from his collection.
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I give you my opinions on them. We try and figure out what he
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was trying to say. We look at what's good about it,
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what's bad about it, and then we compare it to another piece of
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work that did that, but maybe a little bit better or in a
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different way. But first, yeah, there's a
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couple more things I want to mention as like an overall
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critique of the book. A lot of his word choices do not
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sound natural, more like he opened a thesaurus and just
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picked out big words rather than ones that are naturally in his
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vocabulary. And again, This is why it
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doesn't feel authentic. He didn't pick words necessarily
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work with the poems rhythm or rhyme or tone or voice.
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I genuinely want to know if these are words he uses in his
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everyday life, because if he is, he's probably using them wrong
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in the same way he doesn't use poems.
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But the issue isn't just with the contents of the book, but in
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how it's made and put together. So I ordered the paperback from
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Amazon for like 11 LB whatever and it's full of really
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unprofessional printing and formatting errors.
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So for example, he's not created the document at the right size
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and so his bleed edges were off, which means a lot of pages have
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a really awkward white border around them when they should be
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printed to the edge. This is something that you need
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to get right on a basic level before you even create your
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document. You know, when you're set it up
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in Indesign or Word or whatever it is you're using to make your
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book, you set your page size and then you have your margins, you
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have your bleed edges and so on like that.
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And you, you need to get it the right size, otherwise it's not
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going to print correctly. He hasn't done that, so it's not
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printed correctly. And I get it, printing is hard,
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formatting is hard. But this is a basic part of
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self-publishing that you need to get right.
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Otherwise your book just looks unprofessional and unfinished.
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And I don't understand why he would have seen this when he got
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his proofs through and he didn't correct it.
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I don't understand why it's not been corrected.
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This is a very, very obvious thing that is quite an easy fix.
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I kind of worried that because of this, he's not actually that
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passionate about this book and it was just meant to be like a
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quick and easy cash grab for him or something.
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The other thing to discuss about this book is the artwork.
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And I've seen a lot of people saying that they think the
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artwork is fantastic and brilliant and the best thing
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about the book, and I kind of have a slightly different
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perspective, which some of you may disagree with and that's
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absolutely fine. This artwork was done by someone
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called Soli Ralhalla and it seems to be marketed as a big
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selling point of the book. But the problem is I just kind
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of don't find the artwork good enough as a whole.
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And again, there are issues here with formatting as well.
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So many of these images are not of a high enough resolution to
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be printed at this size. And so they look low quality on
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the paper and they look kind of blurry or pixelated, you might
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say. They just don't look good.
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Again, I might be a little picky about this and fussy about this
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because a lot of you may know I used to work in a printing lab.
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It was a photography lab. We did a lot of printing.
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We did art prints and stuff like that.
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So these are the things that I noticed.
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And to me, this was a really, really basic thing that just
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screams unprofessional and amateur and not, not good.
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It detracts from the contents of the book for me because all I
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see are these printing errors, you know?
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But As for the artwork itself, it is a mixed bag.
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Some is good, some I just don't really like at all.
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And I think there's some pages that it's really unclear what is
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actually trying to be drawn. And in others, I think overall
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it lacks cohesion throughout the book.
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There are too many different styles competing from page to
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page, sometimes even on one double page spread.
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You're like, why are these next to each other?
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These look completely out of place.
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What I would have liked to see with this book is the artwork
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really flowing from one page to the next and having a cohesive
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style or theme or maybe even colour scheme if you wanna
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experiment with different styles or even just reusing similar
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elements throughout. I've criticised the artwork in
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collections like Lily Reinhardt, Reinhardt, Reinhardt.
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People keep saying I say a name wrong and I don't know how to
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say it anymore. In her collection Swimming
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Lessons, I criticised the artwork in there for being like
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kind of basic and boring, but at least it was cohesive throughout
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the whole collection. You don't have that in this.
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Even though the artwork was done all by the same artist, it
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looked like it was done by several different amateur
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artists who didn't speak to each other throughout and all had
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very different briefs, and then it was all thrown together the
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last minute. Except it wasn't.
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It was all the same person. So I'm left really confused.
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That said, there were a few good individual pieces from page to
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page. The opening spread of the
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Phoenix is quite cool. The background to Arctic Circle
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of Fire is quite cool. But those few good pieces were
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let down by the overall lack of cohesion and by other really
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weak pieces that just kind of felt I could have kind of done
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without this, you know? Back to the book overall though,
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in the contents poetry wise. And one criticism I saw of this
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book on Goodreads was the person complaining that there weren't
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enough poems for the price tag. But this is a criticism that I
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do really disagree with because for me, when you're buying a
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poetry collection, you're not necessarily paying for quantity,
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but quality. I would rather spend 10, twenty,
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30 lbs on a really, really good short collection than, you know,
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a fiver on 100 poem long collection.
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That's absolute rubbish. You know, for me, I actually
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think there were too many poems in this book because there were
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so many that were just mediocre. And I wish he'd focused on
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making the good ones great and so had less really, really good
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poems than more mediocre poems. Does that make sense?
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None of them in particular really stood out as being like,
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yes, wow, great. This is sticking in my mind.
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You know, a lot of them were mediocre and forgetful.
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And even the ones that had a couple of good lines in here and
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there, I was a bit like, yeah, it's kind of let down by the
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rest of it. You know, a lot of the poems as
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well, covered really similar ideas or events or have similar
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themes or images. And I wish that they'd been
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combined and reworked and refined into one really good
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poem. And I'm not saying you can't
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write different poems about the same topic or whatever, but I am
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saying it's better to have one really, really good poem about
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some things and three mediocre ones about it.
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And if you are going to include multiple poems about the same
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thing in one collection, then I want them to be distinct from
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each other. Maybe you're doing different
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formats or styles or writing different voices, or from a
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different perspective, or, you know, just looking at it in a
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different way. I want them to be really
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distinct, and that's not what's happening in this collection.
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So with that in mind, let's look at some specific poems.
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First up, we have scarification. I am but a Fleck of my becoming
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layers, too sarid to crawl from carapace before my legacy, scar
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my skin. For I cannot grow without your
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abrasion. Trust me, please.
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I must be split open before I can prove my height.
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And then there's a little drawing of a tree.
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Or some trees. A forest scene, if you will.
