ELITE EIGHT: Certain vs. Frank - OPEN FOR VOTES!

[sral]

Welcome back motherfuckers!

Huge props if you’ve made it this far first and foremost! That initial round of sixteen had some absolutely CRAZY matchups but nothing like what’s to come here in the Elite Eight! There’s never been a tournament quite like this one, not with a field so open as to who could eventually win. This is it fellas! Time to show and prove. Slip up, and you’re out. It really is that simple. No second chances. It’s go hard, or go home and cry about it because we aren’t trying to hear that shit. These writers remaining are some of the best in the world, the greatest to have ever done this, and only one can be crowned champion… but who will it be? We’ll get a more realistic view after this round as the competition has now been halved, and will again after this round. Do you have what it takes to become the STI champion?


House Rules:

16 lines min.
48 lines max (unless agreed between you two)


Check-In's due: Monday Midnight EST
Verses due: Wednesday Midnight EST


PLEASE VOTE ON EVERY OTHER BATTLE! I'm not here to police you guys, but it doesn't hurt to vote and it also helps ensure we keep things moving around here - these tournaments are nothing without the support of you guys. Modding is often a thankless task, and I've put in a lot of work to make this happen for you all, don't let me down!

There is NO RECYCLING, BITING ETC. Pretty standard. I shouldn't have to tell you folks that.

First to post may edit verse until opponent posts his verse. Second to post may edit their verse up until the first vote is cast.








TOPIC:

@Certain @Frank

[Certain]

Billy’s a whirlwind. He’s running around the grocery store
plucking boxes off shelves, lost in himself with no remorse.
He’s bright — in smile and intellect — but a bit spoiled.
His parents feel their child’s a gift to them, so they recoil
any time Billy scrapes his leg or struggles to solve
the puzzles they bought with hopes of ensuring he’d gain an edge.

Freddy’s the product of a crowded house, smothering quarters
with mom, dad, two brothers, a sister and grandmother in four rooms.
A quiet sort in public, he’s a scrapper at home.
One brother’s a boxer, so Freddy can take a tap to the dome,
which comes in handy when his dad ambles in stoned.
These are the spots when even the tots’ll glance at the phone.

Joey’s a lovable choir boy, his mother’s one pride and joy.
Pops left him in infancy, but no one could find a void
because he was adopted by all sorts of aunties in the church pews.
Joey’s defined by basketball, gap teeth and a curfew.
Teachers love his vibrant cheer and always try to steer
him to “a better path,” the kind of lines you hear when raised in silent fear.

Timmy’s the studious sort, not that he has a choice.
Cello lessons, math and Joyce — for him, these pass as toys.
The pressure’s intense. His measured success comes in letters on tests.
This was how his parents showed they loved him: stressing the best.
The best for him. The best for his future — with their vision in frame.
But when alone, Timmy wanted nothing more than video games.

Fourteen years later — Will, Fred, Joe, Tim — picture ’em all.
Which one do you envision behind prison bars?
Which one’s in college? Which one dropped out for a rhythm guitar?
Which one’s scraping out an honest living with a kid and a car?
We’re all products of our environment, the physical scars
of a threshing machine expertly designed to bring us to harvest.
Our success rates are driven by markets and traded as rapidly,
where one bad break holds the stakes to make us all casualties.
So think of these men. Did Will keep hold of his silver spoon?
Could Fred display the will to prove he isn’t his dad?
For Joe, did that grin and that laugh fade to a shriller tune?
And did Tim manage to fulfill his parents’ visions at last?
Four boys, turned four men. Picture them all, each complexion and face.
Then remember I never made even a single mention of race.








.

