My 1984 Found Poem

I have created a found poem for 1984. A found poem uses direct quotes only to make a poetic statement. I made mine to show the relationship between Winston and O'Brien. I hope you like it, post your comments here.

O’Brien and Winston
By Paul Stintzi

'We shall meet in the place where there is no darkness.'
It was O'Brien who had spoken to him out of the dark.
Winston had never been able to feel sure
Whether O'Brien was a friend or an enemy.
Winston knew that O'Brien was on his side.
O'Brien, for whom, or to whom, the diary was written.
'We shall meet in the place where there is no darkness,'
He knew what it meant, or thought he knew.
With a flickering hope,
O'Brien might know that he had been arrested.
O'Brien and the razor blade.
In the Ministry of Love there were no windows,
The lights would never be turned out.
It was the place with no darkness.
O'Brien came in.
They've got you too!
'They got me a long time ago,' said O'Brien,
Mild, almost regretful irony.
Broad-chested guard with a long black truncheon in his hand.
You did know it -- you have always known it.
Yes, he saw now, he had always known it.
All he had eyes for was the truncheon in the guard's hand.
It was O'Brien who was directing everything.
He who set the guards on to Winston,
And who prevented them from killing him.
O'Brien was looking down at him gravely and rather sadly.
Winston’s body was held down at every essential point.
He was strapped into a chair surrounded by dials.
An oblong slip of newspaper.
It exists!
It was vanishing in a flash of flame.
It exists in memory,
'I do not remember it,' said O'Brien.
That was doublethink.
A slight movement of O'Brien's hand,
A wave of pain flooded Winston’s body
A needle slid into Winston's arm.
He had never loved O’Brien so deeply as at this moment.
O'Brien was a person who could be talked to.
O'Brien had tortured him to the edge of lunacy.
He would send him to his death.
It made no difference.
Shall I tell you why we have brought you here?
To cure you! To make you sane!
His mind contained Winston's mind.
But in that case how could it be true that O'Brien was mad?
It must be he, Winston, who was mad.
There was a devastating explosion,
Or what seemed like an explosion,
Winston was not hurt, only prostrated.
There was a large patch of emptiness,
As though a piece had been taken out of his brain.
What country is Oceania at war with?
I don't remember.
Oceania is at war with Eastasia. Do you remember that now?
Yes.
O'Brien held up the fingers of his left hand, with the thumb concealed.
There are five fingers there. Do you see five fingers?
Yes.
Then everything was normal again.
'You see now,' said O'Brien, 'that it is at any rate possible.'

'Yes,' said Winston.
A needle jerked into Winston's arm.
He sank almost instantly into deep sleep.
O'Brien walked into the cell.
What are your true feelings towards Big Brother?
I hate him.
'Room 101,' he said.


Quotes taken from George Orwell’s 1984

I wanted to describe the relationship between O’Brien and Winston at the end of the book. I selected the lines that I did because they were descriptive and somewhat powerful and helps you understand what O’Brien did to Winston. I wanted to arrange the lines in a type of pattern and tried to keep to a Short:Long:Short:Long pattern but sometimes I gradually made them smaller or larger. I hoped that by arranging the lines in this poem the way I did would increase the effect that my poem has on the reader.

*I hope you liked it!*