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Because it is. I'm sure the lack of punctuation
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here is a choice, but coupled with some of the questionable
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word choices and odd syntax, it just sort of makes it really
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impossible to read. I don't quite know how he wants
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it to be read. I think the first few lines
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alone tells a lot about this poet's writing style.
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I am but a Fleck of my becoming again.
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It sounds like someone trying to mimic what they think a poet
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sounds like, but in reality, it doesn't really do much.
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It doesn't really tell as much. It doesn't really help the poem
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along. It's not, it's not good syntax,
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it's not useful syntax. It's just awkward.
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Like, OK, so the meaning of this is you're just a little part of
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who you could be. You have potential, but you're
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not there yet. I get it is an interesting
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sentiment, but on its own, when you express it in this way, it's
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just a bit dull, isn't it? Where's the vivid imagery?
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Where's the deeper meaning? Where's the layers?
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Or if you don't want to do that, then make a stylistic choice to
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be forward, to be directed to say, hey, I'm unfinished.
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I have potential, but I'm not there.
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You don't need to try and make it sound poetic when there's
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nothing poetic about how you're writing.
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Yes, in my original notes I wrote there are lines trying to
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sound deep, but without actually doing anything to warrant that.
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There's a similar thing with the next lines, but they sound even
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more awkward. Layers too serried to crawl from
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carapace. It doesn't sound actually I
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don't even know how you pronounce carapace.
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It's a word I've only ever read, sorry, so if I'm pronouncing
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that wrong, please tell me. Yeah, it doesn't sound natural.
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I don't believe these are words like sarid and carapace that the
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poet genuinely uses regularly, and I'm not sure they're even
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the best ones to express themselves in this situation.
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For one thing, I can't help but feel like it should be from the
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carapace or from a carapace. You could even do his carrot
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pace, your carrot pace, anything like that.
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Because one, it would make more grammatical sense.
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Two, it would create a better rhythm and make the poem flow
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and sound better. And three, it provides some
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context here that's kind of missing, and it would make it
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more interesting. You know whose shell with its
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super close layers, is keeping you trapped?
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Keeping you trapped? Is it your own or someone
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else's? Are you telling me that you are
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feeling you need to protect yourself to such an extent that
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it's stopping you from growing? Or is someone else being
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overprotective? The use of a pronoun here would
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tell us a lot. This is followed by perhaps the
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most confusing lines in this poem.
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Right before my legacy scar my skin.
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So does he mean before my legacy comma scar my skin?
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As in I'm standing before whatever my legacy is?
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Or it's the time period before I create my legacy and I need my
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skin scarring to get there? Or does he mean before my legacy
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scars with an S there should be my skin?
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As in his legacy is going to scar his skin and I can't move
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until this happens and he's going to be remembered for
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something that has hurt him but changed him for the hopefully
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the better. I don't, I don't know.
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I don't know. This is where the lack of
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punctuation becomes a problem because it's not that it's like
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purposely ambiguous and intriguing.
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It's just confusing. It's not, oh, there's layers of
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meaning to this and different interpretations.
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It's, wait, are these typos or errors that he's just missed?
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I don't know. And then at the very end, we've
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got some more awkward lines in between about how he needs pain
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to grow again. This would be a really
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interesting concept to explore in a poem, but it's just done in
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such a simplistic way that it's just lacking overall, you know?
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And then, and then despite how simplistic it is, the poet
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decides to end the poem. It's like by summarising what
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we've just read. Like he says, trust me please, I
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must be split open before I can prove my heights.
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We know that's what the rest of the poem was about.
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You just told us you don't need to put a TLDR at the end of your
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poem. Very odd, very odd.
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It adds nothing. I've often said in my videos
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that a lot of the best poems get very specific in order in order
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for us to feel emotions that are universal.
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A great example of this comes from Gourmet's poem Second
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Estrangement. It's a poem about feeling lost.
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And maybe in life, maybe you don't quite know where you're
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going, maybe you feel quite lonely, maybe you feel small.
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But in order to explain that feeling in the broader sense,
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she gives a very specific example of how in your life you
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can feel like a little kid lost in a public space.
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So this is second estrangement. Please raise your hand whomever
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else of you has been a child lost in a market or a mall
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without knowing it. At first following a stranger,
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accidentally thinking he is yours, your family, or your
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parent, even grabbing for his hand, even calling the word you
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said. Then for father only to see the
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face look strangely down, utterly foreign, utterly not the
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one one who loves you, you who are a bird suddenly stunned by
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the glass partitions of rooms, how far the world you knew, and
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tall and filled finally with strangers.
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So this is so, so, so much more impactful than if she just said,
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please raise your hand if you've ever felt lost and alone.
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You know the way that Milo would write it, the way that Milo
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basically wrote it in his his poem.
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The way she writes, though, you feel the helplessness, you feel
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the confusion. You feel like a little lost
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child yourself. Eventually with that image of
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the bird, you feel a little pain and shock.
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You don't get anything like that in Milo's poem, unfortunately.
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You're told what he's feeling. You're told these events, but
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you don't feel anything with him.
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You're not made to feel any of the emotions and this concept of
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being specific to depict a universal emotion is something
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that I personally tried to put into my own writing.
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So I'm just very much an amateur poet, not anything special.
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And my level of success and whether I've managed to use
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specific examples to portray emotions, that's that's down to
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you. You guys can tell me if I've
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been successful or not. But one particular poem that I
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did it in is one of my favourites I've ever written,
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and it's in my second book, Outside, and it's called Wings,
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and it's a very, very, very loose retelling of the Icarus
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myth. But it's about my own life and
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my mum. And like Milo's poem, it has the
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same theme of being about how pain and failure are necessary
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for growth. But we took very different
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approaches to it, I think. So if you don't mind, I read you
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Wings and you know, this is not a perfect poem.
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I'm still very much a work in progress, but I think I just
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want to kind of pop it in here to show you how you can have
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different approaches to the same kind of subject, you know?
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My mother was scared. Scared to watch her child grow
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up. One time she caught me with
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piles of paper, PVA and a pot of feathers pilfered from Penniston
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pigeons and washed in that sad sage bathroom sink.
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I used imperial leather soap, worn down to the size of a penny
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and just an icy trickle from the broken tap to scrub the mud from
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the dull grey veins, laid each with care and rationed the glue
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as she shook her head sadly, took a pair of scissors from
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behind her teeth and told me I was fated to fall, destined to
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stall, and when I did, I shouldn't call out for help or
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beg for her. Better to keep my lowly head bag
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down. Better to keep my feet firmly
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bolted to the ground. My mother was scared.
