The Chop Shop

This is my very stream-of-consciousness exercise. There is supposed to be some white space to indicate pauses before certain phrases but I could not figure out the HTML to force it. I will bring a printed version Monday, if anyone is at all interested.

I like the idea of time and distance being played with in this poem--I also see this as a bit of confessional poetry, since it is stream-of-consciousness..

I enjoy the "parking lot argonauts", or adventurers, seeing a college student as an argonaut fits well..

-I would consider omitting the rhyme in lines 4 and 5, doesn't seem too spur-of-the-moment, and seems only there to be a rhyme
-6 and 7 might work, if spaced out evenly:

worlds a-
part with
worlds
of
distance

...or something like that.
-hands appears several times in this poem; not a bad thing, just curious.
-I like the "keywesting" slang:sounds like a term for urbanization, or bounderies made
-good break between lines 12 and 13
-I would omit lines 15 and 16, because they don't seem to make reference to anything in particular
-rephrase line 14: "That he lost in a swimming pool gambit". Right now it starts off sounding cliche with "He lost it all"
-17,18, and 19 odd, but I like the synaesthesia in the sound of fear
-enjoy "exposed brick prospects": seems to be an overstatement, not exactly hyperbole, but maybe coded hyperbole for opportunity.
-line 24 my favorite line.

Good start for stream-of-consciousness. How about "Neely and the Argonauts" for the next subtitle?

Despite the acknowledgement of this being stream-of-consciousness, I find myself distracted by the single period in the poem. There are no commas or even another period in the last line, so I'm curious to know what the advantage of that one period is.

My overall impression of the poem is that it is filled with some very interesting and vivid descriptions, but that things like the virtual lack of punctuation and intermittent capitalization leans too much toward obvious poetic devises.

On that note, I like the line break for the first and second lines, also "keywesting" is great and "scrub/oak and childhood".

"swimming pool gambit" is interesting as well, it sounds good and also makes you think.

I'm a little wary of "betray"- it suits what you're talking about, but it is so melodramatic while the rest of the poem's language is fairly even-keeled. I think it would sound better dumbed down.

I am not sure if it is intentional, but there's an awful lot of cliche in your poem...

Worlds apart
worlds of distance
too young to be something
too old to be nothing

I found it distracting and vague, like what does that really mean. However, I will say bravo on "the distance between hands on a steering wheel" very nice image, I just don't think it needs the idea of worlds apart to open it up.

Line 12 would read better without "long" being there.

I love the ending, it totally opens up the poem.

Finally, time to work!

We are nearing the very end, doctors, and we finally have two new colleagues added: Dr. Andrew "Ace", and Dr. Dave "Nervo" Gutierrez. I thank them both for joining us: I will see you both at the convention.

Your revision Josh, has accomplished some great direction to your stream-of-consciousness poem, and feels much stronger. Now, to cut back on directness, since your dedication implies already what this is about:

line 1: Amanda is right: this line is cliche and, if not broken up, then seems out of place. Consider omitting.

line 2: This would be a great place to start the poem: not too subtle and not too direct, either. It also seems wistful enough, yet clever enough to give reader's mind to become hooked.

line 7: I would suggest omitting "childhood", and perhaps a childhood object in place of the actual time frame: childhood is too general and doesn't leave much to the imagination.

lines 9-10: This seems very contrived. If there was a way to paraphrase this without saying it directly, then it would work: otherwise, omit.

line 11: omit "future" or change to something less pointed.

line 12: "dampen" sounds like a poor shift in tense: maybe line 11 or 12 needs punctuation.

line 14: since bas-relief definition is a "sculptural relief that projects very litle from background", is this meant to be ironic? If it is, then it seems out of place in two ways: one, it appears to come out of nowhere, and two, there is so much general reference to childhood, especially in cliche, that it seems pointless to bring this up. Why not make it a sculpture that is in the the bottom corner of the house, collecting dust, or something to that effect? I like bas-relief, but it does appear to be a contradiction: not ironic enough to be direct, yet too direct (in the sense that this is the speaker as a direct metaphor) to be ironic.

line 17: this line feels like it needs a line break, because of all the prepositional phrases; otherwise, redundant.

line 18: omit "try" and perhaps part of "this is a college education": we already get this idea from the title, that the speaker may be talking about with the implied father: "him".

Keep this one going: still love "swimming pool gambit"-- what happened to the parking lot argonauts? It doesn't fit, I know; well, I hope you saved that piece for something else, then.