Lift Those Antennas

[Royal Kumari]

Holy streaming explosive thought.
Blood pressure is low but the blood is boiling hot.

What if everyone that is miserable is secretly happy?
What if we chose ourselves?
Our cat
Our house
Our voice
Our mother's face....

What if we handpicked our own woes before we got here--
Can I use the Scientific Method to test this theory?
Why not?
Life is a science. There's a science to life.
To loving it or loving to lose at it.
Because loving and loathing are more or less the same.

At what point does misery become a comedic routine?
What does it mean to mean anything at all?

I mean to
I aim to
I intend to
amuse the self via positive and negative life experiences.

I mean to learn. Not to learn the meaning of anything.
Because everything means something and I suppose that is what matters ultimately.
YET,

I mean to learn the art of translating every moment into

nothing

Moments do not have meaning. They are meaning.


I am worried. You might be too. We shouldn't be.

What is the me who casts dark shaded dreams of faces and mysterious connections upon my sleep?
What is the me who puts pieces of life into context within moments of the day---
The me who does not use words
or opinion as an anchor in a sea of voice?

What is this alive that keeps me so far from my skin
while simultaneously pushing me towards the alive in everybody else?
How can we not be our own skin and darting eyes?


Your (my) God
Your (my) wet hair
Your (my) hopelessness
Your (my) tower of wisdom
Your (my) memories extending
Your (my) hot blood pumping right now
Your (my) response to making eye contact in the mirror




Revision #2

What if we chose our lives,
Before we arrived?
Even the details:
Our fading scars as secrets
Our mothers' sunken skin
Or the way the meter of our breath
Warms the insides of our lips?

[SparkyDashforth]

Hi Royal

nice to see a pic with a poem.

I really got into this until about half-way through, when for me it lost its purpose
and the rhetorical questions lost their incisiveness.

IMO, it need a major edit, but I really did like it from L1 to L 22.

Best

sparky

[drab]

An interesting poem RK.
Too many questions though. I prefer poems that show me as opposed to asking me to answer. I know you could say that you're making the reader think. But some questions have no answers, or too many answers, or are just too taxing.
My own personal opinion is that the moments you speak of don't exist. Because the present does not exist for conscious creatures. We live our lives in the past, every sight, every thought, every action that we naturally assume existed in a 'present', happened a fraction of a second before we realised they did. The paradoxical outcome of this is that when we die we will, for a split second, still be alive.
Reminds me of the Monty Python sketch, "I think she's dead" and Mary Queen of Scots says "No I'm not".
Regards

[mermaiden]

Royal Kumari, hello! 

As Sparky says, really enjoyed the first half. It has an almost rap feel to it, and the chic rhythm sort of makes up for much of the confusion. For instance, are you asserting that we do choose our miseries? Cats, houses and maybe even voice can be chosen, yes. But a mother's face does not usually come with a brochure! Unless she's a very accommodating and knife-friendly mum! 

I think you can distil the different ideas in this poem and make it into three separate poems; it'll be neater and I think more efficient.

Also, in the last stanza, am unsure as to the function of 'Your' and '(my)'. Would be glad for some clarification there.

I'd shorten/slash massively. Don't quit on this, though!

[Justin D Hill]

Not bad I thought.

[Royal Kumari]

Sorry for late reply! So, so busy.
My poems are purposefully strong and taper off towards the end....
Sort of a "straight to the consciousness now let it fade to the subconscious" sort of deal.
The Your/my adage is meant to imply that all that is your life could just as easily have been mine....
same with the cat, mother's face, etc.
(What if before we got to Earth, we mapped out our journey? Including small details.)

The poem is challenging the reader to be fully aware of how they cling to their ego, identity, memory and-- further-- challenging them to go beyond these "things."

Thanks for your time in replying! xx

 

All the best and then some,
RK

[mermaiden]

Ah, well definitely get the whiff of some Advaita philosophy there. 

