Quote:
Well since you asked for criticism, I didn't like it. It sounded like you were trying to be "deep" by using a variety of metaphors, but to me it just ended up sounding very convoluted and not making much sense...none of the metaphors really had much weight or structure behind them. It didn't seem to have much form either, other than a few scattered rhymes here and there.
That's just my personal, honest opinion...do with it what you will!
I've pasted the poem complete with what I hope are clarifying annotations. I do need to take structure into consideration and a series of extended metaphors would have made the poem a little less opaque. The fact that it's a "rap" (I struggle to call it that I obviously have an ego issue ofmy own) means that the music imparts unity. The rapid sequence of different metaphors is also characteristic of the genre. The extreme abstraction is also meant to give the whole a sort of pomp and to make the self aggrandisement seem all the more absurd. I think judging it as poetry definitely finds it wanting but as one part of an artistic whole it starts to take shape.
Quote:
Narcissi
I in my intricate image on silver (Dylan Thomas)
Screens reflected
Silver dipped tongues strip the vellum
From the horn in fearful praise of the (Vellum = Velvet (Deer Horn) )
Oracle's projected (Oracle at Delphi)
The mind the nexus singularity
Draws the carrier waves through (Carrier waves carry information he is godlike)
Ears atuned to frequencies
The eye the mouth the second skin (second skin is a sort of aura used to keep tactile images intact)
Sense the tremors 'long the humming string (Omniscience sensing communications along cables)
Give me a freeze frame and a still game of pool (Narcissus compared with gameof pool)
Give me a marble frieze and bas relief
Give me a golden hacksaw and show me the stalk
Still life of a giant framed in chalk
(This section is a rendering of the DSM criteria for NPD)
Inflation and grandiosity sans
Comensurate facility
Visions and fantasies
Solipsistic realities
Assumed superiority being
Distinct from the mass of humanity
Vacuity of self validation feeding
Vanity
Every whim and each desire must be met
With all alacrity
The ends are centred in your sights
Means subject to calamity
Interpersonal dysfunction marked
by empathetic paucity
Admiration sours turns to envy
Turns to jealousy
Debasement of the other
Plebeian looked at haughtily
Serpent slicks snake oil charms
Boxed and sealed with the sign of Loki
(Dismissive retort. Psychs are snake oil salesmen operating under the sign of Loki of Viking myth)
After time loosens the final helices
Coil shuffle turf soil (After the last human dies)
After the mushrooms bloom (Atomic Bomb)
Flash boom procede from womb to tomb (Cradle to grave transition from life to death)
I am Ozymandias boundless laid bare (Shelley Ozymandias poem highly ironic if you read original)
Look upon my works ye mighty give into
Despair.
The speaker is essentially saying that he is a godlike (Narcissus primarily) figure of legend. A psychologist diagnoses him with NPD. He retorts by saying that after the humanity is consigned to history's list of failures he will remain. He uses Smith/Shelley's image of Ozymandias to state this which is meant to be ironic since it's a symbol of futility decay and mortality in my opinion anyway.
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IMPORTANT PLEASE READ ! !
My history on this forum preserves my old and unregenerate self. In the years since I posted here I have undergone many changes. I accept responsibility for my posts but I no longer stand behind them.
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And He is the radiance of His glory and the exact representation of His nature, and upholds all things by the word of His power When He had made purification of sins, He sat down at the right hand of the Majesty on high Hebrews 1:3
14 Jun 2014, 4:52 pm
