The Writing/Poetry thread

[birdwhistle]

Ooh, a punctuation metaphor! Another reason you blow my mind, J-bird.

Also, I'm amused by how dirty-minded us writerly lot are. (Not that I ever submit anything here so I oughtn't include myself. But if I did it'd probably be similar. Oh yeah.)

[jay]

<4

[Rhiflect]

Literally[/u]

Pink toes and
salty Starburst, mixed with
the taste of extreme freedom.
It doesn't get much better
Than watching eveyone get wetter
But still trying to keep dry

Vast expanses of sea
Rain pock-marking the sand,
grains of which stick to my feet.
But then it starts to pour
And though we don't care anymore
We run to stand under the pier

Pillars in unusual places
We take pictures of ourselves
looking too hard for the view.
But our shins and toes are starting to freeze off
And our chests have started to heave with coughs
So typically it ends in shit.

[sarah]

Rhianne! you are good at poems, well done

[Rhiflect]

Oh thank you! It's a true story, lol.

[bridgetbegins]

Apr 1, 2008 15:35:18 GMT jay said:

thank you, lauren.

big

if there was one thing you liked about him, it was that he was bigger than you. winter arrived with fronds of ice on the windows long before december, and it was more than enough excuse for you to stay close to him. when the snow fell three inches thick, he was most probably trapped beneath a similar thickness of duvet, your long skinny limbs wrapped around his own. you liked how fragile you felt: like you were a rare species of butterfly pinned in a display cabinet for people to marvel at your beauty, only it was him above you; marvelling alone. you liked how big his hands were; how just one of them could encircle both of your wrists and bring them above your head with little fanfare. how his thumb fit perfectly into the smudge of shadow along your hipbone. the warmth of his big palm against the small of your back, fingertips moulding perfectly into the notches of spine. the thickness of his fingers twisting the tuft of cowslick just to the left of your forehead. most of all, you liked how after a night of being nothing but exclamation you could nestle together in silence like two soft and silent commas, one bigger than the other.

I didn't like this the first time I read it, but I felt the overwhelming need to reread it a few days after and somehow it's turned into some sort of favorable feeling.

It makes me feel warm and comfortable and safe in a way: that, I think, is one of the primary differences between dating a boy and a girl: a boy is much more solid and protecting and there is a feeling of comfort that comes from his size (hands! etc.) as compared to mine.

Anyways, so I like it. Hurumph.

Here is my use of the punctuation metaphor. I feel like I overkilled it, but still.

we’ll nestle like
double commas
a shock of sunburned flesh
forever to be entrenched in

the cool damp of sheets
hung to dry in late-march sun
soft and silent and heavy
sleep warmed limbs

flip them upside down and they
will close the long winded explanation

you tried to give for forgetting
the sunscreen and also your bathing suit
and the towels which prompted
us to run barefoot over cool sand

leaving behind the tepid warmth
and harsh drag of grass against
winter pale legs, heads pressed
hard against the wooden slats

breaking off, snarls of lichen
twisting at each other as if to protest their
sudden loss of each other as gulls swoop
overhead, voicing discontent in great, harking cries

as we smoke skinny brown cigarettes down
until the flames lick at nicotine-stained fingers
and we let them drop onto hasty, towering piles
of ash and then smudge them into words with

the tip of another finger, turn to say—
it’s really cold, can we and you are pulling me up
and we are stumbling away from the shadow
that marches on forever and as soon as we

step from beneath it’s overbearing gaze
duck into the cool wash of sunlight
wind pulling your hair back from your face
our steps pick up from faltering to exultant

each pressed mark closing off independent
clauses made with the out-of-breath
curses we form with chattering teeth and
bluing lips, fingernails digging into your arm

footprints behind us until the car is reached
salt drying skin into the cracks of leather seats
as the heat whirs dangerously and we
press blood back into each others lips

with harsh, brackish kisses, cold water
dripping from the tips of hair down backs
and arms and crawling over the gearshift
to sit, all limbs and harsh angles

in my lap, squirmy and chilled and
holding my chin hard, steady
with crooked fingers, drying sticky, already
the scratch of wool covering your shoulders

a pocket of hot air formed and your breath
is hot and uncertain tongue trailing wet
and warm over the curve of ear, so cold
as you curl into a ball and I wrap my

arms around you and together
we’ll make just one

[Rhiflect]

I love how the end goes back to the beginning, that's really well thought out! I love the imagery in the first parts and the bits about how the sea air affects you are really true and are pointed out in a nice way

I love love love it!

[jay]

that was something really beautiful. your words take my breath away... cliché, but they really do. they make me want to improve, but i doubt i'll ever reach that level.

[Rhiflect]

I've been writing haikus lately

Car Haiku

Negative shadow
It's white clouds against dark skies
Driving into snow.

