Alcoholic inhibitions

[kevinthediltz]

His words were sweet and convincing
My warnings
Were not enough
To change your mind
As I walked out
Leaving you
With this sweet stranger
Innocence tossed aside as easily as your tank top
The morning wakes with a quiet moan
Head pounding
Sore beneath the sheets
Beneath the belt
Your innocence is forever lost
As is my love
For you,
My love

[alestar89]

I got confused about who's talking here :S

[PrinceMyshkin]

Despite the admirable economy of means, this is a very full poem, a rich one. I'm puzzled however by the switch from the 3rd person of the first lines to the 1st person of the rest of it. If the earlier "he" is a reference to her former lover, perhaps her first ever, I don't see how he is relevant to the 1st person experience.

[kevinthediltz]

This is the first person. Talking to her about how another man took her innocence.

But on second thought. How about I just take away the first two lines?

[PrinceMyshkin]

This is the first person. Talking to her about how another man took her innocence.

But on second thought. How about I just take away the first two lines?

That would remove a major problem, but on re-reading it, I see another: his "alcoholic inhibitions" suggest that she wants to make love but he doesn't... and then he loses or cancels his love for her after she prevails?

[kevinthediltz]

Ok. Im gonna try to clear this up again.
She cheated on the writer of the poem. He tried to stop her. But she woke the next morning with a stranger, and lost the writers love.
Does that make sense?

[kevinthediltz]

I made yet another edit.
Hopefully it helps.

[PrinceMyshkin]

I made yet another edit.
Hopefully it helps.

Yes, it's perfectly clear now - and so sad. I think some readers might doubt the sincerity of his disavowal of love for her at the end - reads more like vindictive spite, which is all right. It gives the poem an ambiguous edge.

[kevinthediltz]

Yes, it's perfectly clear now - and so sad. I think some readers might doubt the sincerity of his disavowal of love for her at the end - reads more like vindictive spite, which is all right. It gives the poem an ambiguous edge.

Thank you for your help prince. It is greatly appriciated.

And yes. The true sincerity of the loss of love is shown by the comma at the end. As if a name for her: my love.

[~Sophia~]

Hi Kevin. The revisions did help to clear things up but I still am left wondering what the alcohol has to do with anything. In my experience, alcohol lessens inhibitions (at least mine lol). Other than my confusion on that part .... fine poem!

[kevinthediltz]

Hi Kevin. The revisions did help to clear things up but I still am left wondering what the alcohol has to do with anything. In my experience, alcohol lessens inhibitions (at least mine lol). Other than my confusion on that part .... fine poem!

The writer was trying to inhibit her. If that makes sense.

[PrinceMyshkin]

Thank you for your help prince. It is greatly appriciated.

And yes. The true sincerity of the loss of love is shown by the comma at the end. As if a name for her: my love.

Yes indeed, the point is well made by the comma, plus the fact that "my love" is there on a line by itself. almost as if it snuck in in spite of you.

But I have to agree with Sophia that the fact that he's acting under alcohol only clouds the issue. Perhaps you want us to infer that he got drunk because of what he sensed she was about to do, but that might be expecting us to read too much into it.

[~Sophia~]

My alcoholic inhibitions
Were not enough

not really, to me it still reads as though the writer was inhibited by alcohol. Perhaps a word other than inhibitions? It's quite possible I am the only person reading it that way so just consider it my two cents. I still like the poem!

[kevinthediltz]

Yet another edit.
What I'm trying to say is that the writer tried to warn her and stop her. While he was entoxicated.

[Sapphire]

I have not read your earlier versions of this poem, and I am not well-read in poetry. But I just wanted to let you know, that (to me) this poem is crystal clear.

I like it. I like the story behind it, and how it is told in a little amount of words.

I imagine it happening in a bar, maybe everybody being in some state of intoxication - not really for any other reason than the fact that they went out that night/evening and the bar was the place to go to.
But that was just the image that popped up in my mind. I also thought of her loosing her innocence in a car, because of the mentioning of a tank top :confused: I take it that does not make much sense to you - but somehow it is what I associate tank tops with (thinking simultaneously about the clothing as the "closer of your tank" (don't know the word for closer, like a lid but you do not use a lid on a car tank, do you?))
Sorry, I am babbling on :redface:

I especially like the ending, with that last repeat of "my love" while it is just been said that the love is gone.

[PrinceMyshkin]

Yet another edit.
What I'm trying to say is that the writer tried to warn her and stop her. While he was entoxicated.

I assume that this is based on an actual event and as is often the case, some detail that felt intrinsic to what was happening has got stuck in your mind - and in the poem. Reality does get in the way of our attempts to make literary art at times. Why, for instance, do you not mention the T-shirt you were wearing at that time, with its logo? Or the light outside the window? Because, I assume, they had no significance, but the fact that you were (semi?) drunk at the time does appear to you to be significant - maybe because in reliving the episode you can't help thinking Maybe if I'd been sober, the result would have been different? Maybe I could have persuaded her to wait for me...

[kevinthediltz]

That is pretty much exactly it. Do you think I should leave this detail out of the poem?

[PrinceMyshkin]

That is pretty much exactly it. Do you think I should leave this detail out of the poem?

Personally, yes, I do, but you've just had a response from someone who likes it as it is now, that is, with the reference to intoxication, so maybe wait & see which way others comment on that issue?

[kevinthediltz]

Thank you prince. Ill see what else comes up as far as comments go.
The reason I wanted the reference to alcohol is because it affected everyone in this poem. And I think it would have much different if there were not alcohol involved.

[kevinthediltz]

My final edit, prince. I hope at least.

[PrinceMyshkin]

My final edit, prince. I hope at least.

Yes, it's a whole lot better, but...

something I should have remarked on before is your characterization of the stranger - her impending lover - as "sweet". Possibly you mean us to understand that you are (painfully) trying to see him as if through her eyes, but there's the possibility that it will be read as sarcasm, which might alienate the sympathy readers might otherwise have for you.

[kevinthediltz]

Ill leave that line up to the reader. Really it would be truthful either way.