Tough Times

Perplexed

Spoiler

Being Edited: Special Thanks to Kamas

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Draft so far
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The Day turns to dusk,
And the dust fills the air,
As the people go to their houses,
From those houses the monsters emerge,
To haunt the night.

I have no escape,
The day has dried me
At night the frost caps my head.
I pull in, the tunes of the playerless fiddle
Backtrack to the narrative of my life:

A hungry life, unfulfilled.
And as the winds whisper in the day,
They roar in the night,
To and fro, to and fro they fly
So my mind.

Into the cathedrals,
And the holy places,
Where? Where?
Into the libraries,
A gentle breeze that turns the pages,
And moves the leaves,
A silent, mocking laugh
Where? Where?

High and low,
Here and there,
And back again to my origin,
To Zero.
Where will I find my next meal?

For the marketplace is busy,
And the people are many,
By day they crowd,
At night they gang,
Salesmen and con screaming and jeering
Trust me or trust me, friend
All selling the same dang thing.

Oh tough times, tough times!
And the fiddle plays a haunting song,
The drums that damning beat,
Somebody sing me a song,
Old and Weary,
Yet Frank and True.

No there is a Higher Calling.

Hey Hero, as requested

weren't lying in chat about this being less than good.
Very well, a review for you, to start with:

You got any better quotes?
Did you get all the quotes?
Did you pick-up any steady theme?
Did you pick-up any habits (bad or good)
Is this lyric poetry, and should I add more imagery?
Did you like the poem?

I don't like addressing points given to me, because I don't feel those are the least of your concerns.

The main two, being
1. Sense and Clarity
2. Flow

I do realize this is whateverm "flash poetry" as you call it. But I hope you thought before post it. Poetry needs to flow, run like water from one word to the next. Feeding me long-existant quotes, and spin-offs of the such stacked one next to another isn't going to give me a good sense of your personal opinion. I do not know if your intention was rather to share quotations that you liked in poetry form, but to do so probably, they have to work in with the piece, not hastily sewn together like some Frankenstein of religious quotes and weak skeptical utterances of religion. You're religious yes? (If I'm wrong ignore the next sentence) when communicating two view points, one of faith and one of skepticalness, don't be afraid to go all out and fully represent both points, otherwise it's weak and undecided and has a lack of contrast to make it even more boring.

Next, you lose a lot of clarity in the piece, your mind throw off and splattered in every possible direction of some dark alley. Who in the world knows where it all is. Flow plays in with this too, you need a proper train of thought, taking your reader from point 1 to point 2 with the way your thoughts are constructed. Poetry is organized though it doesn't seem like it often. You have to feed your reader along or you'll lose any sense your poem may have had.

It depends on what the meaning of 'is' is
And I wonder...

... if being Homo is natural?

Awful line. Reads awkwardly and is really like -______- when you read it.
It looks like it's another title to one of those religious debates you find in the debates/serious discussion forum that degenerates into flaming. It's not subtle, doesn't make us think, because it's so bluntly stated. Nothing delicate about the way it's constructed. Think of poetry as a web, then throwing a brick at it. That's probably the equivalent of the effect of this line on the poem.

You have to think it through, make the reader think by elaborating, using metaphors and similies for comparisons so that you can create an understanding of the POV you're representing for the reader to take in and decide for themselves.

I am muted and perplexed,
Distressed with the burden of skepticism,
and the gift of though.
And Christ is a sword that I cannot hold!

Somebody once said:
"A synonym is a word you use when you don't know how to spell the other one.

Your ending isn't really an ending. It's really just where you chose to stop writing it hold no impact because the rest of the poem is a tangled mess. Through constructing a cleaner train of thought with comparisons to set up an understanding and description, you'll have created a clear picture and your endings would have a lot more punch.

Lastly,

Right, this was terrible, honestly. I didn't edit it once - it was flash poetry

This does nothing to help your case and encourage people to review it.

Best of luck,

Kamas

Your poem confused me. Perhaps I don't know all the references. e.g. what the meaning of "is" is.
Is it supposed to be symbolic, because you mention it again in the third stanza. "Well I guess it depends on what the meaning of 'is' is." I wasn't exactly sure what it was about until I read your note... (Then again, it's almost 2 in the morning and poetry isn't my best genre). May God be with you!

-Cressy