Toki Pona Forums

Hi guys! After looking back at my first year with Toki Pona, I decided to do a small compilation of selected works from 2008-2009. I hope this becomes a good read for anyone wanting to practice reading TP or for those wanting to get an appreciation for poetry in TP. I hope you enjoy!

xposted to FB

I left some things that struck me as strange alone because I figure poetry does that. And I suppose that some of these comments mess with prosody, but still ... .
page 9 (pdf page, not numbered pages, but I suppose this is 1 of those). 'toki tawa (not 'e') mi' maybe 'mi wile sona' ('Want to know" vs "want knowledge", not much difference) no 'pi' with 'nanpa' (about three years old). 'kama sona sewi mi' (no 'pi', needs two words after) 'wan taso' is overkill, maybe: "isolatedly alone" 'nimi mute lili' ? "a small many words" "a few much words"? probably 'nimi pi mute lili' "not very many words" 'mi lon poka ala' "i am not by the side"? 'toki pi ni' no 'pi' (not two words), maybe 'e' (but unncessary since what follows are nouns) or maybe 'e ijo ni' "about these".

10 (2) prob 'ma Asija kin' ' tenpo sike pi nanpa wan pi mi lon kulupu pi toki pona' complex ideas need breaking down or reordering, e.g., 'tenpo sike minanpa wan pi lon kulupu' habitually 'lona ala lipu ni' (but just what to do with 'ala' is sometimes a problem -- not here so much). 'musi pi lon kulupu Lajuna'. 'musi pi tenpo pini mi' (no 'pi', only one word. but better is 'musi mi pi tenpo pini')

11(3) 'kepeken' not 'poka' (different "with") date is surely wrong -- 2008? rather than 2015.

13 (5) pana e telo oko

17 (9) also ' mi toki tawa sama'

19 (11) 'ona' is odd at the beginning, since it has no earlier referent. Despite etymology it is not English "one" or French or Esperanto "on", though there are occasional outbursts of that usage. better is 'ni', if definite, 'jan' if indefinite, or 'mi', if appropriate.
"tower of stone noise tool" through me, but I had a dream that revealed it as "radio transmission tower". If so, this is strictly correct, but unduly puzzling: the kiwen goes better right up with 'tomo palisa' and anything about radio ought to include 'pana', the fundamental radio activity (I did have visions of a tall metal drum for a while).

This is good stuff. But I sure hope your life has gotten better.

You should have seen the original versions... You'd probably flip from all the rookie errors...

pdf page 9-no comment
10-noted
11-The words are exactly how they appear on LJ, error and all. This is intentional. The date error isn't.
13-noted
17-hmm...
19-Referent is in the title: the church bell ringer. You were almost there when you thought of a metal drum.

i should not ignore titles! So, on page13/5 pana e telo oko ( or pana pi telo oko pi lon ...)
on page 19/11 tomo pi nasin sewi. for clarity only 'ilo kiwen kalama' 'jan lili kama tawa ni, (not 'e')