/lit/ - Literature

>>15221376

She felt angry then, an irritation with the world that graduated into a scorn for those born into the statistical spectrum of normality. She hated the lot of it, and she welcomed the bliss of not adhering to any of it. But fire fades and burns to nothing but ashes, and she was left feeling hollow, a husk of herself. There was something missing, some feeling that should be there beneath the embers -- she wondered if that was what the medication did. Arimnestos smiled kindly, himself raising the piece of wood he'd been whittling into something of indeterminate shape. "Katie, you know better than I do that the doctors here know what's best. You came here to change, remember? Growing used to them is the first step in healing yourself." She didn't respond, prompting him to return to his task at hand.

Around them, the steady stream of blurry shadow-people continued unabated, their current of their passing leaving a chill beneath her flesh. She drew her knees up to her chest, the light gown she wore pressing lightly against her breasts. Her body failed to arouse any sense of interest from her, however, the numbness that had long since crept into her flesh fully making it's presence known. A child suddenly took on a sort of clarity from the rest and walked over to the pair, insinuating himself into their company. "I'm sorry, but have you seen my mother? She was here just a second ago?" Around them the shadow people continued their rapid pace, completely bypassing the odd group that had gathered around the bench. She looks up from her moping, the child is bright-eyed with plated hair the color of damp sunlight. "You should leave now kid, before it's too late. Your mother wouldn't want you here with us." The child looks confused, tears welling in those eyes that see everything and nothing. Arimnestos simply shakes his head, the sadness in his gaze reaching dichotomy with his kindly smile. "It's alright child, I'm sure your mother will return -- why don't you wait her with us for at time?" He scoots sideways towards her, making room, and the child obligingly hops up to take the spot.

>>15221376
>>15221382
A few hours pass like this and the stream of people around them is unceasing. Blurry shapes that never really materialize save in spurts and collisions of colour. Her gown is bright green, yet even it seems to fade as the afternoon sunlight dims. Arimnestos seems to sag as the afternoon recedes into dusk. The lines in his skin seem to yawn into chasms as the sunlight falls beneath the trees and buildings. Finally as evening, itself dims he hands her the piece of wood, the shape now clearly that of a squirrel. Wordlessly, he almost seems disappointed, he turns to the child whose mother still has not materialized and pats her head in a kindly manner. Then, shaking his head in mute disgust draws the pocket knife across his throat, the blood spilling across the sidewalk. The flow of shadow people seems to part around him, but otherwise take no heed of the growing pool of blood around the pathetically thin corpse. She scoots closer to the child as if for warmth, then reaches for the knife still slick with blood and begins to finish the squirrel.

>>15221400
Child changes from a boy to a girl.

So the woman is special because she's depressed? What makes her not adhere to the "statistical spectrum of normality"?

Ultimately this excerpt feels far too vague for me. You say a lot of things but I didn't really take away anything from this story other than this woman is on some new meds, feels le different from all the normies, and there's maybe an air of fantasy or something else going on.

>>15221376
you lost me at
>she

>>15221644
>women bad
I didn't know vacation bible school got out this early on weekdays

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA
https://justpaste DOT it/1mi1t

mine

alright, been writing this today and feel I've hit a bit of a dead end. I don't feel like it's really got much of a point to it, nor does it feel like it's internally consistent. Should I drop it and start writing summat else, or has anyone got any good ideas for it?

>>15221777
>questioned the people on the cottage
I think using on is awkward here, had to reread it to understand what you were saying.

You say that no one talks about the cottage, but then literally not even a sentence later you describe how people talk about the cottage. And not even that, but that people tend to talk about it quite a lot which again is a direct contradiction to "Simply put, people didn't discuss it because there was no reason to". If you mean that people don't talk about it openly, or only speak of it in secret, then you should say so.

>Sam Crawford
Don't mention this dude by name, I see no point unless he comes back later. But even then, just saying he ran into Sam Crawford means nothing to me and leaves me with no information whatsoever. Is sam a child? An old woman? A goat he talks to? Idk, I picture him sort of looking like goob from meet the robinsons.

