Feedback, Por Favor

Hello ya'll. Here's the four page short story that was due in class yesterday. Just felt like posting it here, I'm looking for feedback. What doesn't work for you, what does, what you'd like to see change... whatever it may be, it'll help me along. I'm looking to eventually turn this into something more... Thanks guys :)

Under the Sun


Her skin is caked with makeup. She looks like dough. They put too much lipstick on her. I don’t think I ever saw her wear lipstick before. I always told her she was too pretty for that crap. I bend over her casket and smear her red lips with my fingers, trying to rid her face of this superficial perversion of beauty. A firm grip on my arm tugs me away from Christine and whispers something in my ear. The words try to beckon me to a couch across the room, but I resist. Her face is smothered with the red coloring.
A young man begins to escort me and the others into an adjacent room filled with luscious plastic plants. Another attendant rushes by me to aid the movement. He nudges my shoulder and his hand falls to my lower back. I meet his eyes beneath a creased brow. He closes the mahogany doors and leaves me floating.
I am rocked through the waves of bodies. They examine me and hug me, with red eyes and sorry faces. Some of them are familiar, but I don’t know most of them. A lot of kids are here from Christine’s school, some of her teachers too.
I want to get away and find a quiet spot, just to be alone, away from this plaintive atmosphere. I make a mild escape to the restroom. It smells like baby powder. She was seven pounds and nine ounces when she came into this world, through me. There is an “Employees Must Wash Hands before Returning to Work” sign above the sink. They call this building a home. I look in the mirror, and try to rearrange my hair. Forget it. I dig into my purse for another Paxil, my 20 milligram friend.
The paper towel dispenser isn’t working so I shake my hands, sending drops of water onto the wallpaper. I watch them leak down through the floral pattern.
I return to the plastic jungle and moments later, the doors leading into the viewing room swing open. I can see the casket from where I’m standing. I am escorted back to my post by Christine. The attendants have cleaned the mess I made. Her lips are only a subtle rose tone; better. Her hair looks great. It’s alive and glistens with light from the sconces on the wall. A pink satin ribbon streams down the side of her face, embracing her cheeks. Last Tuesday, she burst into the front door and joined me in the living room, talking about a new crush in her Physics class. I knew she deserved better from the way she described him, but kept this out of our conversation.
The carpet looks clean, but its red color is faded from hundreds of feet that have trodden on the dye. I trace the paths of the carpet and walk into a separate room with a lengthy mahogany staircase leading to a lower level. The small room is quiet and filled with photographs; portraits of families who have probably made this service thrive throughout the years. I walk timidly around the room, catching the faces in the pictures. I spend a longer amount of time viewing a family portrait dated “1997”, which is engraved on a small piece of metal; bottom center of the frame. All but one face smiles: a middle aged man with pale skin.
The stairs began to creak; I couldn’t see anything walking up them though. I slouch back into the nearest corner and hold my breath, hopeful that my reality will be breeched by a supernatural being. A hand uses the banister as leverage to every step, coming closer. I see that this is not what I was hoping for.
A woman with shoulder length black hair and a plain face has stepped onto the top step, and stares at me. I shrug a little deeper into the corner. She minutely shakes her head and glides into the hallway, dragging the red dye along with her feet. I continue scanning the pictures framed on the wall; back to the ’97 family. I wonder about the man separate from the rest. I feel my mouth becoming dry and notice it is hanging open.
I need to be outside. I wander out of the room and around a corner, into a hallway. I find a door; it must lead to an outdoor backyard or something of the like. I push it open and in no time at all, a loud siren sounds throughout the building. I look down at the handle, and much to my dismay, I read “Warning! Alarm will sound if door is opened.” I walk through the door and find myself in a parking lot.
Pools of water have formed in potholes from yesterday’s rainfall. Gasoline swirls on the surfaces; so festive. A breeze nips at my legs and crawls up my skirt. I don’t recall where my car is parked. I try to remember the traffic patterns and turn signals I used earlier, as I fumble for the keys in my purse.
The alarm fills the funeral home, it leaks out through the windows and into the air. I look back at the building. People are piling onto the front porch, spilling onto the sidewalk.
There is a back exit from the lot onto a side street; this is the route I was hoping for. My keys have found their way into my hand and I stab the lock on the door. Swinging the door open emits cracking sounds from the inner suspensions, I’ve never worried about fixing them until now; they’ve never sounded like this before. I hit my head on the doorframe and crash back into the driver’s seat.
The steering wheel has a little shake to it, as the engine is set into ignition. I look at the side of the funeral home, through my dirty windshield. My eye catches the ‘97 man staring at me from a window on the second story. I want to know him, so I wave. I don’t get any kind of response, but his gaze is fixed on me.
The alarm sounds muffled. I turn the radio; I haven’t turned the dial since she set it. As the music forms over the airwaves, words drift through the air,
“Just a smile would lighten everything. Sexy Sadie, she's the latest and the greatest of them all. She made a fool of everyone, Sexy Sadie. However big you think you are”
I pull out of the parking lot and drift onto other roads.
As I merge onto the state highway, I turn my head to look at the passenger seat. He smiles at me and asks to change the station. I don’t answer him, but he does it anyway.
The lines on the road seem endless, and I’m considering the odds of my death. The clouds have removed themselves from view and I am left alone, under the sun.

