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beautyincalvary
Member

since 2006-07-13

Posts 98

0 posted 2007-07-15 03:07 AM

smile, beautiful,
you horrid gray cow,
smile.

wet sloppy tears
down layers of lipid,
smile beautiful.

taste the tickling salt on your tongue;
if only,
if only you could...
feel your ribs,
beautiful

smell the boiling pasta sauce
(hell kitchen)
ignore the beckonings

remember the soft slenderness
you squeeze your arms:
exasperation.

look into the mirror,
beautiful,
see the fat fat fat
bubbling oozing engulfing fat

everywhere
around your knees
your elbows
fingers
wrists
arms
WHERE are your GOD FORBIDDEN ribs

and, beautiful,
smile.

ChristianSpeaks
Member

since 2006-05-18

Posts 396
Iowa, USA

1 posted 2007-07-19 10:01 PM

Okay - your Constructive Critiques message is a little scary...but

This write boarders on brilliant.

Is it the mental ramblings of someone who's fat or someone who is anorexic? Either way there is a conflict of hope and despair that changes with the mindset you choose. Really nice. Keep at it.

Dane

ChristianSpeaks
Member

since 2006-05-18

Posts 396
Iowa, USA

2 posted 2007-07-19 10:34 PM

Sorry one more thing:

The pasta sauce would not boil. You would burn it. It can bubble, but boil doesn't work.

beautyincalvary
Member

since 2006-07-13

Posts 98

3 posted 2007-07-19 11:24 PM

Thank you

And I'll definitely fix the pasta sauce! Thanks for catching that. My mental image is of bubbles, and I know that boiling causes bubbles. Ha, that's my excuse.

beautyincalvary
Member

since 2006-07-13

Posts 98

4 posted 2007-07-19 11:29 PM

Oh, and I meant this poem to be ambiguous in interpretation (did I word that correctly?). I feel that people can relate to it in different ways, although personally I view this person as a recovering anorexic.

e-ReK
Junior Member

since 2007-07-20

Posts 15

5 posted 2007-07-20 02:06 AM

i loved the imagery and how well you described the beef. the idea of the fat oozing just... made me cringe

. i thought it was from the perspective of an anorexic (loved the GOD FORBIDDEN ribs!). i was about to mention the "boiling" point, but some one else caught it.

beautyincalvary
Member

since 2006-07-13

Posts 98

6 posted 2007-07-23 05:42 PM

Thank you very much.

Stephanos

Member Elite

since 2000-07-31

Posts 3618
Statesboro, GA, USA

7 posted 2007-07-23 06:28 PM

When I read this I see what may be a spiritual picture.

Think of the devil sarcastically & cruelly mocking those who should be saints. We are made in the image of God (smile beautiful). And yet we are not actually beautiful but presently fallen in sin and idolatry (Cow). We are self focused (always looking in the mirror, and grasping for what we can't find). Our tears are salty (salt is a type of judgement and grace Biblically). Our uncontrolled appetites tend to lead us astray (hell's kitchen). Eve was taken from Adam's side (ribs), and so finds her unity with him. Christ, the "last Adam", calls us to realize our unity with him. But in ourselves we have no righteousness, and we've strayed far from Christ (WHERE ... GOD FORBIDDEN). And yet we may still hope to have his beauty and genuinely smile as the last line of the poem indicates.

I know this is probably not how the poem was consciously intended, but you can't deny the biblical allusions were strong in it.

Stephen.

Brad
Member Ascendant

since 1999-08-20

Posts 5705
Jejudo, South Korea

8 posted 2007-07-23 07:12 PM

I liked the first three or four lines, but after that it descends into a kind of forced structure of imperatives.

beautyincalvary
Member

since 2006-07-13

Posts 98

9 posted 2007-07-25 02:10 PM

Stephen- you are quite right. I did not even realize I was doing that, but it does fit. Or perhaps Biblical stories are so universal that they can be alluded in many situations.

Brad- I'm not quite sure how it seems "forced"... could you elaborate a bit more?

Thanks,
Emmy

Brad
Member Ascendant

since 1999-08-20

Posts 5705
Jejudo, South Korea

10 posted 2007-07-25 07:36 PM

quote:
smile, beautiful,
you horrid gray cow,
smile.

I can hear someone saying this. Now, if you accept the fact that I'm not as psychotic as I sometimes seem, I think this means you've got something here.

quote:
wet sloppy tears
down layers of lipid,
smile beautiful.

and then

wet sloppy tears
down layers of lipid,
smile beautiful.

quote:
taste the tickling salt on your tongue;
if only,
if only you could...
feel your ribs,
beautiful

Neither of these have that same appeal. Too much alliteration and you constantly return to the imperative. This is the spine, if you will, of the poem. I think you should move in a different direction.

quote:
remember the soft slenderness
you squeeze your arms:
exasperation.

Alliteration again. And then you describe what is being felt after, well, remembering what is being felt. You've completely lost the 'voice' of those first three lines.

Go for the voice, not for the tricks.

taste the tickling salt on your tongue;
if only,
if only you could...
feel your ribs,
beautiful

beautyincalvary
Member

since 2006-07-13

Posts 98

11 posted 2007-07-26 01:38 AM

So are you saying that if I take out the alliteration and (some of the) imperatives it will be stronger?

smile, beautiful,
you horrid gray cow,
smile.

wet sloppy tears
down layers of lipid,
smile beautiful.

if only
if only you could...
feel your ribs,
beautiful

and taste the bubbling sauce
beckoning
(hell kitchen)

instead, beautiful,
hours of reflection,
caressing oozing engulfing
fat

around your knees
your elbows
fingers
wrists
arms
WHERE are your GOD FORBIDDEN ribs

and, beautiful,
smile.

Does that help at all?

Thanks,
Emmy

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