[Frank]

Ms. Johnson separated the two children from their disputement at lunch with a look of truant disgust.
Using her ruler at once: She subjected the unruly pupils to bruises and cuts, wounding the runts with tutoring umpth.
Ridiculing with sudden cruelness, she abusively swung the ruler - acutely and blunt.
“Misbehaving will not be tolerated by two imprudent punks.”
She said fuming as salvia flew out of her gruesome gums -
With cooties - it flung gooey and gunked the view of the fuss
Spewing: the two students threw a slew of punches with amusement & spunk,
Over a new crush who was doodling, blushing, canoodled and hushed
Adam sat in a corner of the cubicle slumped, sucking his cuticled thumb,
Picking his nose, putting it on his clothes, where it gluingly stuck
Damien sat in a another corner, toothless and tough, blowing bubbles out of bazooka gum,
Recruiting others from a secluded bunk, ruthlessly young
Disillusioned with eyes the hue of the dusk, strange letter markings tattooed on prepuberty knucks
Flowers wilt in the vase, the tulips prune in the sun, as the temperature in the room becomes humid with muck
Refusing to be stuck – Damien threw a tantrum, brooding with blood, pouting putrid, scrunched, ghoulish and grunge
This on-going feud had been fueling for months. Ever since the school bus, the two had a grudge.
“You spilled juice on my shoes!”
Damien maneuvered and lunged at Adam with a dark druid grunt, balling his fist, adorably pissed, brutishly bluffing
Adam lucidly ducked
Blocking the other students punch, biting and scratching, hyper reactive, seeing quadruple the lumps
Damien is drooling with mush.
Ms. Johnson gets up from her desk spuming, confused over the hooting and ruckus
She cougarly runs over with a huge bust, her buttons loosening, she smoothly adjusts
Damien stares through the other student, and says fluently in mutant tongue
With unscrupulous rudeness,“We are the ones who dwell within” he said subdued and hunched.
“I am the one who dwelt within.” He tells everybody in his group on the rug.
“I once dwelt within JUDAS!” he said biting into the forbidden fruit with doom in his crunch
“And when you crush an apple with your teeth, say to it in your heart” He gloomily munched
“Your seeds shall live in my body” he said chewing
“And the buds of your tomorrow shall blossom in my soul” he said with an entombing chug
“And your fragrance shall be my breath” he said as the Fuji gushed.
“And together we shall rejoice through all the seasons” he said wiping his mouth of drool and disgust.
Lucifer’s son looked at Adam and scooted down next to him, as he chewed to a mush
There’s always that one bad apple that ruins the bunch

[PancakeBrah]

CERTAIN-

You've written this type of verse before. Or I think you have, kind of recall one similar to this. Multiple quick portraits of characters, then a cherry on top for concept. QUITE THE VIGNETTE-IST, THIS ONE. Of the four, Timmy's section probably had the best writing, but they were all on the same wavelength. An even keel to the entire proceedings, solid throughout but nothing much splashed. You had solid wording/phrasing throughout the piece, no missteps. But also nothing extraordinary. I liked the transition from the childlike names ending in -y to "proper adult names" in the first line of the last stanza. I didn't like the ending line much at all. Came out of nowhere and felt hokey, with no real subtlety to the point. Didn't work as a finisher. Slipped on the turnbuckle. Which is odd, since I often enjoy the conceptual angles you take to topics. One word came to mind when reading this; "Professional". A buttoned up affair, showing your experience. But the verse didn't make much of an impact on me. I think you're capable of better.

FRANK-

Here are the words you used incorrectly;

Disputement - Should just be dispute.

Truant - The teachers look of disgust isn't truant.

Canoodled - How is the crush canoodled during a fight over the crush?

Ruthlessly - They're probably just young & ruthless. Not ruthlessly young. Or Violently underaged. Or maliciously preteened.

Humid with muck - It's probably just humid.

Grunge - A noun, not an adjective.

"Seeing quadruple the lumps" - If he's "blocking the other students punch" and "hyper reactive" he should have no lumps.

Entombing Chug - He's eating. Also, ridiculous.

As for the story itself, it was good in some parts, but on the whole absolutely ridiculous and disjointed. The Damien reveal came out of nowhere. Everything was just aimless and scattershot. They're fighting in the school yard. They're fighting on the bus. They're fighting in the teacher's office(?). Then he's the movie character and he sits down and he's a bad apple. There's no point to any of it. It's an exercise in repeated rhyming (which goes sideways many times), with some interesting lines of action, some genuinely interesting writing, that all amounts to "the character in the picture is Damien". It hit the topic right on the head yet somehow didn't say anything about the topic at all.

