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[MaximumZero]

Okay, folks, I've been prompted to put up my stuff from Creative Writing, and here's a rough-draft of a revision (because I'm not taking it any farther than that,) of the very first poem that I wrote for the class (which sucks and as such will not be posted. I'd delete it, but my prof won't let me.) I'm mostly looking for critique. Good parts? Bad parts? The whole thing sucked and I should never write poetry again? I'd like your thoughts, if you please.

Anyway, poem:
____________________________________________________________________________________________________

A Timeline of Grey
[NAME REDACTED]

Break rocks. Dull and saddening.
Chipping, flaking. Learning and thriving.
Shaping, molding.  Sweating and bleeding.
Sharp points. Hunting and surviving.

Hammers ringing sing the song of daily life.
Horseshoes, nails and blades are my fare.
Ash covers my arms, apron and face.
Again and again, this plain iron I repair.

Expressly empowered, endeavoring empirical.
Amazingly amiable, always appealing and affable.
Devilishly devious, devouring desperately disgraceful.
Glittering generously, generally governing greatly gullible.

Screams and lead fill the air as we march forward,
Smoke obscuring suppressive fire from the enemy.
Pressing on with steel in our hands and in our hearts,
May the last bullet of the last war be the one to kill me.

Machines sing praises to man as they churn out imperfection,
Millimeters here and there are good enough for some,
Robotics overwhelming the need for manual pursuit,
Unless humanity is a trait you wish to overcome.

Perhaps someday we will visit the stars,
Exploring worlds and galaxies in giant human flocks.
However more likely is that we will annihilate ourselves,
Those that survive will do so by breaking rocks.

[mendonca]

Some thoughts, please take them with as much salt as you wish.

I've tried to offer thoughts verse by verse, and i don't profess to be any kind of expert, I'll just tell you what I (personally) feel / think whilst reading it.

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

A Timeline of Grey

Break rocks. Dull and saddening.
Chipping, flaking. Learning and thriving.
Shaping, molding.  Sweating and bleeding.
Sharp points. Hunting and surviving.

Makes me think of an older human civilisation. Works really well as a verse in context of the rest of the poem. Something makes me think the rhythm and choice of words could be different, sharper, but maybe not.

Hammers ringing sing the song of daily life.
Horseshoes, nails and blades are my fare.
Ash covers my arms, apron and face.
Again and again, this plain iron I repair.

Stepping forward 1000 years - Blacksmith working? Works well for me, inspires some nice images in my thoughts.

Expressly empowered, endeavoring empirical.
Amazingly amiable, always appealing and affable.
Devilishly devious, devouring desperately disgraceful.
Glittering generously, generally governing greatly gullible.

Alliteration for it's own sake? What does this verse add to the whole poem? Where are we? Grey is missing ... ?

Screams and lead fill the air as we march forward,
Smoke obscuring suppressive fire from the enemy.
Pressing on with steel in our hands and in our hearts,
May the last bullet of the last war be the one to kill me.

Love this verse, especially the last line.

Machines sing praises to man as they churn out imperfection,
Millimeters here and there are good enough for some,
Robotics overwhelming the need for manual pursuit,
Unless humanity is a trait you wish to overcome.

Like the verse in principle, but I wonder if it could do with a few less syllables? Or maybe it's just the 'manual pursuit' phrase that I don't like, personally I find it cumbersome.

Perhaps someday we will visit the stars,
Exploring worlds and galaxies in giant human flocks.
However more likely is that we will annihilate ourselves,
Those that survive will do so by breaking rocks.

Love the way it spins right back to the start. I wonder if this verse would work better if it spoke in a more confident tone about the future? Man 'will' visit the stars ... We 'will' annihilate ourselves ... maybe this approach could be a more dramatic as a finish to the poem ...

My thoughts anyway. Please feel free to ignore, or let me know if you disagree with me.

[MaximumZero]

Sweet, thanks for the feedback. Here's my responses:

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

V1: Yes, this is supposed to be about the Stone Age, so I want it to be somewhat simple.
V2: Bingo. That's exactly what I was looking for.
V3: Renaissance. Alliteration was used in the format of violin strings, as music (Which also offers a ton of variety in tones, even if it's just black ink on white paper) took a huge step forward here. As for the grey, it's supposed to be represented by silver, but I must not have made that clear enough. It's also supposed to be somewhat bourgeois, as the Ren period tended toward excesses.
V4: Glad that you liked it! Strife26 gets credit for the last line, as I stole it from one of his posts.
V5: Line 3 as a whole is a little clunky, but I really don't know what to replace it with.
V6: I'll strengthen up the language to fill it out. Thanks!

[Strife26]

Actually, that line is kinda from Patton.



I like it overall, although I was somewhat colored by the fact that Grey's been an occasionally used RP character of mine for awhile. It seemed to fit him surprisingly well (the character idea was that he's roughly equivalent to the level 100 character in an adventure-action type rpg who is just doing whatever fits his fancy and who goes to lengths not to die; interestingly, Grey was designed as an awfully cynical character, so he'd consider the line about the end of warfare roughly equivalent to saying when pigs fly).

The lsat two groupings could use a bit of work, methinks. They're roughly the same thought and a few of the lines are somewhat clunky (5,1 and 5,2, specificly). It also kinda seems that 5,3 and 5,4 are mixed up, isn't using robotics for everything overturning humanity? I'd consider changing "Unless" to "Is" and ending the grouping with a question mark. I think that 6,3 and 6,4 might want to be reworded becuase they don't fit with the rest of the stress them of the grouping (which goes unstress stress, as far as I'm reading). I'd consider changing visit to revisit and possibly taking out the human flocks section.


Anyway, I did like it overall. Consider if you want the spelling to be grey or gray. The A is the accepted American spelling, while the UK uses the e.