placate.txt

[Metropolism]

Placate.txt [date modified: |3|4|4|8|6|][<[)}(


Canisters of “BLUE DELUGE EXPLOSION” precipitate exponenti(AL) increases in human consciousness>
No longer god-given
No longer granted and taken
Not for profit or four loss
Placate now or face the music
x12 [is better than] 2y because >>>>>>>>>>>>> >> >>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>

[INSERT: INTEGER]

Concubines of the/COSMOS VENERATION SOCIETY/envisage a future bereft of meaningful paradigms>
Given to inward transfers
Given to untimely decline
Given to tides of rage ^!##
Placate or live by the stock exchange
Placate not subjugate/Or rule or preside or supervise >>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>

Platitudes and i#n#c#a#n#t#a#t#i#o#n#s de-{//:l-iberate on underscored TXT [MY/FILES] >>>>>>
Working for a living
Wor(king) for quotas
Working for peace
Placate or retire to industry
We are matter animated\\We convert to energy (9493) - all of us >>>>>\\ >>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>

?Trains filled with vivid publicists and pallets of Hippocratic theory fly smooth/straight/and-true>
Fixated on light beams
Fixated on magazine articles
Fixated on a closed universe
Placate the area immediately
Placate. Because hazy indeterminate numbers haunt the quantum world.( )>>>>> >>>>>>>>

Kinklepops await the thirsty miners upon their return FROM the brightest depths of spacetime..>
Mining for plastic cups
Mining for reason [12-dimenional fabric]
Mining for morning television
Placate or find yourself in the moment
Suck down another kinklepop - you will need it/it/it/it/it/it/it/it/tit/it <>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>

Pretense is the preferred tense when speaking about distant futures or ruminating on strings>
Imagining theories
Imagining a day at the beach
Imagining exile ….|HOCUS(x-y)
Placate and renounce ev-rything
Economise. Tighten your belt, get your skates on, acceleration<ACCELERATION><ACCELERATION>>

“This has been a community service announcement.”


<< a literary work by: hi(y)per-b===z%-7 >> / CORRECTION: << a literary work by: hi(y)per-b===z%-7 >>

[snorriefitzgerald]

This might be better suited for the Experimental forums. I've read it a few times and nothing in it makes me want to decrypt it. It seems to be the inane ramblings of someone who got mixed up with the brown acid in the glorious summer of '69 and never really recovered.

[billmoss]

Hello.

Some writers try to smoke-screen unresolved self or lack of message in lace; others use their Erector Set. Aside from differences in the constituents of their respective mare's nests, there's little difference in net effect: anonymity and posture fail to substitute for personality and honesty.

Much of this is auto-echolalic gimmick, further burdened by each strophe's final lines, whose language, in an attempt at "deep," only mires. While this kind of presentation might be effective, to become so, it would have to transcend the impression that its writer/N is doing more than playing random-associatively in a verbal sandbox; this piece doesn't reach that level. Rather, most of its phrasing and ideation come off as a thrashing attempt to get off the ground, "decorated" with non-alpha-character rubble, caps, boldface, underlines, and the occasional not particularly novel or stimulating (but evidently, writer- or N-pleasing) dullish pun, or intended-to-be-wink-wink-"profound" allusion/interjection. (E.g., that pointless stutter of "it," just to "discover" or try to "titillate" with "tit." Is N a pre-adolescent boy, that this level of symbolism and simplistic wordplay seems worth inclusion?)

With this pile-on of apparently random clutter, a reader can't know whether the occasional interesting possibility is due to her or his own ability to find bits of value in the dross, or if the writer put them there. Given the low-quality "ore," I'm tempted to vote for the first possibility. Maybe revision will equal refinement, in which case I'd be happy to change my mind.

But until that occurs, N is all pose and no personality: a symptom of an attempt to substitute "clever" for personal. Because the piece's sole crutch turns out to be structurally flawed (inadequately clever, poorly built), the net effect is one-dimensional (weak propositions backed by no one): "who's saying this and why," is information withheld. So is "what's the point," if a point exists beyond faceless and over-general presentation of the low-wattage would-be Cynical-and-Clever-Outside-Observer posture so typical of beginning writers and thinkers. (Imagine a self-perceived misfit at a party: fearing to engage but hoping for attention, s/he either meaninglessly doodles or pretends to have just invented last year's clever phrase; or, for the same motives, interruptively juggles whatever's at hand.)

Yeah, the world is less than ideal, "the system" is flawed or fictional, and people can be venal. What's new? How does this affect you, and who are you or N? Either step up, engage, and care, or forget about it: if you can't own what within you drives this, you're really not ready to make a statement.

Later note: I see that this has been moved to "Experimental": the only experiment I see in this is a random toss that hopes for some sort of undefined success and hedges against failure with a cushion of obfuscation.

Thanks,
Bill

[Metropolism]

I very much appreciate this spirited and energetic critique - many kind thanks indeed for taking the time. Especially enjoyable was the speculation that the writer must surely be an attention-seeking schoolboy with an annoying penchant for posting random text. How presumptuous of the poster (it's been many years since I was a school boy!) I only regret that I've not had the time to respond earlier.

