RD 1: Pinot Grij vs Eng - ENG WINS!

[big baby]

Ahh, the most interesting battle on this thread. One dissevers the topic completely, riding parallel with the image. Hand in hand. The other combats the original practice of storytelling and loosely swings in demarcations of a what a story entails- can embody, and will do to a reader. A few writers in this tournament have done the same and I'm glad an eerie contrast between the two exists. Eng VS Pinot Grij is my favorite battle, not in terms of how fascinated i am with the match-up clashing, but how I believe this will be the most voted on battle, and the closest. Now....

“Hello, I’m Joey Bulbhead, it’s nice to meet ya
Maybe we could grab some coffee or a slice of pizza”

The dating game ain’t easy when your head is a bulb
Whenever Joey went to pick up girls… pathetic results
He was sexually repressed, with no seductive solutions
It’s ironic, he’s a lightbulb but nobody would screw him
Stepping foot in a nightclub was such a horrid idea
All the drunk chicks would ask him if he was born at Ikea
He’d pour them tequila, but it was just a matter of time
Before they’d laugh and ask him if his favorite rapper was Shyne

This. I was wondering how you'd approach the topic, with a more serious, undercut tone. Or if you were just going to go with your regular approaches and hope to captivate a larger audience. I feel like, You're Shel Silversteinesque. You can captivate an elderly person, or an 8 year old - which is in no way saying your verse is childish, but that it could make someone with a young mind, laugh. Everyone here is solid. My only qualm with how you deliver pieces is, that it's templated. That's what makes you so good, but also makes you predictable. Easily countered if one were to take that route. You could make a book of these and I'd buy the book. I'd read the book. I'd laud the book. I don't know if I can say that about your opponent, and that saddens me. It's just that entertaining. It's so simple, and it just works. It just falls into place and I honestly think you don't spend much time tampering with anything.

1. look for stanza subject, look for scheme
2. create the line, use the correct wording
3. buff out the edges.
4. post line.

this whole process, I feel takes you about a minute or so, if that.

Not to mention there was tension and he was down to start a fight
Every time somebody laughed and said, “Hey buddy… got a light?”
Joey left in anger, stormed straight out of the damn place
As the bartender yelled, “Hey freak! You forgot your lampshade!”
He was ready to rampage, you could say he took it badly
So he hit the ATM then stumbled down to hooker alley
He went to the first prostitute, not trying to be pushy
And said, “Hey baby, hows about you let me light up your pussy”

This is where, silently, you encompass a lot of details, a lot of feelings, and a lot of whats going on. This is awesome, the process of you getting here just shifted with a change of scenery, the club/disco/bar. Loud music. Lights. Lightbulb. Joey. I wonder who you know named Joey that made you name the character that. Again, what I dissect, is your lines seem so fluent, it just seems just a tad bit lazy, at times, but its so funny, so involving...that... i almost don't care? It's not even funny in the sense that I burst out wtih laughter. It's something I read and go, cool, slight grin, slight brain tickle. Cool. What I also noticed was...your constant references to light/shade and idiomatic turn of language that almost made it too consistent. The story is there, the concept is there, but the redundancy, in some cases (not necessarily mine) may become dense. The reason why is because in the bulk of your verse you've referenced this many times, but have done little to progress the story. While this may not seem to be of detriment, you're still competing against a skilled writer. I just think things like these shouldnt be overlooked. Maybe its because the first round usually results in about a 100% win rate for most of the writers involved, but then again with those odds being the very subject of this tourney, I think we may have to adjust some of our strengths and tread carefully. Again, awesome.

Back at his place, no questions asked, they got into it fast
She was lickin’ his glass while he fingered her ass
Down on all fours, he pleasured that whore with his tongue
One problem: his bulb lit up when he was horny as fuck
The electrical current made lava out of his saliva
And she howled like Ginsberg as he burned her vagina
That bitch slapped him with a lawsuit for worker’s compensation
And his paycheck was wrecked after the lawyers docked the payments
He lost his patience, feeling helpless in his tries at romance
The fire in his head kept him from extinguishing the fire in his pants

here. Right about here is where I wished you took a risk. Without dabbling in your regular prestigious signature style. If you approached the topic with just a slightly serious tone, with serious language. I think you wouldve, and couldve actually been much more of a force. Especially against a writer like eng. All this was hilarious. Everything clicked. Nothing seemed force. It was all natural. Too natural. I laud you for the ease in which you do all this. It's awesome, intense and entertaining. But I can't see you progressing against a stacked group of writers without taking a bit of a risk, whether that be length, placement of topic, or anything else. It just seemed like you were comfortable in being yourself (thats okay, honestly). And while the story is top tier, the language is funny, the topic is spot-on and you did everything right. It seemed too comfortable. You felt unperturbed. And while your poise is enviable, and your prose is good. Right about here I felt you shouldve taken another route, from the start. Also, I'm sure @deadman will appreciate the Howl reference. I did too. Just very impressive stuff, high level of writing.

