03-10-2014, 03:55 AM | #1 |
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Week 3: oats (2-0) vs. timeless (2-0) \\ oats wins 10-0
Season 3 The Basics | Read the full rules here. Verses are due Friday at 11:59 p.m. PT. THERE ARE NO EXTENSIONS. Votes are due Sunday at 11:59 p.m. PT. Verses may not exceed 48 lines or 650 words unless agreed upon by the opponent. Voting on three battles is required. If you win and don't vote, you will receive a loss instead. If you lose and don't vote, you will receive a one-week suspension. Please post links to your three votes in this thread. Topics this week are available for your choosing here. Good luck, @oats and @timeless.
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03-14-2014, 12:16 AM | #2 |
past tense
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Her lips were amazing, so moist and it’s this love’s grasp that I’m tasting. Saying, “I could kiss you all day baby, I’m so glad that we’re dating.” Such a passionate statement being that it’s a glum Monday morning. Young sunrays stormed in my window with their mundane warning. When I finally opened my eyes… I had to rally into the kitchen. It was the fucking dog! That wasn’t my girl Ally that I was kissing. Madly I washed the drippings off in an instant, then I left the sink with a new face, a new pace in mind to start getting dressed and fitted. A new week is upon me, the dog waited around, saddened but calmly. I opened the front door and he pissed like he just down a gallon of coffee. I sat and lit a cigarette, taking in the warm summer breeze. It carried a strange scent with it, a mix of corn, butter and weed. The pooch sensed it too, Cookie then made her way into the woods I followed as I should, hoping to find a fistful of Kush, but as soon as we hit the clearing, it was for my life that I was fearing. Amazingly high it stood, most height limits wouldn’t have such clearance. I started to introduce myself, I said… “Hi, I’m Kurt.” It seemed really shy and earthed at first, yet the sight was worse. With a nod, it ashed out a joint and replied, “I am Sasquatch.” I nearly shit… felt tighter than coils deep inside of a padlock. “Am I still sleeping? Dreaming? Surely this creature doesn’t exist.” “I’m real, you’re here killing my buzz, I’m trying to get all blunted and shit. You haven’t heard sir? Your country has accepted my kind in society. Quietly, we’re trying to adapt, but don’t count on us for sobriety. We’re not here to hurt you, that’s why we’ve always been in hiding, and I’m not lying, I have the contract right here… Congress signed it.” “So What do you want from me? And where did you get your weed?” “I grew it myself, and as for you…I’m here to give you a lecture on greed.” “You don’t even know me, if you did you’d know I’m not the greedy type.” “No. You are. Learn to seek what’s right instead of trying to feed the hype. You’ve conquered this land here, and you don’t plan to share… correct?” “Unless you’re willing to help pay for it, my privacy is what you should respect.” “Do you like to smoke? All I can offer is bud, I can’t get a job. I won’t come near your house, the woods will forever be my spot.” “So even though your kind is accepted, you’d still rather hide?” “It’d be wise, I’ve grown accustomed to this type of shattered life.” “Ok, well I have to go back in and get ready for work.” “I shall talk to you soon, Kurt. Keep your head up and steady sir.” Later on that evening I could be found in my bed sleeping. Breathing hard, snoring, shit… I might’ve been dreaming. Either way, when I awoke, Sasquatch was standing above me. He said, “So I had a talk with your dog Cookie, she’s so lovely. But anyways, Kurt, she said this was her home… not yours. She said I could come and go as I please and much more. This is my bed now, get out please and shut off the lights.” I shouted, “What the Hell?” he then shouted, “Yeah, fuck your life.” “This is absurd!” I yelled like I was expecting some help. “I don’t know what to tell you, this is the hand you’ve been dealt.” 1. You walk out of your front door one Monday morning to the sight of a mythical creature. |
03-14-2014, 06:47 AM | #3 |
Steel Cut
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Mythical Creatures
