Week 1: Camp Bell vs. YDK [Camp bell wins, 7-4.]

[Adonis]

Verses will be due Thursday Oct. 2nd at 11:59 p.m. Western / 2:59 Am Eastern / 7:59AM UK. There are no Extensions. No Exceptions.

Verses must be a minimum of 10 Lines and maximum of 48 Lines or 650 words unless agreed upon by both competitors.

Votes will be due Sundays at 11:59 p.m. Western / 2:59 Am Eastern / 7:59AM UK .

View Other Rules Here

Goodluck

@Camp Bell @YDK


Topic:

[YDK]

Check

[Camp Bell]

....yup

[Camp Bell]

@YDK


I couldn't wait for this night, he just made me his wife
it felt amazing inside as i was displayed as the bride
waltzing to the altar.....gazing at his face as he cried
as the days went by, something changed, we'd fight
in a way, his violence escalated to dangerous heights
strangled until i saw angels in flight, i prayed for my life
its 8:35...
im late to this life, aye im alive, was i saved or survived?
what does my face look like, am i pretty as i used to be?
i ask these questions as i remain in this paint as it dries
blank in one eye, feeling the pain from him abusing me
i'm amazed at the way he's always smooth with things
thats why i decided not to take my pride away, truthfully
over time he designed the shaped of my mind and fate
now, i realized i was blind an trained for him exclusively
id cry an say "remember the brighter days of you an me"
he'd reply enraged, "fuck that, this is what you do to me"
i'd recite my case while he do brutal things to stupor me
my life was shaded behind the gate an through the trees
tryna find a way to hide my face before my students see
all i do is teach and pray for unity...who's schooling me?
i accepted the domestic violence an cruelty he'd do to me
kept in silence, the evidence is this picture he drew of me.

[YDK]

Demons destroying souls disguised as holes in your logic
Empty your pockets, smoke your money, release the hold of a profit.
Its over, you lost it. Now you're sober and nauseous
Just to cope you score some dope in the hopes you can squash it
But at the most it's a faucet to open urges; less cautious
And the spoken thoughts of an author become notes of a broken promise.
Misdiagnosed? I vomit. The cure for addiction is nonsense
Habitual coke sniffer; there's no prescription, be honest!
They say it's psychological but their cures are just abominable
Because replacing drugs with drugs is simply comical; unconscionable!
How can a hospital accommodate a fool as a doctor
Who prospers when his patients are best described as monsters?
I write this all down somberly and put it in the back of my mind
Because to face the facts I trace it back and see I was the one that was blind!
It's clear as day now; I can nearly TASTE the signs
That led the way to heavens gate (or most likely hell by design)
See my heart was ripped out and stomped on yesterday,
It wont heal; it's just pain, festering, decayed.
I was supposed to get married, but these memories of mine are hurting me
Because i was at the alter at 9am but my bride was dead by 8:33.

[Three-Planes-Aligned]

Just a note on rhyme schemes to both: sometimes in the interest of maintaining a steady scheme one can force the wording - or 'force' it in the sense that it becomes apparent that if this wasn't written in a format where everything is supposed to rhyme it would have been different (scheme-warps-space/time). Illustrated by that you both used specific clock strokes to rhyme off of, for example.

Camp Bell - Mechanics and pace were a strong point: it's nice to not have to retrace a piece just because it is bogged down (just see above note). Domestic violence is a difficult topic to write about (not in the sense that it provokes so many emotional feelings, but rather since many writers plan for it to do so but kind of fail to bring the situation *alive*). Your portrait was concise but a little subdued.

YDK - ...same goes for substance abuse disorders and their accompanying behavioral shenanigans: it's so often that's in on this dramatic level while the life of a fiend is mind-numbingly prosaic sometimes (well, coke bitches are pretty fucking crazy - what with the drug's short duration and other factors). You too managed to keep a solid level of diction going - as well as mechanics.

These pieces were favorable to compare because of their different but similar takes - I'll go Camp Bell because his was the slightly better welded end product with more polished joints and seams at a higher level of execution (callbacks, unconventional schemes, etc).

[NYCSPITZ]

I liked campbell's more on this. better storyline, a bit more engaging. Nice little backdrop to the story and cool insight into the woman's psyche and her relationship with the man who drew her picture.

YDK was pretty cool but not as tightly wound together as campbell's imo. Wording was also slightly less effective.

v/ campbell

[timeless]

both with similar styles in regards to flow but camp came with a more complete drop this time around. ydk had a foundation that was non existant, setting up for a throw-on for an ending. not bad though. Camp had a solid drop, the opening was dope and it all pieced together properly.

v. campbell

[theMuzzl3]

Both being veterans, at this point I would think one of them makes it to at least the semi-finals.

