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140,230 Literary Works • 673,048 Reviews
I actually really like the voice behind this, that dead-beat, not going to do anything about it but thought you ought to know tone. It's cool. What I'm not so sure on is the brevity of your lines. I wanted you to spin the images out more because it feels a little cut and dry at the moment. Here, I'll try to show you what I mean and throw in a few other comments as I go along:
I just don't share worries with [I really don't like the use of 'just' here. It breaks the flow and trivilises any statement you may or may not be making.]
this match box world. [Love, love the match box world metaphor but I'd like to have seen you explore that more. What do you mean by a match box world? There's so many connotations it could have and at the moment while it sounds cool, it doesn't push any buttons. Are we the matches? Light one and they all go up? That would seem at odds with your persona though who thinks rather that it's useless talking about a cause or making effort to follow a cause because one voice has no effect. So match box. What meaning do you want us to take away from that?]
I don't care for small talk,
don't need alcohol to dowse the living flame. [These sentences are too disjointed. There aren't enough lines showing us how they link in to the premise and it makes the poem feel too fragmented. The lines themselves are nice but it just feels like you're passing across snap shot after snap shot and then snatching them away before we have a chance to properly look. This should play more like a slideshow than an impatient shuffler.]
When all the city sways together [Please describe. Please, please? I'd love some more imagery here to back this up, some splashes of colour and something that's going to stick in the reader's head.]
I look on down the open road
and can't help but feel I'm living out
a waste of time and a waste of mind.
Who expects change
when everyone chooses the same?
followers.
Good ending, nice use of the no capitalisation. In general then I like this, I just felt you could have done a lot more of it. As it stands, I'll go away and I'll remember the tone and the match box metaphor, but only for a day or two. There isn't enough tying everything together to really leave an impression in the reader's mind, or enough solid images to grab on to.
If you've got any questions, feel free to pm and hopefully I've given you a few things to think about,
Heather xxx
I'm going to echo Dreamwalker here and say that the tone is off-putting in its pretentious apathy. There's no measure of struggle, just a sort of resignation that everything else sucks but the narrator, but then the narrator doesn't seem to be doing much to make him/herself not suck either.
But poetry doesn't necessarily have to be pleasant or likable, so this might not be so much bad as just inconsistent.
I noticed you listed this as satire, which makes me wonder if this is meant to be a satire of those who go around calling everyone else a follower while not being particularly independent themselves, which reminds me of this. If that's the case, you have a nice start here, but you need to bring out the satirical element more. The reader shouldn't have to see "satire" in the description to know what it is. If that's the angle you're going, really bring out the absurdity of the narrator's outlook.
The grammar/wording of
is a bit off. It's definitely worth a second look-over.
Overall, there's something about your style I like. It has a nice out-in-the-open feel that makes me think of 60s folk songwriters. The main problem here is keeping things tight and consistent throughout. Really have a good idea of what you want to do with the poem before you start writing, and things will hit harder. It's tough to get a good strike when you aren't sure where you're swinging. I'll be looking out for more stuff from you in the future.
Cheers,
Shade
I don't know if the contradictory nature of this poem was intentional or not, but it's definitely worth something to dissect. So I'm here to pick at the heartstrings of this poem.
Anyways, what I found most... curious was the tone of this poem. This off-handed pretension, as if the voice thinks quite highly of his lack of caring. That in all his off-handed brazen lack-of-action, he's the only person whose come to terms with how ridiculous the human psyche is. I find it very interesting that this voice, who speaks so lowly of humanity admits to not furthering any development to it.
Who expects change, I wonder, but someone worth making change? And change never came from someone unwilling to change themself.
Nevertheless, poetically, this could swing either way. I suppose, because of my disdain for the narration, I have a very hard time really enjoying or appreciating the notion of it. It just saddens me too much to see lack of ambition more so than anything else.
Anyways, the biggest flaw to pretentious thoughts is when you start moving into lines like 'who expects change when everyone chooses the same'. Because not everyone chooses the same. It's a generalization like this that would sink your ship in prose, and almost does the same thing here. But, poetic license aside, I found it unnerving, and conceited.
Mind you, ending this poem off with one word was a nice choice. And not capitalizing was nice, too. I find, when you push past punctuation and rules of grammar, you find that the work speaks in a more ethereal tone. Poetry should be out of body. An initial spark that leads up and out.
The fire imagery was a little superficial. Candle-talk is often overused.
The best line;
The imagery of a city swimming in a haze next to a clear, open road is such stark, beautiful imagery. The kind of imagery I would generally associate with a knowing of where one's feet must take them. But, of course, I didn't quite feel I knew if the narrator knew where he was going at all.
Anyways, I'm rambling.
I would like to see you take on a less pretentious tone. So I'll keep an eye out for you, dear.
~Walker
You can call me pretentious if you like, that doesn't bother me. Titles don't matter. In the place that I live, people numb themselves from reality with alcohol, indecision and short sightedness. We are hopeful that change will come when nobody here is going to change. Nothing will change. The behaviour is the same and it is a dehumanising cycle. 'Pretension' assumes that I have some magical answers; none of which are alluded to in the poem. All I see is a way out of the society, towards something possibly more rational and progressive. Where that path leads on 'the open road' I just don't know.
This is not a literary masterpiece, I agree, but the sentiment is of pure impatience at the state of my city and it's young people. This is a cultural problem, one in which all people are under the same umbrella. It is not a generalisation, for it assumes the responsibility of the public in collective responsibility.
But the poem, in and of itself, is that 'magical answer'. This 'there is no point in caring because caring doesn't change anything, and the sooner you realize this, this sooner you can hunker down and live with it'.
And yes, it is a cultural problem, but expressing sentiments of 'woe is me' never interested me much. And poetry, unlike prose, is not simply about cause. I may not particularly like the poem's narration, but I can respect a good, albeit pretentious, piece of poetry. In this case, it wasn't simply the narration. The imagery did not play on the idea of carelessness, the only redeeming quality being that last word.
Mind you, personal opinions won't change the fact that this is, and of itself, is your work. And, when it comes down to it, if you like it for what it is, fine. But apathy will only entertain for so long. Lack of emotion will kill your work.
And if anything, this poem was a 'I don't care. I don't feel anything'.
This poem is not meant to convey 'woe is me'. Far from it actually. I do not simply accept that problems exist and choose to live in a state of disrepair. The breakdown of people around me is somewhat alienating. I don't share worries with other people, as in I don't understand why people do what they do. I am not implying one has to 'hunker down and live with it'. Absolutely not. The road I see is an open one and a possible way to leave the chaos.
'Lack of emotion' is precisely what I am trying to portray. This is madness and chaos and confusion and many people are living in a blank, empty state. The city sways with the disillusioned and physically numb people. The people are almost gone!
Only one flaw to that notion.
You just wrote a poem about that emotion. You are conveying emotion to readers. Better yet, you're conveying the one thing you didn't particularly want to. And that was worry.
And it's the topic that alienates itself. You're speaking of everyone else as if they are on another completely different level. And that's really overgeneralizing, even if it's not a matter of caring. Because you and I both see the same thing. The only difference is I'm trying to find people who feel the same instead of alienating and turning in on myself in a poem.
And the only reason I speak of the narration as you is because you directed it back towards yourself. So hopefully I'm not being overly presumptuous!
Nonetheless, it's not the poem, dear. It's the topic. And the topic is really something that you should choose for yourself, so I'm not going to tell you otherwise. There were fantastic attributes here which I duly noted.
Anyways, I tip my hat.