I liked this - not sure whether the subscriber is actually speaking to the operator (do they really still have telephone operators in the US?) or to herself and the 'wailing' of the dialling tone.
H
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I liked this - not sure whether the subscriber is actually speaking to the operator (do they really still have telephone operators in the US?) or to herself and the 'wailing' of the dialling tone.
H
Pithy and dark night of the soulish...reminds me of that old song by Jim Croce. A good'un as usual, Haunted.
Lonely.
I like the element of confusion in this. It suits this tale of desperate loneliness
I hear ya, Mary, sigh.
Dieter, I recycle trash :wink5: It's great to know that you find the rewrite better.
Hill, amazingly (some) phone companies haven't totally abandoned us yet, they still have operators on their land lines. Also most businesses do if you survive the endless loop of menus. I usually just press 0 randomly and if I'm lucky I get an operator. But yeah, it's an internal dialogue in many ways. I didn't even realize the dial tone resembles wailing, you are brilliant :=D
Qim, I know Jim Croce's voice but not familiar with his music. Do you know the name of the song? Thanks for your comment as always.
Jerry, lonely indeed. Thanks for the read.
Fire, so glad it works for you. I value your comments. Thanks!
Night & Day
that's us
we NEVER see
eye to eye
all except
that one moment
every day
when we meet
each other
halfway
face to face
nose to nose
until we fuse
into one climactic
flushed Sunset
Love the spareness of this, the absence of pushiness in it!
Cryptic but filled with so much promise.
I just wonder whether the "will" in L7 is essential to the message in this poem - if not you might consider removing it to smooth the final few lines' gentle flow to its conclusion
(or possibly making it "we'll").
H
Hill, I agree "will" gets in the way and I removed it.
If it's cryptic it's because it's not written all that well and I just revised it. I wanted to write about the magical daytime and nighttime border on the globe as the earth turns (Day —> Sunset <— Night). At the same time I want to draw a parallel that people (couple) who are opposites of each other can meet each other halfway—perhaps.
Prince, I hope I didn't muck it up too badly and spoil the spareness.
I too read it as cryptic at first when the light was blinding. Exposed in the dawn looking in all the wrong places. x
a brief and meaningful piece
I love the title, the last 3lines. end with forceful
well-done. haunted
ooooops - wrong thread!
Quote:
Originally Posted by hillwalker
Haha, I am wondering , how, did you do that?
Trying to post a new poem in someone else's thread!!! and trying to do two things at once.Quote:
Originally Posted by yuka
H
Thanks Yuka for your kind words!
Jerry, that cryptic word again. I guess not everyone shares my meteorological obsession and the concept that sunset is when day and night get together is a bit lame. Sigh.
Hill, you left your flippers here :D I'll go down to the Water after I'm done with the half dozen clams on the half shells.
honesty
there are days
I doubt you
and I love you less
if you were hurt
I don’t owe
any apologies
I would walk away
take the next Amtrak
and wake up in a new state
truth is
seeing your eyes again
in the morning
is the only reason
to open mine
honesty. what a sad truth! so dependent and yet able to exile oneself emotionally if need be as a matter of survival. Is this the essential difference between honesty and truth? whatever it is, you've captured something thought provoking in your poetic net Haunted.
I'm not sure whether you mean us to read these as two separate poems or as two phases of the one relationship? Somehow the difference between them is too extreme for the 2nd interpretation... and there's something that doesn't quite work for me in the second stanza of the first half. Surely there ought to be a "you" after I don't owe?
And how economical each of the two halves is.
Delta, you see so much more deeply than I felt capable with my words. There's certainly a sense of codependency happening here. I had to choose between "self exile" and "sanity", both a technique in survival. Thank you for your insight, you made the poem seem worthy.
Hey Haunted I may be looking at this one differently. But I feel it could either mean two things. The end of one relationship and the start of a new one. Or, what the reader is trying to portray, is mixed emotions of the relationship he/she is in at the time. Anyway whatever the message, you've manage to do it again. Keep us on our toes. :)
Well done my friend.
read it as it is the honesty of expressing feeling and the underlying truth that sometimes the all you can do is go on loving. simple understated and poetic.
J x
Prince, Mary, thanks for your comments. It's one relationship, one poem. It speaks of the many feelings in a relationship that conflict with each other, just as you surmised Mary. In that respect I guess it may appear to be separate poems.
