My First Experience With Cannibalism

I gave this a like earlier, and I'd like to explain why I liked it.

This is honest, whether it actually happened to you or not. The emotion behind it is honest, a questioning sadness that permeates it so much that it becomes thoughtful. It's a meditation on more than fish, I think, it's about cruelty and leaving a bad taste in the mouth.

The beauty of this is in its simplicity. The title describes what happened in the poem, and you describe what happened in a very straightforward manner that reminds me of the aching innocence of someone actually experiencing their fish eating each other one after another.

You choose the perfect opportunities to describe. The pristine upstairs toilet is used as a funeral basin for cannibal fish. It's beautiful in its ugliness.

And the last lines really got me. It was such a small detail that really made the poem. So sad but so beautiful, a little window into the narrator's world even more than we already had.

Thank you for sharing this beautiful poem with us. I hope you found this useful in some way. Happy poeting!

'Tis a humorous, enjoyable piece. Well done, though I would not call it poetry. (I suppose it is hard to categorize.)

Loved it! I have to check out more of your work.
I liked the way you described the taste as tasting like fish, brilliant!
Also, I didn't really understand the banana thing either.
But anyway, love, love, love!!

so depressing...

Wow. Breathtakingly marvelous ending! I couldn't have written it better myself! No wonder this was on the Literary Spotlight! You, my friend, have managed to take something as innocent as mere fish and turn it into something disgusting. Something revolting. And a piece of writing so good, I'm liking it even though it's on top of the Literary Spotlight. Everything was perfect. Everything. The only criticism I could offer would be in your individual line spacing; (I believe they're called stanzas). I felt some areas could have gone better together and did not need to be separated, but take this lightly, as this piece was marvelous.

Nice short poem. I like that the lines were brief and did not use any more words than needed to convey the basic idea. I wonder if you could make it a little bit longer because I finished the poem in 15 seconds, unless that was the idea and you made it short on purpose.

An enjoyable experience. I love how you've made the imagery, but honestly, if the topic didn't freak me out so much I'd enjoy it more. (Trust me, I love this, I'm just pulling your leg)

The only other thing I can say about this is the last fish is practically a Wendigo now. Yup, no doubt about it. So if you'll excuse me, I'll be throwing dynamite into the nearest fish filled lake...

Hello, it is gottahaveFaith here reviewing what you got. First off how are you doing? Hope you are happy, getting enough sleep, maybe eating a cookie. I really like your work so lets get to it!

I really liked the title that you had chosen for this poem, "My First Experience With Cannibalism". It is very catchy and enticing and really draws in the reader. Now what I find humerous about it is the phrase, "My FIRST time..." because that insinuates that you have more experiences with cannibalism... is this true Hannibal Lector? I am just joking with you. But the title is really catchy and does open up to introducing the poem.

So going off of reading the title, I did not expect it to be about fish. I thought it was really descriptive, not what I was expecting, and really nice...even if it was about cannibalism.

It is weird that I could relate with this poem because I had actually had fish who did that to each other, they were actually brothers. I do not know why they did it but it reminded me of a Kane and Able sort of deal.

I also really like the way you ended the poem it really packed a punch. It was really good.

I hope you keep writing because that was really well!

I hope you have a nice day!

gottahaveFaith out.

Hello CapitalMonday here for a review. I like to begin that this poem is amazing at it is since in the beginning you were saying that all the fishes ate themselves in order to survive yet at the end, you are standing there looking at the fish and you eat the fish like it is a human being in a sense. Plus i think the fish is symbolic as a waste of human lives like the boy is society or something.

Nitpick(s):

Throughout this poem, I see that people have already touched base with this but why is the point that you don't like bananas? Is it because of the fish you had was named bananas? Maybe explain that thought more, to make more sense as to why you don't like bananas.

Overall, I am sure people could relate (in a sense) since most people could have fishes. Sometimes they would leave to go on a vacation, leaving the fish to wonder around it's bowl looking for anything to eat but at the most there is nothing to eat so they begin to eat themselves. Then when the family comes back, all the see is the fish belly up, insides are gone, and that day with be scarred into their memories.

Rambling is my way of saying i love this poem and how well-written it is.

Farewell,
CapitalMonday

It was a great poem! And there are only a few things to work on.

The part that I didn't understand was the part about why you don't like bananas, i may have missed it. But, an explanation would have been helpful

I noticed few grammatical mistakes so good job there!

I love the title, it sure caught my attention!

Wait, never mind, I just reread the poem and I realized why you don't like bananas.My bad!

I can't wait for more of your poems!

You are my 3700th review!

I really like this. It reminds me of Pablo Neruda's poetry in it simplicity and honest storytelling. I think what really gets me is the last line couple of lines in which you reflect why you don't like bananas.

