[oats]

Zyg: I thought this was a cool approach/application of your subject, and I like how you took a single detail of being surrounded by medical instruments and made it a thought experiment on the morality of abortion. It was unique and original, and for the most part it worked. My gripe would be that there was a simplistic portrayal of abortion in here - of course no one would sacrifice 9 months for a total stranger that they never knew they were risking in the first place. Hardly does the dilemma of having birth/abortion justice, since people generally understand that sex leads to pregnancy, and that it will be their child they are going to have or abort. As a verse, I thought it was cool and an interesting take, but as an actual experiment, I think it had some holes.

Vivid: I liked the voice and idea behind this a lot. It was a fun read, a category that's probably not given the credit it deserves. In any case, the character was carved out pretty well for what this was; we didn't know any motivation for his elvis obsession but this was more of a story than a character sketch, so I can look past those gaps in our knowledge. I think the rhyming here was a little weaker than your usual effort. The "twist" at the end was cool too, nice tip of the hat to the crazies that believe Elvis was abducted. If anything, I do wish more detail was utilized on your end, either to flesh out the character or to give more a lush backdrop/setting to the story, since you seem to do well with descriptions.


Vote: This is a close one to me. Zygote had the better writing, and the better idea, but had a more critical flaw to his verse in that his metaphor wasn't an apt representation of abortion in my opinion. Vivid's writing was a little more inconsistent, and his idea was fairly basic, but it was enjoyable to read with no jarring details or omissions. Ultimately I gotta lean towards Zyg. He left an opening to be exploited by Vivid, but V's overall effort seemed a little underwhelming, despite the fun angle he took. With some cleaner rhyming and more detail, I think Vivid could've snuck away with it.