[Soulstice]

split - thought this was great. the stream of conscience style is working quite well for you in this tourney.

a semblance of close as different as treasure and cove,
a sense of remembrance so vivid, it's an extension of home.

thought this set the scene nicely. treasure and cove is a great metaphor for the proximity of emotion between two people. you have my heart, the treasure, in your cove - but the cove is unaware and unfeeling and totally apathetic to the existence of this treasure.

cyan. printed on redness. a red eye. the bedside,
a light I leave on right by my post- & abandonment easens.

i took this as a sort of going back of sorts - cyan printed on redness reminded me of a ticket. but i took it as a late night trip back to this memory that is referencing. there was sort of a sleepless, dreamless feel to the travel - as if your character isnt available during their flight, there just - vaguely existing, lost in nostalgia as they go back.

to my lighter i'm senpai. CONFESS- I cancel my evenings to manage my demons,
and plan to confide in the handful I don't. Beauty and cameras can lie.
regress into the cure of a cancer I breath from. I could sample my throat,
bleed, and ramble for evenings, with every gram that I smoke,
then coalesce to a vanishing point to let the impending develop.

I thought CONFESS was a little wink to black's piece in OM. haha. anyways the senpai line is cool but i wouldve reversed it, like your lighter is training you by lighting the weed that leads to some previously unreachable state of mind. the wording was strange here but not bad. coalesce to a vanishing point was great - it once more evoked feelings of nostalgia - in that when you start to recall memories you 'vanish' from the present.

Send a sad little note I had stashed- I've an preference for relics.
Polaroid photo attached, know why I chose it- to stow in the past.

this wraps up your character nicely, and brings a lot closure to a journey i could visualize - maybe a few nods to the actual memory would be nice, depending on how you wouldve wrote it, but the absence of that was good too - really focus on the character's reactions and growth through the journey. enjoyed this.

Darth - this was pretty wordy. i dont think there was a clear disconnect between describing actual things, altars, rivers, fluorescence, and story/image stuff vs the thoughts and concepts, the topically stuff. i think this was just a discussion on what a photograph can represent. the ending seemed like a a culmination of something but on my later reads i think it was just the final entry on a list, sort of. i think you touched on the artistry of photographs, as well as how they can be technical as seen below - especially the rifle part which was cool.

monocle & hour-glass. one minute to shoot; rifle frames the soldier
digitized optical mass. where eyes glued became the beholder
most say numbers lie. corner stone appeal til' the hero is sung
time-stamps read the binary our life defined in zeroes and ones

after hypnotic shutter cycles (hypnotic is a good entry point to this following concept) i think you go on about how there can be artistry as well as practicality in photographs. you follow up on how no matter what photos are capable of they can be flawed and cause pain as well. that was cool but very difficult to extract from your piece.

vote - split. better technically and a more clearly defined piece. both were good