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Scared to break the class's cast.
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I placed the paper, now confetti, aside and tried wood
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instead, sewing each beam with care and sanding each splinter
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away. I held my breath, carving every
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stroke, carefully shaping my resolution, never shaking,
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intertwining strands of Birch, pine, oak and fir strong enough
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to never bend, break, fold or tear.
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She watched me with a lighter in her hand, a flick and a click
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and a soft flame danced as she told me tale of the evil sun,
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hotter than 1000 flames and begging to burn and blister my
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soft skin. She told me flying was a sin.
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Better to remain on the land you're born in.
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Stay content with your lot in life.
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Stay put through pain, poverty and strife.
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My mother was scared, scared to ever even try.
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Finally, I found what she couldn't Pierce and worked deep
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into the night. By torchlight, I welded wings of
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solid steel, sturdy but cold. The shears slipped right off.
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I set out to soar the silver skies and feel the sun's soft
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kiss. And at first I flew high and
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fast and got my every wish. But soon the steel weighed me
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down and aches spread through my limbs.
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My back cracked, my shoulders sagged, and quickly I was
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dragged into the ocean, waiting below with open arms and mouth,
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with pressure building in my ears.
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My mother's words grew loud. You fluffed your flight.
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She scolded like she was almost proud of herself.
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My mother was scared, scared to see anyone fall and how I fell.
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But what my mother never knew is that we should not fear the fall
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for falling as a part of flying and failing doesn't lead to
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dying and breaking is the path to growing and living means
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always knowing that we will rise again.
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So with raging fire in my lungs, I spat and spun and screamed.
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The heat began to spread until I felt clean.
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My lips and lungs began to blister.
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Then each cell grew anew. My flesh grew stronger.
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New wings grew longer, budding from my healing back, shedding
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the shackles of my past and my mother's words of warning were
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the only things left falling from my mind as I burst through
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the Ocean's surface and found a brand new life and purpose.
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It's a little bit of a long one, but a very different approach.
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Basically I start as a small child trying to build myself
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some wings to fly away, but my mom's scared so she destroys
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them. And as time goes on I keep
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coming back and making stronger wings of stronger material and
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each time she burns it or destroys it in some way until I
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finally create something out of steel strong enough that she
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can't burn it, she can't cut it, she can't do anything to it.
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But with these big, strong, heavy defences, now that she
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can't get through, I try and fly away, but it's too heavy and I
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nearly drown. Except it turns out that instead
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of drowning, I go through this kind of metamorphosis and end up
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naturally growing wounds as my own that'll allow me to flourish
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and fly away and have a good life.
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So yeah, similar theme to Milo's poem, but a very different
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approach. Let's move on quickly to another
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one. And let's take a look at Eat My
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young Destruction I crave. These wounds are infectious.
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I feast on naivety and lick the blood off its bones.
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Must I remove this sanguinity to survive?
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I'm obsessed with restarting frailty and fortress a
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disembowelled Wraith with its limbs in the clutch of canines.
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I've been raised to compete in my own ring.
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Death matches are in my nature. I'm ready for new brood to tear
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heart from chest, devour my spirit.
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For he is my runt. So let's start with trying to
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summarise what he's saying in this poem.
20:41
Because I don't think it necessarily has a clear message
20:45
in itself, but let's try and figure it out if we can.
20:47
I feel like it's a little jumbled at times.
20:50
Basically he's saying I want more destruction and I can't
20:52
help it. So I hurt those who are naive.
20:55
Do I need to keep destroying people's happiness to survive?
20:58
Once I've hurt someone, I go back and befriend other people
21:01
to hurt them again, whether they're weak or have defences.
21:05
I have a eye attack. I can't help it.
21:08
I was just raised this way. I've just finished hurting some
21:11
people. I'm ready to move on to hurt
21:12
some others. But I'm also weak, so people
21:15
will also hurt me and I'll hurt me too or something like that.
21:19
Like I'm weak so I hurt myself. I can't help it.
21:23
I always hurt people who are weak and I'm weak, something
21:26
like that. The poet did add a warning for
21:30
self harm on this poem, so I think he's trying to focus on
21:33
the hurting yourself bit. But yeah, I think overall it's
21:36
meant to be a point about how he keeps hurting himself and isn't
21:38
a child because he just can't help it.
21:41
I don't know, it just it just doesn't work for me.
21:44
I actually wish he kind of leaned into the I'm actually the
21:47
monster hurting people narrative.
21:48
And he could have like, you know, written from the
21:50
perspective of that kind of character.
21:52
But instead he chose to go with the like, I'm just a naive baby
21:55
and I keep hurting myself. I'm not allowed to be happy
21:57
thing. And it felt a little self
21:59
pitying and didn't really do much for me.
22:02
Don't get me wrong, I'm absolutely fine with poems about
22:05
self harm and examining that as someone who has struggled with
22:08
that in the past and still still has urges to this day.
22:12
It's something that I've written about myself and that I commend
22:15
other people for writing about. And I don't think I'm, well, I'm
22:18
never going to critique that as a subject matter.
22:20
I'm never going to critique someone's feelings and
22:22
experiences. I just don't think on a
22:25
technical level this poem is good enough.
22:28
Or does that subject matter justice, you know?
22:33
So let's take a look at why. So firstly, one of the things
22:37
like he has as a selling point about this book is that it's
22:39
meant to be full of like natural imagery, lots of nature stuff.
22:42
There's a big connection with nature, blah, blah.
22:44
And I wish this poem had utilised that a little bit more
22:48
and maybe we could have some comparisons to other animals who
22:51
are known for eating their young and cannibalism and so on.
22:54
So, for example, compare yourself or this character or
22:59
whoever you're talking about, two black lace Weaver spiders
23:02
whose young eat their mother versus sharks who eat their
23:05
siblings in the womb versus hamsters or rabbits who eat
23:09
their young, sometimes due to stress or dealing with food
23:11
scarcity or other issues. And so, you know, you could have
23:14
these comparisons between different types of cannibalism
23:17
and how, you know, draw comparisons between people and
23:20
humans and things that happened in your life and that that could
23:22
be interesting. Oh, by the way, if you want to
23:26
find out more about cannibalism in animals and nature, it's
23:28
actually really interesting. There's a really good book
23:30
called Eat Me a Natural and Unnatural History of Cannibalism
23:33
by Bill Shut, and it's fantastic.
