The Tales We Tell

[Erthona]

.
We were lilies unbound,
running up and down
the ally past the gallon coffee can
of bacon drippin’s my mother left
for the 'colored' garbage man
cause his wife knew how to use’em!
We told tales of plans, and conquered foes
right up ‘til high school graduation,
each, less reflective of reality than the last.

The best tale was told to us by the valedictorian,
outlining how we would change the world.
Tarzan in the ally fighting evil,
cut closer to the bone
than did that commencement speech
of puffed-up overweening teenage pride,
that was several orders of magnitude in error
greater than any story that faintly reflected
the collective human agreement of existence,
at least in terms of the actual impact we
would have on the world.

The greatest impact of any among us,
was during the last summer when
Adam Gibson, and his motorcycle
arrived at a brick wall
traveling at eighty miles per hour:
proving that Richard Bach was
really only a writer of fiction
and not a reluctant messiah
writing his autobiography.

Yet, even such sharp edges of facts
could not cut into the
fabric of fabricated fluff
that surrounded and insulated us
from pragmatic concerns that
might impinge upon us
and shake us from our
dogmatic slumber as we slept upon the bed
of the total conceit of being all-knowing.
After all, we had cut our teeth on
ignoring the atrocities that
Uncle Walter paraded across
our TV screen each evening
while we consumed copious
amounts of gall bladder pluggin',
artery clogging fried chicken,
and mashed potatoes breast stroking
in a butter and gravy pool
of slowly congealing cholesterol.
If we could ignore body bags by the dozens
and treat MIA bracelets with
as little seriousness as any other fad,
we would have no problem
ignoring the reality that our future impact on
the world at large was based solely on
delusional, ego-centric teenage posturing,
and had no more chance of occurring
than did the USSR have of becoming
a legitimate and stable democracy
before KGB cronyism reasserted itself
and sent the country back into
the totalitarian restrictiveness
with which most of the population
felt comfortable.

This provincial amorality play that we found ourselves in,
of homecoming floats, football games, the prom,
ignoring the fear of the draft and Vietnam,
was acted out again and again, ad nauseam,
from small town middle class burg to burg,
where never was heard a dissenting word!
But if impacting the world means
filling body bags by the thousands,
then by God we did out part!

–Erthona

[kingmicahde]

I really like this poem. Makes me feel young because lot of the stuff mention was before my time but still made me feel naustalgic. I really like the line
"the ally past the gallon coffee can
of bacon drippin’s my mother left
for the 'colored' garbage man
cause his wife knew how to use’em!"
I save my bacon greese too!

[Erthona]

Thanks, yeah nothing taste better when fried in used grease. I don't save my own grease, but I love to cook a log of sausage and then scramble eggs in the grease.

Thanks for the comments,

Dale

[kingmicahde]

comment removed/mod

don't worry, you're not being horsewhipped
slip an aside into your feedback by all means but don't leave any on their own, just feedback in the feedback forums :J:

[tectak]

.
We were lilies unbound,
running up and down
the ally past the gallon coffee can
of bacon drippin’s my mother left
for the 'colored' garbage man
cause his wife knew how to use’em!
We told tales of plans, and conquered foes
right up ‘til high school graduation,
each, less reflective of reality than the last.

The best tale was told to us by the valedictorian,
outlining how we would change the world.
Tarzan in the ally fighting evil,
cut closer to the bone
than did that commencement speech
of puffed-up overweening teenage pride,
that was several orders of magnitude in error
greater than any story that faintly reflected
the collective human agreement of existence,
at least in terms of the actual impact we
would have on the world.

The greatest impact of any among us,
was during the last summer when
Adam Gibson, and his motorcycle
arrived at a brick wall
traveling at eighty miles per hour:
proving that Richard Bach was
really only a writer of fiction
and not a reluctant messiah
writing his autobiography.

Yet, even such sharp edges of facts
could not cut into the
fabric of fabricated fluff
that surrounded and insulated us
from pragmatic concerns that
might impinge upon us
and shake us from our
dogmatic slumber as we slept upon the bed
of the total conceit of being all-knowing.
After all, we had cut our teeth on
ignoring the atrocities that
Uncle Walter paraded across
our TV screen each evening
while we consumed copious
amounts of gall bladder plugin,
artery clogging fried chicken,
and mashed potatoes breast stroking
in a butter and gravy pool
of slowly congealing cholesterol.
If we could ignore body bags by the dozens
and treat MIA bracelets with
as little seriousness as any other fad,
we would have no problem
ignoring the reality that our future impact on
the world at large was based solely on
delusional, ego-centric teenage posturing,
and had no more chance of occurring
than did the USSR have of becoming
a legitimate and stable democracy
before KGB cronyism reasserted itself
and sent the country back into
the totalitarian restrictiveness
with which most of the population
felt comfortable.