Same with thomas wiffler. Even just adding in the word local before "friendly man" would let me ground him better in my mind. I didn't know if he was a tourist or a resident or what until a paragraph after he was introduced, and had no idea what he knew about the house.

All in all I think you do a good job of not mincing words, keeping the story moving and balancing imagery with plot and characterization (if not for the named characters at least for the town as a whole).

There's a fair number of grammatical errors, and I think using words like betimes is out of character even for the more 20th century wordage you've got going on.

My main gripe is that you didn't give any reason WHY people think these things about the cottage. If it looks like a duck, and sounds like a duck, why would everyone just immediately universally agree that it wasn't a duck and then speculate as to what it could be? There's a garden, it's well kept, there's fucking smoke coming from the chimney. But everyone insists that no one lives there? I don't get it, seems unrealistic.

>>15222006
I have no idea lol, this was entirely unedited -- a flash fiction piece so to speak. I've just been shitting out words this afternoon for some reason. Here's a shitty attempt at scifi:

>>15222169
Flash fiction still has plot and character development. If you're submitting things for critique that you have no intent on improving then why submit them at all.

>>15222314
narcissism lmao. That and I want to improve my writing in general for when I decide to commit to a proper piece.

>>15221693
>vacation bible school
People here sure have some odd caricatures

>>15221809
Why not just write prose? Poetry is dead.

1/2

>>15223939
2/2, I want impressions and critiques about everything.

>>15223735
Even death may die. That which is dead can be resurrected anon dear

>>15223735
because I like writing poems

>>15221777
completely overwritten

>>15221777
>First sentences, paragraphs 1 & 7
Syntactic equivalent to word repetition at to frequent a rate [e.g. lose the "simply XYZ" refrains]. Synthesize with the following sentences; front load information.

>A cottage of indeterminate origin was avoided by locals in observance of their parents' warnings and local tradition, thus the visitors were stymied at every turn when questioning such time honored customs regarding those people on the hilltop. It simply wasn't discussed. There was no discussion to be had, and that was all there was to be said of it at any given time.

>He looked askance at first, purely out of ingrained habit, then immediately chided himself for the foolishness of it, and proceeded to gape.

Needs a pass acting as a butcher -- trim the fat and economize. The comma staccatos are reliable indicators that there is arrested flow rhythmically

>>15221809
>on the last day
>at the end of days
Cosmic Encore, summation @ the end of time

>A shooting star off Saturn's rings
Original is good ^ optional on death defiance angle/mercurial reference

>heavens laid over my eyes
Eyelids aren't poetic; one doesn't "close one's eye[lids]" much less consciously/intentionally in the absence of too bright a light

>To bathe in a young Aegean's cyan seas
Green/Venus morning star vis-a-vis Saturn
>To plunge into cinnabar [of//the] a Young Aegean
Homer, "wine red sea", cosmological model of Saturn as primary star (and violet tinged light therefrom); the Atlantic as "The Sea of Saturn"; sexual innuendo; you yourself a youthful Mediterranean; a personified blue green Aegean; mix/match

Final line falls flat, it needs to be majestic after this build up. Begs for a classic/mythological ending.
>Only there, with Dionysus in my house
tarot
>Only then my maenads satisfied
>... maenads hunger subsides
Tearing apart the former; ritual eating typically a Goat [Saturnian]

Titles: End of Days, Chronology/-gies

Imagery is compelling, continue with this. Cutting out the "If only..."s after the first also comes out well (with reordering of the Aegean line; "Bathing in . . ." and just "There/Then" for the final lines openings)

An attempt at an exercise from John Gardner's book:

>Write a 500 word (or longer) character sketch using objects, landscape, weather, etc., to intensify the readers' sense of what the character is like. Use no similes ("She was like...) Purpose: to create convincing character by using more than intellect, engaging both the conscious and unconscious mind.

https://pastebin.com/kdfcetum

>>15221644
Kek

>>15221376
Arimnestos should touch her and she goes “YEA BABY UM NO LONGER SAD”
and he goes “CMON BARBIE LEYS GO PARTY”