Gatsby: Where I'm From
by FurryNippleRing (Member) - published: May 5, 2006
Word Count: 161 Word Bytes: 1073 Viewed: 1108 times
Category - Poetry
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I am from gold,
from silver ties and pink suits.
I am from the tongues inside the gossip herds.
(Black, effervescent
it smelled like teen spirit.)
I am from the bottoms of cocktail drinks,
the cold glass
whose reflection mirrors whatever they want to see
as they created Me.

I am from whiskies and pastries,
from Tom and Daisy.
I’m from the big shots and lover’s past affairs,
from batter up and cower down.
I’m from She only married you because I was poor
And in her heart she never loved anyone except me.
And nobody shared this truth with me, except me.

I’m from Daisy and my mansion,
Beautiful shirts and cascading luxury.
From the simple man I sold
to the purchased façade of gold.
Under my illusion was a dreamer
mending love lost,
a shift of appearance
to make my dreams concrete.
I am from those moments—
rained on me before I knew—
drop falls to the ocean.

------
Stephanie W.

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Comments

The following comments are for "Gatsby: Where I'm From"
by FurryNippleRing

FurryNippleRing
Stephanie you are a super wonder talent of a writer! real good.

( Posted by: unseenwriterx [Member] On: May 5, 2006 )

Mm-hmm!
I'll have to agree with unseen on this one - I ate this up. You're really, amazingly talented with your way of wording things. Thanks!

( Posted by: chinadoll [Member] On: May 5, 2006 )

Gatsby
I had fun reading this too, but then I always focus on process, and it occured to me that this poem is unusual because it accesses the egg and chicken question in a way few poems ever do, I think.

So, which came first in this case? Was it the poem, or the poet? I suspect you didn't contrive this. I suspect the poem came first, then went through you to be written.

Some call this inspiration. I don't yet know what I want to call inspiration, but this comes close. Real close.

Thanks for posting it.

( Posted by: windchime [Member] On: May 5, 2006 )

The Great-
Daisy would be (demurely, of course) proud...
very nice write!
Looking forward to reading more of you-
Elizabeth

( Posted by: emaks [Member] On: May 6, 2006 )

Beautiful shirts and cascading luxury
This made for a very enjoyable read - lushly worded, and somehow entirely faithful to the style of Gatsby, though I found it a little too fragmented in its stream-of-image style to read easily. (Was that your intention - perhaps to convey the flickering over-exposed brevity of a life pasted together from scenes at extravagent parties? In the light, it works - it offers something illusory, glimpsed after too many cocktails.)

If I might tinker, I'd pluralise 'lover's' (lovers' past affairs) to harmonise with the plural 'big shots'... I'd replace 'except me' with 'but me' because I like the rhythm better... and did you mean 'drops fall to the ocean'? Or was it intentionally many moments, but only one drop?

( Posted by: MobiusSoul [Member] On: May 7, 2006 )

Odd, and nice. Makes me want more.
I like odd and nice as a combo.

On first read, I didn't like the Nirvana reference. I usually don't like pop references inserted into a poem, and I was prepared to treat this similarly. It's usually simply lazy writing, trying to work somebody else's ba-da-bing into your work.

Once having read the whole thing through, however, I reassessed the use, and was quite pleased. Setting up a parallelism between Gatsby and a more modern version/vision of that gestalt is an interesting task. I'm still not sure it entirely works, as the grunge usage is (I think... unless I'm missing another lyrical homage) singular. For it to be more effective, another, bookending reference to the modern scene would be helpful.

The end is what intrigues me most, and frankly I wanted more:

"Under my illusion was a dreamer
mending love lost,
a shift of appearance
to make my dreams concrete.
I am from those moments—
rained on me before I knew—
drop falls to the ocean."

It is a bit waltzy/old-fashioned, but that fits the tone, until that last line comes up wonerfully abrupt and short:

"drop falls to the ocean."

Bang. Slam. Yup. Yes, it sure does. All those drops. Damn, nowhere else to go, eh?