This provincial amorality play that we found ourselves in,
of homecoming floats, football games, the prom,
ignoring the fear of the draft and Vietnam,
was acted out again and again, ad nauseam,
from small town middle class burg to burg,
where never was heard a dissenting word!
But if impacting the world means
filling body bags by the thousands,
then by God we did out part!

–Erthona

Hi erthona, this is more like it. Taking the comment literally it is so much more and so like it I will need a week. This is a rant in the style of Leonard Cohen, Everybody Knows, but without any attempt to pretend to be a poet. I will come back but expect you will edit it into some recognisable verse/order/form by the time I do.
....or not.
Best,
tectak.
(You Really Should Capitalise Each Line You Know. Everybody Knows It Is A Rule Of Poetry)

[billy]

you like writing long ones

i've read it a few times and while some things could be edited, they could just as easily not. i'll do some in depth feedback tomorrow but after a few reads don't expect much. at present the two impacts, two cuts that are of small concern and a cliche; cut closer to the bone.

some of the enjambment felt like it was trying too hard but that's about it for now. it rambles but it does so in a way i like.
thanks for the read so far.

.
We were lilies unbound,
running up and down
the ally past the gallon coffee can
of bacon drippin’s my mother left
for the 'colored' garbage man
cause his wife knew how to use’em!
We told tales of plans, and conquered foes
right up ‘til high school graduation,
each, less reflective of reality than the last.

The best tale was told to us by the valedictorian,
outlining how we would change the world.
Tarzan in the ally fighting evil,
cut closer to the bone
than did that commencement speech
of puffed-up overweening teenage pride,
that was several orders of magnitude in error
greater than any story that faintly reflected
the collective human agreement of existence,
at least in terms of the actual impact we
would have on the world.

The greatest impact of any among us,
was during the last summer when
Adam Gibson, and his motorcycle
arrived at a brick wall
traveling at eighty miles per hour:
proving that Richard Bach was
really only a writer of fiction
and not a reluctant messiah
writing his autobiography.

Yet, even such sharp edges of facts
could not cut into the
fabric of fabricated fluff
that surrounded and insulated us
from pragmatic concerns that
might impinge upon us
and shake us from our
dogmatic slumber as we slept upon the bed
of the total conceit of being all-knowing.
After all, we had cut our teeth on
ignoring the atrocities that
Uncle Walter paraded across
our TV screen each evening
while we consumed copious
amounts of gall bladder plugin, should it be pluggin'
artery clogging fried chicken,
and mashed potatoes breast stroking
in a butter and gravy pool
of slowly congealing cholesterol.
If we could ignore body bags by the dozens
and treat MIA bracelets with
as little seriousness as any other fad,
we would have no problem
ignoring the reality that our future impact on
the world at large was based solely on
delusional, ego-centric teenage posturing,
and had no more chance of occurring
than did the USSR have of becoming
a legitimate and stable democracy
before KGB cronyism reasserted itself
and sent the country back into
the totalitarian restrictiveness
with which most of the population
felt comfortable.

This provincial amorality play that we found ourselves in,
of homecoming floats, football games, the prom,
ignoring the fear of the draft and Vietnam,
was acted out again and again, ad nauseam,
from small town middle class burg to burg,
where never was heard a dissenting word!
But if impacting the world means
filling body bags by the thousands,
then by God we did out part!

–Erthona

[Erthona]

Billy,

"Long"? I only post the short ones! I know if I posted a long the one it would never get read. You could post "Howl" and no one would come close to reading the entire thing.

pluggin' is correct. Actually plugging is the dictionary correct word as it takes no account of dialect, and so changed it to plugin', as in a DC current plugin'. Thanks for the catch.

"it rambles but it does so in a way i like."

Don't most of my poems ramble...well at least according to Tom they do. If they didn't, they would hardly be mine The message from the muse must by nature follow the convoluted pathways of my gray matter, and somehow by all that convolution the muses original comes out closest to what it was originally. I would hate to see what happen when I apply my active will to it...well actually I have and that is why I generally write this a way. In other words the longest seems to be the shortest course...if you get my drift.

"We must forever refrain
from trying to find water
with an overheated brain!
For in terms of sympathetic magic
what you look with, not for
is exactly what you'll get!"

Thank you for your present and future comments.

