Hand In Hand, Through The Storm

[Oden Prufrock]

[u]Hand In Hand, Through The Storm[/u]


(Journal-Poem)


What is love?
What is a
                           bond?
What is progress?
Where do these things
                                                         come from?
Where do they go?

I had a dream (as all great stories start)
And there was a girl I loved like the countless dreams before
             Yet this dream was special,
                  I came to her
                     A neglected leaf left out of the pile,
                        She lay on a bed on her stomach
                            Her bare butt naked towards me
              And we made love,
                 And somehow
                                         her see-through stomach
Allowed me to envision something,
                   A tree
         wrapped
                 in white string
       In                         Upwards
 a                  pattern
        circular
Inside of her,
There was no meat or lust.
There was a unity shining from her belly button
                                                                            as our hips clicked,
    As her eyes glittered.

Then I was transported to a
                                            dank and

                                                           dirty beach house

                                            And I leave the door in sandals
  A summer shirt and shorts with hairy legs
                Pushing against the wind to get to the sea,
**You might think this is funny
       But I’ve fallen in love with more girls
                   In other countries overseas than I have
                                            In this land of sunburnt beauty,**
I never reach the shore
            As if the dream makes fun of my inability
To reach for true love
Or to tell me it plain.
                                 What is this wind?!
                             Where does it blow from?
                        What am I to do?
                     I feel as if I am
held back
From something truly valuable.

I chase the shadow of that experience
                                      With that woman,
I actually know her
But that wind doesn’t let up.
                                                      Is it me that is the coward for giving up?
                                     After all
             There is still an u[ocean]s
                                 And I don’t even know if she likes me,
I fear the wind,
       I give into the wind,
Yet that dream
                              It means something to me,
             Something so vital,
    I must find that tree and
Shield its leaves from the gusts.
Allow sunlight like a blessing
To be its salvation,
                             But
                                      I don’t know,
It’s all so far

fetched.

I’ve been reading horror manga
                                                    By Junji Ito,
                                                         A very talented artist of terror,
Really chills me,
                    But throughout his stories
           There’s a blatant sense of romance,
            He gets these couples
            And puts them through hell,
   A town
tw        ng
    O
is           ti     into its centre full of
Cannibalism, starvation, desperation,
      Ghosts and insanity,

                                                                                Absolute chaos and suffering

And two lovers,
They twist together
Willingly
Locked in the hellish dungeon of the underground city of spirals.
                Do they even mean it?
                Do they really love each other?

     Isn’t boyfriend and girlfriend just a childish title?
I’ve never believed in unity
But what would a product of divorce
                                                                                                                       Like me

Know about it?

Every couple is just
                                bulls*** 
                                             walking hand in hand,

I would never trust anyone to stay together,

Not even the tree and it’s leaves.
Then where shall I find it,
That secret the dream whispered to me?
I long for it from the deepest part of my being
In a way I’ve never known before,
But how do I know it even exists?
Is that the point?
That I don’t?
Is that what life is?
Seeking unity
But never grasping it?

Is unity horror or beauty, or could it be

                                                             that I decide that answer?

I know I want to tell her that I want her,
That I want to twist with her into hell:
That I want to find that tree and tie a string around it,
Yet my perception only sees as far as failure,
             And how could I
                                        let her mean that much to me?
Isn’t a partner just disposable?
How could I let her hold me in such a vulnerable state?
How could I show her my bare bottom?
Yet somehow, she did it for me, even if it isn’t real,
                                                                                but I’m most afraid now,

                                   That I’m the one who made the mistake.

How could she forgive me
         For being so hesitant,
                    For having these thoughts?

I asked,
            “Why would I trust her or me for that matter
                                Knowing full well that I can be betrayed?”
And the prophet said,
                                   “You trust people
                                          because you’re courageous.”

                                   No,
                                         no I am not,
                                              I am not courageous or valiant or noble.
I can still recall moments I thought I loved a girl
             But it went like the wiping of cleaning spray off a window,
I can’t trust my feelings,
I can’t trust anything.
                                                    Who could guide me through this rupturing sea

To the harbour where I may dock my ship for eternity?

“Sometimes in our life
we all have pain,
we all have sorrow
But if we are wise,
we know that there's
always tomorrow.”

This turbulence tires me

                                   But I dare not show it.

My conscience says, “Commitment and trust requires faith,

                                            when the hell have you shown it?”

I don’t know.

                                                “Then why go on like this?

Afraid of learning about a new world?”

I still remember my sad love letter
And how I was rejected and the air
Became electric with awkwardness between her and I,
And how I went home to bitter tears
Next to the light of my lamp
Wetting my pillowcase.

“You were a fool then,

                                                                                you’ve grown,
                                                    you know women,
                      you know yourself,
as Sun Tzu said it is the knowledge of enemy and army that guarantees victory.”
The prophet says,
                             “Don’t delude yourself more than is absolutely necessary.
                                              The truth shall set you free.”

