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Young Writers Society



Ode to Discontent Poetry

by OrionRising


Oh, futile ink,

your distasteful disgust

so willingly consumed,

as though jaded words

were glutenous, gluttonous

cereal

drowned and choking

in the milk

white page.


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Sun Jul 26, 2015 3:51 pm
Morrigan wrote a review...



Hello.

Here is my honest opinion. It's filled with good intentions.

I feel like this is trying too hard. It's not really pleasant to read, just kind of cumbersome with the inclusion of so many adjectives and adverbs in such a small poem. Instead of using so many adjectives, try using stronger nouns and verbs. It would be more straightforward and more pleasant to read if it looked like this:

Oh, ink,
your disgust
is devoured
as though letters
were cereal
drowning
in the milky page.


I changed words to letters because letters are more similar to cereal pieces than whole words are.

This is one sentence which is not grammatically correct. You don't have a verb in your third line. You should have "is so willingly consumed" to make it correct. This might alleviate some confusion that readers might have.

The poem is also in passive voice. You say that the disgust is so willingly consumed, but by whom or what? The answer is the milk white page, but you shouldn't have to tack that on to the end. It's not direct. However, I can see why you wrote it this way, as you wanted a dramatic ending. I suggest you try to change it out of passive voice, though.

Altogether, clarity is one of the most important things in poetry, and this one lacks it. I hope you find this review useful to you! Happy YWSing!




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Sun Jul 26, 2015 3:33 pm
Megrim wrote a review...



Hey there, this Review Day I've decided to dabble in some poetry! I don't really read or write poetry, so I have no idea what I'm talking about. But I can at least share my reaction with you.

I loved this poem. It made me laugh. I don't think I quite understand it, but I just loved it. It interpreted it as sort of a lighthearted frustration with one's writing. That very relatable experience of writing something down and your internal editor being overly critical and dissatisfied with it, to the point that nothing looks right anymore. I'm kind of imagining that the ink is getting consumed by the words appearing on the page, and they're "drowned and choking" on the white backdrop because when you read them back to yourself, they sound awkward and forced.

I had great fun with this idea. Now that I've read your reply to the other reviewers, I realise I may be a bit off base here.

Either way, thanks for sharing! Cheers.




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Tue Jul 21, 2015 9:20 pm
Rook wrote a review...



Hello!

I will agree with what the previous reviewer said about heavy poems and cereal, as well as what they said about the repetition of gluttonous.

While I think you definitely started out with an idea of what you wanted to write here, it didn't end up as smooth or clear as I think it should have.

The first line starts off one way, saying ink is futile. Futile means pointless.
Then the next line is almost completely unrelated. distasteful means causing disgust. So you're saying "your disgust-causing disgust." That doesn't really make sense. And how does the ink have disgust?
then in the third line, it's even more unrelated. What is so willingly consumed? The disgust? What? The Ink's disgust-causing disgust is willingly consumed by what? by the writer? the paper? what? Can you see my confusion?
And the fourth line again does not clear any of this up. Jaded means bored or tired. I don't see how any of these words or images go together in the slightest.
This makes your poem sound like you didn't put much effort into it, and just wrote pretty words to sound poetic. If that was your intention, then that wasn't obvious that it was your intention, and you should make that somehow clearer, I think.

This is all I had to say for this poem. Without knowing what you were going for, I don't know how to advise you to correct it.
I hope my review helps somewhat Let me know if you have any questions, and keep writing!
~fort




OrionRising says...


I think my poem does make sense. Of course, explaining a poem should not be necessary but I believe you're overlooking pretty obvious ideas.

Firstly, this is a poem speaking of "Discontent Poetry." I call the words of this poetry "futile" because writing poetry about being discontent fails to solve your discontent-ness. The next few lines refer specifically to readers of "discontent poetry." Poetry being consumed is poetry being read-- that is by no means a hard connection to make.

The metaphor of the poem being cereal can be taken in any way which you wish it. But to me I see the "glutinous, gluttonous" cereal as Reeses Puffs or Coco Pebbles or some cereal which is sugarfilled and offers a lack of health benefits and thus is nearly as futile to eat as a poem on "discontent-ness" is to write.

(NOTICE: It was a typo when I wrote "Gluttonous, gluttonous," It was suppposed to read "glutinous, gluttonous.")

Does this make sense? Do you have any ideas on how I could clear this up? Thanks.



Rook says...


I see what you were trying to accomplish now.
However, the subject that you are referring to as being consumed is the ink. I think you definitely need to specify that you're talking about poetry, specifically discontent poetry. Also, I have no idea what discontent poetry is. Is that a term I should know?

I sort of disregarded the title because (a) I think poetry should be able to be understood without a title (especially because many things put references at the bottom of a quote, and the references include the title, so people wouldn't understand your poetry at all until they got to the title at the end, and then they'd be forced to re-read it, which is not a good thing, because most will just give up, I think), and (b) because an ode is generally a poem that praises the qualities of something, not degrades them.

And the pun makes better sense. But I think it would also be wise to reference the lack of health benefits, otherwise the cereal part just sounds like a random addition.

And a lot of sugary cereals put in extra vitamins and minerals so really they're not all that bad. Not that that really matters to the poem :p



OrionRising says...


As an Ode I think it makes sense that everything in the poem refers to the title. That's typically how Odes work. This poem is meant to be presented with the title first. I read poetry regularly and it is almost always presented with the title first. I do not understand what you are talking about when you say the title might not be first.

Odes are not necessarily supposed to "praise."

Discontent Poetry is simply poetry written about feeling/being Discontent.



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Tue Jul 21, 2015 7:58 pm
TheStormAroundMe wrote a review...



Hello! I'm here to review your poem.

Cereal is an interesting thing to compare to words, I must say. If the poem was trying to be heavy, then I suggest you find something else to compare to words. If not, then keep it. It sort of makes the poem lighthearted and happy, although the beginning sounds deep.

The repetition of "gluttonous" here seems a bit useless, so I would cut it out if I were you. Again, it's not my poem, so do what you wish. Otherwise, this poem was nicely written.

-Grace




OrionRising says...


Thanks for the review! I made a slight typo when typing this from my hand-written version. Gluttonous was only supposed to be there once. The other word was Glutinous (gluten-filled). I have fixed it now if you want to give it a quick re-read to see the change.




"Be yourself" is not advice. It's an existential crisis waiting to happen.
— Hank Green