I feel like I'm being harsh. There were highlights, of course. You're capable of great writing.

"Using her ruler at once: She subjected the unruly pupils to bruises and cuts, wounding the runts with tutoring umpth.
Ridiculing with sudden cruelness, she abusively swung the ruler - acutely and blunt.
“Misbehaving will not be tolerated by two imprudent punks.”
She said fuming as salvia flew out of her gruesome gums -
With cooties - it flung gooey and gunked the view of the fuss
Spewing: the two students threw a slew of punches with amusement & spunk,"

The best section, far and away. Pitch perfect here.

"Flowers wilt in the vase, the tulips prune in the sun, as the temperature in the room becomes humid"

Good!

But overall, the stretched wording and weird, almost pointless aimlessness of the story detracted from my enjoying those great sections of writing only you are seemingly capable of, in your imitable style.




I read all of Certain's verse and the first couple of lines from Frank's yesterday night and honestly thought Frank would get my vote.After fully reading both a few times, the tides shifted. Certain's verse was a technically forthright affair with a bad ending and a short impact. Frank's was a semi-english scattershot story with occasional flashes of brilliance with a short impact. Both writers are capable of multiple levels of higher quality, in my estimation. If Frank had tightened up some loose ends and given his plot some, I don't know, plot or, I don't know, point, he wins this running away. As it stands now, Certain's stolid approach withstands the calamitous chaos that was Frank's attempt at a whirlwind of creativity.

v/Certain, begrudgingly

[UnbornBuddha]

Certain: You used a similar narrative sketch in your one of your last AOWL bouts. The way characters are introduced, the subpar rhyming, and the lack of interesting phrasing leads to a lackluster presentation. The fluidity of your transitions is always really exemplary, but even the overarching theme here was riddled with banalities, especially in the last stanza where the series of questions themselves presented nothing that really led to any reflective deliberation that will lead to an insight on a perspective I haven't been presented with. I quite liked the ending phrase, I have to say, but generally it lacked vivacity.

Frank: I found this more amusing than your adversary. It did get a bit preposterous at certain junctions. And as the other astute commentator so elegantly pointed out, your misuse of certain words leads to awkward readings. That cause the reader to stop and scratch their head to what you are are talking about. Clarity is an area where your opponents excels in, but storytelling is where you excel at. In the end, I found your story more amusing and had some more interesting descriptions. The biblical take was quite an obvious take, but the way you presented it appealed to my tastes more.

Vote: Frank

[Vulgar]

Certain - You went with a difficult route on this one. I would describe this verse as formal and academic. The transitions were calculated, the overall tempo a bit monotone and controlled. This was very much a tranquil documentary produced by a peace organization about economic disparagement between nationalities. I'm not going to pretend like I could pull off this approach. I do think it was the kind of verse that's supposed to hit the reader like a quarterback hiking the ball to a running back. Its success is dependent on the message being delivered via capsule of 'transcendent truth' about race and humans. It didn't pack the punch it needed, I feel, to get to the end zone. It's hard to quantify the thought that goes into rhymed verses; this medium is so limited people don't even realize, until they read short stories and novels and see how such a small thing can translate to something larger, more ambitious and better defined. With that said, I don't want to disqualify your idea because it's interesting. I don't think this verse worked well in this format because there were so many unanswered's. It was like a bare PowerPoint, making its point, but not really as demonstrative and animated as it could've been if an energetic presenter replaced the laptop and slide presentation.