But somewhere between "mending love lost" and that drop, I felt like I needed a bit more explanation of how the narrator came to even understand the differential between "the dreams" and wanting to make them "concrete."

There is, of course, a "me" and "them" in this, as there must be, and the journey from simply being a part of "them" towards discovering a separate me-ness is often the most interesting part of this kind of narrative.

How does the drop disassociate? When does the fall become terrifying? Because that last line (or one very much like it; don't ever change it much) has, I think, the power to really scare -- "drop falls to ocean." Yikes! That does suck to find out. That simple line reminds me of some of W.B. Yeats' most terrifying stuff, where he manages, through the effective use of thrilling metaphor, to make us feel like the bottom is about to fall out of our universe. "The falcon cannot hear the falconer."

"Drop falls to ocean" reminds me of that.

But the weakness is, "before I knew." OK. Now you know. What woke you up? That's what I want to hear more of...

Nice stuff. I look forward to more.

( Posted by: andyhavens [Member] On: May 7, 2006 )

Thank you for the comments
They were all very much appreciated.

Unseenwriterx >> I really don't think I have super wonder talent, but thank you for thinking so. Btw, I'm curious to see your writings.. will you be posting?

Chinadoll >> Thanks much. I'm glad you enjoyed it.. you must've liked the book too. I think it's the moments in our lives that shape and define us.. and it definately was for Gatsby.

Windchime >> There's a curious thought, I haven't thought of it that way. This was actually an assignment from my English class way back in high school. I found it as I was going through some old files and thought I'd post it. As much as I remember, after the class read Great Gatsby, our teacher assigned us to write a poem about his character. Of course, everything was in the book; I merely chose the parts that mattered. Maybe in that sense the poem (or whatever form it may be) did come first; perhaps it was just floating among the pages of the book waiting for someone to take it and give it shape. Could imitation be the next thing to inspiration? On another note, you brought up a good subject. Have you written anything on the "creative process"? I imagine that'd be a topic with a whole lot to explore. Thank you for reading.

Emaks >> lol yes, demurely. Thank you for enjoying~

MobiusSoul >> You hit it right on. I really wanted it to be the moments in his life that defined him. If I had as many cocktail parties as he did, I think they'd all eventually just blur together; rather than remembering them as defined memories, I think they'd just come back as flashes. As far as the fragmented style, I think that's my general writing style for poetry creeping in (aside from free writing, I really don't know the different forms or mechanics of poetry). Ooh yes, thanks for the corrections, I'll fix them. Yeah, the "except me" was really redundant and drawn out the sentence. I think I'll replace the second "except me" with "but me." As far as drop vs. drop(s) fall to the ocean, I honestly can't remember whether it's a mistake or I wanted it to be singular. I used to be so picky about my the phrases in my writings that I'd think it over and over. But it also makes sense if it was a typo, drops, because drops would reflect the moments that Gatsby's from. Thank you, it was really good criticism.

Andyhavens >> You know, I was kinda torn when it came to that line. I wanted to capture this feeling among the "gossip herds" and what was more specific than "teen spirit"? But yes, it really really does feel out of place because when you read that phrase, you don't really think of that feeling first, but Nirvana and the song, as you know. I even went as far as using "smelled like teen spirit." Yeah, I agree, I'll change it when I find the fitting phrase. I see what you're suggesting (with "drop falls to the ocean," and "drop" being singular instead of drops,) is different from MobiusSoul's suggestion. "Drop" being singular vs. plural would convey very different things.. I'll definately think it over. You also brought up some very good points. I guess the choppyness that MobiusSoul mentioned was also probably due to the lack of elaboration between Gatsby discerning himself from "them." Thanks very much Andy, these were all very good points.

( Posted by: FurryNippleRing [Member] On: May 8, 2006 )

G: where I'm from
You are good. I like everything about this poem. Awesome awesome back at you.

( Posted by: Legs [Member] On: June 15, 2006 )

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