Arbitrary Angst

Prose vs. Poetry

"Prose is words in their best order. Poetry is the best words in their best order." -Samuel Taylor Coleridge

I'm more of a fan of poetry myself, so excuse my present bias, but prose is supposed to be something more than a rant with superfluous spacing and punctuation. If one is going to write such a passage, they might as well keep it in the proper paragraph form. It isn't really art then. Prose has a sophistication to it. The words are beautiful and there's imagery and emotion. It doesn't rhyme or have a meter, but it's tastefully put together. 

"I walked up the stairs

And went to the bathroom

I grabbed the razor blade out of my bathtub

And dragged it

across my

wrist"

There's just something so juvenile about that. I understand the need to rid one's self of such feelings in a dramatic or artful way, but even in my darkest times (and believe me, they have been dark) I would never settle for something so simple and blah. That's a rant. Not even, that's a narrative one never followed through with. Put it in a paragraph. 

Poetry rhymes, yes, and that's cool and it's difficult some times, but people omit the inportance of flow. They will try so hard to make it rhyme, it's difficult and annoying to read. 

"I kicked him in the balls to show him I was mad

He was very sad

He said 'Sorry' and cried

I hoped that he died

I will never love again

I will be happy by myself until the end"

Granted the story in this one wasn't redeemable either way, poor scheming can sabotage a well-worded and meaningful poem.

Popular Taste

What the fuck is wrong with some of these readers? One would think everyone on this website was 14. I must have searched through a thousand profiles by now and found a handful of talented writers. I'm a critic, but given the crop of people who pop up wanting to show off their "art", I've lowered my standards considerably. I have read amazing stories and poems that can have a few readers or hundreds of readers and one or two comments. I've glanced over some of the more popular poems and fiction that comes up and am apalled to see this kind of writing encouraged. "OmG!! this is ssssssso goodddd. plz keep writing <3" and the story is written with the same syntax or the poem is something generic that took no talent to pull together.

If I find an amazing writer, I will let them know. Somebody has to. I happen to think I'm pretty good. I generally have a strange way of interpreting topics and some of my writings aren't considered user friendly and don't appeal to general audiences, but I follow structure and I create things I think no one has done similarly to the best of my ability. 

How many times...

...can an arranged marriage be done? How many times will a rock band adopt a girl and how many more times will one of the members fall in love with her? How many fanfiction kidnapping stories with rape and Stockholm syndrome can be written? How many people are on an active quest to figure out these numbers? Why is original fiction so frequently ignored? Why is this commonplace, generic material being idolized and replicated thousands of times over?

Why, God, why?