Campbell:

You're verses struck me precisely as full of emotion. An engagement of lines written by the woman pictured had me at awe of your writing skills. I am still unsure of what metaphorical stuff you tied into it, but it seemed like there was a story behind the lines. I love how you took the picture and turned it into a story of what she went through. Too many lines ending with "me" docked you a little bit, and a lot of your lines rhymed (which in AOWL isn't a big deal I guess, but it impresses me). You also posted a day or two early, and I think the words/storyline/structure was great, which impresses me. Your lines all lined up very well, and if it weren't for the "me" overuse, I'd score you a 9.

As far as possible grammatical errors (which I won't dock points for, since this is poetry and AOWL): "the shaped of" should be "the shape of", or "and shaped".

As far as constructive criticism, I can't do of much, except for using the word "me" and "i" too much.

The creativity is mostly what I'm voting on, and I give you an 8/10


YDK

Your lines were very creative and very well executed. There seemed to be some metaphors going on… which I wasn't completely aware of. You strayed at the beginning to your own idea and tied it together at the end to associate with the picture. Your grammar was perfect, and your structure was extremely good.

My favorite lines were:

Originally Posted by YDK

And the spoken thoughts of an author become notes of a broken promise.
Misdiagnosed? I vomit. The cure for addiction is nonsense

I wasn't sure how you were tying in the coke fiend into the subject matter, but looking again at the picture made it clear as to what you were going for. This is tough, you deserve an 8, but I'm giving you an 8.5/10

This was a tough one to score, and it was VERY close, but given this is AOWL and syllables/line length don't count that much… I'ma have to:

/v YDK

[Soulstice]

Camp bell. That was pretty good. The flow was truly a strong point. The schooling bit was nice. It added an extra layer in a piece marked by a linear narrative and heavy rhynes. Nothing wrong with that approach but would've liked to see more oof stuff like schooling. Displays deeper skillset and makes for quite an enjoyable read.

Ydk - probably a better flow but it was clear you put an effort to display your mechanic skill rather than paint a vivid a picture and use clear or cleverly written phrases to bring the piece to the next level. Your take on the topic was nice and you seem to have a lot of rage against the status quo type bars in your verses. Noting the doctor and his patients being monsters was a nice dichotomy that seems prevalent at its base in a lot if your stuff. Cool. Keep working on personal stylistic things like that. Elongate them weave them into the imagery et ect. Best advice I can give to help you elevate I think.

Anyway voting campbell for using his language for vivid storytelling and dope flow vs mostly the latter for ydk

[PancakeBrah]

Camp Bell-

Not bad. Not bad at all, really. You're lines being SO. EXACTLY. matched in length bugged me. You purposefully did it. Spent time parsing words, paring down, to make it just so. Let your freak flag fly; go a syllable longer or shorter here or there. It's scary, I know. But trust me it'll be okay.

I thought this was really accessible, without being overly simple. Which is something a lot of writers could take to heart. The rhymes were very smooth, and although they weren't uber-complex or anything, they never felt intrusive (except for the use of stupor). I think your first person take was good, and there was a bit more depth here than I expected coming into it. I like it, sometimes, when writers take an extremely literal approach to the topic. Can be more creative than some far-flung metaphor tangentially related to the picture. I thought you captured some emotion here, albeit pretty surface level. But I liked this, a fun read.

YDK-

I've been staring blankly at your first line for a few minutes now trying to figure out wtf it means. Are the demons, who destroy souls, the hole in my logic? Or, are the souls, that are being destroyed, the hole in my logic? Usually one line being a bit off isn't a problem, but when it's your opener it presents a problem. My gut reaction after reading that line is to stop reading. It seems way too try hard intellectual/deep, to me. Then again, I'm some sort of moron so maybe I'm missing an obvious meaning.

Anyways. I'm with you from your second line until 'less cautious'. You're making a point and setting up the payoff/tie-in to the topic (I'm assuming; writing this vote as I read). Then the author line doesn't make a lick of sense to me. It sounds cool, and poetic. I just don't know what the fuck you're trying to say, or how it relates to the previous lines. *reads the rest of the verse*

I liked everything else until the end. Well, maybe not liked. But it made sense and had some strong lines/wording (capitalized 'taste' and the parenthetical phrase) but the ending has me off a bit. So, this is written from the perspective of someone who's fiancee recently died right before their wedding. So what's the purpose of the body of your verse? She died from drugs, or the system currently in place that deals with addiction? There's no concrete tie, but that's the assumption I'm working with. May be wrong? I just think this was all a bit disparate, with some serious issues in terms of clarity and intent.