I accept all of these observations. Placate.txt is not personal, decisive, logical, or profound. It may benefit from revision. The problem with poetry that adheres closely to established rules, and with work that has been subjected to repeated polishing by is anxious writers, is that the results are often staid, boring and unreadable. There must be a reason the appeal of contemporary poetry is so limited and decidedly not embraced by the masses. I believe this could be it.

Placate.txt staggers haphazardly, as if searching for a way around this problem. It wants to express the prospect of an exhilarating incomprehensible distant future. It falls well short. It is conscious of its own silliness, and spectacular in its failings. Yet I still love it.

[billmoss]

Hello.

Nowhere did I mention "school boy," nor would I: the perspective of which this type of obfuscatory work is a symptom is not limited by gender, age, or education, and can be found in submissions by all manner of writers affected by uncertainty or aversion to negative response.

Were love a factor in criticism, I might have inquired about its apparent absence or remarked on its presence; though, given my point of view as a reader, I might have preferred to use "pride," instead. Nothing in the piece contradicts the notion of pride; and nothing there raises "pride" above that of the "stuck in his thumb and pulled out a plum" variety. That notwithstanding, surely, given all of the introductory material this sites offers by way of orientation, you could not have posted the above work in hopes of receiving praise with respect to your love or pride.

That the piece falls short of "its" intentions and my vision of what poetry (experimental or otherwise) can be does not seem to constitute a point of disagreement. And thus, I suggested and suggest that your next offering meet more of the expectations the piece's intentions would imply. If you knew it fell short and was not what you say it is not; if its sole intrinsic value other than your fondness was that the piece also was not a poem by "established rules" (whatever they may be); then why post it? As a guess? Because the piece, personified, assured you that consciousness of its own silliness was ample reason to offer it up? This is a critical workshop—not a gallery for vanity posts.

As I've been repeating lately, random application of device or anti-device no more makes a piece a poem than nailing a horseshoe to a dog makes a horse—or scrawling (in sequins, even) "not a dog" makes the dog something else. Let's hear it for silliness and less "staid, boring and unreadable"—and let's see less stagger, more dance, and much, much more poetry. Develop a style—shotgunning may hit a target now and then, but all of the other things it hits give lie to the art and accuracy (and intentions) of the shooter.

Thanks,
Bill

[Chan]

Hello, it has been pointed out that this is a sequence of inspirational writer's notes and nothing more, and I concur.

I was going to write a witty critique, but after composing it in my head, I found I no longer had the energy to type it up. The only thing that stuck out for me was the use of the unusual suffix in the title 'Placate.txt'. It is highly unlikely to enter common usage if that was the hopeful intention of the writer. Consider:

"Would you like a whole placate full of biscuits, or a half-full?"
"Thank you, I would like a placate.txt." See how unlikely it would be?

It later occurred to me that .txt. might be a reference to the fact that the work itself is a text file of inspiration notes from a writer's notebook, which in itself begs the question of why it should be dressed up and presented for evaluation as poetry. Anyway, given all these observations, I really shouldn't attempt to decrypt this as poetry.

Kindest Regards,
Chan

[manxmog]

There must be a reason the appeal of contemporary poetry is so limited and decidedly not embraced by the masses. I believe this could be it.

No. Experimental or not, any poem must wash over you and thrill you. It should richly reward the effort of deciphering it. Perhaps 99% of contemporary poetry does fail to do this.
There is nothing wrong with the old rules or the new rules or no rules for that matter (or the strange gimmick of mentioning ancient chinese rulers.)
The only requirement is that a poem be thrilling.

[StaleMilk]

Placate the area immediately

I thought that was brilliant, personally.

On first glance it looks like my desktop threw up, but upon closer inspection I enjoy the cohesive confusion that speaks of everything and nothing simultaneously, and knows it.

[aintu]

Sorry, I don't know who moved this, but it really isn't experimental. It's a relatively conventional poem with a few tagged-on intrusions.

Non-alphanumeric characters are used more interestingly by several experimental poets it's worth familiarising yourself with. Sean Bonney, Allen Fisher and p.inman are just three among many. Each has a distinct identity, and each is effortlessly more experimental than this poem.

There are glimmers here of what the poem might become. Repetition, permutation, and the intrusion and juxtaposition of starkly contrasting elements are all interesting strategies that can be pushed a lot further.

I really would recommend reading Sean Bonney as a great contemporary example of how this kind of subject matter can be dealt with in an experimental form. He has been published by Salt, Barque, and Veer among others.

But back to the poem in question.

I think having relatively regular stanzas here works against the poem. Unless you're going to do outlandish things within those constraints what you have is a conventional poem with a bit of set-dressing.

'Placate' might be a good place to start. It recurs through the poem, but only once is it used in a witty or unconventional way, 'Placate the area immediately'. If you're going to use it (and you might consider using it either much less or much more than you currently do) then try to be a little inventive about it.

You can pun, split the word across lines (pl/acate; pla/cate; plac/ate), place it close to other words that look or sound similar (place, plate, lactate, placenta), or play with it in other ways I haven't thought of.

Then there are those non-alphanumeric characters. Think about why they're there, what you intend them to do/mean. For instance I've seen parentheses used to indicate o, 0, absence, a missing vowel or vowels, and more besides. In some cases what they appear to indicate shifts throughout the poem.