Dale

---

I haven't noticed Leonard Cohen trying to be a poet either, so I will take that as a complement. I am now and will always be a lyricist posing as a prose writer. I would hate to be thought of as a poet as I simply cannot follow all their silly conventions such as starting each line with a "cap", or center justify, or write subtly in such a way as to make old women have toe orgasms as they curl up with my table top book of soft porn masquerading as poetry with images dancing in their minds of Percy Bysshe Shelley in his boy blue outfit, Paul McCarthy eyes and pink feathered quill pen doing naughty things to their old aching, calloused feet that continually snag on their cheap panty hose, as Avon truckstop #9 perfume wafts across the boudoir to mask the smell of never been douched pheromones, lest the overly fat and pampered cat walk in and catch them in their reverie.
------------------------------
Now let's see, did you write anything worth responding to that needs redressing... no, I suppose not

–Erthona
[/quote]
Hi erthona, this is more like it. Taking the comment literally it is so much more and so like it I will need a week. This is a rant in the style of Leonard Cohen, Everybody Knows, but without any attempt to pretend to be a poet. I will come back but expect you will edit it into some recognisable verse/order/form by the time I do.
....or not.
Best,
tectak.
(You Really Should Capitalise Each Line You Know. Everybody Knows It Is A Rule Of Poetry)
[/quote]

[Brownlie]

.
We were lilies unbound,
running up and down
the ally past the gallon coffee can
of bacon drippin’s my mother left
for the 'colored' garbage man
cause his wife knew how to use’em!
We told tales of plans, and conquered foes
right up ‘til high school graduation,
each, less reflective of reality than the last.

The best tale was told to us by the valedictorian,
outlining how we would change the world.
Tarzan in the ally fighting evil,
cut closer to the bone
than did that commencement speech
of puffed-up overweening teenage pride,
that was several orders of magnitude in error
greater than any story that faintly reflected
the collective human agreement of existence,
at least in terms of the actual impact we
would have on the world.

The greatest impact of any among us,
was during the last summer when
Adam Gibson, and his motorcycle
arrived at a brick wall
traveling at eighty miles per hour:
proving that Richard Bach was
really only a writer of fiction
and not a reluctant messiah
writing his autobiography.

Yet, even such sharp edges of facts
could not cut into the
fabric of fabricated fluff
that surrounded and insulated us
from pragmatic concerns that
might impinge upon us
and shake us from our
dogmatic slumber as we slept upon the bed
of the total conceit of being all-knowing.
After all, we had cut our teeth on
ignoring the atrocities that
Uncle Walter paraded across
our TV screen each evening
while we consumed copious
amounts of gall bladder pluggin',
artery clogging fried chicken,
and mashed potatoes breast stroking
in a butter and gravy pool
of slowly congealing cholesterol.
If we could ignore body bags by the dozens
and treat MIA bracelets with
as little seriousness as any other fad,
we would have no problem
ignoring the reality that our future impact on
the world at large was based solely on
delusional, ego-centric teenage posturing,
and had no more chance of occurring
than did the USSR have of becoming
a legitimate and stable democracy
before KGB cronyism reasserted itself
and sent the country back into
the totalitarian restrictiveness
with which most of the population
felt comfortable.

This provincial amorality play that we found ourselves in,
of homecoming floats, football games, the prom,
ignoring the fear of the draft and Vietnam,
was acted out again and again, ad nauseam,
from small town middle class burg to burg,
where never was heard a dissenting word!
But if impacting the world means
filling body bags by the thousands,
then by God we did out part!

–Erthona

The diction is very good in this poem. If I were to edit this I would let events and images describe themselves so the reader can discover the underlying themes.
I suppose some of the adjectives are bothering me. I'm interested to see your response.

[Erthona]

Brownlie,

Thank you for your comment, however I you need to be more specific about which "adjectives are bothering you."

"let events and images describe themselves so the reader can discover the underlying themes."

That's a tad vague, as this is written in the first person narrative what you are suggesting, that I change the voice? I don't see that it draws all that many conclusions for the reader, so you will need to be more specific if you want a response, which I would be happy to give once I understand what you mean.

Thanks again,

Dale

[Brownlie]

Brownlie,

Thank you for your comment, however I you need to be more specific about which "adjectives are bothering you."

"let events and images describe themselves so the reader can discover the underlying themes."

That's a tad vague, as this is written in the first person narrative what you are suggesting, that I change the voice? I don't see that it draws all that many conclusions for the reader, so you will need to be more specific if you want a response, which I would be happy to give once I understand what you mean.

Thanks again,

Dale

I'm not sure what you mean by voice. I assume the term refers to the tone of the speaker. Puffed-up overweening would be an example of too many adjectives. Artery clogging is another example. Thank you for indulging me.

[Erthona]

"Puffed-up overweening"

Puffed-up: feeling self-important
overweening: presumptuously conceited

I see one as the internal state that gives rise to the external action. That's my rationale for the usage. I'm not saying it is a valid rationale, but I did want to hammer home the point, so to speak. It is certainly true one could read this as being redundant so it is something to consider.
Thanks again for the comments,

Dale