Post by Robin on Feb 10, 2006 18:54:47 GMT -8
Another one of my nonconforming/conforming poems. This one takes a different take on it, though. I think it could use a bit more flow, and a more musical quality, so that's the biggest thing I need help with, but I'm biased. I need outsiders' opinions.
---------
“Let me see your fingers,” was the first thing that she asked,
Tucking a pen behind her ear as she reached out for the would-be rocker’s hands.
Reluctantly, as if he knew what was coming, even though he had no way of knowing,
He extended the criminal fingers: smooth and un-calloused.
She poked them with a pin, and, disgusted, shoved them away.
“No calluses,” she said. “Who do you think you’re fooling, kid?”
And he didn’t know who he was fooling, he hadn’t the slightest idea.
All he could do was stammer out that he didn’t do finger work and curl his guilty fingers into his palms, the red dots of blood from the pin as accusatory as a Hindu’s marriage mark,
As a positive TB test.
And she told him that they didn’t do pick work there,
That pick work was laziness, that only finger work showed true initiative.
Only finger calluses show dedication.
And, helpless as any villain in a Russian fairy-tale, he was forced to leave.
Brave intrepid? He’s not coming.
He’s walking away from a tryout for a band, rejected without even getting started.
Those with callused hands get to eat their fill: those who use picks get the refuse.
Hey, because that’s all amateurs are, right?
Dogs that get the food nobody else will eat, or can eat.
And Van Halen was never an amateur, oh no:
It’s like the stories say: he came out of the womb playing guitar.
And even if Van Halen ever was an amateur, he didn’t get his way to the top by being supported;
He had to wade through blood.
And who knows?
Maybe you have to be waist deep in blood before you can call yourself a rock ‘n roll man,
Maybe children need to be beaten.
The only thing that’s certain is that there’s a brave intrepid walking through a parking lot with the sun reflecting off his guitar -
The strings worn from the pick, you know, but other than that bright and shiny as new -
A brave intrepid with TB bright pinpricks on his tragically smooth fingers and a tragically new looking guitar.
And when he begins to sweat under the glaring sun, he wonders if maybe they’d like him better now, with his hair in ropy tangles around his face, and new pimples itching to pop out from under his skin:
If maybe they’d like him better now, with his guitar smashed to pieces on his knee.
Because if it can be broken, then it can be fixed, and breaking in is just what everything needs.
Maybe they’d like him better with tears drying in salty rivers down his face, angry tears, tears of unfulfilled desire.
Maybe they’d like him better after he starts writing gothic poetry and cutting himself.
The only thing that’s sure is that he won’t.
He refuses to conform by nonconforming.
But it hurts.
Oh, Lord, does it hurt.
---------
“Let me see your fingers,” was the first thing that she asked,
Tucking a pen behind her ear as she reached out for the would-be rocker’s hands.
Reluctantly, as if he knew what was coming, even though he had no way of knowing,
He extended the criminal fingers: smooth and un-calloused.
She poked them with a pin, and, disgusted, shoved them away.
“No calluses,” she said. “Who do you think you’re fooling, kid?”
And he didn’t know who he was fooling, he hadn’t the slightest idea.
All he could do was stammer out that he didn’t do finger work and curl his guilty fingers into his palms, the red dots of blood from the pin as accusatory as a Hindu’s marriage mark,
As a positive TB test.
And she told him that they didn’t do pick work there,
That pick work was laziness, that only finger work showed true initiative.
Only finger calluses show dedication.
And, helpless as any villain in a Russian fairy-tale, he was forced to leave.
Brave intrepid? He’s not coming.
He’s walking away from a tryout for a band, rejected without even getting started.
Those with callused hands get to eat their fill: those who use picks get the refuse.
Hey, because that’s all amateurs are, right?
Dogs that get the food nobody else will eat, or can eat.
And Van Halen was never an amateur, oh no:
It’s like the stories say: he came out of the womb playing guitar.
And even if Van Halen ever was an amateur, he didn’t get his way to the top by being supported;
He had to wade through blood.
And who knows?
Maybe you have to be waist deep in blood before you can call yourself a rock ‘n roll man,
Maybe children need to be beaten.
The only thing that’s certain is that there’s a brave intrepid walking through a parking lot with the sun reflecting off his guitar -
The strings worn from the pick, you know, but other than that bright and shiny as new -
A brave intrepid with TB bright pinpricks on his tragically smooth fingers and a tragically new looking guitar.
And when he begins to sweat under the glaring sun, he wonders if maybe they’d like him better now, with his hair in ropy tangles around his face, and new pimples itching to pop out from under his skin:
If maybe they’d like him better now, with his guitar smashed to pieces on his knee.
Because if it can be broken, then it can be fixed, and breaking in is just what everything needs.
Maybe they’d like him better with tears drying in salty rivers down his face, angry tears, tears of unfulfilled desire.
Maybe they’d like him better after he starts writing gothic poetry and cutting himself.
The only thing that’s sure is that he won’t.
He refuses to conform by nonconforming.
But it hurts.
Oh, Lord, does it hurt.
