The Writing/Poetry thread

[mimicry]

I guess it's just the Ms! It's okay, though, I get it enough in real life I can take it on the internet.

ihaveanego said:

mimicry said:

It's like the after effects of being hit in the head particularly hard, or the feeling of having a really high fever.

When I feel like the above examples, I usually wish I didn't.

True, I can dig it. But the last time I had a high fever absolutely everything was fascinating and fun.

[Rhiflect]

playedinstereo said:

rhimansworld said:

Sorry! I can never remember who is Melba and who is Meryl, even though Meryl has her display name saying 'Meryl'. I'll get used to it eventually.

but mimicry is neither meryl nor melba...

Proof I suck at forum names...Sorry to all :/

[bridgetbegins]

This is tentatively tilted "City Night"

and the gritty romanticism of
the city at night is near too much to bear when
the summer night is uncouthly warm and
fairy lights draped over trees

only serve to illuminate
the beauty and life that is young,
twenty-somethings in impractical heels
and sequined tops as they endlessly flash

relatively white smiles in the
night that is never really dark, instead
tone upon tone of gray and blue and light
the city that never sleeps is

decorated in hues of black and teal and
the occasional multicolored swirl of
florescent lights that are never quite focused
and the letters that flicker endlessly

like the blinking eyelids colored
in brave hues of green and purple
and powder flamboyance of the
brave twenty-somethings in the city

and we, the bystanders of these impending wrecks
will hold hands and press our lips together
timidly in the cold, damp, metal seats of a café
and, when finished the first, easily progress to

the second and the third and tune out the
conversation that has turned towards us:
stay wrapped in each others arms and eyes
until the waiter comes to drop the check

and we let money clatter carelessly on
the glass topped table, leave half full mugs of tea
and milky rings and napkin doodles for someone else
to deal with, as long as it isn’t us

and we grasp hands and board the train
to head for home, endlessly content
in these moments to pull faces and share dreams
across the center aisle and over screeching brakes

And this one is untitled, suggestions for a title would be excellent.

you say
it’ll be fun, come on
and before much more
thinking is done

your lips are wrapped
around the lit end,
mouth carefully not
smothering glowing embers

and you will pull me towards
the other end, surround it with the light press of lips
and cup your hand around
my head and blow

the smoke is too sweet and heavy
and thick as it fills my lungs,
stretching stretching as the
moments keep passing

at some point after
I start breathing, again
the world starts to lose
focus and objects that

ought to be, normally are
crisp and solid start to
blur around the edges and
the world takes on a rosy tint

your body, it is hot and tepid:
the movements I make are
sluggish at best and you say
It’s Almost Over, Already

as if I have panicked, which I haven’t-
there is nothing that is worth it
not when there is warmth and you
weighing me down to the bed

when your hand moves to
grasp mine, it is smaller
and somehow bigger than
I remember and I reach for more of you

It’s Time For Sleep,
I’ll Be Here When You Wake Up
you say, and
this is proof enough for now

[birdwhistle]

Oh you.

[Rhiflect]

I wrote this to someone on msn last night..

Reet, sweet
I've got to leave.
You see, my knight,
it is almost
deep in the night
and i need to wind down,
rest the clown,
and wake up spritely
ready for another lively
day.

[cheshire]

Katie, all of your poems are instant-love feelings for the relationshipless. I would explain this more but I am too sick to think...

You guys might know who this poem is about!


Matthew

mine is the sort of love that requires. I am attentive to you despite what I assume is your growing dislike of me. admittedly I have tried to not look towards you every second but that grows harder as the minutes go on and without realizing it my gaze continually will wander towards you and will it meet yours, I wonder? your hands betray a nervous disposition, nails bitten, skin stretched tight across the spidery joints of your fingers. it is dizzying to watch you play because you are trying so hard but making it look effortless. yet your entire body is thrown into this music. you have surrounded yourself with ivory colored keys and their plastic electronic vessels and you are at home there. like a child surrounded by toys, your play is curious, and determined. this same determination may be what has caused the premature white in your black hair, streaking the bangs that threaten to cover your eyes. I spend so much time convincing myself that your eyes are brown, a deep and perfect brown- my excuse for looking at them so often is that I have forgotten what color they are. continually my eyes try in earnest to meet yours, but I believe they never will. you do not notice how intently I continue to look to you. and why would you? you busy yourself with your efforts to create music which sounds adult and curious like yourself, and your gaze strays over the keys. I risk looking into your eyes again to find you suddenly looking into mine, distracted by my small efforts to gain your attention. the music slows and I smile nervously. you smile back and everything is as perfect as you are.