But just when he thought it was game over for his hopeless penis
There’s a reason lightbulbs are synonymous with strokes of genius
He set up a booth at a BDSM convention, all draped in leather
And sold his services to sadists who believe that pain is pleasure
Masochist bitches lined up for his electrifying cunnilingus
And they’d be fuckin singin while his molten tongue was flingin
He paid off the hooker, his new job had him making ends
And “bulbing” became the porno industry’s latest trend
See, Joey’s the fuckin’ man as he steadily pounds muff
Now that’s something Thomas Edison can really be proud of

I don't know man. Just very impressive. Entertaining. Am I getting boring yet? This is all weaved so tightly you can call it perfect, but that would be a disservice to actual critique. Like I pointed out earlier, redundancy may get the better of some vote casters. Bulbing was a pretty cool tally to it. Shel Silversteinesque. Albeit with tinges of vulgar, intense language, and overall topic resolution. I'm glad Joey found his niche. I'm glad he found resolution. I'm glad the topic was executed as it was. Really nothing much else to say. We go to Eng.

The filament is right here; light-years protest the seed.
Incandescent spirit is fire, fire is synecdoche.
I’m blinking with ideas perpetually;
perspectives gleaned from the perplexing beams I cast.
There’s ecstasy through the looking glass,
exiting sands pass inexorably through porous hands.

Wording. Thick. I like the wording, the descriptive emotive here might stream past a lot of people, but the last two lines in particular, ecstasy, looking glass, I think are paramount to the setting of scenery, the feeling, the emotion. Whenever a body part has something attached to it (porous hands) I think the reader needs to pay very close attention, which is what I did. And it payed off, though, i'll tell you why in the forthcoming paragraphs. The thing what most won't get is this - and what I think you purposely did, blinking, perspectives, looking glass, perplexing beams (i didnt like that phrasing, but the scheme made it acceptable, usually, when i use the word perplexing, it isnt to describe an object, but more so the emotion of the stanza itself, for example if someone were to write, perplexing. how the turn of society blah blah blah, granted, you described something, it just seems like an overused phrase, especially in online arenas such as these) ecstasy, existing sands, porous hands, all this word usage is connective and very intense, it sets up a display, and the display is gorgeous.

Pouring, as some sort of author plans
though it’s dawning this might all be the force of chance.
Man, it looks unnatural: the tie, the suit and subway line commutes
provide the gel cap for the bureaucratic capsule – you swallow it,
I might if I had that orifice, or some kind of tooth to bite the con
but I’m busy kindling love for torches: lighting books of right-on
with my sidearm. Recognize it’s bright if the sense isn’t numb
or stoke your fires by the warmth of the Empyrean.
It’s all aetherial -- ad infinitum,
except we’re too worried about bills sinking the funds
and the cost electricity runs to ever have that symphony done.
That’s ok, not bothered with it - I’m constantly lit; literally, Sun.
A half-cocked old concept waiting to flash flint from a gun.
The heat of three AM whiskey liquors that dig in your lungs
to sit on your breath, but I’m best when thinking upon
notions of feeling, theory, meaning - opinion.
It lights me up, being dim’s insistently dumb.
Filament wires tie us, then in sequence we’re spun,
chain-linking hands to fence in seeming oblivion.

it's fucking outrageous that I quote this entire bulk. But it has to be done, it all syncs in perfectly, and not only did you use keywords, light, sun, heat, dim, numb, lighting, bright, empyrean, warmth, aetherial (lol british), electricity, lit. you get where i'm going. See, the first quote doesn't extend this deeply, this is where you put gloves on and went to work. You're staying close to the relatable image, but you definitely aren't encompassing the EXACT image, more so, it's how you feel. Where as your opponent encompassed the image in itself, he is the image, literally, where you grab the figurative language and mold something differently. Artistic. You started and ended, delving into the apathy and morose situation thats life, that more or less holds a depiction of the image, which is prettty impressive.

Seven point four billion
currently conducting currency, no current weaves between us.
Mind’s bent towards Time spent despite charge being intravenous.
La petite mort relates to more than just that which leaves your penis.
Still, I can’t say much – dispossessed of the most loyal intent:
sparking up cigarettes to discuss the post-coital tristresse.
One flick of ash, cinders crash into moist soil. It’s dense.
I’d collapse the light into Earth in hopes it’d reflect, just
to know it, I guess. I confess to be a blunder.
Necessity’s mother elucidates the path – abrupt in ending.
The light at the end of your tunnel’s not intention, but invention.

I liked this a lot. I also found it ironic how you used the word invention in your last line and Pinot alluded to Thomas Edison. Well, not alluded, but you know. The language here is high tier. I quoted this to another writer in this tournament saying that it's really good. I also REALLY like the use of the word tristesse, even though, it's spelled wrong, but I may chalk that up to you being british or something. You sort of tapped into some bohemian bummer bar cinematic scenery here. I like the carelessness of the flick of the cigarette. Turn of language may confuse or turn off a lot of people, but it may not. Not really sure how you progressed a natural 'story' here, which may actually hurt you, but I think in describing scenery with beautiful language, tightly woven, concentrated couplet, that you actually did just that, you told a story, in language, and of a figurative, illustrative sense. But being that your opponent did that so precisely and beautifully, easily, it may actually hurt you more than intended, but that works both ways, which is why this is my favorite battle this week. this is insanely close. Also I feel a lot of self-hate this round because a ton of writers will actually have to choose who won, when in reality nobody really lost. But, if I have to go with my gut, and with what I feel was harder to pull off, and stuck to the confines of the meaning behind this tournament, i'll go with, with a heavy heart, that would be Eng. It pains me, to say this, but I just really loved both verses but I guess voting is my duty. Either way, any writer can win this.


thanks.