Camp Bell was strong where YDK was weak; accessibility and fluidity. YDK had some nice sections but I think Camp Bell took this pretty easily.

v/Camp Bell

[Adonis]

Camp - Good pace and flow coupled with a decent amount of emotion. Charchter build up could have been much better, explaining who she is and the dude a bit before jumping fist first into the ol' eye socket ya dig? It was short and to the point, I guess that's the best thing about this verse. That probably came out wrong. I mean some, or a lot of verses lack that I guess, but you went from 0 to 60 in under 30 lines, kudos.


My favorite first place loser - This gone be a tough vote. You too had this verse move in quick fashion, finishing just as fast as you began. Solid flow, no real quarrels there. I didn't like the brevity in the sense you jumped from coke sniffer, to horrible dr to I'm the wedding and he's dead. So much detail was missed there. I did however appreciate the sly innuendo's Ie. "Stomped on"... as I took that as a coke reference in the Overdose as it was stomped on and altered (being another innuendo) to killing via it not being a good product.


I had every intention of voting for CampBell after reading them each. But I just talked my self through YDK's verse and feel like I understand more for it.

Voting YDK

His verse had some sense on hidden message that might be wishful thinking, but I'm sure it was on purpose.

[kannon]

I was gonna use my last vote on Certain and Frank since it has less votes than this and inno vs. dove, but since these two battles are a lot closer, I'll drop votes here.

Bell Camp. I was excited to read your verse immediately because the lines are all the same length haha. It flowed super well throughout. Which always makes these things easier to read for me. I like this piece a lot. Unfortunately, I didn't really like the literal take on the picture being an actual picture that he drew of her. I liked it more when it was metaphoric. Unless the last line was meant as a metaphor, too. Oh shit. Who knows! You do. But I don't. I digress. There were a couple spots of shaky wording to make the schemes fit; "was I saved or survived," and "do brutal things to stupor me" stand out the most. I wish you had introduced the idea of the woman being a teacher earlier in the piece. With the lack of elaboration around that point, and the late revelation, it almost seems like it could have just been thrown in to make the rhyme work. But overall, this was a really good piece. Very well written, mechanics were sound, flow was dope. Yeah..

YDK, which I'm assuming stands for, "Your Dick Knows." I had to read this piece a couple times to try to connect the last four bars to the entire rest of the piece. The whole first chunk seems to be using the proverbial "you." But the ending seems to be a lot more specific. I'm not sure if the bride died from a drug overdose? Or if the random death of his bride led him to drugs? It seems like the former would be more logical. Sounds like she was super into drugs, and doctors tried to prescribe her drugs to get her off the drugs, and eventually the drugs killed her on the morning of her wedding. I guess my biggest quandary at this point is how the wedding ties in. It seems like a weird pre-wedding ritual to do a bunch of drugs. I like that you incorporated the time on the clock into your piece, but the whole wedding take seemed a bit forced. Overall, I felt like this was a strong start into a rushed ending that kinda just didn't sit right :/

Vote is for campbell's chicken noodle soup

[Pent uP]

Campbell -- the topic is boring...a little tried and true. ..I think the concept was a little disconnected from the topic. It was nice to see u attempt the lyricism that you did but I feel like it was pretty sophomoric in the end. I liked what you tries to do but I dont think the product was "There"

Ydk -- I liked the writing...it was borderline strong. The ending felt like too much...you made too much happen and it muddled the verse. Up until the end it was a steady set of ideas building up and then BOOM drop useless bombs..idk couldve been wrapped up better

Vote ydk

[Frank]

Major upset

Vote - Cambell

Big time upset here. I enjoyed Cambells rich tomato soup for the soul over YDKS bowl of sloppy joes. Cambells verse had a tighter wound watch. YDK had a greater concept, his opponent just out classed him on the score cards. YDK was not TKO here. Dude just lost by decision. Major upset. Cambell out boxed YDK but missed a few .... and , to really wow any judge's

[Defiant]

Campbell


I dunno I didn't like the beginning easy rhyming, wife, knife life etc, thought I wouldn't get into this verse till the middle when it read like more of a story, I liked that
This is what u do to me till the schooling line was dope,


Ydk

Thought your verse was more complex, I actually followed your verse more and enjoyed the read, ending was weak, felt you kinda gave up and didn't finish the verse how u wanted to.


It's close but I got Ydk prefered his verse more



Vote - ydk

[King Ra.]

Camp bell wins, 7-4.