Potential

by xanthan gum

Published August 4, 2006

So what if words were art and we could
paint a masterpiece over this falling sky,
trying to hold it up with fortifications and
architecture and all the pointless beauty that we
fling into the open, hasty air –
Broken moons and lunar clouds will stay and listen
to our wishful dreams, the spritz of poetry we spit out
at a simple passerby. But we are acquiescent, passive
to raining hellfire and dead synapses.
We laugh over the rims of effervescence and claim ourselves a delicacy,
But what makes us more than just a lunar cloud,
what identifies us as the final broken moon?
Hung high, we emblazon failure across the sky.
Pretty words, let’s paint this world away and hide
in the canvas, in the clandestine that we resigned ourselves
to past tense.

Comments & reviews · 8
User avatar
faith
Review
faith wrote a review Review · Aug 11, 2006

Pretty and sophisticated. I particularly liked the beginning and:

But we are acquiescent, passive
to raining hellfire and dead synapses.


probably because I'm a neuropsychology freak and I like the word synapses. Yes, I'm a dork.

User avatar
Wiggy
Review
Wiggy wrote a review Review · Aug 10, 2006

Well, xanthan, I loved this poem! You did an awesome job painting a picture, as has been said, but you probably could have done it with words just as beautiful, but easier to understand (also already been said lol :D). I just have one question and one correction:

to our wishful dreams, the spritz of poetry we spit out

Is spritz a word?

at a simple passerby. But we are acquiescent, passive
to raining hellfire and dead synapses.


The rhythm would flow better if it went like this:
at a simple passerby. But we are acquiescent,
passive to raining hellfire and dead synapses.

I just think it flows better and it's not so jerky.

Overall, awesome job! Just clarify the language. Gosh, I wish I had your vocabulary! ;)

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Prosithion
Comment
Prosithion commented Comment · Aug 10, 2006

VERY wordy. I think you could have gotten the point across with less words, althought they really painted a picture. The lines were very irregular, and I think it could have been written in a more orderly fashion.

Random avatar
Niamh
Comment
Niamh commented Comment · Aug 6, 2006

Creative. The imagery is nice--for some reason, it makes me picture Michelangelo's work. The vocabulary is broad and beautiful. I didn't seem to have a particular rhythm, but overall, very nice.

User avatar
yoha_ahoy
Comment
yoha_ahoy commented Comment · Aug 5, 2006

Great imagery, and a really pretty poem. I like it a lot. Erm... nothing much else to say. :D

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Incandescence
Review
Incandescence wrote a review Review · Aug 5, 2006

Hi xanthan,


Enjoyable. This builds to quite a climax.

I wonder if L8 and L9 are really working for their living or secretly working on their own agendas, flirting with the temps, writing poetry, what-not?

I could live without them.


All the best,
Brad

User avatar
Raven
Review
Raven wrote a review Review · Aug 4, 2006


I really like this. I like the style of it too, with no stanzas and no ryming. This is my favorite line:



xanthan gum wrote:let’s paint this world away and hide
in the canvas,


Really well written.



Perhaps it is better to wake up after all, even to suffer, rather than to remain a dupe to illusions all one's life.
— Kate Chopin, The Awakening