Because I like to read into poems way too much (no, seriously, it annoys a lot of other members, lol) I see it almost as you showing your reluctance to bite into the only surviving fish. And it's a fascinating idea because I have to wonder, "Hm... why?" Is it because you feel a connection with the fish that systematically starved to death? Or is it because the survivor's death impacted you that much and you feel reluctance to bite into what reminds you of him, almost as if it makes you feel like you're killing a survivor? Or maybe it's because you feel like this makes you feel like the next fish that is going to go belly up? Maybe it's because you feel like you are indulging in a victim of your brother and you are culpable? It's a fascinating part of the poem, and I love it for the multiple images that it conjures up! So I commend you for this!

I do think that calling the toilet "pristine" is a bit odd. I would probably get rid of that adjective. Still! Very nice!

so simple. so good.
i loved the simple layout of the poem and i specifically loved the flow in the story. i love the voice which tells the story and i love the way it tells the story and i love the tingles it sends to my heart. absolutely amazing.
i love how while telling the story the narrator is so detached and yet an integral part of the story, and how you tell the effect of small incidents in life without actually telling it.
a few things could have been better but i don't think i need to pick them out for you as i think that you are capable to do that yourself. i'll like to suggest that before you post the poem and after you finish it, in that time read it yourself from the eyes of the reader at least once and you'll see you will be amazed by the improvement in you.

delicious

This is Very Hemingway.( I just read 'The Old Man and the Sea' so fish=Hemingway in my head XD) The dry,sparse imagery is wonderful. The sort of mock lament, or dead pan remorse gives it a wonderful dark humour edge. The free verse style is PERFECT ( William Carlos Williams would be proud ) It's marvelous how this story is just presented to us with no emotional context, so everything we feel is a specific response by the reader to the piece. It's really difficult to do that in a narrative, but you have succeeded splendidly. I LOVE the seventh stanza "One by one, / they came floating / to the surface / bellies up / insides torn out / by their brothers" ( the imagery is wonderful but the language is sparse and distant ahhhhhh so wonderful ) And I love the phrase 'pristine upstairs toilet'. Very Ginsberg-ian. ( this also reminds me of a much more reserved Ginsberg ) My only real nitpick is the sixth stanza "That food / was each other". You don't need to say that. If you take it out, the next stanza tells us that the fish float up to the top with their guts torn out by their brothers, which suddenly leaves us to put the pieces together, giving the image more impact, in my opinion. It also makes this image more surprising, which I think is good for this poem. Also, on a really nit-picky note, I would probably say 'down the pristine upstairs toilet' instead of 'into', but that just makes more sense to me. Given those two things though, I think this is a Marvelous piece of work. I hope to see more from you in the future! You have an enviable economy of language and if you let it,it will take you places. Thanks for posting!

Wow, thats...a really kinda dark story XD.

I like it though, its deep, deep like the ocean.

Iv'e been reading a lot of poetry on the site, and I see its a rather big thing, and I think this is a good addition!

Keep working on poems, keep publishing stuff, yeah?

Just happened to come across this and wanted to say I really enjoyed this actually. It was short, and to the point, in an almost dry-humor, kind of way.

Also, this reminded me of my fish that I used to have. We had a goldfish, two small silver fish, and one of those that cleaned the tank. We somehow got a snail infestation(?) (idk if there's really a proper word for that)
Anyway, so the silver fish got caught in the plants in the tank and died, the snails ate them, and then the goldfish died of some sickness- went down the toilet. Then the snails ended up eating the last fish- it was pretty nasty haha. Anyway, hope you enjoy that little story and this pretty useless comment on your awesome poem.

~Genesis~

Hey!

So, in the beginning and middle parts I became a little sad. But not, like, super sad. I know this was supposed to be sad and be serious, but I just could not stop myself from laughing. Not because of the situation or anything, like not a mean funny...Sorry I'm being a bit random. But...yeah.

I any case, though, I really did love this and the fact that none of it rhymed. Nonetheless, a poem doesn't necessarily always have to. You did an awesome job performing a task such as that. I also liked how you told a little mini story from your knowledge and past experiences. (Although sad). Actually, I've never had a fish. So, I don't know what it takes to take care of one.

But, my brother has had 2 gerbils at 2 different times....each one died and lived less than 3 months....
I also own a cat...but that's different.

Anyways, I also really like how your grammar and spelling are both on fleek! You did a great job! Keep it up! I hope to read a lot more of your work! Bye!

~Tiff

I know this is supposed to be horror, but I laughed at the end. It sounds like a punch line to a Jim Gaffigan joke.
"I know people who love bananas but, to me they taste like fish. I like banana's! This guys such a meanie!"
But this is a fun bit. It actually reminded me of an event my household calls "The Great Fish Plague" where all but four of our fish died from a sickness (we don't know what) those four later died as well. So I guess it was kind of relatable. I mean, who hasn't killed their fish?
~ Lord Clickdun

Hey ClippedWings! This isn't a review, just to help with formatting. If you do shift-enter in the submit box, then it only goes down one line instead of two!