Ode on a Maize & Blue Pen
It is my
pen- for now.
I
could drop it, and tomorrow it could be somebody else’s
A
professor, perhaps
Another
student, to scribble the opening lines to his later-to-become award-winning
novel
My pen
came to me free
dual-colored
and
served as an advertisement, a promotion for the university-
You
can engrave anything in a plastic pen and it won’t wear away.
Same
goes for the ink it produces- it can stain a page for decades
Everything
about the pen seems to be permanent:
It
could be the last man-made item left on this Earth- what would it say about
humanity?
There
are multiple parts to the pen’s construction; I could tear it apart if I wanted
It
clicks when my mind clicks
And
yet I might loan it to a friend and forget about it,
As it
is just as easily replaceable.
This poem intrigues me because at first I want it to be very significant to your life, and it hurt me that it happened to not be. The idea that it could become the last man made item on Earth brings the most power and importance to the pen. So I really like that line. The play on words on the line "It clicks when my mind clicks" is really good.
ReplyDeleteMy favorite line is "it click when my mind clicks" because it uses the word in two different ways and sounds satisfying when read aloud. It would be cool if you did a line break between his and later-to-become because as Taylor pointed out, the line may be too long and leaves little room for anticipation. I think that a line break there would be ultimately helpful because it creates two meanings for the line. I enjoyed how you discussed the importance of the pen to you and then ended on the note that it is "easily replaceable" because that shows the truth of any pen, as people continuously lose and find them. Your listing brought you to interesting conclusions, but if you fleshed some of them out more your transitions between lines would probably come more easily.
ReplyDeleteI think you should consider the idea of a generic pen. Even if you don't keep the idea it might help you go more places and find more ideas about the significance of the pen. I need more, that is for sure, because that last line tells me this pen has major implications. What are they? Are they bigger than college? Are they personal or do they affect everyone?
ReplyDeleteI like how you have brought up a familiar object and dissected the multiple connotations behind it. I enjoyed the way you emphasized the ephemerality of this object that can be spotted almost everywhere around campus. In the last line, I feel like you can cut the "As it is," in order to settle the ending better. Payton suggested to take out the Maize & Blue pen in order to fall under the umbrella of a universal pen, however I like the uniqueness that it brings to the poem. With that in mind, I think you should allude to Michigan in the poem if you decide to keep the title. I also feel like a few line breaks here and there would help the poem flow better and leave a little more anticipation. For example "Another student, to scribble the opening lines to his// later-to-become award-winning novel."
ReplyDeleteOne potential line break to add additional meaning would be "...lines to his / later-to-become..." because then it would also mean that in the writing the pen became his pen. One way to expand this poem would be to push the stories of each potential life of the pen, what might happen?
ReplyDeleteOne of my favorite ideas in this poem is that random things can be extremely permanent but also entirely replaceable.
I like the theme of this poem a lot! In the first line, take out the “for now”.
ReplyDeleteThe engrave/ink it produces line can be adjusted, say less but mean more.
“It clicks when my mind clicks” is a great idea but could be said better.