Paper Cut Melodrama

[PoetryAndPhysics]

Ouch! A paper cut!
Guillotined by printer parchment!
Canyons of skin, carved by a crimson river,
oversee numbness advance like Pleistocene glaciers.
Fingers curl and plead for iced tap water.
Devils radiate up my nervous system, whispering intrigue
of a prince bested by a commoner’s breadknife.
Talk turns to riven skies, to earthquakes,
to cracks in the Earth’s crust.
Plans drawn up to empty the bars of alcohol,
to build defense shields of gauze and cotton balls,
fall to wanton mobs of maniacs and clowns.
As ascetics run rampant with flagellating birch rods,
as ancient statues crumple to hails of rocket fire,
as everyone clasps hands in a final plea for grace,
all seems lost.
.
.
.
.
.
Tranquility always comes with a new day’s retrospect.

[Todd]

Hi PoetryAndPhysics,

I enjoyed this poem. You might consider adding more of the traditional melodrama elements. Like the finger tied to a train track. Additional comments below.

Ouch! A paper cut!--I think if you want to announce it would be better done at the end of the poem. As it stands your title already tells us what we're getting into so it is a bit redundant. I like the Ouch and it could serve as a lead in to line two. I would actually consider changing the title leaving Melodrama but being a little more ambiguous. Having the great reveal at the end be: A PAPER CUT.
Guillotined by printer parchment!
Canyons of skin, carved by a crimson river,--love this image and the alteration.
oversee numbness advance like Pleistocene glaciers.--Maybe cut oversee and go numbness advances like Pleistocene glaciers (that last part is especially great added detail)
Fingers curl and plead for iced tap water.--I'm not sure I want you to just come out and say its tap water. It feels like a lessening of the melodrama... a cooling stream maybe but I'd stay with the hyperbole
Devils radiate up my nervous system, whispering intrigue
of a prince bested by a commoner’s breadknife.--that's a funny image
Talk turns to riven skies, to earthquakes,--what's nice about the melodrama in the title is it gives you so much room to go over the top. I like the apocalyptic language here
to cracks in the Earth’s crust.--and here
Plans drawn up to empty the bars of alcohol,
to build defense shields of gauze and cotton balls,--just like the tap water I'd like more implication than out right saying. It's admittingly mostly a preference on my part.
fall to wanton mobs of maniacs and clowns.--I love clowns here. Maybe maniac clowns would be stronger
As ascetics run rampant with flagellating birch rods,--I don't know if I'd end stop the last line. I might start with "honking their red noses (to play again with red for the blood) swinging flagellating birch rods" just a thought
as ancient statues crumple to hails of rocket fire,
as everyone clasps hands in a final plea for grace,
all seems lost.
.
.
.
.
.
Tranquility always comes with a new day’s retrospect.--if you alter the first line. You can slip out of melodrama here. And end with "to a paper cut.

All just thoughts of course. I enjoyed the poem. I hope some of this will be helpful.

Best,

Todd

[PoetryAndPhysics]

Hi Todd. Thanks for the crit, and glad you liked it. Ending with "All seems lost...to a paper cut" sounds very good, I played around with a few things but ended up settling (temporarily) on the relatively verbose last line.

Gary

[billy]

hi gary

i mentions a few things but noting bigger than a nit, maybe the 1st line thing the images are great. i'm sure they make everyone else as well as me remember what a good paper cut feels like. i had to look up Pleistocene but i'm dumb so that's no biggy :0

thanks for the read.

Ouch! A paper cut! is 'a paper cut" needed?
Guillotined by printer parchment! i like the drama, but is Guillotined, the right word?
Canyons of skin, carved by a crimson river, this is an excellent image that blows the cut to disproportionate size
oversee numbness advance like Pleistocene glaciers.
Fingers curl and plead for iced tap water. is 'for iced tap water needed?leave something for us to imagine
Devils radiate up my nervous system, whispering intrigue
of a prince bested by a commoner’s breadknife.
Talk turns to riven skies, to earthquakes,
to cracks in the Earth’s crust.
Plans drawn up to empty the bars of alcohol,
to build defense shields of gauze and cotton balls,
fall to wanton mobs of maniacs and clowns.
As ascetics run rampant with flagellating birch rods, i see myself so easily
as ancient statues crumple to hails of rocket fire,
as everyone clasps hands in a final plea for grace,
all seems lost.
.
.
.
.
.
Tranquility always comes with a new day’s retrospect. not sure you need this line, just leave us hanging as to your pain.