Frank - Brilliant ending but damn dude, the older I get the less I enjoy your coast to coast rhyme schemes. It was completely wack at some parts while it was nice at others. I can't stress this enough, it ruins so many of your good storylines. As a concept, this isn't a new rendition; God and the Devil or God's children and the devil as toddlers. The way it succeeded to a partial degree (due to the painful rhyming) was how it hit the topic picture, which was very clever. Please understand, I have to deduct points because the verse was one long fight scene. There was no skilled interweaving of biblical stories, no glimpses of the adults the toddlers would grow to be. In a way, you are betting the house on the twist ending - if the reader isn't receptive, they're likely to not be that impressed by your rhyming steez, and vote the other way. It's a "statement of power" trying to take a risk like that, however, it's not exemplary writing. It's just not. I guess we each do different things in different ways. It was fun to read though for about 70-80% of it. At the end of the lines, it was slow-going, as I had to acknowledge (ok, he's rhyming with this and this...) and adds to the drudgery effect. If this happened in a movie, people would turn it off. It's like the same film device - the most difficult film device to implement - equivalent to a one-rhyme scheme verse, used over and over and over again. I know this is falling on deaf ears because it's your style and you are good enough at it to win championships, but let's go son...

Vote - Frank

Based on the strength of his twist alone, I think he tops Certain's potentially effective character studies.

[Eŋg]

certain - i wanted to like this more, not to say i disliked it. the four points on their own - succinct as they were - exhibited very solid writing tied together with competent rhyming (though one or two lines read off to me for reasons i'll assume are native). but i don't think they converged as you might have hoped. it felt ultimately like a conceit that wasn't quite proud enough of itself. as pancake mentioned, the maturation implicit in the 'proper' names was an appreciably subtle nuance, i also thought the brief stint with an ABAB in the final stanza was cool if seldom seen. drawing from the topic: the finish needed more bite. i'd also note there's something i drew objectively from the picture which i didn't find in your verse - certainly i didn't take what frank took from it. there's a question of privilege, and colour (is being a brown-skinned immigrant salient?) i suppose, but eating all that is the idea of necessity in the picture. you sort of rejected the connotations of race with four ostensibly white names. i found that a bit awkward.

frank - this was a playful jaunt through your flipping of the topic in a verse fraught with whimsy and stuttered rhymes. in this arena (outside of it, i'm more forgiving) it's difficult for me to get past questionable syntax and a lexis informed almost entirely by a repetitive scheme. i don't see the merit in it, but then i wouldn't. tell a lie, i can deal with those things when they feel authentic! when they're there to mash rhymes together in some semblance of coherent continuity to carry a verse by a preconceived metronome, it's a bit annoying. actually, it's fucking laborious. the story had its moments - the dichotomous reveal at the end was a bit out of left-field but curious, some segments of description were impressive and you rhymed similar sounding syllables a lot. that is something. i didn't really get the take on the topic other than two kids/bad apple - in truth, i didn't really like your interpretation of it. i think both writers could have done better with the task at hand, though i don't know if i would have (i might have) so maybe that's harsh.

with respect, i expected more from this battle. after a bit of deliberation, based on the cleaner delivery, i'll edge my vote to certain.

[dead man]

short vote a la cake.

certain: 4 different environments, parental styles and backgrounds. playing on our mind's tendency to stereotype based on all of these descriptions. it was cool. i wasn't too much feeling your phraseology at all. very clunky at times. i hate the word "tots" as well. has a choice / pass as toys, rhythm guitar, just fell flat as i read them. if you could improve one aspect of your writing it would be honing your creative turn of phrase. i liked the idea behind this and how you closed it out. interesting work.

adam and damien. very cool. the apple and everything. i dug it. that idea by itself was not enough to carry this i don't think. vulgar has a point - you belabor this idea of formatting your verses around a single rhyme and it really shits on you sometimes. it stabs you in the back. i don't know why you feel the need to make that your trademark maneuver but you do. first week, okay you had a great enough idea in my mind to overlook a lot of the missteps. here -- well, pancake pretty much covered how absurdly some of this translated. you are great at what you do. and do it well very often. but here, you did not have the conceptual power to overcome the shortcomings.

v/certain serpent.

[sral]

CERTAIN WINS

FUCK YOU ALL FOR NOT VOTING