Six word story

[Jae Mc Donnell]

Innocence Lost: and found, children's remains

[Erthona]

Do you need a colon after "lost". maybe after found instead. I'm assuming this alludes to Milton's two poem, "Paradise Lost" and "Paradise Regained". The "children's remains" has a nice ambiguity about it. This is one of the few times not putting a period at the end of a sentence is justified, as it keeps it open-ended.

Good work in a small space.

Dale

[bena]

I agree with Dale, the colon seems to be misplaced. I started a thread in Fun Poetry about 6 word poems...so I've already been in love with the idea. this is a good one.

mel/bena

[71degrees]

Innocence Lost: and found, children's remains

Hemingway is usually credited w/the creation of the six word story. Yours is unique in its own way. A colon's true usage is to "note what follows" when not using it to designate a list of some kind. With that in mind, I am comfortable w/its placement after Lost. This writing is too short for you to make such an error and you wanted it there.

I often look at dates, names, and such while walking in old cemeteries (what I glean from "children's remains" plural). I also had a sister die in her youth a million years ago. The poem is perfect for me, as is.

The capital on Lost seems odd to me, but again, you wanted it there so there it is. Look at what's been generated by six words, five grammatical symbols, and no end mark.

Thanks for posting it.

[John Galt]

Good effort, the use of "lost" brought to mind that a crime had been committed, but the piece is open to multiple meanings, good depth..JG

[Jae Mc Donnell]

Thank you all for your replies and your thoughts, they are all much appreciated.

I know for such a piece I should really leave it up to the reader to decide the meaning, but as this is for critique I will give some background on what I was thinking.
I live in Ireland and recently a story came out about two kids who found a mass burial of children in a septic tank in west Ireland. Maybe you heard about it? A real horrific story, but this is just the start of the list of horrors perpetrated on the Irish state under the Catholic regime. So I was also getting at a lot more.

As for the colon that was a misprint.

[milo]

Innocence Lost: and found, children's remains

There is an interesting ambiguity presented with the different combinations. I wonder if you considered playing with the formatting to enhance the ambiguity:

Innocence lost
and found -
children's remains

or something along those lines.

[Jimmy Stark]

After I read your background on the poem, this is quite chilling. I obviously thought of Hemingway's six word story when I read your title, but this seems far more unnerving than his for some reason. Maybe because there are so many unfortunate deaths that could fit in with his and yours is more about a specific event? I'm not sure, but once I knew what you were writing about it became really good and really disturbing. Nice work!

[Joey Automata]

Innocence Lost: and found, children's remains

Seems too much like a rip-off of that one famous poem. Something about baby shoes. Let me find it real quick...

Here it is:

For sale: baby shoes, never worn.
-Hemingway

I just feel like, if you're gonna do a 6-word poem, try to make it as different from the only famous 6-word poem ever written. I'm not sure if you intended to make it very similar. You even did the colon ( : ) after the first two words, and the comma ( , ) after the next two word. You even mentioned "children's remains", while the original implies that a child died. However, how yours differs from the original (and I'm not sure if it's in a good way) is in the abstractness. Hemingway's way clear, unambiguous, and visual. Yours is sort of odd. You're trying to do a double meaning thing with the lost/found and children's remains. So, I think you're trying to say, children's remains are found (after being lost) and so is one's innocence. Just not really sure if it works. Hemingway's worked because it was so subtle and left everything up to the reader, but it was also unambiguous. I don't know how clever you want to get with these 6-word poems. That's probably why no one writes them.

[nicksherman]

Writing a six word poem about children/babies is automatically going to be graded on the Hemingway scale, which is a scary thought and something that should probably be avoided.

With that being said, I think this is a powerful poem. I like your response on how this was inspired by the story in Ireland about the babies in the septic tank. I didn't know it was discovered by kids, but it makes your story even stronger as how traumatic it must have been for those children who found this. Your poem relates to the children who found the remains and to the children who were killed. I don't know if it's appropriate for a six word poem to have a title, but if it is, you may want to title it after the tragedy in Ireland to tie everything together. Great job and best of luck!

[sandraleigh05]

I understand the placement of the semi-colon. It make sense if read like you are meaning it. I think I get it at least. If you moved it like those above suggested I think the meaning would be different. It's not a lost and found so those words need not be phrased together and the punctuation serperates it perfectly. To me.

[billy]

if you made it a five word story you would distance yourself somewhat from the Hemingway attempt.
Innocence Lost: children's remains found though i do admit i like your six words better. meh on the colon, why use any punctuation at all?
if you use more than one line it's not needed. i saw the said item on the news then it sort of died away like the children, sad affair indeed.
it gives food for thought and that makes it worthy in my opinion. just play around with it to see if you can make it better.

Innocence Lost: and found, children's remains

[owl_eyes]

Innocence Lost: and found, children's remains

apart from the colon following Lost, this is a lovely six word story. A haunting effect brought by "children's remains"

[Cyferz]

Innocence Lost: and found, children's remains

Ooooh may I?

I'm gunna do it anyways ._.

Innocence, lost and found; children remain

BETTER? o.0
Oh I changed the ending to make it less dark too.