04-30-2014, 02:44 AM
Well it seems to be working. I sort of completely kind of adore this poem, without qualifications.
Below are what I take to be mostly copy editing suggestions. Take or leave, but I think they streamline and strengthen what you're doing:
My Name is Orange Juice
I never did acid in the '60s
because I hadn't been born
but what became of the '60s generation
let me see
that drugs were now a form of Control
set up by the CIA
to excite revolutions to spin in circles
circularly, to nowhere, then back again,
to spin in those same circles, excitedly.
I was born in prison
into drug culture, born into drugs.
In the first and second grade we'd go to the sink in the back of the class
and swish green fluoride out of tiny paper cups,
and our school had neighbors that made tiny flowers, butterflies and birds
out of paper.
All our teachers were underpaid
and the principals were crippled or minorities or both
and one of the janitors was young and in love with the youngest teacher
and then he died.
Before that, he'd bring her students candy in the mornings just to talk to her.
In middle school I brought rock cassette tapes to school in a lunchbox
just to feel them with me.
in high school I wrote this poem on the board:
Skies are tanks where the moon sinks fat
and tiny stars tremble like parasitic fish
as they turn and twist in twinkling knots.
The whole world is a prison, and freedom doesn't exist.
Stars are also fleas—bouncing on a dog's
flat head,
trying to lift it.
Who hunts emptiness?
Dogcatchers and astronomers,
hard men, maybe, swallowing tears
the size of keys.
Swallowing lies to belch out the truth.
I copied quotes from dead rock stars into my journals
because you can relate to someone dead and feel alone at the same time.
I realized the only right way to use drugs was to use them the wrong way.
I wrote:
"Withdrawal is a distinction, give it to your brother."
My friend lost control of his bowels.
We couldn't relate to each other as much anymore.
Each of us had too much “personal baggage” to move into each other's consciousness like that.
Below are what I take to be mostly copy editing suggestions. Take or leave, but I think they streamline and strengthen what you're doing:
My Name is Orange Juice
I never did acid in the '60s
because I hadn't been born
but what became of the '60s generation
let me see
that drugs were now a form of Control
set up by the CIA
to excite revolutions to spin in circles
circularly, to nowhere, then back again,
to spin in those same circles, excitedly.
I was born in prison
into drug culture, born into drugs.
In the first and second grade we'd go to the sink in the back of the class
and swish green fluoride out of tiny paper cups,
and our school had neighbors that made tiny flowers, butterflies and birds
out of paper.
All our teachers were underpaid
and the principals were crippled or minorities or both
and one of the janitors was young and in love with the youngest teacher
and then he died.
Before that, he'd bring her students candy in the mornings just to talk to her.
In middle school I brought rock cassette tapes to school in a lunchbox
just to feel them with me.
in high school I wrote this poem on the board:
Skies are tanks where the moon sinks fat
and tiny stars tremble like parasitic fish
as they turn and twist in twinkling knots.
The whole world is a prison, and freedom doesn't exist.
Stars are also fleas—bouncing on a dog's
flat head,
trying to lift it.
Who hunts emptiness?
Dogcatchers and astronomers,
hard men, maybe, swallowing tears
the size of keys.
Swallowing lies to belch out the truth.
I copied quotes from dead rock stars into my journals
because you can relate to someone dead and feel alone at the same time.
I realized the only right way to use drugs was to use them the wrong way.
I wrote:
"Withdrawal is a distinction, give it to your brother."
My friend lost control of his bowels.
We couldn't relate to each other as much anymore.
Each of us had too much “personal baggage” to move into each other's consciousness like that.