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Teen Spirit
Silently riot breaks out after the sunset,
Every control signal searched & destroyed.
It's fun, riding drunk on highway,
Wave wild with flickering lights.
Softly whispers so prententious shady breeze,
Sigh so contagious self-assured living deads.
Come on, turn the world upside down,
Or all the tides gotta drown you out.
Light up your fire, set the night on fire,
Recklessly burn through our poor dark age.
Shine no shame, as a blooming Lotus,
In proud stand out of muddy swamps.
Teen Spirit
Silently riot breaks out after the sunset,
Every control signal searched & destroyed.
It's fun, riding drunk on highway,
Wave wild with flickering lights.
Softly whispers so prententious shady breeze,
Sigh so contagious self-assured living deads.
Come on, turn the world upside down,
Or all the tides gotta drown you out.
Light up your fire, set the night on fire,
Recklessly burn through our poor dark age.
Shine no shame, as a blooming Lotus,
In proud stand out of muddy swamps.
I find myself simply confused here: I can’t work out what you are telling us with this poem. There are too many lines that I just don’t understand.
“Every control signal searched & destroyed.”
Is the idea that the control signals are “found” and destroyed, or that we open them up and search them as a policeman would search a house.
Or “Sigh so contagious self-assured living deads.”
I am kind of assuming that a “self-assured living dead” Is a bumptious and complacent person, one of what some call” brainwashed sheeple”, but I’m not in the least sure, nor do I have any idea what the “blooming lotus” means, nor why anyone would “stand proud out of muddy swamps.
Your poem veers between descriptive statements and apparent imperatives, telling the reader how things are and then what to do.
I wouldn’t presume to edit the poem as I am not sure what it is trying to do, but if you welcome suggestions I’d stress clarity. It’s clearly strongly felt, and has an energy that is good, but I fear you are more focused on what it means to you and less on what a reader can take from it. I know myself I often get caught telling people what my lines mean, when really I am saying what they mean to me. But the text says what it says and we can’t carry our understanding out into the world unless we have it clear in the words on the page.
If this critique makes sense to you, then I would be very interested to see what you do with an edit, there is more than enough in there to form a clearer poem, I’m sure of that.
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Joined: Oct 2015
It might work as the lyrics to a rock number, but as a poem, it reads like a set of loose, rambling lines. Grammar has been sacrificed for nothing. Sure, teen spirit don't follow no rules, but there has to be something in it for the reader.
(01-06-2016, 01:00 PM)PoetCraft Wrote: Teen Spirit
Silently riot breaks out after the sunset,
Every control signal searched & destroyed.
It's fun, riding drunk on highway,
Wave wild with flickering lights. .... What's 'wave wild'? A wild wave? Why the inversion?
Softly whispers so prententious shady breeze,.. Why pretentious? How is a breeze shady? The personification adds nothing to the line. The next line is beyond my comprehension. I get it that you're trying to channel the spirit of Jim Morrison, but it's not working.
Sigh so contagious self-assured living deads.
Come on, turn the world upside down,
Or all the tides gotta drown you out. ...."tides" have no relation to anything being turned upside down. It's ok in loose everyday speech, but if I wanted to hear just boring everyday speech why would I read a poem?
Light up your fire, set the night on fire, .... an uninteresting allusion to Light My Fire
Recklessly burn through our poor dark age.
Shine no shame, as a blooming Lotus,
In proud stand out of muddy swamps. .... What's "in proud"?
~ I think I just quoted myself - Achebe
Posts: 7
Threads: 1
Joined: Jan 2016
Ah, the angst and false assurance of teenage years.
I agree that there is no real rythm and that it is a little choppy upon first read. The biggest problem I see with my plebeian eyes, is the communication and positioning of the metaphors.
I can however, feel the themes false ego, reckless emotional uncertainty and 'happily' numb attitudes. That plague many teenage years.
As stated in previous comments, clarity is key. If you want your ideas to be understood, make them understand. Don't be afraid to be clear, be articulate.
Posts: 15
Threads: 4
Joined: Feb 2015
Teen Spirit
Silently riot breaks out after the sunset,
Every control signal searched & destroyed.
It's fun, riding drunk on highway,
Wave wild with flickering lights.
