Bedlam (Edit 1)

[Brownlie]

Edit 1:



I’ve seen a bedlam house that’s stale
With sodden Tom’s in front
A color painted place of heavy air
Where drinking men are done

I had my day of lunacy
Inside and know the way
We wasted men can feel our lives
that slowly slip away.

So gather up all bedlam boys
And throw away your shame
To join with me for a moment’s whine
And plaintively exclaim!

The warring winds and elements
Will always be in fight
For blackened words were always ink
and never shining light

We men have braved the chiller air
With fragile cracking bones
We battled cold and harnessed flames
and did it all alone

We faced the lurking fiend of death
And took the devil’s bridge
Untamed we shattered pendant chains
And sealed off Tartarus

Despite our raging valor dogs
Are hounding at our heel
So we set our feet to the snake
And turn the burning wheel

Let’s toss our dusty leaflet books
and find a maudlin maid
Whose haggard hair will bear the air
With hissing gorgon snakes

But though we fight we’re doomed to lose
Our thrashing fatal clash
We crumble with the roaring wind
Bequeathed into the grass

We’ll find that maudlin maids were myths
In lashing merry tunes
So we go like bears in the air
And we all get drunk by noon

Original:



I’ve seen a modern house of bedlam, where
Tom’s in front with chipped
Up teeth and soil heavied clothes
are sodden down by scripts.

I had my day of lunacy
Inside and know the way
that wasted men can feel their lives
that slowly slip away.

You cannot cover up a cell
With smiling murals crafted
On the prison walls and paint away
A single plaguing fact

That all these bonny boys are trapped
If you heard the ticking clock
Inside then maybe you could see
What they can feel, a lock.

It’s true that prisons can be gauged
In degrees, but freedom lost
Is freedom lost and where is he
That sets his cage aloft.

So gather up all bedlam boys
And throw away your shame
To join with me for a moment’s whine
And plaintively exclaim!

[Erthona]

This line gave me pause:

"Inside then maybe you could see
What they can feel, a lock."

Maybe

Inside then maybe you could see
What they can feel's a lock.

Maybe I'm misreading your intent, but that seemed what you were trying to say...maybe not.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

The first stanza reads a bit awkward, but from there on it reads smoothly.

This was a nice stanza:

"I had my day of lunacy
Inside and know the way
that wasted men can feel their lives
that slowly slip away."


Dale

[Mopkins]

Hi Brownlie

The first two stanzas made me think of a psychiatric ward, with the references to bedlam and lunacy, so i was a little surprised when it turned into a poem about jails. Still it could be a high-security psych ward...

that wasted men can feel their lives
that slowly slip away. ('that' doesn't seem to fit- i would have used 'slowly slipping away' but that might mess up your meter)

i liked the alliteration in 'soil heavied clothes are sodden down by scripts' , and the alliteration of C and P in the third stanza.

Unsure about rhyming crafted with fact - though it is alliterative and the stanza reads fine - the following rhyming of fact and trapped in the first line of the next stanza carries the rhyming along even though it's not in a second or fourth line.

Overall, I thought it was quite well done


Marianne

[Brownlie]

This line gave me pause:

"Inside then maybe you could see
What they can feel, a lock."

Maybe

Inside then maybe you could see
What they can feel's a lock.

Maybe I'm misreading your intent, but that seemed what you were trying to say...maybe not.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

The first stanza reads a bit awkward, but from there on it reads smoothly.

This was a nice stanza:

"I had my day of lunacy
Inside and know the way
that wasted men can feel their lives
that slowly slip away."


Dale

I deviated a bit from the pattern in the first stanza so I could see how that could come out awkward. For the most part your proposed change preserves the intent of the poem, though the comma emphasizes lock more it does slow the poem and take away its momentum, good catch. Thanks for the feedback.

---

Hi Brownlie

The first two stanzas made me think of a psychiatric ward, with the references to bedlam and lunacy, so i was a little surprised when it turned into a poem about jails. Still it could be a high-security psych ward...

that wasted men can feel their lives
that slowly slip away. ('that' doesn't seem to fit- i would have used 'slowly slipping away' but that might mess up your meter)

i liked the alliteration in 'soil heavied clothes are sodden down by scripts' , and the alliteration of C and P in the third stanza.

Unsure about rhyming crafted with fact - though it is alliterative and the stanza reads fine - the following rhyming of fact and trapped in the first line of the next stanza carries the rhyming along even though it's not in a second or fourth line.

Overall, I thought it was quite well done


Marianne

Thanks for reading I really appreciate it. Lunacy has implications of a temporary diagnosis of insanity. You make a good point that the syntax is a little strange in that line you referred to I hadn't considered that before you pointed that out, thank you.

[SilverMire]

I’ve seen a modern house of bedlam, where
Tom’s in front with chipped
Up teeth and soil heavied clothes
are sodden down by scripts. If you're going for uniform feet in lines 2 and 4, it feels as if there's an extra one in number two for my ear

I had my day of lunacy
Inside and know the way
that wasted men can feel their lives I'd perhaps junk revise if you want to capitalise the start of lines or not. Only in these first two paragraphs I can see that it's not, so maybe aim for consistency
that slowly slip away.