           Freedom,
                            it’s like a storm
                            But I know if someone would just
                          Take my hand
                            I could get through it.
The prophet says, “That only occurs when you love something
                                              More than you love yourself.”
Have I ever dared to open myself up
To love?
And if I did,
                                                            would I ever do it again?
What is the meaning of trust,
Of commitment?
To know that the hurricane
Could pick you up
And bury you into boulders
As you try to protect the tree,
It is courage
That emanates from your open chest
Assaulted by air-slicing pressure.
Until you love something more than you love yourself
You’ll never grow that sapling
To the iron-bark spruce that will withstand
Any test of nature.

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The formatting is weird because I do it in google docs.

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Link to that is here for a better perception of the form it is in: https://docs.google.com/document/d/1f__4...QPsGupUEjg

[Mostly Holy]

This is fascinating and bizarre, both in a good and bad way. I want to start by saying I rather loved this, so I hope you take my criticisms as they are intended, because I do have quite a few.

First and most obvious, the formatting is not helping. In fact it is extremely distracting, and often seems unmotivated. The visual impression is of a partially preserved text, with most of the content lost to time and only fragments left to puzzle out the meaning, which is interesting without the additional size and bolding variations, whihc do not seem to add very much. The poem is interesting enough without visual gimmicks, in fact I think they detract from the poem itself.

In terms of structure, I cannot see any. There is no obvious rhythm or meter, it reads like a stream of consciousness scream into the void. There is nothing wrong with this, Ginsberg's "Howl" is one of the best poems ever written and it hates structure and meter almost as much as your poem does, but if you are going to forgoe structure you have to impart a sense of progression or motion in your poem, otherwise it becomes chaotic and static. You repeat the same essential point multiple times. The narrator wants love, but is afraid. It is fine to repeat, but you have to intensify to keep the readers interest, otherwise the repetitions merely blunt the effect and eventually bore. This may be intentional, but it is still exhausting. I would suggest trimming the fat and picking some emotional beats to escalate and advance as the poem progresses

The themes are deep and complex, love and trust, nihilism vs hope, self doubt and jealousy, all good fodder for a poem. Your imagery is striking and original. "her see-through stomach / Allowed me to envision something, / A tree / wrapped / in white string / In / Upwards / a / pattern / circular / Inside of her" is a horrifying and wonderful image, if rather awkwardly phrased, and there are many other interesting and unexpected images that I really enjoyed.

The poem's emotion feels real and raw, lines like "Is unity horror or beauty, or could it be / that I decide that answer?" go to the very core of the paradox of romance, of losing oneself inside another in order to be fully ourselves. 

The literary references are unexpected, I am not sure if they are a positive or negative, they are certainly eclectic even if a little messy.

Speaking of messy, you have a LOT going on here. That is great, but you risk drowning out your own message. I would suggest picking a dominant metaphor and developing it, rather than moving between metaphors about trees, the wind, oceans, dreams, etc. A metaphor developing over time will keep your reader on track even without any structure to guide them, throwing multiple metaphors in quick succession is more likely to confuse

All in all I really liked this, once I copied it into a text editor and formatted it so I could read it without a headache. The best parts are when you anchor it in the personal, like the dream about the woman (that line about the see-thru stomach is the line of the poem), the part about the awkward rejected love letter, “And how I went home to bitter tears / Next to the light of my lamp / Wetting my pillowcase.” and the part about the tree needing salvation “I must find that tree and / Shield its leaves from the gusts. / Allow sunlight like a blessing / To be its salvation". Not coincidentally, these are also the most honest and most personal parts of the poem. More of this, please, and less of the airy philosophy and idiosyncratic formatting

[plsgoawaywhoisthis]

hey oden! heres my piece of cake, if you'd like it:
– tighten the dream sequence. the transition from the girl and the tree to the “dirty beach house” happens a bit abruptly. maybe add a single bridging line that connects the intimacy of the dream to the confusion of waking up. it would help keep the reader grounded.
– simplify some of the punctuation and spacing. the scattered layout adds rhythm, but sometimes it distracts. for example, “in upwards / a pattern” could be condensed to “in an upwards circular pattern” to keep the visual focus on meaning, not spacing.
– rethink the explicit detail (“her bare butt naked towards me”). it’s vivid, but it might push the reader out of the moment. softening it or focusing on emotion instead of the body could make the vulnerability feel more universal and less physical.
– watch for over-explaining. lines like “you might think this is funny” or “but throughout his stories / there’s a blatant sense of romance” sometimes tell the reader what to think instead of letting the images do the work. try trusting the imagery more.
– make the prophet voice clearer. when the “prophet” starts speaking, the tone shifts strongly but without warning. maybe introduce the voice earlier or give it a clearer purpose — like representing conscience, wisdom, or fear.
– consider trimming repetition. the questions about courage, trust, and love repeat often (“am i courageous?”, “could i love again?”). keeping only the strongest instances would make those moments hit harder and feel less circular...
– end with more restraint. the final stanza is powerful, but maybe stop one or two lines earlier — the “iron-bark spruce” image is strong enough to close on its own.