Yowl

I saw the best minds of my generation destroyed by foolishness, thirsty for crazy commotion, swinging from one adventure to the next foolproof distraction just for giggles,

who spent countless nights drinking from a sufficient alcohol bottle and communicating with superficial wannabe’s to still feel empty deep inside,
who camouflage their unique young face in cheap make-up to have self confidence and still feel rejected by society,

who smoked themselves ignorantly sluggish thinking this is bliss, forgetting the consequences of the after effects,

who could care less about human intelligence, wasting precious time shunning any system of education and leaving with nothing in their hands,
who became mindless drones to degrading lovers, losing valuable keepsakes, and regretting the never returning novelties,

who experimented with deadening poison to feel a sensational high, just to crash and burn with tremendous deterioration from the one night of horseplay,
who ran from the law, causing many misfortunes upon common people and getting caught in the end only to never grasp the lesson,

who spend every nickel and dime on anything expendable to lose their dreams for the future and get stuck in an inescapable nightmare for the next decade,
who were expelled from high school for obscene pranks & crummy behavior towards teachers and peers,
who cruised along many streets with aimless directions just to avoid the folks at home and searching for justifications or resolutions to life’s little misfortunes that could easily be found in their own soul,

who sold themselves to the mass culture since everyone that surrounded them were and buying into the crowds definition of cool,

who never earned a pretty penny by doing a honorable man’s job and instead sucked their folks dry for everything manageable,

who let themselves be trampled on by simpleminded people that enjoy torturing passive people just for merriment,

who spend every waking moment either longing about the past or worrying about the future just to realize they wasted the past year doing nothing,

who never get caught up in life’s little troubles with love, angst, school, or family and later regret having the wrong obligations in life.



Eschew! Eschew! Regret! Shame! Wrong doers whose lives were crushed by countless mistakes!

Eschew! Nightmares of Eschew! Eschew the heartless! Grief Eschew! Eschew the hungry children!

Eschew the draft! Eschew the unforgiving prisons! Eschew the court fees paid by average citizens! Eschew the string of bad luck given to decent people!

Eschew whose mind that is a scrambled puzzle! Moloch whose blood is dirtier than sewage water! Eschew whose fingers take without paying! Eschew whose mouth is full of deceiving words! Eschew whose heart is blacker than coal!

Eschew Pollution! Enemies! hostages of love! brain washing schools! broken master pieces! Eschew the endless nights and countless fights!

Eschew Dreams! Supernatural! Fantasies! Inebriating substances! Men who act like whores! Free criminals!



Young Adolescents! I’m with you in Kent where you’re more foolish than I am

I’m with you in Kent where you feel smaller than an ant

I’m with you in Kent where peer pressure is in every corner

I’m with you in Kent where student pull all nighters just to get a studio project done on time

I’m with you in Kent where most of the faculty don’t know how to teach

I’m with you in Kent where you’re confined to a small white room with a complete stranger day in and day out

I’m with you in Kent where sometimes there is no winning the epic battle of love

I’m with you in Kent where you have the chance to turn your life around for the better

I’m with you in Kent where disease or disorder is commonly found among others

I’m with you in Kent where you can’t only use geometry and geometrical systems of thinking

I’m with you in Kent where it’s a race with many hurdles striving to come in first place

I’m with you in Kent where once it’s over you are happy but the journey was painful

Pure! Pure! Pure! Pure! Pure! Pure! Pure! Pure! Pure! Pure! Pure! Pure!

The earth is pure! The heart is pure! The foot is pure! The eyes are pure!

Everyone is pure! Every place is pure! Everything is pure! Every moment is pure!

The beggar is as pure as the pope! The madman is pure as our minds are holy! The president is as pure as a new born child!

The novels are pure the voice is pure the drummers beat is pure the dancers leaps are pure!

Pure Megan pure Jenn pure Brad pure Josh pure Katie pure Scara Pure Hatfield’s pure parents pure sister’s pure brother pure pets pure the suffering homeless pure the forgotten human angels!

Pure forgiveness! Pure faith! Pure luck! Pure the soaring airplanes! Pure the busy streets full of cars! Pure the forests full of wild animals!

Pure Northfield Pure Bedford Pure Macedonia Pure Kent Pure Bavaria Pure Paris Pure Vienna!





Allen Ginsberg’s poem Howl inspired me to write my own parody of the poem. In the poem you meet junkies, visionaries, and criminals in the Beat Generation that Ginsberg came across. He writes it in a free verse form exemplifying the idea of writing freely and spontaneously. The poem is brilliantly written with nothing that can compare to it and is encouraging to anyone who reads it. I chose to write my poem about the people I have come across in my generation. Many of the people I know have made wrong decisions and have become a criminals or junkies. Howl inspired me because maybe if I could write what I have seen and how I feel I could get a message across to other young adolescents. I tried to say true to his technique of writing by creating images with descriptive words and writing freely. I also made sure to keep a similar beat to the beat in Ginsberg’s poem. One of the first steps in writing a parody is to analyze the poet’s work.

The poem Howl is one of the principle works from the beat generation. Originally Howl was considered to be obscene because of Ginsberg’s unique writing style. He used many descriptive words to create many different images that were still tied together by a string through out his piece. Ginsberg’s poem shows the reader the horror in the world while telling a story and keeping a beat. Howl is made up of three parts and a footnote, each with a different purpose. Part one describes scenes, characters, and situations from Ginsberg’s experiences in life and through out this section there are many drug references. Part two is a rant about the industrial civilization. He associates Moloch with the average human mind that can’t love or have a soul because they are too focused on material objects. Then Part three is written for Carl Solomon and is more like a turning point from the grim tone of Moloch. Ginsberg is saying he doesn’t think Solomon is crazy; he just has a different way of thinking. Last is the footnote, added later on, that is an ecstatic passage where everything is holy and can be viewed in a new light. Today, Howl is widely accepted and has become one of the most popular poems of the Beat Generation.

The saying “Imitation is the sincerest form of flattery” lead me to writing a parody of Howl. To imitate someone is like giving them a compliment. I enjoyed reading Ginsberg’s poem and writing a parody seems to be best way to show this. To start off I titled my poem Yowl to mimic the title of Ginsberg’s poem Howl. He uses the word Howl with multiple meanings such as a cry of pain and an extreme longing. For my poem Yowl is also a cry of pain and a longing for something more in life. The layout and the context of my parody is similar to the language, style, and technique used in his poem. My part one describes friends, situations, other teens and their experiences in life. There are many examples of drug use, kids buying into the mass culture, and foolishness. Then part two is a rant about society and is focused around the horrible and unnecessary things in life. I changed the word Moloch to Eschew because it means to shun or avoid. Everything being ranted about in part two are ideas that should be avoided or things happening that doesn’t make me happy. Part three is written for my fellow teens as a message of inspiration. Then the footnote is the counter part to part two and is like a new way of looking at things. I also changed Holy to be Pure which means to be free from inappropriate elements. To produce a poem that could even compare to Ginsberg’s work is hard to achieve but my parody reflects pieces of his work while it’s still my own writing and ideas.

Images

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