23:35
I really recommend it with this in mind.
23:39
I don't hate the choice to use wolves as his main subject
23:43
matter in this poem. Wolves have been known to eat
23:47
weekend or injure pack members or pups if, for example, it's a
23:50
particularly harsh winter or if they're struggling to find other
23:53
food. So I get it, it's like an eat
23:56
your weakest link sort of thing. But I do think he could have
23:59
leaned into this imagery a lot more because as it stands,
24:03
there's not really not really much there, is there?
24:07
The artwork is about wolves or the artwork shows wolves, which
24:11
is fine. But again, this is one of the
24:12
examples of a of a piece of art that's too low resolution and it
24:15
just looks poor printed. And then he's got to the lines,
24:18
like licking the blood from its bones, saying he has canine
24:21
teeth to imply, you know, some sort of meat eating mammal,
24:24
maybe, Maybe a wolf. I don't know what else is there.
24:28
That's about it, isn't there? Yeah.
24:30
Nothing else really says wolf in that poem.
24:32
So I do feel like he could have done more.
24:35
I wish he'd got more specific. I wish we'd had more actual
24:38
natural imagery in there. I also feel like he's relied too
24:42
much on cliches in this poem and stuff that's just been overdone.
24:46
Feasting on naivety, licking blood from its bones.
24:49
Wounds are infectious. It's all been done before and
24:52
this poem doesn't really do it in a new or inventive way.
24:55
It doesn't add anything new to that stuff.
24:57
I would have liked him to get more specific and be more clear
25:00
about what the message of this poem was.
25:02
And there's some really clunky syntax throughout, which has the
25:05
same problem as the last one we just read.
25:06
He's trying to sound poetic, but at the detriment, but at the
25:10
detriment of clarity, rhythm, and, you know, making sense and,
25:13
you know, grammatically correct syntax.
25:16
And look at the opening lines, right?
25:18
Destruction I crave is not natural, but it's not been
25:21
changed up for any good reason. Naturally, you would say I crave
25:24
destruction, right? Why switch it up and flip it
25:28
around if you're not going to have a purpose for it?
25:31
There's no rhyme or rhythm there that he's trying to stick to.
25:34
He's just done it to sound poetic, right?
25:37
Sometimes you do want to change up the syntax for the sake of
25:41
sticking to a certain rhythm or making a rhyme scheme work, but
25:43
there's none of that here and it just sounds awkward.
25:45
A good example of that done well, though, is in Christina
25:48
Rosetti's poem. I Wish I Could Remember That
25:50
First Day, which is absolutely lovely.
25:52
I wish I could remember that first day, first hour, first
25:55
moment of your meeting me. If bright or dim the season, it
25:58
might be summer or winter for all I can say.
26:01
So unrecorded did it slip away, so blind as I to see and to
26:05
foresee, so dull to mark the budding of my tree that would
26:08
not blossom yet for many in May, if only I could recollect it.
26:12
Such a day of days I let it come and go as traceless as a thaw of
26:16
bygone snow. It seemed to mean so little,
26:19
meant so much. If only now I could recall that
26:22
touch. First touch of hand in hand did
26:24
one. But no, I feel like I read that
26:27
poorly. I'm so sorry.
26:28
But as you read it and hear it, you'll notice there's a lot of
26:31
lines which don't exactly sound natural syntax wise, Right?
26:34
So you wouldn't say so unrecorded.
26:36
Did it slip away in real life, would you?
26:38
You'd say, oh, it slipped away and recorded, right?
26:41
But Christina is right. In a sonnet here in iambic
26:43
pentameter, that means it's a 14 line poem.
26:46
Each line has 10 syllables with five little the dum sounds.
26:50
So the dum, the dum, the dum, the dum, the dum.
26:53
So unrecorded did it slip away? She also has her rhyme scheme in
26:57
here that she's sticking to. So in this case, having unusual
27:00
syntax is appropriate because she's creating meaning not just
27:04
through her words, but in her rhyme and rhythm and wanting to
27:07
emphasise certain words and sounds in her poem.
27:10
So unrecorded did it slip away? You've got an emphasis there on
27:14
UN slip way. You know, you're really getting
27:18
that punchiness to it and it creates this little flow.
27:21
Milo doesn't have this excuse. He's not using any particular
27:24
rhythm or rhyme. His unusual syntax doesn't
27:27
really emphasise any particular words.
27:29
It just sounds clunky. Again, it's like he's seen other
27:33
poets do this unusual syntax and thinks, oh, I'll copy it too,
27:36
but he doesn't understand why they did it and what it brought
27:39
to the poem. So it's that lack of knowledge
27:43
where he's implementing these things but not knowing why he's
27:45
doing it and that's why it doesn't work.
27:47
Following on from this, I noticed a lot of odd clusters of
27:49
words which don't really let go together or make grammatical
27:52
sense in this poem. So I really don't understand
27:54
this line. I'm I'm obsessed with restarting
27:57
frailty and fortress. You've got a, you've got a
28:00
present participle verb and then 2 nouns, 1 abstract, one
28:03
concrete, right? Put any other words in here and
28:06
you'll see how little it makes sense.
28:08
I'm obsessed with swimming, honesty and house it.
28:11
It doesn't, it doesn't make sense.
28:13
It's for me the fortress at the end, which really throws it all
28:16
off. I get with fortress, you
28:19
probably want to use that word to create an image of like
28:22
defensiveness, right? That's, that's fair enough.
28:25
So you have this juxtaposition of frailty and strength, frailty
28:29
and defence. I get that, but it just doesn't
28:32
work with the words he's chosen. And I also don't get what it has
28:35
to do with restarting either. If he described something as a
28:37
frail fortress that would have been really cool, but being
28:40
obsessed with frailty and fortress doesn't make sense.
28:44
You could say I'm obsessed with frailty and defensiveness and
28:49
you could say I'm obsessed with a frail fortress, but as it is
28:56
it I just. I just don't know what he's
28:58
trying to say. I don't understand.
29:00
This is by far the worst, most confused stanza in this poem.
29:04
It's very odd because then it goes on to say a disembowelled
29:07
Wraith with its limbs in the clutch of canines, which again
29:10
kind of confuses me because we had this wolf imagery and now
29:13
simply we've got Wraith imagery. And when I think of rates, I
29:16
don't think about them having bowels or limbs at all.