Would still suggest using very minute, precise details to stand for the abstract ideas (otherwise ideas like these tend to simultaneously overburden a poem and underwhelm the reader since they're mostly 'been there, done that' kind of themes) and more brutal editing. But this is cool stuff, looking forward to more.

[duck]

While superficially this appears interesting, IMO, that is what it is, just a series of smoke and mirrors. many questions that deliberately have no answer - otherwise they would be provided, several answers, which have litle real substance and too many unfocussed ideas for one poem to carry. I would simplfy and clarify and reduce the number of opinions if I wanted a better poem.
Royal Kumari you responded to comments on comment but actually in terms of poetry this needs a lot of work IMO as it provides few interesting images or sensory impulses.
Breath is life and this worthy attempt does not breath enough.
Duck

[Royal Kumari]

I disagree with you Duck. I do not think my poem is a series of smoke and mirrors. You believe that I shouldn't be asking questions without answers, but I wasn't asking. I was merely trying to make the reader aware of the fact that, in this life, there often aren't answers. In life, all of these questions exist, and so there is no reason why I should need to pinpoint a specific set in this poem. I write with the intention of capturing thoughts, beautiful & fleeting, and sharing them with others. Often thoughts occur disorganized or they are not poignant with grammar or imagery. They are still powerful thoughts and worth capturing. Something for you to think about. Also, to say my poem, " . . . provides few interesting images or sensory impulses," is a strange opinion to have about a poem that mentions wet hair, hot blood, your mother's face, darting eyes, etc. I see and feel such humanly things quite clearly when I read this poem.

All the best and then some,

RK

[SparkyDashforth]

If you don't want a critique of your posts. You have three options.
You can post to the Gallery section. You can continue to post here but state
clearly in each post that you do not want your work to be critiqued,
or you can go away and find a forum that will just love everything you write
and that will be eager to bolster your overinflated ego.

The choice is yours.

Sparky

[Royal Kumari]

I have a right to defend what is clearly an insult. Critique would be--- add grammar here. Not "This poem isn't interesting." That is merely offensive. I won't defend my ego. I merely feel it's wrong to insult someone's work as "uninteresting." And you! "Go away?" "Over inflated ego"? If this is how members of this forum are permitted to talk to each other, then I'd rather not be a part. I don't understand how a grown adult could speak to anyone that way. Very, very disappointing.

[SparkyDashforth]

I guess this forum is not for you then. Everyone is allowed an opinion here,
and I found nothing insulting about the critique that you got bent out of shape over.
Duck said your poem wasn't interesting to him.  Some would agree with him, some might not.
It's his opinion, it is not an insult.  Instead of being grateful for this honest feedback
you want to to get defensive.   My advice is that you post only on Gallery or to
your 'friends' on Facebook.  I doubt if you will learn anything here.

Sparks

[Royal Kumari]

I will admit to being sensitive. It has been a while since anyone has critiqued my work. I do very sincerely apologize. Even if the words were harsh, I should have accepted their blunt nature. Yet, I still can't get over what you said Sparky. Really, there is no justification for speaking to another person that way. Your intent was to be hurtful, and that is terrifying. I'm not sure if you have a second set of morals for posting on a forum or if this is the same moral code you abide by in real life; either way, this sort of treatment is entirely unethical. Attacking me is illogical-- you don't even know me.

[Royal Kumari]

You could have merely said, "Please don't take honest feedback for granted." In which case, I would have stopped in my tracks and been immediately aware of my lack of ease in accepting feedback. The latter would be wrong of me, but understandable seeing as how I've not done this sort of thing for quite some time. No reason at all to be cruel to someone who is sensitive to start.

[SparkyDashforth]

I said you had 3 options.  We all "go away" at some time or other. I am not suggesting you do,
I was saying that was one of your options.  If you are sensitive to mild comments, then you might
get "upset' on a regular basis here.  That's all I meant.