Log in

View Full Version : Dystopia



serenity185
10-09-2011, 06:57 PM
Smoke pumping into the sky,
A Gothic Skyline filled with black
*
Black architecture,
Dominating a brooding landscape
*
Clanking cogs grinding,
Making an inhuman scream
*
People walking silently,
In black uniform lines
*
No individuality survives,
Everyone dressed the same, skin pale to the eye
*
Morbidly cold to the touch,
Mere machines
*
Blackness permeating everywhere,
Flesh providing no warmth
*
I dream of what the world could have been like,
Full of colour and life, full of creativity and uniqueness
*
No place to voice my ideas,
Dangerous ideas crushed by those in control
*
Part of one collective mind,
Merely a subjugated citizen
*
By Josh Gibbens

hillwalker
10-10-2011, 11:34 AM
I'm not sure the structure works particularly well - separating each pair of lines the way you do. But if that's your trademark then stick with it.

This puts one in mind of '1984' or 'The Matrix', so it's not easy to come up with something new that's not already been said 100 times before. You do manage a degree of originality towards the end, however, which gives us hope.

There are a couple of places where you replicate an image so that it loses effectiveness - for example the phrase 'a Gothic Skyline' is an unnecessary label to pin on the visions you share with us so early in the poem because all you do afterwards is tell us what a Gothic skyline looks like.
Similarly I would remove the closing pair of lines - the reader gets the message without having it spelled out so directly. Sometimes you have to allow your readers to figure things out for themselves rather than presenting everything on a plate...

but a reasonable effort.

H