Electrotopia

[JaneMarie]

You do not know.
You can not see me,
the curve of my chest,
the light of my yellow eyes,
It is not for you.
Pillowed by the vacuous,
Dominated by the Self-obsessed,
Our precious humanity,
Gathers like cattle,
Monadically joined.
Anonymity gives comfort,
when I'm alone in your herd.
I stare aimlessly,
Equally disconnected from reality,
Into an electronic delusion of lazy indifference,
Where the truth can be written and still fall on death ears.
A new evolution,
Purges all that we were,
diminishing our senses,
It draws focus,
From what we could be.
Joined together,
We are now obsolete.

[deryk]

Alternatively, you could use the binary code to form partial shapes of the words, but that might come off as too contrived.

[hillwalker]

I understand the message behind this I believe - the loss of individuality through the Big Society's attempts to treat us all as members of the one 'herd'.

A couple of queries - 'monadically' - did you mean 'nomadically' ? and should 'death ears' be 'deaf ears' ?

It's quite an arresting piece.

H

[JaneMarie]

I actually wrote it about the effects of technology on our lives and how our reliance on computers is slowly making people less capable while simultaneously irradicating individuality (via Facebook and the like).

A monad is a single unit.

Yes, I should have written deaf ears not death ears.

[Delta40]

gathers like cattle is a very effective line.

[blank|verse]

I liked the title of this poem, JaneMarie, suggesting this 'electronic utopia' and there is some interesting thinking behind this, in what is a decent first post; but I found it all a bit too direct and lacking in poetry - it reads more as just a series of statements. See if you can give more thought to the form of the poem as well as just its content.

[JaneMarie]

gathers like cattle is a very effective line.

I was thinking about this line today... It doesn't really fit. It doesn't work with what I am trying to say...it's too natural, too peaceful, not noisy enough, and lacks in dependence. I mean, the cattle gather together because it is comfortable, not because they are useless alone or inefficient. I think that maybe some sort of classic assembly line equipment would be better...or maybe some sort of stationary machinery that does a simple useful task when combined other more useful machines but more or less useful alone. .... It would have to be something no longer useful. That way the last line could be a sort of reflection on mention of whatever sort of machine it was...

Anyway, thanks for sparking the thought.

[Jack of Hearts]

As an aside, all of philosophy started because some guy only had a monad. It didn't make him any less of a man, though (referring, of course, to Thales and water).

An interesting poem but where'd the binary go? ePrivacy is a hot issue at the moment and the poem is relevant and well done.





J