Poetry Forum

i grab your mechanical fingers
meet your electric gaze
you tell me of the world
and calculated ambitions
i tell you of my dreams
you kiss me with cold lips
and tell me to keep quiet

revised:

i grab your mechanical fingers
meet your electric gaze
you tell me of the world
and calculated ambitions
i share with you my dreams
you kiss me with cold lips
and leave me in silence

mechanical/electric/calculated nicely led to 'cold', but the concluding line is less interesting/ambitious:

and tell me to keep quiet

perhaps

and I know to keep quiet

or

and all will be kept quiet

cheers

mac

Your leading of the reader works well, and fleshes narrator/narrators out just right.

The last line bothered me too, I think it could benefit from better word choice.

With care I also think you could get rid of some of the repetition within the poem, for instance there is the word
Tell written 3 times within those 7 lines, the word And is also written 3 times.

all the best...David

thank you two very much for the critique! i've made some changes, what do you think of the new ending line?

best regards art

Hi Arty,

I'm not sure if that last line means, "And leave me silently," or "And leave me silent." (Who is silent?)

I'm trying to understand why you are bound to this person--why grab the fingers? Why hang around? The relationship could work for me if the "you" is a parent, perhaps. Perhaps the "I" is perceived by the parent as the ordinary one?

Thanks for this-
Jackie

Jackie wrote:Hi Arty,

I'm not sure if that last line means, "And leave me silently," or "And leave me silent." (Who is silent?)

I'm trying to understand why you are bound to this person--why grab the fingers? Why hang around? The relationship could work for me if the "you" is a parent, perhaps. Perhaps the "I" is perceived by the parent as the ordinary one?

Thanks for this-
Jackie

hey jackie, i think it means "and leave me silent", but both could work
it's not really conveyed in the poem so i can see why you don't understand - although the "you" sees the world in a fixed way and "mechanically" follows the norm, she is a sweet girl, and that's why the "i" hangs around her, the ordinary one. i think your parent perspective makes good sense as well

thanks for your interest! best regards art

and leave me in silence

'leave' is too passive. 'seal me in silence'...anyway worth working on

cheers

mac