Heh. Score another one for Porny Pants.Totally missed that.

It's a gift.

Yeah, and you unwrap it every chance you get, right.

Keeps on givin'!

I'm still not sure about this poem.... But. Tell me what I can do to make it better.

WE WERE ONLY TALKING AND THEN: (troika study) 



Sneaking into yr building late at night. May I crack open the locks, wedge a note 
Under yr doors, rattle yr windows? The matter closes. You wouldn't blink an eye, 
Reach out an arm, or say the word. The dots & dashes. My watery whirlpool star: 
Visible at night only from great distance. Some telegram, or glyph, or graph. 
Empty the cartons & contain the mold. Sweet season. Some lie. The forgotten broken-bottled 
Ink spreads stains across the piles of clean laundry. Folded, fixed, forlorn. Let me 
Leave & not be solid, questioned, sold into a merry best estate. Ring promise. 
Labeled with a past, future, & guess. & not the picture dissolving slowly under yr tongue-- 
& not the silent breath of wind-- We're loose upon it. Body spread to wind, my eyes 
Not shut, my limbs entangled. Lay back. There is no distance. 
Considering the question. Fought. Or stage directions: You're 
Entering the hallway, the water dripping from yr umbrella & ruining my rug. 

cool image, RL. I too am an old-school spelling woman, so if I were you, I'd change that, even though it's hip right now and it's not just you. It's going to look faddish later, like spelling "Amerika" with a "k". (Although I might prefer that, for obvious reasons.)

Okay, can I just say this?

However ridiculously, I'm getting really upset that you are calling me faddish. I'm not trying to be in vogue. I'm not doing this just to be kicky and cute, or just because I think it will make my professors like me, or just to blow air up the skirts of people I think are old fogies, or just unquestioningly because it's all the rage. For fuck's sake. I'm using these abbreviations because I think the poem is better with them, and of course I considered whether or not to use them. I'm a very, very careful person about that sort of detail, and-- however silly it is of me to get my feathers ruffled by this-- I feel diminished when you-- plural-- insinuate I'm just trying to be fashionable.

She wasn't insinuating any such thing, RL. She said in the future it might seem faddish. She didn't comment in any way on your intent.

It was that on top of connie's. I'd had a post earlier that I deleted. And, dyrr, I'm not not "old-school" spelling myself! I'm not a kid. I'm very careful and conscious of language, this is a fairly well-established tradition already.

... And I'm defensive. Hot button me.

What MM said. For that matter, the fact that several people -- Buffistas, who are smart by definition, right? -- have raised the issue suggests that whatever the intent, those choices aren't coming through to your audience as "better". Don't take it as any intentional diminishment, but do take it as feedback that should be considered seriously.