a cold and blustery day, like the last 1000 before a constant buzz sat on top of us, the air’s a powerful storm that let us shower in our cowardice - we have no outward importance - until the morning I courted it from my house at the door aroused to explore, I froze in a sickened demeanor at the site of it, like a frightened kid, a pitiful seizure scanned it up and down, impossible! all the typical features of what we learned in fairytales of the Mythical Creatures it had the signature pieces of the giants of old wrapped in long obsidian hair, eyes a fiery gold they roamed the land in massive structures, mighty and bold and tamed the depths underfoot and placed the skies in their hold As a child I was told they were great seekers of Truth - (they were lies, I supposed, but don’t hold me to my youth!) they were teachers and prophets, the keepers of knowledge clinging to secrets for solace from their meagerly proofs till they believed in a ruse that the planet belonged to them when in fact they were captive, inhabiting caustic pens; confined by their desires: colliding dishonest whims were the seeds of their undoing that they sowed their conflicts in constantly quarreling. it stained their species’ existence never united - each one of them was equally vicious one evil achievement insisted another’s need to eclipse it till the day they set the sky aflame. there’d be no peace or forgiveness. seasons since don’t exist in the Earth we inherited their curse was our carriage; we were birthed from their arrogance service is imperative - to them that idea would be unsuitable discussion we sacrifice for the greater good; they only united in their mutual destruction. he was huge, with mold and dust outflowing like a draping gown - whether they were God’s first creation or the other way around this one was facing down at me with a placid, distinct grin the smug desperation of a beast who couldn’t fathom extinction he laughed as he inched slowly toward my home and kids he was intent to turn this place to a morgue - I hope they hid his motion limped, so close I could notice his broken ribs he was stoic, gripped with a refusal to coexist no one had ever been as close as this, his shadow was calming until the last thing I saw: the final darkness upon me. the creature collapsed, leaving a path of violence and a single roach out of billions…stuck beneath the boot of the last surviving man
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03-14-2014, 11:21 AM | #4 |
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Ok this was a great battle. It was cool you both wrote on the same topic. It makes it easier to vote on
Timeless, lol my dude, I liked your piece because it was about a weed smoking sasquatch haha. I want a weed smoking sasquatch for a friend, bet he had that danky dank. The story was good, progression ect. I just don't know if was a little too juvenile in some of the wording. Against a lot of the people in the league it's ok but oats is a monster with his verbage and cadence. I really enjoyed how you went more into storymode this week though. I really did feel more involved in your piece this week. Nice drop Edit- you gotta stop centering your pieces bro. Thats a bad look and 90% of people will agree Oats, great piece here again, especially that last part. Very vivid imagery and the flow throughout was just spot on for real. You're definitely a force to be reckoned with and I hope you stay in the league. I feel this piece started out slow and kind of bored me but really started picking up halfway through the third stanza and finished very strong. This is actually a very hard battle to vote on for the first battle this week. You both did a great job tackling this topic, timeless you told a kind of fun loving story while oats, you told this kind of stand backish fairy tale type story. Hmmm, this is difficult but I think im going to have to go with oats for imo a more polished piece. Great read guys Mvgt=oats
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Last edited by Just Write; 03-14-2014 at 11:43 AM. |
03-14-2014, 06:50 PM | #5 |
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timeless:
I can't say I agree with Just Write about centering text. I don't think it matters much at all. In reality, the formal structure of a piece can be used to denote some meaning beyond the language. Centering your text though really doesn't do anything to take away from the verse; I do it sometimes as well. Again, not sure it matters, and I can't think of any real reason why it should. Definitely lots of humor built into this very strange story. You have the ability to rhyme fairly well, so that made the piece both awkward in some cases, but also dope in some places. The rhyming itself throughout was concise, but I take issue with stories in this format because a lot of time the rhyming starts to dictate the story, or at least it starts to appear that way. Not that that is inherently bad, I mean, this is the nature of our genre of writing, but I think writers tread fine lines telling stories, because the reader is trying to follow a narrative, and if the rhyming obstructs that narrative in any way, it can work against the writer. That said, I don't think you needed to be very profound with your word choices here, because of the comedic approach to your story, so in that sense, there were only a few places where I cringed at the language: the saddened but calmly/gallon of coffee was funny, but weird, fearing/clearance part was weird sounding in my head, but again, not so much that it works against