29:19
So how it could be disembowel, So how it could be disembowelled
29:23
with its limbs in the mouth of a wolf, I don't understand.
29:27
That's an image that just doesn't work in my mind.
29:30
Rates are by definition sort of insubstantial, sort of entirely
29:34
immaterial. To say it has the limbs and the
29:36
teeth of a wolf and it's been disembowelled feels odd and not
29:40
in a purposely uncomfortable way.
29:41
Just in a this is really muddled and doesn't make any sense kind
29:44
of way. And again, having Wraith imagery
29:47
just randomly in here when you've had all this wolf
29:49
imagery, I don't understand where it's come from.
29:52
It doesn't make sense. It feels out of place.
29:55
And I would prefer if you'd stuck with the animal imagery
29:59
in, you know, like the real world.
30:01
So have like a wolf cub, like a weak wolf cub or some other
30:05
animal that wolves kill or I don't, I don't know anything.
30:08
Excuse me recording this outside my busy street but I was just in
30:10
the Co working space and I realise that I am pretty sure
30:14
I've completely like misread this line I'm editing.
30:17
I'm like, I think he was going for something entirely different
30:20
and I've just completely misread it because again, the grammar is
30:22
so poor. So I think what he meant is blah
30:26
blah blah, restarting. Full stop.
30:28
New sentence. Frailty in fortress.
30:31
And then he goes on to his race line and the race is meant to be
30:34
the frailty, the teeth of the fortress.
30:36
But because that grammar's not there, it doesn't make sense.
30:39
So it's just it's hard to read it.
30:41
It's still bad. I don't get what restarting has
30:44
to do with the race being eaten. It's bad.
30:47
It's just bad in a different way to what I thought it was.
30:51
I'm very confused. And then then the next stanza
30:54
talking about being in the ring and death matches, which are
30:57
like what? Boxing terms?
30:58
I don't know. I'm not I'm not into fighting
31:01
wrestling. Maybe I don't know some human
31:03
sport anyway, right? You wouldn't hear those words
31:06
normally in the context of either wolves or rapes, so it
31:09
really takes you out the poem and it doesn't make sense it, it
31:12
feels completely out of place. It's just, it's really jarring.
31:16
There's nothing connecting these stanzas.
31:20
There's no see it. There's some other basic grammar
31:26
errors too, like in the last stanza.
31:27
I am ready for new brood to tear heart from chest, devour my
31:31
spirit. For he is my runt.
31:33
Do you mean a new brood? Like I am ready for a new brood?
31:38
Because just brood alone makes no sense.
31:41
Or Are you ready to brood? I don't.
31:43
I don't know what you're trying to say here.
31:45
This is the same issue as carapace in the first poem we
31:48
looked at. I don't know.
31:51
I don't know. I don't mind to tear heart from
31:55
chest line because it leaves it a little bit ambiguous.
31:57
This is fine. Are you eating them?
31:59
Are they eating you? Are you doing it as a team?
32:01
I don't know, I think it works. I just think the theme of
32:05
cannibalism and eating your young or eating weakened members
32:08
of your pat or even in yourself is something that could be so
32:12
powerful if it's done really well.
32:14
I just feel like it hasn't been understood or developed enough
32:16
in this poem for a more direct comparison and something that
32:19
seems basic on the surface, but it's actually really, really
32:22
well done. Listen to this absolute genius
32:24
piece by Walsonshire. It's called filial cannibalism.
32:28
From time to time, mothers in the wild devour their young, an
32:32
appetite born of pure, bright need.
32:35
Occasionally mothers from ordinary homes, much like our
32:38
own, feed on the vicid shame their daughters are forced to
32:41
secrete from the glands formed in the favour of men.
32:45
Sorry if you can hear could be having more cry outside plus
32:48
her. She uses this idea of
32:49
cannibalism being born from necessity and a survival
32:52
instinct to explore the relationship between mothers and
32:54
daughters raised in a patriarchal society where women
32:57
are inherently taught to feel shame.
32:59
And she gets you question how much of that is based on
33:01
survival instinct and necessity? How much are we taught to feel
33:04
shame and make ourselves small and modest, to protect
33:08
ourselves, to survive, when in this world men are the predators
33:12
essentially. It's so simple on the surface,
33:14
but it gives you so much to think about because it's got
33:16
these layers to it. And it's absolutely fascinating.
33:18
OK, Day 2 of filming. And let's let's see how far we
33:22
get up with this today. And our next one that we're
33:24
going to look at is called Lean Into.
33:27
And this displays all of the same same problems that we're
33:29
speaking about in that last part.
33:31
So this is a prose poem. So let me just read this to you.
33:34
It is easier to fall into heartbreak.
33:35
Stiff arms, gentle. Now close your eyes and let the
33:38
pain take you in waves. Your strongest days are yet to
33:41
come. Resistance is the enemy of
33:43
growth, for our greatest creation arrives in the wake of
33:45
our destruction. The dance of your fire burns
33:48
hotter each time it flares, but this light will guide you to who
33:51
you're meant to be. Raise your head, pull your
33:53
sleeves back up, and get up. This is only the beginning.
33:57
Lean into me, rest your tired mind, and I will hold your heart
34:00
with grace to know how much love you deserve.
34:03
I will fight for it. Take this blue of mine and paint
34:06
your dreams to life. Once again.
34:09
There's a reliance on cliches and imagery that we've seen
34:12
before. It's not really doing anything
34:14
new, you know? Heart breaks, stiff arms.
34:17
Our greatest creation arrives in the wake of destruction.
34:20
It kind of feels like every single line is a cliche, as
34:22
harsh as that is to say, you know?
34:24
The message here is also similar to poems where we've seen you're
34:27
sad, heartbroken, but pain will help you grow.
34:29
Keep going, I'll support you too.
34:32
It's simple. It's not the message that
34:34
there's a problem with. The problem again, is with the
34:36
execution. It's that it's not doing
34:38
anything new or creative or interesting with this idea, with
34:41
this concept. I feel like there's some parts
34:43
of this poem which could be good if they were developed further.
34:46
As cliched as it is, I do enjoy the personification of
34:49
heartbreak, it having arms which was stiff, now gentle as you
34:54
work through your grief and come to accept it and start to heal
34:57
again. I think that's something that
34:59
could be really interesting. And if it was developed more,
35:01
that would be really damn cool. But again, it's just not not
35:05
enough. And it's not original.
