The Australian

[briarwoodbine]

This is my first real poem attempt, so any sort of feedback or criticism is extremely welcome! Thank you in advance.


The Australian.

Indeterminate age, I think
Indeterminate age, with his bedraggled jeans
With his colorblocked shirt,
Too small shirt, too much shirt
From before colorblock was a real word

The friendless dreadlock, I behold
Alone as the dreaded wallflower
Thicker than my forearm and crowded with the dirt from a lifetime
Stories from a lifetime, companion of a lifetime
Sagging over the collar

Paranoia issues, I write
Homeless, spewing, avoid
You’re here on a mission, he says, didn’t you know?
Shouldn’t you know? How couldn’t you know?
Call the others from the field

Going away, he threatens
The water can haul itself
Loathing her, but always, always the love for him
The competition for him, the loss of him
Escape is intimidating

Indeterminate age, I think
A bottle of scotch instead of soda
Stymied at the start, but who is so different?
You aren’t so different, I’m not so different
With our colorblocked shirts.

[Leanne]

I see you've met my brother

Poor bloke, he's just got one dreadlock?

There is a lot to like in this poem but some of the words could easily go. For example, I like "indeterminate age, I think" -- the line is quite ironic -- but it doesn't need to be repeated. L2 would work better with just the jeans phrase. Similarly, in the last stanza, instead of "you aren't so different, I'm not so different", you could easily just say "not you, not me".

I do like mapping people via their shirts, though I'm having difficulty with working out what a "colourblock" is. It may be my fashion ignorance, or it may be that they're called something different here.

[briarwoodbine]

Thanks for the critique! I like your suggestion about the repetition of "indeterminate age", and I'm most likely going to change L2. I do think I will keep the "you aren't so different, I'm not so different" because I want to maintain the pattern of the previous stanzas, if that makes any sense. There's probably a specific word to describe that, but I'm super new to this and am going more off feelings than any sort of technical knowledge!

Colorblocking is a new-ish style of patterning clothes where only one or two solid colors are purposefully used in "blocks". It sounds more complicated than it is, so here is a picture with a few examples: http://makeupandbeauty.com/wp-content/up...-trend.png

(Oh and he really did have just one dreadlock, and it was truly as thick as my arm. Rather morbidly fascinating, actually)