you. It's probably just hte nature of the piece itself that causes this weirdness, because the story itself is really weird. All in all, there's nothing really here that I can say is absolutely amazing. I really wish people would not use names in these kinds of stories, because they always make me cringe... a convenient name that happens to rhyme with some scheme somewhere... haha, it just makes me stomach hurt. Now, the verse does have some depth, in the few lines about the strife of the Sasquatch, being accepted but not desiring the cohabitation earned. One could use this as a launching point for interpretation, by comparing the Sasquatch to some other oppressed sect/culture/society etc. I don't know whether or not your were trying to speak on anything like this, but its there. All in all, I didn't laugh out loud reading it, it just presented itself as peculiar to me. Haha. Oats: Well man, you turned this topic into a fantastic piece. The inverted mythical creature scenario, from the "outside looking in" almost - what we must seem like to other creatures, and the perspective of beings "lesser" than the "greater" beings. The personification of the "lesser" beings serves as a window through which humans, or "men" are seen as mythical creatures. Your description was concise and fantastic, your rhyming was bonkers, your flow was dope except for a couple lines that seemed to cram in too many syllables - HOWEVER - even when that occurred, because I am an insanely dope emcee, they still managed to flow quite perfectly. (haha). There were many interesting metaphorical choices too: the broken rib idea resonated Genesis for me, indeed, there were many scriptural overtones, and I think that serves as a dope reinforcement of the mythical creature idea. It would be one thing to just speak from the perspective of a pygmy, looking up at human beings as Goliath(s) with description only, but you used metaphor interwoven with imagery. Superb. I'm confident this line is probably the dopest line in the piece: "whether they were God’s first creation or the other way around" I wish I could sit here and break down every line like it's necessary, but great pieces speak for themselves in this regard. VOTW contender here. Vote: Oats - After a few reads each, a break, a few more reads, the conclusion is rather clear. Though I love timeless's writing style, he was outmatched this week by a writer who probably deserves to be in anyone's top 10 all time.
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03-16-2014, 04:41 PM | #6 |
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timeless: LOL. Sasquatch is a fuckin G. Long verse but the humor kept it going by rather quickly without it ever getting dull. My only complaint is in the ending. The writing there when compared to the rest of this seemed rushed, but besides that I'd say this is damn good work. Props.
oats: Hello, Newman. Whenever I read "Mythical Creatures" at the end of the lines had a Peter Griffin moment as I said to myself "so that's why it's called that." But in all seriousness this was a helluva work. The flow was excellent and I don't think I ever really noticed a spot where it slipped up. The story was also well done, basically all around this was great. At first after I read timeless' piece I really wanted to vote for it, but oats technical ability shined in this battle so V/oats |
03-16-2014, 08:04 PM | #7 |
ghost in the matrix
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Phone just fucked up after trying to post my breakdown smh
but short vote, timeless you had a strong verse and did well with the story and imagery. Oats you also had a strong verse with storyline and imagery. the big difference and my reason for voting for OATS was the flow. I felt timeless could have used a few more inner and multie rhymes to pull the upset vote oats
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03-16-2014, 08:32 PM | #8 | ||
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Timeless, maybe this isn't your fault.. but this is the 3rd verse I read about weed already this week. Which suggests a lack of originality overall. What I did like was your pace in the storytelling, it kept it moving and I wasn't bored (until I got to the weed part). The kissing your dog shit was funny, but it didn't connect to the rest of the story. The finisher was a little weird too... so the point of the story is that sasquatches can talk to dogs and then the guy got kicked out of his bed.... I dunno man, I need a little more than that. In sum, I really like your storytelling, I just didn't feel your story.
Oats, grabbed me from the beginning. It's so clear after reading a bunch of other verses before this that you're just part of that next tier, hands down. You have such control over your story, it reads effortlessly. Quote:
Quote:
Oats gets it for me easily with the best verse I've read this week.
