Witty vs. Cimmerian - OPEN FOR VOTES

[Adonis]

Winter Topical II: Round II


SUMMARY OF RULES:

Verses are due JAN. 19th
TUESDAY at 9 P.M. Pacific/West Coast or TUESDAY 11:59 PM Eastern / 6:00 AM WEDNESDAY JAN. 20th Central European/London
There are NO extensions.

Verses MUST be a minimum 10 lines or a maximum of 48 lines (or 650 words).

Votes are due Thursday at 4:00 p.m. Western / or Thursday 7:00 PM Eastern / 1:00 AM Friday Central European/London Failure to vote will result in NEGATIVE VOTES if you advance to the next round.

WHAT DOES THIS MEAN? You can technically start a match down three votes by failing to log a single vote the previous week.

so....

All competitors must vote on THREE battles

Read the full rules here! (http://www.netcees.org/showthread.php?t=122320)

Topic: Vanities Fare


G/Luck

Witty Cimmerian

[Witty]

Rawr.

[Cimmerian]

His pores opened—hot towel—skin soaking
Eyes closed—Barbicide on the nose
His mind, floating—full sail, wide ocean
Wind-stroked wings, stock brokering bonds broken
Business brought attitude, office at high altitude
A fountain of youth with a peter panoramic view
Dollars made sense, frenemies, mere platitudes
Dog eats dog—canines turned to cannibals
Live by the blade and pay for close shaves
He laid twenty on the ledge, waved ‘em good day
A light in the darkness, he turned up the shade
Lit up a cigarette, opened his window a ways
Flicked the ash, tracked down its elegant path
The direction, he laughed, that the market had crashed
Breeze through his hair, swearing sea salt’s in the air
He leaned out and flew. He was no longer there.

[Witty]

Vanity Fare

Eternity is obsolete, infinity is bust
These cobbled's streets instill in me disgust
All that's left in this vicinity is dust
As I take a look around, It's killing me
Unjust duplicity? We trusted willingly
Now look at what their infantry has crushed.

I was on a search to find the inner me, that's 'Us'

At first it was the eyes, staring back through tainted lenses
A blink, a sign of life, but ultimately remaining senseless
Next were the fingers, placing all hope at their tips
Then the glorious day a song broke from the lips
The moment was bliss, but came to form a sobering cyst
Puss filled the cup of glory, it runneth over and dripped
They were our David, our Mona Lisa, our Sistine chapel
Sculpted by the hands of Gods with a pristine scalpel
We raised them as babies, our precious creations
Taught them how to live, from lectures to patience
Each man provided a tender, caring, hand that guided
And when it got itself in trouble, we would stand beside it
Enduring years of hell, from the first tears that fell
We taught them how to hear, and smell...fears to quell
However, time quickened in pace, they grew to be strong
Suitably drawn to things they knew to be wrong
It wouldn't be long, they were taught by hate - the mind of Man
Devise a plan, bide your time before you take the final stand
They learned the art of war, the lust for blood in a fight
We saw them come in the night...the ultimate, thunderous blight.

Playing God? Surely the creator can destroy
Like the days of Sod?
Though it was them who crushed our cities
And them who laid us bare
Though they betrayed our lust, our pity
It was them who made us care
Ego told us to create and advance
Learning, hoping...taking a chance

My vanity built a masterpiece, and he became free
All I can hope that maybe one day, my vanity...
...will re-create me.

[UnbornBuddha]

Cimmerian has this very smooth style and his verses are very quick to read due to their brevity. So, it was a story of suicide as I interpreted it. A man who dedicated his life to business and money and so when the market crash his passion and love collapsed along with it, so he decided to take his life. There was no remorse for how he lived his life, he even waved goodbye to a twenty humorously. I will say though I didn't really find anything really meaningful. Not that all reads have to be soaked in profundity and delve the reader into the mystery of life, death, or the universe. But, I do like verses that give a glimpse of something less superficial. While, the materialistic aspect is important to convey, there was no underlying reason behind it all. The character's motive wasn't really sketched out enough for me. Some great descriptions though I will say. Not as beautiful as your last week's verse. I did detect a sense of freedom in this verse, liberation, i.g. by the usage of flying, bird, ocean, etc. The rhyming was also quite simple, which isn't a bad thing, but I do like a little bit more rhyming. If not, it better make up through other means, which it invariably did.

Witty: The first short stanza is not at the caliber I expect from you. Albeit, it still had rhythm to it, it did not give me those images that I expect from you. Now, in your second stanza you fleshed eveything out more. There were also some spelling errors, puss= pus. And I assume its pus since the previous word is cyst. But, I don't really care about that to be honest. A few spelling errors here and there and not that important to me, sometimes they are though. There were other instances that did leave the reader hanging, incomplete thoughts," infinity is bust.... Each man provided a tender, caring, hand that guided", guided whom? Humanity? Ultimately, your premise is that vanity and ego were motivating forces that compelled us to create and go forward. But, then you juxtapose that idea further by stating how it will recreate you, at the end. Which is an interesting premise, that I'm pondering, perhaps vanity of man is what creates the goodness so it can remold one to be a better species, but not a better person. Also, I couldn't figure out who was the narrator exactly, who was us. It didn't seem to be Man because someone else looking at them, those who raised them through thick and thin. Hmmm, while your rhyming was better than Cimmerian, it also didn't feel at par to what I expect from you.
I could say more, but let me decide already.

