Fortune Cookie

[Milu]

Quite frankly, I had to work up a lot of courage to post on here. There are so many talented people! I have been messing around with free-verse/prose style, and I wanted some C&C, so I can see if it's viable or just stupid and pretentious. Someday I dream of writing like Elizabeth Bishop and Robert Lowell, but I think I just come off as their angry baby. So without further ado:

"Fortune Cookie"

Cockroaches lined up at my door
since I sprayed it the previous night.
I felt sadistic in a certain sense,
(one could describe it
as a schadenfreudian delight.)

Here they were lined up at the finish line;
Joyously they embraced, making it through the final stretch.
With happiness they wept, only to fall asleep
Never to wake up again.

I like to lay in my bed and think.
It makes me feel special, like I'm one of those thinkers.
Everyone thinks they're a thinker
thinking they're edgy
just because they just read too much Catcher In The Rye.
I hate those kinds of people, I guess I hate myself too.

I had a half-awake dream the other day.
The world had evolved into a civilization
where machines could run on happiness.
Naturally, everyone took medicine to be happy,
but then they got pissed when they realized it was heroin.
Taking heroin kind of sucks (or at least one would think).

I listen to lots of bands that have joy in their name
(Joy Division, Joy Formidable, Joy Wants Eternity)
All of it seems to be pretty damn depressing.
I guess those who are furthest from joy desire it the most.

I used to dream of being a fortune cookie writer.
I would dispense knowledge like a well,
only it would be an angry tainted well that made people less complacent.
Needless to say, people weren't looking for an angry dystopian masturbatory fantasy in their cookie.
I don't blame them

…..Well, maybe sometimes I do.

[JohnLott]

Hi Milu,

On the downside:

".....as a schadenfreudian delight.)" ........not sure schadenfreude stretches to an –ian adjective

"...Never to wake up again" .... why cap?

"....I like to lay in my bed and think" ..........lie in my bed

I think heroin is a false god here because the happiness does not survive the long haul 24/7/52.


On the upside:

Easy to read and I think it is a very good 1st attempt.
Very interesting thoughts and connections.



J.

[Milu]

Thanks for the corrections! I always hate the tenses of "lay" and "lie," too darn confusing. Plus if I say "lie in bed," people might think I am just being mean to a boyfriend. Lol.

Also, yeah. I looked up "schadenfreudian," apparently it can also mean a silk crepe used for blouses. Maybe I am wrapped in a silk crepe of despair? (not really, I will rework it and fix it).

Thank you very much for the fast and helpful critique.

[Nash]

Hello Milu,

I think that you may be trying to give us too much here, there could be two or three good poems in here fighting to get out.

I get that you're going for a stream of consciousness type of thing, but it reads a bit like a first draft to me. When I get a bit of a block I'll quite often write something in this way and then sift through it and pick out the nuggets to polish up into poems.

I'd pick out the cockroach part and the fortune cookie part (which I really quite like the idea of) and elaborate on them.

Just my opinion though.

Look forward to reading more,
Nash.

[Milu]

Thank you for picking up on that! I've been really conflicted lately. I keep trying to mess around with stream of consciousness stuff, but I'm not sure if I'm putting too many concepts into a poem. I've mostly been trying to mess around with different types of writing trying to find my own form. I think I am going to practice going balls to the walls crazy, but trying to make it stick to one concept. I really wanted to practice writing something like Sunk Hour (http://people.virginia.edu/~sfr/enam312 ... owell.html), but even then it had an over arching theme.

So yes, I shall work on it. ^__^

[Nicky B]

Hi Milu,

I'm afraid I agree with Nash. For me there is just too much here. But also like Nash I see real potential in some of it. The fortune cookie lines made me laugh out loud!

I like the idea of the stream of conciousness. I recently met a bloke who does it really well, his name suddenly escapes me. But I think for most it's best to use it as a tool to create a load of material which can then be crafted into a poem, or poems.

Good luck with it - I'll look forward to reading more!

Nicky B.

[Jonny.H]

Hi Milu

I think other comments are right there is a lot going on in this poem, possibly too much, on the other hand I love fortune cookie as the title and It’s quite disturbing to then find cockroaches in the first stanza when you’re expecting to read about food (in a good way though.)

'In a certain sense', I think this could be worded better, there’s something not quite right about it
And schadenfreudian seems a little forced. I’d take out the brackets too

I like the flow of the second stanza. On a purely rhythmic basis, it works much better than the opening stanza.

I don’t like ‘read too much Catcher in the Rye’ try, ‘read Catcher in The Rye too many times’ or simply ‘read Catcher in The Rye’ instead?

“I had a half-awake dream the other day.
The world had evolved into a civilization
where machines could run on happiness.
Naturally, everyone took medicine to be happy,
but then they got pissed when they realized it was heroin.
Taking heroin kind of sucks (or at least one would think)”

I don’t know what’s going on here. It’s a bit mad!

The idea of machines using our happiness as fuel is a bit far out but I guess it could work if you put a little bit more thought into it. Drop the heroin stuff maybe? And just concentrate on the idea of machinery/technology absorbing/impacting on human happiness.

The pop culture references are quirky and I think they work quite well.

"angry dystopian masturbatory fantasy in their cookie." That is too much of a rant.

Plus, “I used to dream of being a fortune cookie writer” is a lovely line and what follows it needs to be more thoughtful and subtle.

There's some interesting stuff going on in there, it just needs untangling and re-drafting.



Jonny

[Nicky B]

Milu,

I remembered his name: Steve Spence

www.stevespencepoetry.com

I saw him read recently and was really impressed by one of his stream of conciousness-type pieces.

Enjoy!

Nicky B.

[Milu]

Holly crap you guys are awesome! Thank you so much for looking at my stuff. I will definitely rework some stuff, and try to get better at polishing. Thanks!