02-07-2017, 02:53 PM
This reads like a boring short story out of a college lit mag except it couldn't get published b/c it's too edgy. This is a dramatic monologue, so it's confined to the perspective of a single character. But it's not just a dramatic monologue--it's trying to be a poem. It doesn't subvert itself or break its own rules or allow for the impossible/remotely unexpected. What, then, makes it worth reading? The literary references? I guess they contribute to the character of the speaker--he/she is well read and is maybe trying to prove his intelligence to himself/ the mirror of himself he's created in the "reader?"
This poem successfully creates a voice, but it doesn't do anything with that voice. The voice itself is not poetry. At times, it is musical, and that is good--"living off the kvass, the leftover hosts – at last, witnessing winter" is a fine line, though the beginning of the sentence doesn't add much. It has recurrent 's' sounds and some real imagery. "Not that you ever notice, you Narcissus" is an example of a good literary reference, even though the language could be pared down a little. It has good consonance and a sense of direction--"you Narcissus" is name calling of the purest order. "Changing through error from Jew to Lucy" is another decent line, this time thanks to assonance and the cryptic "Lucy" (the devil? the drug? the Australopithecus?)
Unfortunately, these lines are outliers in this poem, which is for the most part drudgery to read. The speaker says the same thing over and over-- 'i want to die' 'woe is me' 'i have a beautiful muse who isn't real & is perfect in every way' 'did i mention i'm a poet & i want to die' 'plus i hate gay people & shit' 'here have a sylvia plath reference' etc. Most of the lines in this poem have minimal substance of their own and serve instead to emphasize the same few ideas by means of repetition. However, repetition alone does not give an idea intensity or depth. I guess that the repetition does contribute to the characterization of the speaker, who is clearly stuck circling the same desperate ideas. But still--is a self-consistent character monologue a poem? Is one unwavering idea as compelling as two conflicted ideas colliding such that one or both of them must bend?
Look, I think that detestable viewpoints are the fertile domain of poetry, and I think that reading something insightful from a loathsome perspective can broaden your human empathy. Plus it can be entertaining--see Plath's "Daddy" which this piece is plainly derivative of. But a poem has to accomplish something remarkable in order to be worthwhile. A calligram spelling out "woe is me" composed of "woe is me" repeated over and over would be self-consistent. The form and content would match perfectly and the core idea would be communicated as directly as possible. But it wouldn't be a good poem--you wouldn't spontaneously remember 'woe is me' and feel chills, accompanied by a sudden broadening of your understanding of the poem. Reading such a poem wouldn't change the way you write.
This poem successfully creates a voice, but it doesn't do anything with that voice. The voice itself is not poetry. At times, it is musical, and that is good--"living off the kvass, the leftover hosts – at last, witnessing winter" is a fine line, though the beginning of the sentence doesn't add much. It has recurrent 's' sounds and some real imagery. "Not that you ever notice, you Narcissus" is an example of a good literary reference, even though the language could be pared down a little. It has good consonance and a sense of direction--"you Narcissus" is name calling of the purest order. "Changing through error from Jew to Lucy" is another decent line, this time thanks to assonance and the cryptic "Lucy" (the devil? the drug? the Australopithecus?)
Unfortunately, these lines are outliers in this poem, which is for the most part drudgery to read. The speaker says the same thing over and over-- 'i want to die' 'woe is me' 'i have a beautiful muse who isn't real & is perfect in every way' 'did i mention i'm a poet & i want to die' 'plus i hate gay people & shit' 'here have a sylvia plath reference' etc. Most of the lines in this poem have minimal substance of their own and serve instead to emphasize the same few ideas by means of repetition. However, repetition alone does not give an idea intensity or depth. I guess that the repetition does contribute to the characterization of the speaker, who is clearly stuck circling the same desperate ideas. But still--is a self-consistent character monologue a poem? Is one unwavering idea as compelling as two conflicted ideas colliding such that one or both of them must bend?
Look, I think that detestable viewpoints are the fertile domain of poetry, and I think that reading something insightful from a loathsome perspective can broaden your human empathy. Plus it can be entertaining--see Plath's "Daddy" which this piece is plainly derivative of. But a poem has to accomplish something remarkable in order to be worthwhile. A calligram spelling out "woe is me" composed of "woe is me" repeated over and over would be self-consistent. The form and content would match perfectly and the core idea would be communicated as directly as possible. But it wouldn't be a good poem--you wouldn't spontaneously remember 'woe is me' and feel chills, accompanied by a sudden broadening of your understanding of the poem. Reading such a poem wouldn't change the way you write.