At Tescos - edited

[nar]

Also I see nothign wrong with the name Tracey - some cliches are just true - anyways Tracey would seem more obvious then a Lucinda or a Tamara.

Depends.

If it's London . . . .

It's perhaps more accurate to say that the same surname comes up in supermarket staff. Retail inbreeding perhaps.
We had 3 Foxs, 2 Allens, 2 Gormleys and a handful of Hamiltons.

- Neil

[Elphin]

hi sharra

A neatly caught moment and great image of you being wheeled away. My criticism would be that it is over described - I would prefer the language to be more surreal and less conventional. Just to illustrate, here is what I pared it back to.

This morning I stepped outside of urgency.
Teabags in hand, I ignored their pleas
to move and let the conveyor belt continue.

They steered customers to a new till.
A girl named Tracey apologised for my static
behaviour. After they wheeled me away,

strapped in for my own safety, they tried
to peel back my reasons. It was impossible
to explain that all I wanted was to wait a while.

A lot of my omissions could be imagined by the reader workging with the title. Thoughts only...

elph

[brianedwards]

This morning I stepped outside of urgency.
Teabags in hand, I ignored their pleas
to move and let the conveyor belt continue.

They steered customers to a new till.
A girl named Tracey apologised for my static
behaviour. After they wheeled me away,

strapped in for my own safety, they tried
to peel back my reasons. It was impossible
to explain that all I wanted was to wait a while.

That's a terrific edit. Changes the voice completely, of course, but still: terrific.

B.

~

[Sharra]

John, glad you liked it, Nar glad to have inspired you
Elph - love what you've done with this. It's taken it in a very different direction to what I envisaged, but I'm very tempted by what you've done. Of course, that then brings up the question, when does a poem remain mine or become someone elses?
Sharra
xx

[Mic]

I was thinking that very same thing just now. Hmmm. Tricky one.

[stuartryder]

Hi Sharra

Maybe I was just being too contrary, but something was missing from this in the human perspective, then I read it as the told by the barcode scanner deciding to conk out, and it seemed to make a lot more sense.

I would also prefer to see more visible form. It seemed to be a little loose.

Cheers

Stuart

[Sharra]

Cue for everyone to say how much better the first version was...
edited version posted
Sharra
xx

[Arian]

Hi Sharra, OK, I’ll be first up on V2.
For me, V1 has clear edge. There’s a narrative flow about it which is missing in V2 – to my ear, the triplet form otf the revision implies logical distance between the various stages of the story which aren’t there. The continuity of V1 was better. Still, both versions capture nicely that feeling most of us have from time to time of disconnection and dislocation from the trivialities of everyday life.

Two pleas from the heart:
1. Reinstate tracey – she doesn’t deserve to be fired
2. Pleeeeeese lose that bloody crescendoed/crescendoing. Horrid word.

Good stuff, though
peter

[ray miller]

I thought the original format looked better without all the line breaks.I also think Tracey was more apt, Amber would work at Waitrose.Don't think that the 5th stanza is helping any and I don't even know what a bogof is!

[Arian]

BOGOF - buy one get one free, ray.

cheers
peter

[brianedwards]

I prefer the original Sharra . . . sorry. The flow, the cadence, the line breaks. . . Glad to see the back of Tracey though.

I'm still listening.

B.

~

[Elphin]

Original format I think Sharra.

Triplets are too ordered for this rather mad moment.

elph

[Sharra]

bah!


Thanks for looking anyway
Sharra
xx

[emuse]

Sharra, Brian hit the nail on the head. In my mind this poem is heavy with symbolism. It speaks to me of the pressures of our modern life and the paraellel beneath the images is the woman carted away to the insane aslyum. Here she is tring to get out of it--out of the que and the stress and the factory chain of life. I love the line about the static

A girl named Tracey apologised for my static

This to me is brilliant. It sets the reader up to objectify the unknown -- how another can take control of a life--or make one look less than they are simply by inferring that one's actions are questionable or irrational.

I'll be back to this but I want you to know I feel you've accomplished what you wanted. I will be back for further thoughts.

Cheers,

e

[Raisin]

I read this before and thought it was great, with a brilliant, almost sinister undertone with your comparisons of Tesco and insanity. Now I think the re-write is even better, with the best bits maintained but with a steadier pace (in my opinion )

Thanks for the read,

Raisin

[brianedwards]

OK, here's a thought from the left field: change the title and strip away the last 3 stanzas.

And I couldn't explain why

This morning I took a step outside
the urgency of the queue and stopped.
The complaints behind me crescendoed,

but I ignored their demands to move,
to let the conveyor belt continue
regurgitating wine and TV dinners.

They fenced me in with trolleys, steered
customers to a new till, where a girl named Amber
apologised for my static behaviour.




B.

~

[Sharra]

e & Raisin - glad you liked it, thanks for the postive comments
Brian - I love that rewrite - like Elphin's earlier it is oh so tempting to adopt it - but then who's poem is it? Thanks for the thoughts
Sharra
xx

[brianedwards]

e & Raisin - glad you liked it, thanks for the postive comments
Brian - I love that rewrite - like Elphin's earlier it is oh so tempting to adopt it - but then who's poem is it? Thanks for the thoughts
Sharra
xx

Hell, Sharra, of course its yours. Rumours have it that Pound was responsible for at least 50% of The Waste Land, but whose poem is that?

B.

~

[ray miller]

The poem could belong to Sharon, who could also be the shop-girl.

[Ros]

Think the idea of stripping it down, via elph or brian's ideas, is good. Less is more, and all that, and it makes it more surreal, which this needs. Of course it's still yours!

Ros

[Sharra]

Yup, I think I agree that's the way to go, I'll work on this one some more
Sharra
xx

[chicory]

Sharra - I actually like the first version better myself - it is as if I am beside you & with you in the first - In your edited version if is as if you forgot to tell me half the story or polished the truth too much. Perhaps put TRACEY in all caps - as in a nbame tag? I was Tescos - in a small town near Windsor -- My friend works of O2 - This was two years ago - my first & only visit to merrye olde Englande

[bodkin]

Did I comment this before? I think not but the old memory...

Anyway, I like it. One of your good ones, I think.

Ian

[Sharra]

Wow I'd forgotten this one. It's always spooky when old posts pop up like this hehe