S4 is my favorite stanza, leaping from scattering Dad’s ashes to fucking. I wish it felt like less of an aside because I need interesting moments like that in a poem on a commonplace topic, though not without a sense of where the whole is going; the argument/narrative in this draft starts to feel soggy in S5, which I think is why I don’t have any advice about the end. S1 is another point of interest for me. This is a workable proposal: > In your old Honda we were having > two different conversations. I’m less convinced by the following lines, though: > Both flicking pain-coated words about > breaking and blame over our teeth > into the dank air as pulpy > rain licked your windows, > lost in translation. The register waxes poetic here with less than usual word choices, repeated /k/ sounds, and personification of the rain, which isn’t bad per se but sticks out in an otherwise plain-spoken poem. More of an issue is that when I chew on these lines, I’m not enlightened about what’s happening except for that it’s raining. “Lost in translation” in particular is received language and repeats the idea of “two different languages.”