h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

LOL... I knew there was something surprisingly familiar about it! Actually you probably did a better job at it than I have...

Lunch Break

black coats
hair spray
cigarettes and cell phones

sitting on the sidewalk
perfecting the lunch break

lounging
in front of
70's tent architecture


they watch

Newark, Delaware

Cheap New Balance sneakers
Hang from the street light
As cars passed peacefully

The church nearby
Is under renovation
Gospel dances
With
The pulsing clang of the hammer

Students pass
Between old Colonial style halls
Psych, English, East Asian Cultures
Party at 10 sharp

Main Street crawls
As pedestrians dodge cars
Or maybe the cars dodge the pedestrians

There is a din from the restaurants
Locals and students coalesce
And a raven flies
Under the stone balloon
Somewhere near the east end

The sun shines
A band is playing
As a boy sits under a tree
His nose buried in a book


My two more recent poems... But I don't think they have the same depth of my other poems... In fact, I think I may have written about my hometown once before, but I don't remember...

What do you think?

I was a bit confused at first: didn't spot the break between the two, and read them as one poem. They actually work well as one poem.

As ever, I love your imagery and the way you skim across a social landscape, highlighting things here and there to create a well-rounded impression. I think you have done yourself proud, and I don't see why you don't think so much of them.

I suppose my only comment would be that I wouldn't have known 'Lunch Break' was about hairdressing students if you hadn't told me, so a change of title might be worthwhile.

What on Earth is Seventies tent architecture?

See the reason I don't like them really is that they are purely observational. Though most of my stuff is observational, I kind of want more commentary. Yet I really don't have time to comment really... Like for example, Youth Ministry, which is observational, but at the same a commentary...

One poem? Really? (Surprised by this revelation) They're written in different styles, well my style, but different flavors... Hmmm... (Considers this...)

On the architecture, well I assume its tent architecture, the hair place is designed like triangle, which I think was common in the 70s cause I saw it on the Brady Bunch once...

Yes, I see what you're saying about the lack of commentary. But what you've done, particularly with the Newark one, is given the reader a snapshot of a place and time; there's a real sense of atmosphere there. I live in a completely different sort of place, and your poem allows me to have a taste of what it's like to live in Newark in 2004. It seems exotic to me. I like the contrasts you've got between the people's various lives and the architecture: a mixing of ancient and modern, of movement and stillness, and of noise and tranquillity.

I suppose now you're going to tell me you didn't intend any of that, aren't you?

I like this bit the best:

There is a din from the restaurants
Locals and students coalesce
And a raven flies
Under the stone balloon
Somewhere near the east end

My grandmother has paintings on her walls which show things like open gateways, and turnings in paths, and woods which open out onto spaces the viewer can't quite see. I like them, because they tell half a story and leave me wondering what's through that gate; what's round that corner? Your Newark poem has the same effect on me. You highlight a lot of things which have stories hidden behind them. How did those sneakers get up there? Who did they belong to? Have those Gospel singers got nowhere else to worship while the church is being renovated? Why is the boy sitting alone, and what is he reading?

As for the tent architecture, I guess it's different over there. British 70's architecture seems to be mainly about prefabricated square blocks.

Thats the point of it being called Lunch Break, I was thinking the "Hair Dressers go to Lunch", but I like small titles. Also I like things being vague and implied... So really its more or less the scene, then the ppl...

"I suppose now you're going to tell me you didn't intend any of that, aren't you?"

Yes as a matter of fact I am... Really I just like the feel of my hometown and watching the ppl in it as they walk by, though I don't know their names or stories...

I am however going to write about two guys I always see on Main Street... A bum and a guy I nicknamed James Brando, cause he looks like Marlon Brando and James Dean with the body of James Belushi...

"I like this bit the best:

There is a din from the restaurants
Locals and students coalesce
And a raven flies
Under the stone balloon
Somewhere near the east end"

Aside from the second use of students (which I need to change) that stanza is play on words for three of the major restaurants on Main Street... The raven is Deer Park Tavern (where Edgar Allen Poe supposedly stayed), the Stone Balloon is well obvious and the "east end" is East End Cafe... Never been to Stone Balloon, but I have been the Dear Park and East End Cafe...

Ah! You know, Edgar Allen Poe had a habit of hiding things in his writing like that.

The East End Cafe--it doesn't have a sort of London theme to the decor, by any chance?

The East End Cafe--it doesn't have a sort of London theme to the decor, by any chance?

Not really, mostly average bar stuff... Beer ads, pinball machines, greasy, wooden tables, various pictures of half nude women where applicable...

Oh, okay. It's just the name: it's a part of London. Famous for Cockneys, poverty, and now its Asian community.

And Jack the Ripper if I'm not mistaken...

Really?

*Off to check*

Cor blimey, so it is. Fancy my not knowing that!

Its okay I don't know jack about my own country either...