Ok, so this really doesn't fit into fan fiction so I figured I would post it here for all of your amusemant. It's a short poem about Fallout 3 that I wrote for my creative writing class that focuses in on poetry. The poem itself, started as an object poem, focusing around those the cool little bobble-heads that everyone who got the collectors edition are in possession of. So here it is. I hope you all enjoy reading it as much as I enjoyed writing it (although I may do a bit more work on it) and I hope you all are enjoying your time in the Wastes! Frag a Behemoth for me!

Miracle of the Machine Age

It was the first thing I saw, all yellow and blue,
sticking out among the wreckage and
painted with optimism and expressionless eyes.
“Will the people be brave?” “Will the world be new?”
I ask and wait for his knee-jerk reaction,
a nod with fiercely false enthusiasm.
“Liar,” I mutter, at his plasticine sneer,
“this Wasteland has has broken us,
and stolen our years.”

But I can't be too pissed. This
Vault-Tec Boy- a pre-war toy, will fetch
me a bundle in caps. New boots, more ammo,
a scope for my rifle, and before long my face
matches his megaton smile.

You see, wealth is hard to come by here
in the Wastes, congeries of scavengers
moving at a reckless pace, looking for
travelers to overtake, and finding diplomacy
at the tip of swallowed bullets.

But for now,
I have the solace of my treasure
and a withering sky.
To my back I have the wind
and its plutonium sigh.


cheers,
graysunlight

That was really good, actually. I enjoy that style of poetry, quite akin to the style I adopt myself, which is probably why I am bias to your work

The third verse earns a do-over, maybe. It doesn't quite draw you in like the others, and detracts a little from the rest. I see what you did with it though, it fits, it's just a little sub-par compared to the others, they were beautiful

I appreciate the effort it took to write this, but I'm also from the camp that believes poems should rhyme, otherwise they are merely paragraphs with random breaks in the sentences.

But, since I probably can't write any better myself, I'll return to the corner and shut up for now.

My thoughts about the third verse are in agreement with yours, and I'm in the process of revising it. It's just a matter of finding a good alternative that fits both lyrically and/or contextually (which is turning out to be harder than I anticipated today). When I get it cleaned up I'll edit the first post with the new verse. Anywho, thank you for the most constructive and honest critique, it's a very difficult thing to get nowadays.

Agreed. I'm no expert on poetry but this ain't great. I mean no disrespect, just my opinion.

I can totally respect that opinion as many of my favorite poets belong to that school as well. If you're into that sort of poetry you may enjoy (especially if you're into the grotesque/macabre) "Les Fleurs du Mal" (The Flowers of Evil) by Charles Baudelaire or the sonnet sequence "The Fungi of Yuggoth" by H.P. Lovecraft which details on everything from dream travel and beautiful ethereal landscapes to death from malignant cosmic forces and the destruction of the universe... Good stuff all around!

The first four lines are great. There's a nice sense of broken rhythm and rhyme - the way 'new' makes sense of it and completes what seems to start out as fractured - gives it order by rhyming with 'blue', and also a sense of rhythm.

I like rhyming in poetry, but don't need it - it's just that it is an extremely useful device for structure and meaning.

I never thought I'd be discussing poetry on a fallout 3 forum.

That was lovely. Thanks for posting it.