Thank you Jerry!
I sense the narrator is torn between facing the truth and giving in to her heart :wanting to cut all ties when acknowledging the flaws in this relationship, yet unable to let go due to the overwhelming love she still feels for him.
And it's neatly encapsulated here.
H
Hill, you just sized it all up. Should I even be surprised coming from you? : )
Prince, I forgot to put in "you" in S2 but then it seems cleaner and universal in a sense. So I decided to leave it out.
Jerry, I re-read your comment, it's so eloquent like I don't deserve it. Thanks again :D
the real me
I am the knock
on their door
they ignore
I am the voice
on their phone
they hang up on
I am somebody
@something.com
they delete
I am a 100 pixels
by 73 pixels avatar
nothing more.
Oh Haunted. I hope you don't actually feel this way!
Secondly as a poem you use the sounds of existence and the technology of existence to your advantage to diminish the real you. Very effective and it hits home to me straight away.
Sound of 1 st stanza tried to avoid someone at the front, the rest of it remind me of have photo taken but really does not want to have taken.
Sorry just re reading the poem. I also hope you don't feel that way to. You have home and family here. xxxxxxx
God, this is surely close to the bleakest of the poems you've written & posted - but your confidence in handling this very terse form just grows and grows!
Thanks Zoo and Prince.
Delta, true that, from real life to cyberspace. sigh.
I missed this because it was buried in the basement of the previous towerblock - but having retreated one page there you were. And as bleak and regretful as this reads - at least it got noticed, so your efforts were worthwhile. As are the efforts of reading your poetry.
H
You are HAUNTED. Screw them all . But you know that :D x
Hill, thanks for hauling it out of the basement, hope it was worthwhile for you too.
yes Jerry, with a driver :D Cheers
Your value is splashed all over the recent history of this classless society of ne'er do wells :D
translation please (too much screwdriver in my noodle)
Haunted, it's maybe because I feel somewhat weak and shaken at the moment (after a ghastly ex re-contacted me some days ago – a two-hour-phone-conversation too gruesome for words) but 'honesty' hit me in a tender spot, almost made my eyes water. You painted with so little and simple words a whole world in which I recognize so much of myself that it nearly hurts. When I was living with my ex (it lasted 13 years), I had that tendency to give up who and what I was for my Significant Other. I felt that 'seeing your eyes again/in the morning/is the only reason/to open mine'. When it was over (the creep had a sideway affair going on for months before I discovered it and left), I suppose you can imagine the pain, the feel of loss, the world crumbling down. I find all of these in your precious lines.
'The real me' is excellent, too; yet it appeals more to my head, less to my feelings ('honesty' was like an emotional hit with a hammer on my head!).
Dieter, I'm touched by what you said and how much you relate to "honesty", means a lot to me. xo
#345 is one of your better pieces. I say this because unless there is explicit evidence to the contrary, I try never to confuse the "I" of the poem, the speaker, with
its author. This piece works because it is expressed artfully (each stanza or "strophe) begins with the same phrase, "I am," it depicts an individual against the inroads of an extremely superficial, technological society, but most of all it's effective because rather than an amorphous, overly "personal" journal entry, it is actually "about" something specific.
All this gobbledy-gook above ^ is just to say that you've done a good job with this particular poem.
Aunt, it's a pleasure to read your thoughtful gobbledy-gook. I walk a fine line between fiction and autobiography. But in this last one it really is me. :(
Hi Haunted, Sorry, been neglecting you a bit. Really liked your last two offerings but have a couple of suggestions to run by you.
In Honesty I would recommend dropping the last line of S3. By doing this you'd leave the statement open and give state a double meaning. It would also even the stanzas out so that they are all three lines. For this reason I'd also tweak the last one. try:
"To see your eyes every moring
is the only reason
I open mine"
Lastly I'd drop the italics on truth is.
The Real Me
The only thing I'd suggest here is changing the indefinate article to the definate in the first two strophes. Economical and effective poem.
Best, H
Hawk, so glad you are back and with a bagful of suggestions no less! I'm guilty of the same but never for a lack of interest in reading the poetry here.
In honesty it is supposed to be a double meaning, so I dropped the last line as you said. I'm holding on to the word "again" in the last stanza, it implies a bit of codependency and for that reason I'm also leaving the bold/ital emphasis for "truth is"
In the real me you are absolutely right about the article.
thanks so much!