Black Bag

[MiltonSatyr]

You open your eyes, but there’s only blackness,
and the warm, spoiled stench
of your dry mouth fills around your head;
your face is needled by the cactus-like fabric.
Lost in the disorienting darkness
you try to remember the last thing
you were doing before this happened.
The fibers taste like a rotting carcass,
and they start to itch the skin of your eyelids.
Your chair-tied wrists and ankles feel red.
You can hear footsteps.
The black bag is raised but there’s only whiteness.

[DarkMage7790]

I guess seeing the light means you are blind? The bit at the end where the bag is raised.

[Pompey Bum]

So it's a beanbag chair? just kidding. Your use of sensory description is effective but a poem that's as intense as this one needs more concrete visual imagery. That along with more assonance and alliteration (and maybe some meter) would put the horror in the readers head where it belongs. (It's only so effective when it stays in yours). A mean critic might ask how exactly your speaker knows what a rotting carcass tastes like, but I don't think I want to know. Hope you get out of the chair!

[DarkMage7790]

I see the chair as a metaphor for the working life of course I am just cynical.

[MiltonSatyr]

So it's a beanbag chair? just kidding. Your use of sensory description is effective but a poem that's as intense as this one needs more concrete visual imagery. That along with more assonance and alliteration (and maybe some meter) would put the horror in the readers head where it belongs. (It's only so effective when it stays in yours). A mean critic might ask how exactly your speaker knows what a rotting carcass tastes like, but I don't think I want to know. Hope you get out of the chair!

Haha, it is a beanbag chair! lol, no. You're right about needing meter. I should have paid more attention to that. I also agree about the assonance (it's my favorite) and alliteration. I very much appreciate how knowledgeable you are and your attention to detail. Thank you for taking the time to read my effort.

[MiltonSatyr]

I guess seeing the light means you are blind? The bit at the end where the bag is raised.

I suppose. I guess, when I was writing this, I was thinking, if a person were to be kidnapped and black bagged, once the bag was removed, the exposure to the immediate light would cause temporary blindness. I also like your interpretation of the chair. Haha I can be pretty cynical as well. Thank you for taking the time to read this piece.

[DarkMage7790]

Keeping writing. I enjoyed it a lot. Maybe the being tied to the chair is a metaphor for being tied to your writing?

[MiltonSatyr]

Keeping writing. I enjoyed it a lot. Maybe the being tied to the chair is a metaphor for being tied to your writing?

Thank you for the encouragement. I'm glad you liked it. I never actually considered that interpretation of the chair. That's very cool. Hopefully, I'll die tied to it. :P

[Shadowlight]

There's an intensity present in your vivid description of a tortuous situation. I think it would have added some intrigue to have added some stanzas of any potential racing thoughts the narrator may have had on why they could possibly be in the situation they were in after the line "you try to remember the last thing
you were doing before this happened." I think an internal digalogue could have revealed how a person would feel in this situation, adding depth. No one is innocent and I wonder what dark secrets could have been bestowed to the reader. Or perhaps the victim is truly a perfectly good person and how would they internally handle the blame.

I was hoping to comment and write a response to your initial offering to the site "Run". It made a substantial impression on me and am sorry not to see it on here anymore. Some friendly LitNet advice, Not every poem that doesnt get responses is worth deleting. If you only seek praise or even just interaction, you may be disappointed during slow spells on here, and you may be quick to leave if that is all you seek. But to have content whether good, bad, or mediocre- there is still something people can derive from them all and you never know when someone may have wanted to comment on them weeks later

[MiltonSatyr]

There's an intensity present in your vivid description of a tortuous situation. I think it would have added some intrigue to have added some stanzas of any potential racing thoughts the narrator may have had on why they could possibly be in the situation they were in after the line "you try to remember the last thing
you were doing before this happened." I think an internal digalogue could have revealed how a person would feel in this situation, adding depth. No one is innocent and I wonder what dark secrets could have been bestowed to the reader. Or perhaps the victim is truly a perfectly good person and how would they internally handle the blame.

I was hoping to comment and write a response to your initial offering to the site "Run". It made a substantial impression on me and am sorry not to see it on here anymore. Some friendly LitNet advice, Not every poem that doesnt get responses is worth deleting. If you only seek praise or even just interaction, you may be disappointed during slow spells on here, and you may be quick to leave if that is all you seek. But to have content whether good, bad, or mediocre- there is still something people can derive from them all and you never know when someone may have wanted to comment on them weeks later

I don't agree with you, respectfully. I think the ambiguity adds more than any internal dialogue would have. But you may be right, and that is something worth considering for my next poems.

In regards to Run, I just didn't like that poem at all. I post on here for critiques, not praise. Though praise is nice, it doesn't help me get better. I appreciate the advice, though. Thank you for taking the time to read this.