I just wrote this, after some of the things I have been thinking about lately. I would like some criticism on the form and flow of it. Let me know how to make it more rhythmic and surreal (in a sense of thought-provoking imagey surrealism). Let me know also if you like it, or how (and if) it made you feel. Let me know wherever you had to pause because it momentarily stopped making sense as well (happens to me occasionaly when reading others' work). This is a peice of shit, with maybe a couple good phrases. It starts very lowly, and then makes its way toward some sort of mediocre triumph. Words of honest criticism and advice are appreciated:
the slow gears of the beaurcratic mechanism turn and turn
my mind reels at the overwhelming beauty of an entire world
i might not see it
a quagmire is built around me
so complex that im blinded
and my lucidity comes and goes in wrinkled turbulent races of apathy, madness and yearning
for i am an inventor, i am a genius
but the machine that subdues me is beyong my understanding
because i have not yet studied
i am 18
and already i feel coal being shoved into my throat
i have no family
i have no money
i feel capable of everything
numbers seem like planets
books seem like gods
i read fast, arithmetic is fast, but in my mind there is no place for reliable emotion
because besides everything
the facts:
i have only a GED
no references
no job
no money
no paperwork
no friends
no home
the thoughts that rupture my circumstance will still adhere to logic
because without a way to suceed, i will not
and with no human guidance:
compassion and emotion are hopes and nothing more.
i will steal food every day.
i will walk restlessly through crowds of my peers,
i will not recognize their faces or their thoughts.
my only pain, my only life and drive
are magnificent.
my skeletal structure might change from malnutrition.
from sleeping on concrete.
from wearing a heavy backpack wherever i walk.
but i am 18, and i am set on my path
i will invent
and everything that happens is toward one purpose.
lonelinesss, hunger, filth.
these are my burdens until i overcome them.
ive had a difficult past.
but it is passed.
deal with the reprecussions.
one day i will make love in a field of poppies.
and stand beside the brightest minds of our century,
and walk with the honest vigor of true health,
and children and suffering minds will see my work,
and they too will know: greatness exists.
as a jet flies in the night sky, and a satellite is in orbit,
so can a human be in heaven on earth.
because a person living by their ideals,
furthering their own existence,
will not rise and fall with every wave.
they will rise and fall of their own accord,
and the waves will come from (within) them.
and in their quest to realize their potential and be happy,
so will they make others happy in their wake.
a prosperous person is an asset to his or her country.
a human mind that can speak its own opinion and thought is a resource to be treasured.
where a man can create something from nothing, so will they inspire this behavior in others.
others will see their work, and see that it shines from its own light,
from a nature that is its own.
it was not borrowed or given.
and this light will shine on dark minds and in itterative causality will ensue.
where there is no joy there is no novelty.
figments of a collective imagination from a common past might be passed forth as inventions and genius.
but when an individual thinks of NASA,
how can one live a life that does not appeal to them?
there should be no true inhibitions of any passionate ambition
and whenever a person might think that there is no self,
they can watch the sun set or rise.
they can know that to watch such things is human, and nothing else except their own decisions
every decision seems very critical
every moment elongated with a silence,
seemingly (loudly) impregnated by its own implications.
there, do you still have the will to go on?
when beauty is in the sun shining through weed-smoke
and happiness in the sick-insomnia of drugs
(huge losses, terrifying memories: how do people fall asleep)
will you still seek the thing within your self that gives you power?
internal dynamisn is the facet of all greatness
a car moves on its own. it has fuel.
and a human can pull itself up by its own bootstraps.
there is an entire world of bounty,
brimming with win-win situations.
a daughter wants flowers for her mother.
a mother wants food-money for her daughter.
and so with horticulture and capitalism is happiness.
this never ends, because the world is so big.
so many people suffer -
but these are neither mine nore yours.
they belong to themselves as we belong to ourselves.
and just as they can suffer from their shock and trauma,
so can we shout in our glory.
it is our privelege to appreciate our selves.
and to not sabatage our selves with contradictory logics.
or dreams that we break.
it is not our right to destroy our dreams.
because these dreams are ours,
and the vicious world of immediate participation
is maybe ours, and maybe not.
but it is less massive than our dreams.
just as a pedestrian in ohio will not disturb a flight from paris to prague,
so should a yearning for fruit not lead to the chopping down of a tree (or the stealing of a carrot, as is many times the case).
when i have no money to feed my self, i cannot be taking too many classes.
i need to work as well.
but time is not against me,
it is very real and neutral.
any idea of someone not having enough time is due only to dishonest or unreal planning.
and the same goes with these words.
they will likely go into the ageless abyss of lost and discarded works.
an impression has been made on me, and so i make an impression in paper.
but will these words die in the eye of the beholder?
or be held forever as a movement (a concept or idea)?
(perhaps this is) an extra component of the engine inside each of us.
eternally more efficient, stronger and faster:
this, i think, is the purpose of art.
I'm a big fan of meter. I know its not very popular these days to write metrical poems, but really, the art of being able to put something into meter is at the heart of true poetry. I would suggest you master this art. Once you have done so, you will of course be free to play with meter, or even to write completely a-metrical free verse. But it will then be a conscious choice, not something you are doing from a lack of ability. And you will ever after be confident in your use of rhythm.
As for this particular poem, to get the effect you say you are after, cut out all the words that don't have images attached to them:
the slowly grindinggears of the bureaucratic gearsmechanism turn and turn
my mind reels at the overwhelming beauty of an entire world
i might not see it
quagmire of invisible cogsis built around me
so complex that im blinded
or some such. And don't mix your metaphors. Again, once you have mastered the art of extending a single metaphor, you can choose to violate this rule. In the meantime, don't.
and already i feel coal being shoved into my throat
I love this line. It's very powerful.
I am a fan of free verse. This is promising but needs tightening. I'd not go so far as Sean, but I would like to see you strip down each line to its essentials.
Also, I notice that the first part of the poem is full of feeling but it tends to drift into ethereal philosophizing as you go on. Try to keep it grounded in your feelings and experiences. The line I quoted above is powerful specifically because it is embodied.
Because the poem is so long, think about breaking it into sections. You don't have to title them, although you can. You could just number them.
I didn't claim that poems can't deal with abstract philosophical concepts directly, just that this poem begins by grounding ideas in experience and then drifts away from that grounding. In my view, the less grounded sections are, in this case (not necessarily universally) weaker.
