One of my favorite poems from DDLC
Slight spoilers for Doki Doki Literature Club ahead (though nothing too detailed).
(Photo of a golden eagle flying from Wikimedia commons)
So there's this game called Doki Doki Literature Club (DDLC for short), I have Opinions on it. I used to like it a lot around the time when it first came out, there's still positive things I feel about it but as I've grown older I've come to like it less and less. Still though, despite my complicated feelings for the game there is one aspect I appreciate quite a bit, and that is the poetry in it.
So for those unfamiliar, DDLC is actually a horror game, but on the outside it looks like a cute dating simulator where you get to meet these 4 anime girls in your school's literature club, they all fall in love with you and you get to pick which one you want to date depending on your in-game choices. Eventually there is a dark twist that comes with some interesting 4th wall breaks and a lot of disturbing revelations about the 4 girls, it gets really unsettling and at times shocking.
Near the beginning when you join the club you are tasked with writing a poem every day, on the next day you get to read the others' poems, which you may not always understand at first because they tend to reference things that are yet to happen. Each day you play a little minigame in which you pick from a list of random words, you have to try to figure out which words would appeal more to which of the characters in order to write a poem that will impress the one you're interested in.
One of the girls is named Natsuki, the short pink-haired one, the first poem she shows you tends to get pretty varied reactions out of people, it happens to be one of my favorite poems in the game (I do like her poetry in general, she's my favorite writer out of the 4 of them). So here it is:
Eagles Can Fly
Monkeys can climb
Crickets can leap
Horses can race
Owls can seek
Cheetahs can run
Eagles can fly
People can try
But that's about it.
A lot of the time people laugh at this and call it terrible, and yeah sure, I'm not a proper writer, I haven't read a lot of poetry, I'm sure this could be improved in tons of ways, but I think the purpose of art is often to inspire emotion, to connect with you in some way, so I think this is a good poem because I really connected with it.
I actually decided to write this post because I came across a video of an actual poet grading various poems from the game, she did NOT like this one at all. It seems my opinion is not unpopular though because a lot of the comments under that video are defending it, but let me try to put into words why I think this is well written. And of course, no shade to the writer who made that video of course, I just have a different opinion, it's all subjective.
So, first what is it about? We could look at the in-game explanation Natsuki gives but even without taking it into account I think it's fairly obvious, this poem is about self-hatred. I often have this experience where I look around me and see everyone is doing so many things, I have friends who are really good artists, I have friends who are really good singers, I have friends who are really funny, charismatic, creative, smart, hard working, etc.
And then I look at myself, I just feel... disappointment, shame. I'm sure my friends would have nice things to say about me, but it is hard for me to really see those things when the only thing I ever do is try, I don't succeed very often, even during creative endeavors I enjoy a lot of what I see are flaws, so standing next to my loved ones what I feel is often this sense of inferiority.
When everyone around me can put so much effort and passion into things, when I see people with impressive skills they've built up over time while I often struggle to do the bare minimum it's hard not to feel discouraged.
But this is written very childishly, right? well, maybe, but one of the things I appreciate in poetry is, well, being able to understand it, and I don't typically have the easiest time reading. So to me this reads as approachable, easy to digest.
The poem is really short, so I think it's hard for it to do much and yet if you look at the structure you can see a couple of neat details.
The poem keeps building up from the beginning with the same rhythm, it starts with a trochee (a 2 syllable word where the first one is stressed) and then two monosyllabic words after it.
DUM du-du-dum
DUM du-du-dum
DUM du-du-dum
You settle into the rhythm of it and start right off with a rhyme between the title and the first line.
Eagles Can Fly
Monkeys can climb
The next four lines don't rhyme, but then the line in the title repeats and you get another rhyme, almost like it's building up to something.
Eagles can fly
People can try
And then right at the very end everything falls apart, the four syllable rhythm with an initial stress is interrupted, there is no final rhyme or thing that connects to the previous line, it clashes.
But that's about it.
It's jarring, and regardless of whether or not this is deliberate (it is, Natsuki says as much after you read her poem) it highlights the final line with this dissonance. It feels wrong because it's not supposed to feel right that you're so below everyone else.
Something else I appreciate is that in using animals for the metaphor it seems almost natural, inescapable. Cheetahs being fast is so well known it's basically part of their identity, it almost feels silly to point it out (which is perhaps another reason why so many feel the poem is childish). And while humans have plenty of good qualities it is not too rare to come across the sentiment that we are... kind of lame? boring, if not even worse, evil (which I don't agree with) but many people would say that humans are comparatively uninteresting due to our lack of strength, flight, speed, etc.
The first time I read this poem it took me a little bit to fully understand it, but once I got it it hit me pretty hard, it's something I feel quite strongly, and I think it was expressed quite well.
I think it's fair if after reading this you still think it's stupid or uninteresting, again, could the same sentiment be expressed in better ways? I'm sure, but I just find it a bit unfortunate that something so concise and impactful often just gets ridiculed, seen as something stupid not even worth much thought or consideration, to me it doesn't look like something that got haphazardly thrown together, it looks like good writing.