[sarah]

i decided to write poems about uninteresting things

Futons

What shall we do today?
Read Vogue or
bitch or...
What else all day?

Shall we lounge on futons?
Eat sushi, don wrap-around tops
discuss how frills are in?
And then-
Oh, you're gone?
Oh well,
It suits me fine.
I have my cigarettes and wine.

Ode to 2004

What on earth happened?
My darling, dear, 2004?
To put it simply:
I grew up, and became a bore

Ode to Descartes

"The Godfather
of Modern Philosophy"
is what he is known as.
But I know him
as a spectacularly moustashed
"Dez-kar-tezz"

London

I thought it might be nice
to say goodbye.
But how could I?
Neither of us were there in the first place.

Tired

Maybe one day
I won't stay up
Waiting for some words

Maybe one day
I'll get to sleep
At 10 (or maybe half past)

Maybe one day
I won't stay up
Worrying about some words

Maybe one day
I'll get to sleep
Uninterrupted by the light

But maybe on that day
When I don't stay up
And I do get to sleep
At 10 (or half past)
The words will be there.
Unread, because I
was asleep.

[bridgetbegins]

cheshire said:

Katie, all of your poems are instant-love feelings for the relationshipless. I would explain this more but I am too sick to think...

No, that makes perfect sense! It is a good compliment. Thank you.

And here are two more! I'm endlessly title digging for the first, so I'm open to suggestions.

1. I tell you,
One night when
You’re sleeping deep that

This is almost over
I can feel it and
You do not react the way

You will when I say it
To your face and long moments
Pass as I watch your forehead smooth and wrinkle

And eventually you wake
And press me down to
The bed and rain kisses

On my face and ears and
Push back my hair and
Desperately press your lips to mine

As if I the breath I give is life itself
and you say
I love you, do you know that and

I nod, whisper that I do and
Hook my chin over
Your shoulder and take deep breaths

And you say, oh katie,
What’s the matter now, and I
Just shake my head and shrug

And you hold me like
The world is shaking and
Our lives are disintegrating and

The end is coming

I know it is
I can feel it

and, the obligatory Little Prince love poem...

2. the taming of hearts
it’s hard to believe that
this is anything but right when
my voice breaks as the fox says
I knew it would end badly,
but I fell in love- anyways

as she hooks her chin
over my shoulder: presses
her nose into the difference between
throat and clavicles and, I can feel
the cool saline of her tears, dripping

down, into my shirt: leaving
a patch darker than the others and I turn, blindly:
search out her lips clumsily, but,
instead, just manage to find
her nose but then, she turns and I turn and

for the first time in seeming ever
our lips meet and its as if they
remember what to do, even though we
have conscientiously tried to forget
in all waking moments

and it’s easy to tip my head
to the degree which has always been expected
separate her lips with a questing tongue,
sneak my arms back, around her waist
until more breath is needed and we break

to take giant gulps of air, too loudly
for our little circle of arms and books
and blankets, lean over and take the battered
hardback from the floor, pick up where we
left off- somewhere just south of Asteroid B612

“Tu deviens responsable pour toujours de ce que tu as apprivoisé”

[ihaveanego]

pipipipipi said:

London

I thought it might be nice
to say goodbye.
But how could I?
Neither of us were there in the first place.

This made me crack up, in an excellent way.

[sarah]

ihaveanego said:

pipipipipi said:

London

I thought it might be nice
to say goodbye.
But how could I?
Neither of us were there in the first place.

This made me crack up, in an excellent way.

haha, it was originally meant to describe a sad situation when i thought of it, but then i put it down and it sounded pretty funny, which made me realise the situation it is describing is pretty funny as well

[mimicry]

Sarahpipipipi, I love those poems! Their simplicity is so utterly charming. They put a big smile on my face. Your decision to write about uninteresting things reminds me of this David Byrne quote:

"I try to write about small things. Paper, animals, a house... love is kind of big. I have written a love song, though. In this film, I sing it to a lamp."

[Rhiflect]

Sarahpipi, i LOVE Futons And all of them, haha.