35:07
It's not really interesting. I just want more.
35:11
This again feels like notes for a first draft, not a finished
35:14
poem. Once again, we've got the
35:16
criticisms of having some clunky syntax, and it all just sounds a
35:19
bit generic, doesn't it? It's all very vague.
35:22
Nothing's very specific, nothing's really like making you
35:25
feel these emotions. It's a lot of telling, not
35:27
showing. I just, this is the thing, a lot
35:31
of the poems in this collection are just very forgettable.
35:33
Nothing's really stuck with me. I haven't found myself in the
35:36
time I've been making this video or like since I first read the
35:38
collection or the number of times I've read it now.
35:41
Nothing's really like stuck in my mind where I find myself
35:44
sitting and just like having a ponder about what was said.
35:46
Like I don't think about them once the book is closed or when
35:49
I'm not working on this video because it's just not very
35:51
memorable. There's not really much to it,
35:54
you know, just to move on quickly.
35:57
I know that was very brief on that one, but we're going to
35:58
move on to 1 called Musings of the Christmas Past.
36:01
And there's also Musings of the Christmas Present and future
36:04
poems. But this one I just want to talk
36:06
about briefly because it does something a little old slash,
36:10
maybe interesting, but I'm not personally a fan of it.
36:13
I get why people might like it, but it's not for me.
36:16
And I will just say as a little warning here, this poem just
36:18
talk about sexual assault. So I'm not going to read the
36:20
whole thing out to you in case, you know, it's it's not good for
36:24
some people. But what I will say is that as a
36:26
whole, this is actually one of the better poems in the book.
36:28
There are a few lines in this that show real damn potential.
36:31
And I think, again, with a lot of reworking, there's something
36:34
here and it's still clunky as it stands.
36:37
It's still underdeveloped and it does need more editing.
36:40
But there is some really powerful imagery in here on like
36:43
a few of the lines, like the lingering licks of sweet potato
36:46
pie lay underneath the taste of his mouth.
36:49
That's damn good. That's fantastic.
36:50
I love that. It's horrifying and that
36:53
juxtaposition really makes you feel so uncomfortable.
36:57
Something which should bring you joy and sweetness and happiness
37:00
is just so dark and brings back these bad memories and now kind
37:05
of disgust you, I think. I think that's a really damn
37:07
good image that's so strong. It's just these little lines are
37:10
let down by the rest of the poem, which just isn't as good.
37:13
Again, I'd like to see this pushed further with more
37:15
uncomfortable juxtapositions with more uncomfortable imagery.
37:19
Don't be afraid to make it dark. Yeah.
37:22
I just. I just want a bit more, that's
37:23
all. And what I don't like how there
37:25
are there are random quotes stuck in the middle of stanzas.
37:28
Like, they'll be like, stanza, stanza, stanza, blah, blah.
37:31
I stumble across his favourite quote.
37:33
I am naturally warlike. Attacking is one of my
37:35
instincts. Nietzsche.
37:36
Now, I know everyone says Nietzsche's name differently, so
37:38
if I say it in a different way to you, I'm sorry.
37:41
I understand what he was trying to do with this poem, but once
37:44
again, I just find the execution is lacking.
37:47
I'd have preferred an integrated illusion rather than just a
37:50
direct quote in in the middle of the text.
37:53
Like if it had been integrated like into his lines with
37:57
something like, you know, maybe call call the abuser because
38:00
that's what he is. Call him a wannabe Nietzsche.
38:03
Say about how something like his witterings about war rattle
38:06
around your memory or something like that.
38:07
Like so allude to the quote, allude to what was said.
38:11
You don't necessarily need to quote it directly like I want to
38:14
hear. I don't just want to hear a
38:15
niche quote like that's not really enough, that's not really
38:18
interesting. What I want to hear is how it
38:20
relates to you, how you as the poet remember it, how it makes
38:24
you feel, what you think it says about him.
38:26
Therefore, paraphrasing can be a really good way of doing that.
38:30
Alluding can be a really good way of doing that.
38:32
Just directly quoting in the poem.
38:34
I mean, there's a time and a place for it, but I just don't
38:37
quite think it worked here. It just falls a bit flat, you
38:39
know? And I have the same feelings
38:41
about the quote at the end too. It just sort of lets down this
38:45
poem, which, like I say, has some promise and has some really
38:47
good lines in it. It just sort of lets it down to
38:49
just be like, and I'm going to end this by just quoting someone
38:52
else's words because I don't feel confident to write my own.
38:55
You know, you can, and I'm going to keep saying this, 100% allude
38:58
to these quotes in the poem and reference them.
39:00
Or maybe like integrate the line somehow if you want.
39:03
Perhaps similar to how Karina Copp integrates lines of John
39:06
Don's poem The Good Morrow in her poem Sonic 59.
39:11
That's a really good way of like integrating lines and quotes,
39:14
but making them your own and kind of putting your own spin on
39:17
it and making them feel part of the poem rather than just like
39:19
quote shoehorned in there like the way Milo does it.
39:23
And to end a poem like this by just shoving in a quote by
39:26
someone else, it just falls so flat for me, especially after
39:29
the rest of the poem showed so much promise in certain areas.
39:32
Not just the Queen of Cop poem, though.
39:34
As a direct comparison, I want to bring in Cassandra Myers, who
39:38
wrote a poem called Medusa Calls the Rape Crisis Line, which is
39:42
fantastic. And again, a little bit dark, so
39:45
I won't read it out here, but I'll pop the text on the screen.
39:47
And if you want to read it for yourself, I really, really
39:49
recommend it because it's absolutely fantastic.
39:52
This is filled with illusions from how it's formatted to look
39:56
like a labyrinth made from this never ending ringing of the
39:59
phone to her lines referencing a number of myths.
40:02
So, for example, you have you wouldn't believe the labyrinth
40:04
of services it took to get me here.
40:06
Every handprint. Every handprint blooms a new
40:09
head, obviously referencing Hydra.
40:11
And of course I beg to be Granite, which in my mind is a
40:14
reference to both Pygmalion and Medusa.
40:17
And there's plenty more in there.
40:19
It's a really damn good poem filled with illusions.
40:22
And she brings in these references so you understand the
40:25
meaning from these references. But she doesn't just directly
40:28
quote something, which again, would kind of fall flat because
40:31
she's bringing in her interpretations on it, her spin
40:34
on it. She's giving what these quotes
40:36
and illusions and references and characters mean to her, not
40:40
just, you know, this isn't an academic essay.
