Old Ink

Experimental poem and I haven't written a poem in ages, so please review and tell me how to improve in writing this style of poem.

Old Ink

Stale urine and coffee and second hand smoke
clot the room, scavengers around carrion, as she intones
regarding raleigh bikes, name, make, childhood whisperings
repeated like the complainings of a trapped fly (or a funeral bell)

How like themselves are they?
How dead,
paper bound up in blue membrane and a crooked spine, books,
History
blurring and dripping down the pages of their skin

Like the man, punky slicked back hair, nonsense
and seaside phantoms exhaled from where they rise above his ink
and buzz inside his skull and through his mouth and roll off tongue like a biblical truth
time worn words that can never be born again

Niiice. Great imagery, though parts of it didn't make a ton of sense. Maybe that's just me not trying very hard right now . Can I just say well done? Just one thing, though; When you write a poem, it's pretty typical (and I think grammatically correct) to capitalize the first letter of each line. Not just the sentences, but the lines.

Awesome job.

You don't seem to follow a set stucture, which I really like, and the imagery is vivid yet not specific as such and I like the questions that it created in my head when I read it.

I didnt get the purpose of the poem, it was all over the place, like it had no set structure or topic, you went from pee to coffee to time and stuff, I didnt get it. The imagery seemed vivid, when I could understand what it referred to. I can tell you have a talent for writing, but maybe poetry isnt your niche. Sorry to sound so harsh, I really dont think you're a bad writer, just that this wasnt your best work. Keep Writing!

Hi Halycon,

as requested, a quick glance over.

The biggest issue I see here are your line breaks and the clarity of your thought process.

Stale urine and coffee and second hand smoke
clot the room, scavengers around carrion, as she intones
regarding raleigh bikes, name, make, childhood whisperings
repeated like the complainings of a trapped fly (or a funeral bell)

Read that first line to yourself. It doesn't paint anything for me, nor does it create the sense of atmosphere you would like it to, it's like attaching nouns to a place and expecting me to imagine the rest. And this happens through your entire poem, words are meaningless and thrown in to add description but fail to paint anything in my mind of the scene. You're telling me things, not showing them to me. Don't expect me to come out of reading your poem with much because you're telling me this and that. I have to see it in my head, feel it, hear it, breathe it in etc.

*complainings is not a word.

Next, watch your flow, for now it sounds a little like someone stopping and starting their car over and over. You're jerking your reader back and forth with your sudden line breaks and punctuation. Make it as natural as possible for me to read. Read it out loud to yourself, where is the flow off or interrupted? It's up to you to determine how you fix it, but pay close attention to how it reads.

Best of luck,

Kamas