WRITE WEEK #4

[Certain]

@Camarac: For six lines, this was good. I took the same, obvious approach to this topic, though I aimed to be a little more subtle and layered. You attack head-on at all times, though, and there was potential in that. But it needed more development. Your rhymes were strong; does that still need to be said about anything you write?

@Adonis: I like this combination of low-brow, common content with more abstract and metaphor-heavy language. You kept your focus tight enough here and had a clever closer. The rhyming was pretty much what I expect from you, which is a bit unstable but not incapable. There were some turns of phrase that didn't connect, like the line about dabs. But this was solid.

@Pent uP: The approach was what got you this contest. In these write week competitions, we see so many verses that have similar approaches that are all pretty basic. Last time, I tried something really weird and wrote a battle verse. Here, your approach was more fundamentally familiar and yet also really creative. I didn't like all your writing, to be honest. You used "fish" three times in six lines at one point, and the first stanza felt a bit clunky. You often stradle the line between straight-forward and poetic but sometimes fall into a gray area that qualifies as neither. "It's amazing how the ship and ground were changed and made to shift," doesn't sound like a natural way of speaking. But again, I applaud the creativity and completely understand why you seem to be the overwhelming winner.

@timeless: The problem with this verse was at its roots, that you humanized the polar bears to the point where this story simply didn't make sense. You basically turned the polar bears into humans rather than writing about polar bears as though they were humans. Does that make sense? I don't know. I get what you were doing here, almost like a cartoon movie about polar bear pirates. But it didn't connect or resonate, in part because you didn't really make this verse funny and didn't give us the outlay earlier.

@pharaohsarmy52: I liked the natural fluidity of the thought process, but it didn't offer as much conceptually as your opponents. There simply wasn't much in the way of content here. The thoughts felt like fragments, while others were composing more complete pieces. But the natural writing works, and if you hone in on that strength and develop it in more focused verses, you could have something going. You should join the next season of the Art of Writing League, our topical league which should be starting by the end of this month.

@Certain: Trite and obvious.

@CopyPat: Well, you wrote about 24 lines worth. So that was a bit much and frankly enough that I couldn't give you the vote here. The first stanza was absolutely great storytelling within the context of your thorough rhyming. But the story kind of slid to the back toward the end of that stanza, and you lost some of your clarity that stood out so much early on. I love your storytelling whenever you commit to it, even in short bursts like in that collaboration with Zen. I just wish the ending had been a bit crisper here.

@theMuzzl3: Your rhymes are really basic. Consider using more syllables to rhyme and evening out your bars. When you can do that, you'll be able to command more complex rhyme schemes. The content was really basic, too, as though you decided at the beginning to write from the perspective of a polar bear but not what you'd actually say along the way.

@Badi Alii: You've written much better things. You just said Einstein "knew of wifi while he was drinking Mai Tais." That doesn't make even a little bit of sense. There was no real focus here, and even the rhymes weren't quite up to your normal standard. And it didn't seem to be about the photo really, aside from a few thrown-in references here and there.

@Split: This was my favorite verse of the contest because I thought your content decision was really, remarkably original. There were times when your writing got a little bit too far into Split-ness. (It's so you to use "halcyon" and "gauze" and "velvet" and "spiderwebs of frost," for instance.) But you had so much to say about nostalgia and relationships. I loved this submission and am not sure why it's getting so overlooked.

So here's my rankings:

1. Split
2. Pent uP
3. CopyPat
4. Adonis
5. timeless
6. Camarac
7. pharaohsarmy52
8. Badi Alii
9. theMuzzl3

[Camarac]

Originally Posted by Certain

@Camarac: For six lines, this was good. I took the same, obvious approach to this topic, though I aimed to be a little more subtle and layered. You attack head-on at all times, though, and there was potential in that. But it needed more development. Your rhymes were strong; does that still need to be said about anything you write?

i think the fact i didnt even find time to write up ten lines speaks volumes

waaaaaayyyy too busy of late

glad i hopped out the tourney rather than no-show later on