40:43
I don't just want to hear a quote from someone.
40:45
I want to know how it makes you feel.
40:47
I want to know how you relate to it, how you remember it.
40:49
And if you misquote it a bit, that's fine because that's how
40:51
you remember it. I just, I want to, I want to
40:54
hear your side of it. I want to hear your voice and
40:57
your words, not someone elses, you know, Cassandra Myers poem
41:00
there. It's absolutely packed with
41:02
illusions. It's damn powerful.
41:03
It's a motive. It's an incredible piece.
41:05
And I think looking at pieces like that, Milo could learn a
41:08
lot from her. And I think, I think that's the
41:10
thing with Milo. I just want to see some evidence
41:12
of him having really studied and understood some of these
41:15
fantastic works of poetry and incorporating what he's learned
41:18
into his work rather than just blindly copying lines from
41:20
others. You know, I want to see
41:22
understanding, not just mimicry. The very final poem that we're
41:26
going to look at is another prose poem, and this is called
41:29
storytelling. And it's interesting.
41:31
And this is one that I think ties into telling us about his
41:34
creative process, his writing process, how he views his own
41:37
work, and with what we know about his issues with Age of
41:40
Scorpius. I think it's quite revealing.
41:42
So let me read this one to you. Let me bend time now, blur the
41:46
lines between sentences. I write to silence, chronology
41:49
and all. It's dead, existing between
41:52
bliss and agony. I am drawn to abstraction, to be
41:55
as we are. That is our humanity.
41:57
That is our neutrality. Let connection flourish.
42:00
Let it be dampened with ink and paint and tears.
42:03
Let us wield the pain that follows.
42:05
Give in and lean into my spirit incarnates each ghost I summon A
42:10
chromatic aberration, wayward to consistency.
42:13
To paint with my heart is to learn my compatible mediums,
42:15
running pieces of meat to repair them.
42:18
This is how I create. I'm not sure myself what it is,
42:21
should be, couldn't be. I breathe the comfort and
42:23
serenity of it all. We are creation.
42:25
Creation is art. How beautiful it is to share
42:28
such intensity and passion, to find imagination and hope and
42:31
emotion. The human experience is ours to
42:33
share between US and the world. We are just two eliminately
42:37
addicted artists creating chapters of purpose in one
42:40
larger novel. So before I talk about this
42:43
specifically, let's talk about Age of Scorpius.
42:45
If you know anything about Milo and their TikTok video and the
42:48
first novel though they published, you'll know it was a
42:50
bit of a mess and people were not happy.
42:52
I will say for Milo, he's very good at marketing, you know, and
42:56
he bragged about something like getting $100,000 worth of
42:59
pre-orders on this novel, which sadly he couldn't really deliver
43:02
on. Some people didn't even get
43:03
their books. The people who did were
43:04
disappointed with it was like a whole drama and but his
43:08
marketing was good. He knew how to get people
43:10
excited and interested in the book, the world, the characters,
43:13
the are the everything. He can mark it.
43:15
However, he also refused to get any decent editors or beta
43:19
readers or actually listen to them.
43:21
And his writing and editing process was really really odd
43:24
because apparently instead of just editing his text, he would
43:27
just rewrite his entire book from scratch every time.
43:31
Which was kind of like busy work where he created like these 21st
43:35
draughts instead of 1 edited and polished piece of work.
43:39
Which is why it was so full of typos and inconsistencies and
43:42
plot holes and repetition and all this mad stuff.
43:45
Like I say, as a result, the novel was not well received by
43:48
people who were saying that it was full of typos, poor syntax,
43:51
purple prose, And when all this was pointed out, Milo got quite
43:54
defensive about it all. Although he's now apparently
43:57
putting out a second version soon.
43:59
He references it in the author's note of this book, saying it's
44:01
coming soon or somewhere in the book, I think.
44:03
Is it? It's about section.
44:06
Hang on, let me double check for you.
44:07
Yeah, it's the little about section which ends with, we're
44:10
still working on the second edition of The Age of Scorpius,
44:12
don't worry. So it's referencing here.
44:15
He's still not put it out yet. Apparently he's released the 1st
44:17
chapter on Patreon and it's better, but I don't know.
44:20
I've not, I've not read it, can't judge.
44:22
But anyway, the point is, I feel like this poem of his
44:24
storytelling tells us a lot about why he had so many issues
44:27
with that book. Because this poem romanticises
44:30
the act of writing and creating without understanding that it's
44:33
also a craft that you need to work on and actually put real
44:36
time and effort into. Milo acts like all you need to
44:39
be a good writer is to have some feelings and throw something
44:41
together and for it to have meaning to you, and then that
44:43
will automatically bring people together.
44:45
But he fails to understand that creation takes time and effort
44:49
and skill, and it doesn't just come together overnight.
44:51
It's not just a matter of putting in a lot of hours, it's
44:54
about making those hours count. It's not just about writing a
44:58
lot of words. It's about making sure that what
45:00
you write is high quality and putting in the time and effort
45:03
to edit and get feedback and edit and get feedback and
45:06
improve. More than this though, the this
45:08
poem is literally full of all the things that the novel was
45:10
criticised for, namely the overly flowery writing style,
45:14
saying a lot without any substance and being utterly
45:16
pretentious. I think a lot of people like
45:18
Milo Romanticise being an author or a poet and they want the
45:22
label, but they don't really understand the years of study
45:24
and hard work that other successful poets have done to
45:27
get where they are today. Like, I'm only an amateur
45:29
myself, and yet I know I have hundreds of draughts of poems
45:33
and short stories and all sorts that I've thrown out because
45:35
they weren't good enough. And each poem that I published
45:39
in my books has already gone through countless draughts, like
45:41
again and again and again and again.
45:44
And for me, part of that writing process is going out and
45:46
performing them open mics and seeing how people relate to
45:49
them, and then coming home and making changes and writing and
45:51
trying to make them better based on the feedback I get.
45:53
And more than that, I spent hundreds of hours reading God
45:59
knows how many poems by other people, probably thousands at
46:01
this point, and picking them apart and saying, well, I like
46:04
this, I don't like this. What were they doing here?
46:06
What's the technique used here? What was the meaning here?
