Question Home

Position:Home>General - Arts & Humanities > What letter grade would you give this poem and why?


Question:

What letter grade would you give this poem and why?

One of my notions is that those public restroom drains,
So bronze and grated they appear to be industrious chains,
Should not, so seemingly, be the source of nostalgia's noxious exhast,
But mere mechanisms spaced forseeably apart unto a conformity's loss.

<br>

I should not be overwhelmed but that somehow
into their pipe dreams I would unfurl a brow,
Ambivalent of ever finding common ground,
or home where wooden picture frame memories make a belly round.

<br>

I don't understand why I should ever stop now,
Or sigh and suddenly be like, "Oh, wow...I was a dumb cow."
Instead I will find something lost in a momentary silence,
And continue with my attempts at a valence.

<br>

And get back to work, allowing the restroom door to wheeze shut.


Best Answer - Chosen by Asker:

I do not, nor would not, give letter grades to poems or prose fiction. I do not believe creative writing should be given a letter grade. When I grade freshman essays, I use a rubric. Do not mistake my meaning. I am not an aesthetic relativist. I believe in comparative competition.
For instance, some sonnets are better than other sonnets, and some sestinas better than other sestinas, etc. I will say that in your poem I saw something of a struggle between wanting to "say something" and wanting the persona to seem without care.