Unexpected Assistance

Shocked and now shaking
Now i'm covered in butter
and i know you care.

Fetching Haiku

I'm cold and soaking
but if i run fast enough,
I can dodge the rain

[sarah]

poyummmmmz

noname
ask yourself this:
can she play the cello?
no?
well there we go.
quite frankly
i feel that is where you went wrong


love poem to a scarf
you'd keep me warm
for example, from the snow
if only i'd take you
your arms around my neck
but i'm just too forgetful
to remember to take you


aryanluvvr
brown hair
and green eyes
will simply not suffice
as it is all too probable
that i may have been Hitler
in a past life


blaaaaah

[Xteenuh]

SARAH. I LOVE THOSE. I think that first one is great.

[sarah]

haha, dankeschoooon

and Katie, your poem (as always) is so impressive

[pigeon song]

mm another good poem from katie, for some reason that reminds me of a Carol Anne Duffy poem we once studied but i can't find it on the internet , if i do i'll post it

[jay]

valentine? i love that poem.

[bridgetbegins]

Apr 18, 2008 0:09:27 GMT jay said:

valentine? i love that poem.

If so, I'm quite honored to be compared.

Thanks for the love, guys! I've been invited to read at a local jazz festival (with a live band! and Billy Collins in the audience), so hopefully I'll get some audio from that.

[jay]

i like it. it's not uber-shit.

[bridgetbegins]

I like it. The beginning feels really awkward to me when I read them since I kind of have to force the rhythm/rhyme, but maybe it's just the way I speak.

I particularly like "And the pretentious individual with his beret and his Wilde
Will grow ever more contrived compared to the next gruesome child
That the swelling group of morons endeavours to produce,
While said ‘intellectual’ struggles over Proust-"

This is kind of for laughs, but I found it today, and thought it was entertaining.

we trade the mush mush of
sweet ‘nana kisses
surrounded by an indulgent
spread of cups and saucers

elbows and scaly winter-pale
ankles knocking carelessly
turning a mug full of suspicious
yogurt covered raisins

(you say it almost like reasons--
it’s the only thing neither of us will eat)
to an even more suspicious puddle
that we push into shapes

a face here and the sun here: a line
that stretches as far as your arm can
that we slowly push into the
ground next to the blanket

covering each with dirt, careful
pressing half moons into the soil
as our bodies slowly gravitate together
at the beck of some parallel magnetism:

end shoulder to shoulder with
your hand almost holding mine,
the other pointing at the clouds
while you look off in the distance

at the dirty rush rush of the water
that I waded in once, almost naked, with you
before, when we spent long nights on your porch,
camp cots and welded metal the only things

separating us from the man who spent
the night singing to himself in the alley next door
but today, there is a resounding ache of bitterness

I never finished it, but at the end of the page (in really angry letters I wrote)

why the FUCK do you still control whatever the HELL i think about ALL OF THE FUCKING TIME!?!?!

before scribbling over most of the poem.

[jay]

the way you write just transports me to whatever place you're in when you write... i fall in love with your poetry more and more each time i read, and i feel lucky that you choose to share it with us. please don't stop, your words are beautiful.

[Rhiflect]

Apr 28, 2008 12:32:59 GMT jay said:

the way you write just transports me to whatever place you're in when you write... i fall in love with your poetry more and more each time i read, and i feel lucky that you choose to share it with us. please don't stop, your words are beautiful.

Agreed on everything, you give me hope sometimes and it makes me so happy. I also really like yours, pistol, some of the rhymes are really clever and I liked the rhythm, personally.

[bridgetbegins]

That means an incredible much to me, guys.

And, just because I love you (sort of) and because the unfinished poem was bothering me...

we trade the mush mush
of sweet ‘nana kisses
surrounded by an indulgent spread
of cups and saucers

elbows and scaly winter-pale
ankles knocking carelessly
turning a mug full of suspicious
yogurt covered raisins

(you say it almost like reasons--
it’s the only thing neither of us will eat)
to an even more suspicious puddle
that we push into shapes

a face here and the sun here: a line
that stretches as far as your arm can
that we slowly push into the
ground next to the blanket

covering each with dirt, careful
pressing half moons into the soil
as our bodies slowly gravitate together
at the beck of some parallel magnetism:

end shoulder to shoulder with
your hand almost holding mine,
the other pointing at the clouds
while you look off in the distance

at the dirty rush rush of the water
that I waded in once, almost naked, with you
before, when we spent long nights on your porch,
camp cots and welded metal the only things

separating us from the man who spent
the night singing to himself in the alley next door.
today, there is a resounding ache of bitterness,
echoed in the puckered cold of your skin

and whisps of sentences: poems to
be folded into countless careless paper airplanes
no longer come with the ease they once did:
instead, words trip against the insides

of shiny slick teeth—a scrape of abrasive silence
the tongue can’t soothe

Finished!