Softly whispers so prententious shady breeze,
Sigh so contagious self-assured living deads.
Come on, turn the world upside down,
Or all the tides gotta drown you out.
Light up your fire, set the night on fire,
Recklessly burn through our poor dark age.
Shine no shame, as a blooming Lotus,
In proud stand out of muddy swamps.
I agree that the poem conveys a sense of throwing off all inhibitions like the 60’s movie “Wild in the Streets.” There are phrases, however, that I don’t understand and for me, need clarification. Can a riot break out “silently” or does the very nature of a riot require loud sound? A riot of color does not require sound but I don’t think that’s what you are trying to convey here. Your second sentence makes the nature of riot a designed purpose. I know that individuals with a purpose in mind may incite rioters to specific actions like railing against the police only to have the crowd overturn and burn a police car. This sentence appears to want to cast off all vestiges of control. I don’t see the “uncontrolled individual” as having a defined search and destroy plan. I don’t understand the usage of “Sigh so contagious.” I would recommend dropping the use of “gotta” and using a non slang term here. The first line of verse three is reminiscent of the Doors classic rock song “Light My Fire.” I like the line “Shine no shame” but don’t understand its use here. This has a lot of potential. I look forward to see future revisions. Thanks.
abbigailpaige
Unregistered
The use of fragments and incomplete sentences fully drives home to idea of inconsistency and the jagged conduct of teenagers. I love how the poem backs up what it's really talking about with the structure of it. The meter is inconsistent as well but again, that just brings the feeling of irrational changes, quick motions. The diction (word choice) also gave the air of being sharp and quick. The repeated usage of words starting with or containing the letter s and f helped with the overall tone of the poem. Despite it's initial feeling of inconsistency, it's actually quite consistent by being inconsistent. I really like it.
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The poem maintains its form until the last stanza. Good idea overall though and definitely something to be amazing when improved, but it will need some editing! P.S I'm not sure if it was a mistake or not, but I would include "the" in "riding drunk on highway".
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Smells like...irony.
Unfortunately there is nothing energetically holding this together, nor is the satire very biting.
"It's fun, riding drunk on highway,
Wave wild with flickering lights."
In the future try not to hold back, then go from there. I think a little vulgarity is needed with this subject.
Pump her full of baby batter, just don't catch her name;
dump'er at the mall then there's no one she can blame.
Make it a little more specific. When you can elicit emotion in the reader, then the reader becomes invested in the piece. When a piece is as generic as the poem in question, there is really nothing to elicit that emotion and no investment by the reader.
Best,
dale
How long after picking up the brush, the first masterpiece?
The goal is not to obfuscate that which is clear, but make clear that which isn't.
Posts: 5,057
Threads: 1,075
Joined: Dec 2009
as the reader i'm fighting every line to know what's going on. an example is the first line; is riot a person? or [a riot]? stitch it together, remove the cliche and then go from there
(01-06-2016, 01:00 PM)PoetCraft Wrote: Teen Spirit
Silently riot breaks out after the sunset,
Every control signal searched & destroyed. what control signals, show us
It's fun, riding drunk on highway, so are you drunk on the highway or having sex with a drunk on the highway?
Wave wild with flickering lights.
Softly whispers so prententious shady breeze,
Sigh so contagious self-assured living deads.
Come on, turn the world upside down,
Or all the tides gotta drown you out.
Light up your fire, set the night on fire, cliche and a doors line
Recklessly burn through our poor dark age.
Shine no shame, as a blooming Lotus,
In proud stand out of muddy swamps.
Posts: 11
Threads: 3
Joined: Jan 2016
I enjoyed the overall sense of "throw caution to the wind" because it mixed well with your breezy language. I can feel the author taunting me to join the bandwagon and let go.
However, I felt a lack of rhythm and, call me old fashioned, but I felt a strong lack of rhyme. The way it is written is almost begging to be set to rhyme or at least some kind of consistency within rhymes. They're there one minute and gone the next. I particularly disliked "Light up your fire, set the night on fire" because it felt both too familiar and a missed opportunity to add something extra and less repetitive.
Overall I think this could become something good and very relatable but would love to see some work on the rhythm and rhyme.
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