posted
I just can't let this thread die. Here's a recent one:
Like Flying When she said yes, I had no idea that gravity was about to flip into reverse and hurl me out the window and into the sky like a dollar bill on a prankster's string. But it did. She waved once, her mouth a startled "O," sparks dancing between our outstretched palms.
I found myself bobbing over the suburbs, picking up speed. Traffic stopped.
A woman in a SUV pulled onto the curb, and her oldest son stopped hitting his brother long enough to press his nose flat against the safety glass. He whined, "Mom, can I be a flying man?" And with weariness she felt something snaking out of her throat to say, "Maybe when you're older."
A pigeon was pacing me for a while, giving me the evil eye -- "hey, buddy," he said, "ain't got no right" -- but the clouds were soft as candyfloss, so I flipped him the bird and kept on swooping.
As the air got thin and the sky got dark, storms below me and stars twinkling all around, I almost got to thinking about bare skin and the vacuum of space. But then it dawned on me, as the sun peeked over the edge of the Earth: Who am I to need air? Who am I, to float past the moon fretting over minor details, sweating small stuff?
Let ice crust my astonished face, my eyes turn into mirrors. Let Saturn tip its hat to me, and Pluto fetch my slippers. Let my lungs swell full to bursting, my heart cook in its blood. Andromeda waits to dance with me and stroke the face of God.
[This message has been edited by TomDavidson (edited January 04, 2003).]
Very nice. Especially the image of "a dollar bill on a prankster's string," the line break in "I flipped / him the bird," and the whole bit about the SUV.
[This message has been edited by Deirdre (edited January 04, 2003).]
posted
Yeah, that was a good poem, Tom. I liked it.
I liked yours too, Locke, though I didn't know how to pronounce it or what it meant. Can you give us pronounciation and a word by word literal translation along with a translation of the sense of the poem? I think I could appreciate it more that way.
What synapse snaps to, Attentive, affectionate, bounding Across my cranial reserves, When my lips touch yours? Familiar touch, softness and breath And heat, like sweet racing Between lips and souls. Our lips, our souls, Our racing synapses, All so quick, we blur Together. At last.
There is poetry in my soul. Sometimes he tries to crawl out, but a boot to the face fixes that -- and he tries less often anyway, nowadays.
I really don't know why I bother; most nights, he sits there in his s**t and pokes at and plays with his food, making little tangles out of the dailies and clippings and sitcom sauces. Sullenly. And it's not like his droppings are solid gold anymore, or his steaming vomit worth plating up and passing around.
I'd complain, but it's not worth the trouble -- and who has the time now to cook anything?
So what's the point? Half the time, he just paces back and forth, banging his head into my ulcer and calling for his lawyer. I haven't had the heart to tell him.
Used to be good times, him and me. I'd drop down scandals and smile, and get similies back. We spent a whole day hanging up paintings my first time in Paris -- and even if he didn't really come through for me that time, at least we had fun.
But he just doesn't understand. I've got things to do. I'm married. Got a house. I don't have time to take him to the park every afternoon. Computer job. And it's not like he's housebroken.
A few mild shocks might help.
[This message has been edited by TomDavidson (edited January 29, 2003).]
In the days when the sweat-shined sun hung high, Quiet as mice were we before the windows; Palm to glass to palm is no less palmers' kiss.
But now beneath such cold and harsh fluorescent glare as this, We tap electric nothings in our studios PDA a false memory, and I
When I sleep, dream not of local skies But cool air, mild days, green and orange meadows, Sitting on the gates of apple orchards; this dream is
None of our lives, but a stolen season: Waking to perpetual summer, I rub my eyes and wonder what the lesson is.
Copyright (c) 2003 Nicholas Liu Sheng
By the way, Tom, I loved your poem, but I think it could be strengthened by removing "...I/almost got to thinking about bare skin/and the vacuum of space./But...."
posted
Lately I've been writing down some of my thoughts in prose peoem form, inspired by Pascal's Pensees. Here's the first installment:
Prelude Earth is an earthenware container, containing this:
Thoughts
Who set these limits for me? Sight, sound, touch and all of sensation - why not something real and immediate? Unfathomable passages is what they are, mazes leading into the mind that cannot be followed back out.
Time: why is just this one segment of my life’s long serpent here for me?
I feel like I am on the verge of something.
Sensation. A membrane of skin streched across a four-dimensional manifold. The feeling of time’s flow against it.
Not yet night... a gray sky. What a thing it is to stand beneath a gray sky!
These blood vessels move like mechanical parts - it’s not my will that moves them! I am automated flesh. I feel like a corpse in the making.
[This message has been edited by Destineer (edited February 21, 2003).]
[This message has been edited by Destineer (edited February 21, 2003).]
smell the fire: this is pitch-song. fastitocalon drowns in a bowl of fire: his own sweet smell betrays him.
II.
she is the sort born too late. an earlier age would offer more to rage against: cf. the burning of bras cf. the raping of locks and oh, oh the joys of picketing the makers of whale-bone corsets.
III.
I eat the flesh and skin and eyes of fish sadly unschooled out of their bass natures.
I take inventory:
sockets, rami, branchial arches muscle, cartilage, pectoral fin pelvic, dorsal, anal, caudal fin fin fin fin fin fin fin
flesh and skin and eyes.
IV.
fastitocalon passes water passes fire passes wind and notes and burns in schools: you can hear it but is it keening or siren-song? fastitocalon drowns in fire.
V.
It is failing of school system! Come, we have beautiful time. Collon is make crisp and bright, for your benefit: Harmony! Artistic! Providence! Do try our Nippon.
VI.