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03-16-2014, 10:53 PM | #9 |
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timeless - I couldn't take this seriously. It's humorous that Sasquatch is taking over the guy's household because of what the dog said but I don't think you capitalized on that opportunity much. I wrote about weed this week lol, and I hate my verse, so I thought I'd mention that if it should be taken into account. The fashion in which this was written wasn't bad.. the approach was just a little stale and the humor was lackluster.
oats - Best verse I've read so far this week, your flow is damn good and helps you drive the approach forth. Clean portrayal of the mythical creatures, although the cockroach twist was a slight copout, unless I'm directly missing the point right now. I love how the first bar of the verse flows. Rhythm is important! My vote goes to oats. |
03-17-2014, 01:35 AM | #10 |
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timeless - LMFAO really? ... good shit. i liked how you poked fun at general morality and danced around stereotypes. it was enjoyable. the end was a little.. out there, i don't really "get it" if you will, but i got the basic gist of where you were going. and i appreciate the direction you pointed me at.
liked the imagery here.. With a nod, it ashed out a joint and replied, “I am Sasquatch.” I nearly shit… felt tighter than coils deep inside of a padlock. these lines hit home hardest for me this week out of anybodys ... period.. “So even though your kind is accepted, you’d still rather hide?” “It’d be wise, I’ve grown accustomed to this type of shattered life.” oats- really liked this set and had to quote before i finished.. As a child I was told they were great seekers of Truth - (they were lies, I supposed, but don’t hold me to my youth!) they were teachers and prophets, the keepers of knowledge clinging to secrets for solace from their meagerly proofs ^verr niice oOoo... this one was facing down at me with a placid, distinct grin the smug desperation of a beast who couldn’t fathom extinction ahhhh... sticking to a topic and .. making the piece into a metaphor, or saying something further than what one might've expected getting into it, was appreciated. many thanks. /v oats - he not only outrhymed his opponent, but he actually had a pretty cool story that stuck out to me this week. if timeless' character had said something more profound then "fuck your life" at that key moment in his verse, i truly believe, with all sincerity, he would've gotten the win this week. great effort from both. nice reads, many thanks. Last edited by patrown; 03-17-2014 at 01:39 AM. |
03-17-2014, 01:44 AM | #11 |
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timeless: For the record, I don't care if anyone chooses to center their piece or not. I never understood the issue with it. The initial impression starting from the first line is that the language used and the way some of the dialogue was structured was comical, but not in the way I think you intended it. The weed approach as a vehicle to introduce multiple topics in one verse felt too easy. The scenarios being introduced seemed ridiculous, but worked, since the character was high.. but still. Overall the verse was hilarious and fun to read, part of that from the intentional humor you added, and part from unintentional humor that probably only I found funny, mostly around word choice and the way things were constructed.
oats: Gotta say... obsidian hair is a description I've read one too many times... though there's nothing wrong with it and I've used it myself. I like that you held off the introduce the actual perspective of your character to the end, you were successful in leading me to believe you were actually describing a giant until the end. Vote: oats, his verse was better overall to me. I appreciated the humor that timeless brought, but it didn't quite match up to oats take on a giant
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03-17-2014, 02:26 AM | #12 |
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Timeless
Sasquatch smoking up in the serene woods. I myself, am a big bigfoot believer. An avid sasquatch hunter. I've tracked them through the Adirondacks. He smokes heavy. You chose not to paint him in a larger than life picture, instead you made him regular like, and I thought that was intriguing. Keep it interesting. Keep writing. Oats This was a good verse. A lot of solid material with a superb sense of flow behind it. An overall enjoyable read. Fantastic all around. Vote to Oats. Good read.
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03-17-2014, 03:16 AM | #13 |
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Timeless- nice. I laughed even though the ending made the squatch a bit of a doucher. It took a little patience to get into this long lined piece, but once it lightened up in mood, I dug it and forgive the drawn out structure. Cool story bro.
Oats- damn. Both you guys brought it. As a chronic story twister, I was guessing til the very end. I loved how you drew out the story while still storytelling and giving a kind of backdrop flashback as filler. Excellent storytelling devices, even better rhyming and word usage. I was actually interested the entire read. That's an achievement given my set of dysfunctional personality traits. Great job. MVGT Oats. Both were cool, but Oats brought the full program.
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