Log in

View Full Version : Time is Money (A Fragment)



Waldo
04-01-2012, 02:15 AM
Noon slumbers silently, the struts of skyscrapers: the city, and sidewalks under the blue day—lazily lights lifting the long clouds, the white wisps that waft overhead under the oval glance of the sun, and luminous lies the lanes where streetcars pass by in flash, fleeting away farther from their last second: Cause…

Time is money /the voice of her father, far off, found sound in the thought—but it turned, and her tone tugged her thoughts out, so that the mute words-never-worded met her mind as hers: hers solely, separate from Salvatore, her father.

…And that’s why. Why the cars flash by—places to go people to see /sounded like him, he said that once as he left, and closed the door; and was that a gun she saw for a moment in the light? maybe—hurrying on, like sharks. If you stop you die—had her mother stopped?; is that why she was dead every day since six years back, when her head came in box: too young, a small girl with tears down her cheek, but old, old enough to know and yet not know; she was young enough to cry into her father’s shoulders, to be frightened about the whole thing she couldn’t grasp, but old enough to know her mother died a few days back (six years, and more, ago now as she walked towards Bennet Tower) and wouldn’t live any day after that: wouldn’t hug her any day after, wouldn’t comfort an old-young girl buried in her father’s shoulder, sharp sputtering sobs, it was a warm damp against his jacket tear-stained; and then he left, maybe with a gun, she wasn’t sure, but he had places to go and people to see: so the door closed, and she cried without him—so never stop.

Her cheeks are dry now, never wet unless in the rain when it pours torrents, and her mother died six years back—six years and more /it sounded farther back said and thought that way, more distant: like a bad dream that makes you wet the bed at 3 but fades from your life ever after—so she was strong: her legs strode proud each step, and the cars flashed by under the noon-face sun, never stopping.

She would move, like sharks: time is money; places to go people to see—that’s why she wouldn’t falter: falter, stop, and die. She wouldn’t.

The traffic light was green, turned red, and the sun-flung flash of passing cars stopped.

Waldo
04-01-2012, 02:16 AM
I'm not a big fan of the excessive alliteration at the beginning, but overall what do you guys think?

Alexander III
04-02-2012, 06:43 AM
I will be brutaly honest. The first paragraph will cause 80% of people to stop reading. Descriptive prose/verse is sublime when one pulls it off, but in the majority of cases it fails and it is horrid on the point of being ridiculous. You need to re write and re wrirte, and cut down on the description, remember each word should be seen as a unique god in the pantheon of your poem. Give each word the weight of a god and 374 of them will be found to be superflous.

But yes, you have potential, also I know no one has responded, but dont take that personaly. The forums can be a lot like Italian politics, if you doont have any friends you wont get anywhere, first its who you know then its what your write. Comment on others writings try and make friends and then people will look at your writing.

frontlip.eu
04-04-2012, 07:41 AM
I don't want to be negative but I have to agree with Alex III. The first paragraph is off-putting.

But don't be disheartened. Work at rewriting it until you get something you're happy with

Jay