[tectak]

Ouch! A paper cut!
Guillotined by printer parchment!
Canyons of skin, carved by a crimson river,
oversee numbness advance like Pleistocene glaciers.a little structural uncertainty here
Fingers curl and plead for iced tap water.
Devils radiate up my nervous system, whispering intrigue
of a prince bested by a commoner’s breadknife.nice phraseology but the "...intrigue of a prince bested" is hard to assimilate...for me, anyway.
Talk turns to riven skies, to earthquakes,"
to cracks in the Earth’s crust.
Plans drawn up to empty the bars of alcohol,
to build defense shields of gauze and cotton balls,
fall to wanton mobs of maniacs and clowns.Brilliant dichotomies in this. The threat of chaos is tangible and certain by intent and structure at the same instant. You might consider a few less "as" in the next lines because the syncronization of overlayered events is probably less important than the inevitability of their sum.
As ascetics run rampant with flagellating birch rods,So: As ascetics.....the ancient statues....and everyone clasps......all seems lost". Your poem
as ancient statues crumple to hails of rocket fire,
as everyone clasps hands in a final plea for grace,
all seems lost.
.
.
.
.
.
Tranquility always comes with a new day’s retrospect.Yes. Bang. Commitment. This is where we were going. Destination.

You know what you are writing about and it shows. This is commitment verse and is commendable. I can look down a microscope and see half of your descriptive imagery...I can look through a telescope and see the other half. "Canyons scream.." is just perfect. I have looked down my microscope at the callous, the cut and the crimson...it is all in this poem.
My only nit is that you jump a little too quickly off the cliff of complexity and leave the more timid (me) unable to take the frightening leap of faith with you. I may need to clarify. The tonal change between L7 and L8 is a little too much. I feel that you need to separate the certainty of bodily perception from the cerebral peregrination that follows, though this opinion of mine could be modified if you could find another two or three lines to lead in to the conclusion. Sometimes I annoy myself in this area.
Your word choices are not at fault here...it is just a category shift...Iike a dentist talking about drilling to a coal miner. No. I have just reread it. Leave it alone. Miners have plaque and dentists coal fires!
A great effort.
Best,
tectak

[newsclippings]

I don't know why I'm regressing but the poems I'm reading today remind me of previous stories. This, for example, reminds me of The Searching Satyrs by Sophocles.

That's really all I had to add. Oops.

[PoetryAndPhysics]

Hi all, sorry for the late response, but again thanks very much for your thoughts...

billy... no worries, my first draft had 'Holocene' as a stand in word before I ventured over to wikipedia

tectak... thanks very much for your crit. This poem is based off an older one I wrote about a kitchen accident. I felt I handled the transition to the surreal better in that one, so will revisit it here, time permitting.

newsclippings... I recon there's probably lots like this. Downside of being in physics is, you're not very well read. One day I'll read Sophocles, one day...

Thanks again,
Gary

[newsclippings]

newsclippings... I recon there's probably lots like this. Downside of being in physics is, you're not very well read. One day I'll read Sophocles, one day...

Thanks again,
Gary

believe it or not i started off in engineering :]

[tectak]

Hi all, sorry for the late response, but again thanks very much for your thoughts...

billy... no worries, my first draft had 'Holocene' as a stand in word before I ventured over to wikipedia

tectak... thanks very much for your crit. This poem is based off an older one I wrote about a kitchen accident. I felt I handled the transition to the surreal better in that one, so will revisit it here, time permitting.

newsclippings... I recon there's probably lots like this. Downside of being in physics is, you're not very well read. One day I'll read Sophocles, one day...

Thanks again,
Gary

Read Feynman...knocks quarks of Soph......and as a bonus, you won't understand him, either
Best
TEChnicalTAK

[PoetryAndPhysics]

Read Feynman...knocks quarks of Soph......and as a bonus, you won't understand him, either
Best
TEChnicalTAK

I thought it was Gell-Mann who took quarks from Finnegans Wake? And nope, there's no way I understand Feynman (at least not yet

Regards,
Gary