This is a hard vote for me. Mostly because there were factors that I disliked from both, and liked from both. Cimmerian had the more elegant verse, while Witty had the more thoughtful verse, the wittier verse. And its not like Cim surpassed Witty by much in execution either. Albeit, Cim was more precise with crisper wording, I still felt Witty still had the more interesting premise for me.

Vote: I'm going to go for Witty here.

[Argh]

I commend both writers on a nice showing.

Witty
Your introspective verse considered the role that vanity and ego play in moving mankind forward. At times, your pronouns got a bit muddy (we, us, he) which caused me to pause. There were some beautifully written passages throughout, most notably the eyes and fingers section.

Cimmerian
I'll just say it: I'm a big fan. Your words speak to me, and this piece was no different. Your verse told the tale of a stockbroker who orchestrates his own demise following a market crash. I loved the set up, the attention to detail, and the bird allusion in the closer.

Vote
Both verses are worthy, for sure. The only true differentiator is personal preference. In terms of content, I prefer linear narratives that are grounded in the human experience. I also think Cimmerian's piece was more tightly constructed with a sharper focus on word choice and description.

VOTE = Cimmerian

[PiE]

Cimmerian, very brief, but direct enough to get the content. The flow and short line format you used was pretty nice and made it more like an onstage performance script like monologue. Would of liked a bit more content to develop this more

Witty, nice flow and topical approach to this. I like the inner me of vanity angle you used and it came together nicely as you wrapped it up. The graphic take with the cup of puss running over and the pristine scalpel of humanity and art. Nicely put together.

Vote Witty

[Mr. J]

Cimmerian, The flow of your piece was quite good, impressive transitions.
since the opening of the first few lines I was enjoying the direction you were going
I feel like the elegant path/crashed idea seemed ok but kind of off for me.
otherwise this was a pretty good entry, it could have used some more lines but nice work

Witty, I thought your piece was pretty well written as well, I didn't like that opening though
but from the start of the actual verse I felt that the beginning was dope.
the way you work the whole flow in & just keep it up is worth the whole read.
its fun reading your work when you actually have the time to sit down and do it.
I really enjoyed that Sistine Chapel line...nice work brah....


v/This was kind of tough to come to a definite decision due to both writers interpretation
I feel like both came with decent concepts but the one that kept me motivated to finish & read again was Cimmerian.
I really enjoyed Wittys piece due to the way he sculpted his rhyming to stay so smooth.
I felt the opening and the follow up after the end of the verse was quite odd. But not as impressive as the main structure.
Nice battle fellas. v/Cimmerian

[Diode]

Cimm:

Effortless rhyming. You have a knack for this. The piece seemed more than a little inspired by Birdman but with a Wall Street twist. A lot of people will take solace in an imaginary banker killing himself if only for the schadenfreude of it all. In some ways, I wish you'd expanded more on this character, but in others, I am completely satisfied with the brevity. Great work. You're going to be an interesting match for some of our more visual/creative competitors.

Witty

I'm not going to lie.. I hated your opener. Not sure what you were trying to do here but it came off as a first-time writer attempting to play around with rhyme schemes without having the technical know-how to put it together in eloquent fashion. The stereotypical nature of the prologue doesn't help either. Rah rah, everything's bad, someone did me wrong, now let me tell you my plot of revenge/origin story/etc.

Anyway... you did the whole Asimov thing with the story. It was much better written than the opener but it's so fucking cliche. I know you were a bit hamstrung by the topic, but compared to Cimm, this really bothered me. "Humans are evil and ruin everything created in their image" has been done to death, especially in the topical arena. I did like your visualization of the various parts that made the whole and your allegories to other stories (oh, sweet rhyme, self!). The ending was a nice bow on the whole package though it did lack profundity. We create in our image, which is bad, and only hope the mirror helps us see the error of our ways before it's too late? Is that what you were going for?

The bizarre opener and well-worn story detracted from your writing in a major way. It needed something more captivating, perhaps. Better imagery? More technical rhyme schemes? It just wasn't enough for me.

Can we still be friends?

VOTE: Cimm

[Pent uP]

Cimm -- let me get this out of the way -- i hate the ending...it felt cheap. Ok. I love moments in time. Flash in the pan moment after moment (ironic or paradox, you decide). Your wording is exceptional. Each thought is layered with literary devices that dont hinder the narration. Probably my favorite verse this week (though to be fair its also the fourth ive read so far, but stylistically its hard to beat for me).

Witty -- interesting take. I thought, at first, you were internally trying to sculpt the beginning of a relationship. I quickly understood i was incorrect, and was interested in seeing how you woukd tie it all in; i was a bit dissapointed. The ending was rushed/forced in my opinion. Some very good body content, but overall a weaker structure.

Vote cimm

[Razah]

They were our David, our Mona Lisa, our Sistine chapel
Sculpted by the hands of Gods with a pristine scalpel

Dope.

To be honest, I thought you had a real, real solid verse. Flow was smooth, I liked your take on the topic, everything was good. But, Cimm's verse just appealed to me more.

Might be the first verse from Cimm I read, but I thought it was dope. The rapid fire rhyming, the schemes, the wording, the whole take on a stock broker/market crash.. It was a really dope verse bruh. Kudos.

Sucks because I feel like Witty had a good verse, just Cimm's was so much more enjoyable to me.

Thanks for the read guys.

vCimm