But during the above speech the play fades, overtaken by dark and music.
posted
*grin* AE, both of your last two have been marvelous. The meter and rhyme are impeccable, never forced, and the repetition is handled well. Nice symbolism in the latter, too, although I may not be able to forgive you for this:
"of fish sadly unschooled/out of their bass natures"
[This message has been edited by TomDavidson (edited February 21, 2003).]
We baptized Luca in the ocean near Lerici at sunset, when the sun hit the September water low and rough. It was my second month in Italy. I wore my whites for the first and only time. When Anziano Cabitto spoke, there was a sound like the rushing of wings, and Luca disappeared beneath the clutching waves.
Arisen to new life, he smiled like a simpleton, like a man receiving a death-row reprieve, and we slapped him on the back and changed our clothes on the rocky beach in twilight. Within three months he had slept with some girl and was never seen in church again. It was the Bay of Spezia, where Shelley sailed into a storm beyond his skill and vanished under the gray water.
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posted
From time to time I think about posting some of my own work to this thread, but then other people post and I realize exactly how clumsy and embarassing my poetry is. Even so, I love reading what you folks post here.
So thanks for making me feel small, Dante.
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There once was a puppy named Piggy Who ran into my auntie's lit ciggy His black and white tail Left a gray smoky trail That was doused before flames got too biggy.
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As I did watch, these fourteen thousand years, The vines curl slowly round these piers of stone, The marble etched away by nature's tears, And salamanders' toes, and all unknown Unthought of tiny things, I dreamed of how We'd speak, we'd sit, and paddle our bare feet Amid the fountains' swift bright stabs of now, Just so, as here alive we cherish sweet A song's duration, framed between the deep Long past and futile future reaching on Alone into the mountains bare and steep And past them through the night without a dawn, Remembering all the while that bright sun's rise, The light upon your brow, and in your eyes.
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That was beautiful, Anne Kate. My sense of metaphor is a little underdeveloped; was the length of time meant to be literal? If so, who was the speaker?
I liked the images you used quite a bit. Haunting. . .
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Yes, it's literal. The speaker of the poem is me, and I'm actually fourteen thousand years old.
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Fourteen thousand, eh? Wow. I've seen your picture on foobonic and I have to say, you look amazing for your age.
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I drank from terra cotta glazed in calla lilies a smooth draught that reminded me of
Water from a pitcher overlaid with dragon jade enamel of the dynasty-before-last that
Tasted just like sips I took from dainty Breton porcelain and realized
That the wells must all eventually converge inside the center of the planet.
_____________________________________________
I've actually put some of my poetry on the web now, too - at my geocities site. Stop by and look if you like.
I liked yours, Anne Kate - it was very OSCish in a strange way.
And Dante - when did you serve in Italy? I have a couple really good friends who went to the Padova mission.
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I just read some of my really old poetry on this thread - back on page two. Wow. I wrote that when I was a... a freshman. *shudders*
I do hope I've gotten better.
Actually, I think the naivete showcased in those old poems can be explained by one of my newer ones:
Enter Stage Right
I enter stage right to discover that the stage is not as smooth nor the characters as flat nor the dialogue as clear as a child in the balcony had always hoped to hear.
afr--I've hardly ever written poems about experiences on my mission, which is really kind of odd; I mean, a mission is FULL of bizarre and/or emotional experiences. I'm glad to see that this one rang true for you, at least.
Annie--I finished my mission in 1995.
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Find something you believe in And never let go Let it become something No world could overthrow Cling to your faith Like the child their home Let it become something The world has never known Too many in this life Have lost that precious sight- Of the rock we may cling to And that ever-constant light Whether your faith be simple And of the simple things Or of the unseen angels And their silent wings Keep the faith inside you Keep the fire alive For this belief in something higher Many men have died.
...::blushes a little:: I wrote this a few minutes ago. Definitely not the best I've ever written (I haven't even gone through for edits yet) and I feel rather silly posting it here but I'm looking to improve my writing so any comments would be most appreciated.
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I think this is probably the oldest thread on Hatrack. OSC even posted in here. That was back when he used to have time to post before starting on Crystal City.
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Scott--that is cool! Yeah, Aaron was one of the coolest guys I served with. I got to see him a year or so ago when I was at Penn State. Before that I hadn't seen him since, well, since La Spezia in 1993.
I'm actually in the process of writing a poem about each of my eight cities on my mission. I probably won't inflict them all on you guys here, but it's keeping me entertained.
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I haven't read all or even many of the poems here- but here's one. I know nothing of structures or meters etc, so I don't know how to follow them.
rain poem
It's raining on me now It's been dry, I allow and we really need this
But Im angry, digging out this trench and I need this done today It should have rained another day
Then I picture this "other day" and hear, I think, another say Why is this happening now?
So I get back to work
It's got to rain on somebody, Hiss I, bring it on, drown me Then I shovel defiantly.
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posted
I'd love to be able to write poetry books someday...my work got published in my school paper when i was in highschool, But i am by no chance any good at it. I just write what comes to my head. This was originally part of a longer poem...but i cut it down a lot. There's no rhyme scheme or anything...just a free verse poem.
2a.m. In the middle of the road is where I stand thinking about the life that's slipping away like sand
it's 2 am and here I stand here I am come take my hand
walk with me hand in hand and maybe we can dance to an imaginary band
i'm breathing the cold air looking at you there smiling with moonlight in your hair.
To bad the light in you eyes begging to be seen so sad that being with you is just a dream
I want it to be real, the touch the feel I want it so much
my love held back by an unbroken seal waiting to be broken by your hands only
posted
If you look at the thread number you'll see how old this one is - it's the 18th thread ever posted on this forum... its staying power is amazing!
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posted
Yes, but how could we change it now? It's the traditional hatrack spelling. It would just be wrong to change it now.
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