Menewsha Avatar Community

Menewsha Avatar Community (https://www.menewsha.com/forum/index.php)
-   Writer's Conference (https://www.menewsha.com/forum/forumdisplay.php?f=95)
-   -   Ribs <<HELP!>> (https://www.menewsha.com/forum/showthread.php?t=140669)

mwahhaha 11-04-2009 10:45 PM

Ribs <<HELP!>>
 
I have no idea what to do after this bit that I have. . . Any suggestions? Thanks. And, not that I think it's amazing, don't steal this even though it's random and not finished. . . b/c it's MY random and unfinished blurb).
Again, thanks much for the help <3 <3 <3


“Unbleached, untouched till now. Her last breath finally touches the sky, but dirtied. Will rain never come to wash?” Myung said looking down at the ribs, half buried in the earth. They stuck out like pale yellow fingers, arched in a very loose fist.
“I'm calling the police.” She said, rubbing her arms and taking another step back.
“No,” he stood straight and stared at her. “Don't you see it. It's a poem in nature.” He's been published – too many times, perhaps – in The New Yorker, Poetry, and several Korean journals from before. Journals I'm sure you've never heard of.
“It's human.”
“Maybe,” he said. He bent too close to the bones for her comfort.
“No, it's human. And I'm calling the police.”
He was too gone to hear the beeping of her cell phone buttons. “Do you have a head?” He asked the ribs. Next to the tree, from the storm last night, a branch as thick as his thigh waited to rot. This branch he used to dig around the ribs.
“Don't! Stop it!” she shouted. “You're tampering with evidence!” Police shouted into the air, hearing what she said to him through the receiver. She moved forward.
“I'm only looking.” No matter what, the average female is not as strong as the average male, and she rubbed her arm again from a further distance. The phone fell a maple leaf's distance from the ribs. Contaminated in her mind. Probably really was, if there had been anything to catch.
Not too long and, “I've found the skull.” She said she was going back to the car. “I want to touch it.”
“Stop it. You touch that, Myung, and I'll never touch you again.” Firmly, she strapped her arms across her chest.
Bent forward over the skeleton, he looked up at her, smiling until he saw her arms barring him from one of the things he liked best. Resolutely, he sighed and stood up. “Sorry.”
She rubbed her hands rough onto her thighs, as if there was something on them. Pinching her hands between her knees she shouted towards her phone, “Police! We found some bones – human bones, I think – in Lisle Woods. We're uh. . . well, I dropped the phone by the rib cage – and I don't want to . . . I don't want to touch it.”
Myung, ignoring her disgust with the condition of his hands, stuck one under her arm and pulled her away from the phone and body. “Let's go,” he said softly.
“No,” she jerked away from him, but didn't step away. “We can't just leave the scene.” She was short, even shorter than he was, and had to blink at him through her red lashes. The way the sun lit her freckles and bounced around her hazel eyes was enough to keep him there. It made him glad to hear her say that.
He took his spot by the ribs again. “It really is beautiful isn't it?” She said nothing. “A garden should grow here. Let's plant it.”
“Isn't this against your religion?”
“You're my religion.”
“Then it's still against your religion.” Louder, she said towards the phone, “Police! We're just off of the light blue path's scenic look-out. Please hurry.”
An hour later, she was sitting at the look-out. The sound of Myung digging up bones and soil, his hardworking breaths, and a couple distant bird songs fell soft on her ears. Curling her legs onto the bench, she gazed out at the trees. Earlier, he had sat with her and told her they were “rapturous green mountains harboring a million chirping, roaring hearts.” Some parts weren't so green. She was noticing now, some of the leaves shivered in the breeze in grayish tones.

Nolori 11-18-2009 10:45 PM

Hello there! I hope this helps!
--
Quote:

Originally Posted by mwahhaha
Will rain never come to wash?

I understand the sentence, but I think the negation makes it’s a little confusing. I suggest ‘ever’ instead of ‘never’.

Quote:

Originally Posted by mwahhaha
Myung said looking down at the ribs, half buried in the earth.

I’d put a comma after ‘said’.

Quote:

Originally Posted by mwahhaha
Don't you see it.

I think this should be a question mark instead of a period.

Quote:

Originally Posted by mwahhaha
Journals I'm sure you've never heard of.

Since you never refer to the reader in any part previous or later (as far as you’ve written) I’d cut it out. I think talking to the reader is either something that needs to happen consistently or not at all. Otherwise, it seems a bit jarring.

Quote:

Originally Posted by mwahhaha
“You're tampering with evidence!”

I’d drop this into a separate line so that it’s easier to tell that this is a different voice from “Stop!”

Quote:

Originally Posted by mwahhaha
No matter what, the average female is not as strong as the average male, and she rubbed her arm again from a further distance. … Contaminated in her mind. Probably really was, if there had been anything to catch.

This confused me. I feel a little like maybe you left a sentence out somewhere before that would have made this make sense.

Quote:

Originally Posted by mwahhaha
Some parts weren't so green. She was noticing now, some of the leaves shivered in the breeze in grayish tones.

I’d switch around the punctuation. I think ‘She was noticing now’ should be in the same sentence as ‘Some parts weren’t so green.’ ‘some of the leaves shivered in the breeze in grayish tones’ could be it’s own sentence.
--
I quite like the way you write. While there were a part or two that took me twice to understand, mostly I think it was very well written and the characters seems interesting. I can’t decide if I like Myung or not; he’s got aspects that I like and aspects that I don’t. That gives him such a three-dimensional aspect that I want to keep reading about him.

As far as going on, my first thought is to explain to the readers why Myung is digging there, why the police haven’t shown up yet, and why his girlfriend(?) isn’t stopping him like she had been before. That rather confused me, but I figured it was supposed to.


All times are GMT. The time now is 07:22 AM.