You cannot cover up a cell
With smiling murals crafted
On the prison walls and paint away
A single plaguing fact Not to rhyme here, or even slight-rhyme, seems out of sync with the rest of the poem

That all these bonny boys are trapped
If you heard the ticking clock
Inside then maybe you could see
What they can feel, a lock. This stanza just feels really contrived. Lock feels solely chosen for the rhyme.

It’s true that prisons can be gauged
In degrees, but freedom lost
Is freedom lost and where is he
That sets his cage aloft. Again, doesn't really make too much sense to me. "Freedom lost is freedom lost" doesn't sit too well with me. Consider revising this?

So gather up all bedlam boys
And throw away your shame
To join with me for a moment’s whine
And plaintively exclaim!

Hope this helps in some small way

[71degrees]

I’ve seen a modern house of bedlam, where
Tom’s in front with chipped
Up teeth and soil heavied clothes
are sodden down by scripts.

I had my day of lunacy
Inside and know the way
that wasted men can feel their lives
that slowly slip away.

You cannot cover up a cell
With smiling murals crafted
On the prison walls and paint away
A single plaguing fact

That all these bonny boys are trapped
If you heard the ticking clock
Inside then maybe you could see
What they can feel, a lock.

It’s true that prisons can be gauged
In degrees, but freedom lost
Is freedom lost and where is he
That sets his cage aloft.

So gather up all bedlam boys
And throw away your shame
To join with me for a moment’s whine
And plaintively exclaim!

The language here reminds me a bit of Ken Kesey (the bedlam boys). Anything "Cuckoo's Nest" is okay in my book…the Chief's fascination w/anything metallic or machine operated (such as your own cell, and lock, and cage, and ticking clock, and "gauged" degrees, and "whine" (a double meaning, for sure). The atmosphere of the poem shows me you know the way around such a place. The continuing shift between "I" and "you" bothered me a bit, as did the repetition of "freedom lost" in such short spacing. The cage "aloft" is weird to me, also. Second floor cell arrangement? Also, that same stanza reads like a question to me (question mark at end?).

Liked this. Fun read.

[Brownlie]

I’ve seen a modern house of bedlam, where
Tom’s in front with chipped
Up teeth and soil heavied clothes
are sodden down by scripts. If you're going for uniform feet in lines 2 and 4, it feels as if there's an extra one in number two for my ear

I had my day of lunacy
Inside and know the way
that wasted men can feel their lives I'd perhaps junk revise if you want to capitalise the start of lines or not. Only in these first two paragraphs I can see that it's not, so maybe aim for consistency
that slowly slip away.

You cannot cover up a cell
With smiling murals crafted
On the prison walls and paint away
A single plaguing fact Not to rhyme here, or even slight-rhyme, seems out of sync with the rest of the poem

That all these bonny boys are trapped
If you heard the ticking clock
Inside then maybe you could see
What they can feel, a lock. This stanza just feels really contrived. Lock feels solely chosen for the rhyme.

It’s true that prisons can be gauged
In degrees, but freedom lost
Is freedom lost and where is he
That sets his cage aloft. Again, doesn't really make too much sense to me. "Freedom lost is freedom lost" doesn't sit too well with me. Consider revising this?

So gather up all bedlam boys
And throw away your shame
To join with me for a moment’s whine
And plaintively exclaim!

Hope this helps in some small way

Some good catches here. I'll return the favor when I can.

---

I’ve seen a modern house of bedlam, where
Tom’s in front with chipped
Up teeth and soil heavied clothes
are sodden down by scripts.

I had my day of lunacy
Inside and know the way
that wasted men can feel their lives
that slowly slip away.

You cannot cover up a cell
With smiling murals crafted
On the prison walls and paint away
A single plaguing fact

That all these bonny boys are trapped
If you heard the ticking clock
Inside then maybe you could see
What they can feel, a lock.

It’s true that prisons can be gauged
In degrees, but freedom lost
Is freedom lost and where is he
That sets his cage aloft.

So gather up all bedlam boys
And throw away your shame
To join with me for a moment’s whine
And plaintively exclaim!

The language here reminds me a bit of Ken Kesey (the bedlam boys). Anything "Cuckoo's Nest" is okay in my book…the Chief's fascination w/anything metallic or machine operated (such as your own cell, and lock, and cage, and ticking clock, and "gauged" degrees, and "whine" (a double meaning, for sure). The atmosphere of the poem shows me you know the way around such a place. The continuing shift between "I" and "you" bothered me a bit, as did the repetition of "freedom lost" in such short spacing. The cage "aloft" is weird to me, also. Second floor cell arrangement? Also, that same stanza reads like a question to me (question mark at end?).

Liked this. Fun read.

Interesting catch on the you and I, who am I talking to! A question mark at the end would be interesting. Thanks for your comments, they were pretty good. I'll make sure to return the favor when I get the chance.