46:10
If I want to say this, then maybe I need to look at other
46:12
poems who do this, this and this so I can find out what works and
46:16
what doesn't work and so on. And I'm just an average amateur
46:19
writer. I'm not a professional.
46:20
I'm not like good at it. So I feel like Milo hasn't even
46:25
done that, but he still wants to be a professional writer and a
46:30
professional poet in people's eyes.
46:33
Like I say in his author's note for this book, Milo says this
46:36
collection began when I was a senior in high school,
46:38
eventually growing to become a 40,000 word project, pared down
46:41
to the contents of this book, which sounds like he has done a
46:44
lot of editing. However, I'm failing to see
46:47
evidence of this in the text itself.
46:48
Again, it still just seems like a lot, lot, lot more editing is
46:52
needed. And it's again, a quantity of a
46:55
quality thing. He seems to think because he's
46:57
written a lot, there must be something good in there.
47:00
But it's not just about writing a lot.
47:02
It's about what you write and how you write.
47:05
So I guess with all this in mind, while the review is for
47:08
the readers, not the author, if I was going to give any advice
47:11
to Milo or other poets out there, but to Milo specifically,
47:15
I think what I would say is to take a break from writing for a
47:17
while and go back to reading and studying and listening and
47:20
learning. And then when it comes to
47:22
writing again, maybe stop just trying to rewrite the stuff you
47:25
wrote to 18. Do not be afraid to Kill Your
47:28
Darlings. He seems to keep holding on to
47:30
like, well, I started this one, I was 14, I started this one, I
47:32
was 18. It's like, OK, cool.
47:34
And you were a child back then. You probably had some juvenile
47:36
ideas. It's OK to let it go and come up
47:39
with new ones. Focus on the quality of your
47:41
writing over the quantity of your writing.
47:43
You don't need to write 40,000 words and whittle it down.
47:46
You just need to make sure that what you're writing is good.
47:49
And then you get feedback, and then you edit, and you get
47:51
feedback and you edit. It's not the quantity, it's the
47:54
quality. I'm going to keep saying it.
47:55
Don't be afraid to be harsh with yourself.
47:58
Give yourself some distance between the writing and the
48:00
editing process so you can come back to it and be more
48:02
objective. Stop trying to think about the
48:04
image of being a writer and start to actually think about
48:07
the act of how to be a writer. After writing the script, I
48:10
decided to go back and read some of the reviews on Goodreads,
48:12
which I think I mentioned at the start of this video because I
48:14
mentioned one of the one of the reviews.
48:16
So I thought it'd be an interesting idea to just take a
48:17
look at a few of them. Because I I was a little bit
48:20
worried that the people were just giving this book bad
48:23
reviews because they already didn't like Milo because of the
48:25
Age of Scorpius thing. But I don't think that's true.
48:28
I genuinely think people have real criticisms.
48:30
So this person has two stars. While it wasn't the worst poetry
48:32
I've ever read, it still it wasn't great.
48:35
Still very angsty with little depth.
48:37
Definitely, although definitely more than Age of Scorpius.
48:40
I also find myself confused by the point of many of the poems.
48:43
I read them over and over but couldn't make head nor tail of
48:45
them. One aspect I liked was
48:47
ecological themes. Pray that clearly loves the
48:50
natural environment. That's something that I mostly
48:53
agree with, and although I think he could have gone way heavier
48:56
on the nature themes. Just saying.
48:58
Another review said three stars, or rather 2 1/2 stars.
49:03
There were positives and negatives.
49:04
The positives did not outweigh the negatives.
49:06
It's very clear that the author hasn't learned at all from the
49:08
feedback given on his debut novel, and it shows through his
49:11
essay and this piece. I don't have a lot of high hopes
49:14
on the upcoming second edition of his debut.
49:16
Never take a second chance to make a first impression.
49:19
This felt like a collection of perfectly serviceable first
49:21
draughts. It's a collection of ideas for
49:23
poetry that need a lot of work and editing, of a standard I'd
49:26
expect for high school homework submission.
49:28
The thing with poetry is that vibes aren't enough.
49:30
It requires careful thought and curated word choice.
49:33
Words need to hit with surgical precision, which is something
49:36
severely lacking in this collection.
49:38
It's overwritten, unedited, lots of errors in grammar and style,
49:41
and there are a lot of words to pray that simply doesn't seem to
49:43
understand the meaning of or how they should be used.
49:46
The whole collection feels like someone writing poetry who
49:48
assumes that because it's highbrow it requires big words.
49:51
So dugout the thesaurus without really thinking about how
49:53
language works contextually. And I completely agree with
49:56
that. I think they put it better than
49:59
I did in the rest of this video. But yeah, they're just my
50:02
thoughts as always. I can kind of be objective and
50:06
be like, in some ways and be like, well, objectively this is
50:08
a metaphor. Objectively, this is
50:10
personification, objectively this is a lack of rhyme scheme
50:15
and so on. But everything else about
50:17
whether it's good or bad is just my subjective opinion.
50:19
And if you like these poems, if you like the collection, that's
50:21
absolutely fine. There's nothing wrong with that.
50:23
I'm not going to tell you you shouldn't enjoy something or you
50:26
shouldn't get something out of it.
50:27
I do think there are topics covered in this book that are
50:30
worth talking about, worth writing about, worth sharing,
50:32
absolutely. And I think there is potential
50:36
here, it just needs more work. It just needs more editing.
50:40
It just needs more time, effort, and conscious thought put into
50:42
it. But with that, I'm going to end
50:44
this here. Thank you so much for watching
50:45
today. Sorry if this end, but it's been
50:47
a little bit rushed. Kyra's really, really anxious
50:50
over in the other bedroom, so I'm going to go see how she's
50:53
doing. Bless her, her medication is
50:55
still making her very, very irritable.
50:57
I'm thinking of speaking to a vet and seeing if she can do
50:59
anything to help because I don't don't like seeing my baby all
51:01
anxious. But yeah, I'd love to hear your
51:04
thoughts on this. If you've read any of the poems
51:06
or the collection, or if you've read Age of Scorpius, let me
51:08
know what you think. And if you'd like me to read and
51:10
review Age of Scorpius at some point, if I'm not too late,
51:13
please let me know about that as well.
51:16
But for now, yeah, thank you for watching and thank you for
51:20
listening. Thank you for being here and
51:22
sharing your time with me. I do appreciate it.
51:25
And yeah, I will see you guys again very soon.