Yummy.

Fiction is by far one of the most freeing styles to write in. My opinion of course. Writing fiction is one of my passions. No shame.
Everything about it is captivating. Detail, form, style, characterization, etc. (The list goes on). As the author of a piece takes readers through an alternate twist of their world. The familiarization of readers with characters builds as the story continues, then by the time the conflict occurs, one is able to sympathize. An actual love has been established for the imaginary.
This thought alone gives me chills! It is absolutely amazing.

Conflict must occur in fiction (if you want people to take interest). People can relate to conflict, we breath conflict and resolution. These are lessons we've been taught since kindergarten.

FOR EXAMPLE: Way back when...
Jimmy knocked over my lego tower. CONFLICT
In return, I revealed to the class that Jimmy wet his pants a few days ago. RESOLUTION.

okay. well i guess that's not the best example. but you see why i was going there. Right?

Reviving the forgotten

The word prompt is defined as: "to move to action, to assist by suggesting or saying the next words of something forgotten or imperfectly learned." I find this Merriam Webster definition to be extremely relevant to the context within the poetry prompts. These are in fact exercises used to revive images stored in the memory, in order to complete a work. I have three prompts I found listed below:

Poetry Prompt - List ten items that you would buy at an auction, or tag sale. Write a poem including those items. You may choose to title your poem, "Things Found At An Auction". Variation, have someone else create a list for you.
-By tossing in the list of objects, one is able to draw upon past relations to the items. I really enjoy the idea of having another individual come up with the objects, it makes the exercise become organic and less biased.

Poetry Prompt - Write three shaped-verse poems. Shaped-verse poems are a form of "pattern poetry", where the letters, words, and lines of the poem are arranged to form a picture/outline of the subject of the poem. An example is a poem in the shape of a Christmas tree discussing your thoughts about Christmas itself, family traditions, and so on.
-I remember writing one of these in the third grade, I'm pretty sure my image formed a pidgeon of some sort. I like the idea though, linking words through visuals...

Prose Prompt - Writing the known and the unknown. Close your eyes, let a landscape appear. Allow yourself to view the landscape, taking note of texture and mood. Next, pretend that you have a rose petal in your hand. Feel it between your fingers and give it color and scent. Allow yourself time to make it a realistic experience. Now go back to creating your landscape, again focusing on details and texture. Continue writing about your landscape.
-This really draws upon the unconscious, I like! This is where the good stuff lies. I'm definetely going to try this one out. I also enjoy the shift from the landscape to a small unit of weight (rose petal), and back to the larger mass we know as earth.

By tuning into our emotions, words will spew out of the mind. Our images will translate so well, and these promps will make them even better. It surprises me that most humans have blocked off this ability. Prompts can help get us there. Amen to that.

Confound me, James!

"The only demand I make of my reader, is that he should devote his whole life to reading my works." This statement is brutally honest. I'd really like to believe the man had a little more humility than what is presented here. Perhaps this statement was meant to cause some type of cataclysmic reaction within the literary world.

Countless scholars and literary critics have been baffled by his writing. Finnegans Wake is considered to be one of the author's more controversial pieces (completed as the sequel to Ulysses). When Joyce was asked why the style was so difficult, he replied, "To keep the critics busy for three hundred years." So far, he's kept them busy for over a hundred.

I came across a random link that brought me to erotic love letters written by Joyce to his lover Nora. I read through a couple of the letters, and questioned if it was morally correct to read them. These are very explicit. I really can't believe that someone had the balls to publish them in a book. Feeling snoopy?
Go here.

The man had no shame, and I applaud his methods. His writing continues to challenge generations through an ever shifting society. Without a challenge we accept defeat.