Poetry Forum

He lies under stars and leaves
on a lone tree imprisoned by concrete
Engulfed by gray hair and broken glass,
he’s eaten by eyes of occasional passers-by

You roll to work in tonnes of steel
Merging into a stream of ants,
you gaze upon the solitary man
enjoying the perks you’ll never feel

and from a mountain of hogged esteem
you toss him a coin
By the foot he kneels,
obliviously fishing in the cold stream

HI artr.
The word choice here comes across as pretty wooden.
More freshness needed to avoid well worn thought. I.E merging into "stream of ants"
The man is "layed" beneath "stars" yet people are going to work and "noticing him" that seems slightly odd to me, I know people do go to work when the "stars" are out, but still.

The "tossing of the coin" and being at that point in a "tonne of steel" does not gel for me.

I like the thought of the last line....seeya...

hi david, thanks for your comment - in my mind, the poem isn't set in time as such, it's just a portrait of two people

best regards art

I'd quite like to see this with (a) a bit more rhyme and (b) the form regularised. I'm just a formal kind of guy, I suppose, but I think it would be interesting.

Cheers

David (another one)

Art,

This has some really good visual details, and I liked the neat way you inserted that the passers-by consume N when they look at him (eaten by) and that when you act, you consume his esteem as well (hogged).

However, the line enjoying the perks you’ll never feel seemed out of place to me--preachy, and with the viewpoint skewed.

Thanks for the read,
Jackie

I enjoyed the read. I too wonder if you could make the first stanza rhyme as the other two do. At the moment the rhyme scheme for the last two stanzas looks like a bit of an after thought, rather than something integral from the start. but on the whole it's a very good poem I think.

I'm quite confused by this to be honest.

I thought the 'solitary man' was a statue of some one famous, but then he kneels... which made me think it was one of those buskers who dress like statues and stand on street corners encouraging people to give them money for standing still.

other than that I quite liked the line

'he’s eaten by eyes of occasional passers-by',

but I have some issue with:
'You roll to work in tonnes of steel
Merging into a stream of ants,'

it works but I think you could make it more interesting, perhaps search around for another way to describe traffic.

Just my thoughts
-Rose

thank you all very much!

david2 - i'll try! i find it difficult to write within a fixed form, it's hard for me not to compromise the picture or message i want to convey, but it's definitely something to work on

jackie - i agree with you, that sentence does seem out of place, but i'm just not sure how else to convey the message that "he" has a freedom, that the "you" doesn't have - i'm open to suggestions

kev - indeed the rhyme scheme was more of an afterthought or a coincidence than a deliberate effort, i'm very glad you enjoyed it!

yesterday - the "he"/the solitary man is supposed to be a homeless man, being looked down upon by the "you", and the ants are in my head supposed to describe how the you assimilates himself with the rest of his kind, i was thinking of a working upper-class briefcase kind-of stereotype (which i think the ant picture supports), in contrast to the "he", who has broken loose of that and is a free man - i hope it makes sense and seems more interesting from that point of view, i agree that it's a dull way to describe traffic

again, thanks a lot for taking the time to post your thoughts, i very much appreciate it!

best regards art

enjoying the perks you’ll never feel

I wonder if you couldn't work on the first stanza a little to bring out that freedom. The first line does it, but then the word imprisoned (even though it's describing the tree) and engulfed and eaten don't give us an image of a man enjoying perks.

Jackie

Ah, I feel a fool. Of course he is... now it suddenly makes so much more sense... Sorry.

Jackie wrote:

enjoying the perks you’ll never feel

I wonder if you couldn't work on the first stanza a little to bring out that freedom. The first line does it, but then the word imprisoned (even though it's describing the tree) and engulfed and eaten don't give us an image of a man enjoying perks.

Jackie

mmmh, it doesn't, i didn't think about that earlier, i'll work on it thanks jackie

Yesterday wrote:Ah, I feel a fool. Of course he is... now it suddenly makes so much more sense... Sorry.

im glad it makes sense it's no problem at all

best regards art

I think it's very much a case of less is more with this one. Verse 2 adds nothing in that it simply states the message of the poem in an all too obvious manner. By cutting it out and tailoring the remainder to focus solely on the images, you'd have a far stronger piece.