Warming up...MAYBE

I decided to come into the second assignment with a clean slate; I was going to give E-Poetry another try with the new found knowledge that I can't really COMPARE regular poetry to E-Poetry, but rather I should see E-Poetry as a different genre.
After reading the first part of the assignment written by Deena Larson, I think I began to have a better understand of what E-poetry is all about. I think she did a great job of providing examples for each different medium used. My personal favorites were "Nio" by Jim Andrews and "Strings" by Dan Waber. I think I may have preferred those the best because the interactions were easy to understand. Some of the E-poetry we have experiences in the past can be confusing to the point where it discouraged me from trying to understand the message it was trying to convey. I also enjoyed the website that allowed different people to collaborate on writing a single poem. Each person is able to write a line or two in a poem that had already been started by someone else. The poem has influences from many different writers. I think this can be useful because it encourages people to add their own vision on to a poem while incorporating the vision of someone else.

The poetry that we read this week I thought was more engaging and enjoyable than last week. As previously stated, I don't really enjoy when someone else reads the poem for me. I like being given the freedom to interpret the poem as I see fit. With this in mind, I must comment on the poem " Firefly" by Deena Larson. This was by far my favorite poem presented this week. I loved how I was able to choose the story while still staying within the lines that the author assigned. I enjoyed changing each line and seeing how it effected the poem as a whole.

I also enjoyed "Penetration" although it did confuse me a bit. As the reader continued on in the poem, the flower on the side grew. The colors of the key words ( which them redirected the reader to another stanza of the poem) changed depending on if the reader had completed this section or not. I eventually did complete the whole poem and I think I grasped the main concept, but it was confusing at times because I wasn't sure if I was at the beginning,middle or end of the poem. I could see how this confusion could be meaningful to the context of the poem though.

The last piece I wanted to comment on was "War Games." I think the idea behind this piece is brilliant. The reader was instructed to try to "click on the landmine" which was moving at a fast pace at the top of the screen. Each time the reader missed, a fact about landmines and their devastation would be brought up. After reading the fact, I went back to tried to click the landmine again, with no success. Eventually I caught the landmine ( I was rewarded with a prosthetic hand) but only after numerous attempts. This was fun but also informative. I think the majority of people won't be satisfied until they catch the landmine. This desire propels them to continue to try, thus providing them with more facts each time they miss.

I think I may be warming up to E-Poetry. My only gripe is that some of the examples are too confusing. I can't speak for anyone else, but if I can't figure out how the animation works within a couple minutes, I am totally discouraged and have lost all desire to read the poem. I think simple is better. If the website is easy to understand, I can see how E-Poetry would add to the meaning behind the poem and engage the reader more deeply than traditional poetry can.