Katie I love the last few lines of the first one especially, maybe you could relate the title to that part in particular?

[sarah]

haha, thankyou both

Mimiclare: i love David Byrne<3
Rhianne: Futons is "loosely" based on one of my friends. we have a theory that when she is older, her house will be full of futons and vogue magazines and wrap-around tops and sushi and red wine.
Katie: i love your poems! especially the second one

[jay]

there must be more little prince poems. that was fabulous, seriously.

[Rhiflect]

The story I mentioned a while ago is finally done.
It's about 10 chapters long with an epilogue. Most chapters are a Word page long. The link is heeerreee

[bridgetbegins]

playedinstereo said:

there must be more little prince poems. that was fabulous, seriously.

I concur. I'll get right on it.

[jay]

this is not a poem. slightly um... heated. rated. whatever.

marmalade

abusing, musing
marmalade flesh
naked spread am i
if today i die, and can't deny
the poison chosen for tonight

you miss him, maybe. you don't know what you miss about him exactly, but you can't not miss him, the way his taste still lingers in your mouth. some obscene cocktail of weed, vodka, and camels that you can't quite brush away. even if you wanted to. you weren't thinking; but when do you ever think? you just do, you just go, and you don't stop, and you don't consider consequence. that would entail thinking, and thinking takes time, time you just don't have. not when you've got to concentrate on what's happening right now, in the present. you're not thinking about what you're doing when you slide your arms around his neck and tangle your fingers into dark brown curls. you brush your mouth over his and feel his fingertips dig into your hips as you mumble against his mouth. "hey, you." ambiguous, that. hey, you. could've been to anyone. you don't name names. you just taketaketake and this is no different. he gives relentlessly and you let him. you don't know who that makes the bigger whore.

he has huge eyes. the expression deems them saucers, but you'd never repeat that to anyone. you wouldn't breathe a breath in the direction that shed light on the fact you'd been looking into them for longer than you needed to. he's short, shorter than you. doesn't bother you. short guys have this complex that amuses the shit out of you when you can be bothered to settle and think about it for long enough. he's no different. he carries himself like a little legend; shoulders constantly squared like someone's insulted his mother and he's looking for the next dumb fucker to punch. all because he's five foot four. laughable, really, but when he turns those dark endless eyes up at you and moves his bitten red lips to form "hey, peaches," the wind's knocked out of you like you were the dumb fucker who let him.

hey, peaches. that has some connotation, it must do. nothing ever comes out of his mouth without some second meaning, you know this. maybe you were loose with the "you" but he's onto something with this "peaches". what's a peach? a fruit with juicy flesh surrounded by soft fur? surely that's not any kind of reference for someone you're about to fuck, but you're scrabbling here, trying to find something solid to cling to; something that gives this meaning. whatever this is. when you look deep enough, yeah, maybe you can find something that gives this a background. because you know what you look like; stretched out taut and cream skin, dusting of burnt red along your cheekbones. is that what he's referring to? you don't have time to think about it, no, no time. he kisses you hard, then, sucking all the breath from your lungs and leaving you dizzy with the lack of it. he bites at your lips, draws blood to the surface and you mewl like a slut but you don't fucking care, work your fingers at his belt buckle like you're programmed to do it. sound, violent and crackling, hisses against your ear, and you realise it's him, breathing a soft litany. "i need you i need you i need you."

the backs of your legs meet the edge of the bed, what an image to behold - old acquantainces! nice to see you again, bed, we've brought another this time - and you pull him with you, by the hips. for a few painstaking seconds, you merely lay together, one of your hands in his hair, his fingers beginning to curl beneath the hem of your shirt. then you kiss again, and it feels solid, a dead-weight, in the centre of your chest of all things. slow and deliberate, no fighting, no one-up-manship, just kissing. you let him around your mouth, he lets you around his, and you think you're so close that you can taste the amalgam in his fillings, but that's probably actually - fuck, yeah - the blood from your lower lip. the contrast between oxygen and the lack of it is like the difference between black and white; you realise, when things darken around the edges and immediately rush back in startling vividity when you pause to inhale.

a groan rushes from you before you even know what you're doing. his lips are twisting into a smirk against your skin, pinpricked with blood where his teeth have sank beneath the surface slightly. his eyelashes tickle when he turns his attention back to the welt and you wriggle down on the mattress happily. then he stops. he looks up and you look at him as his hair falls in front of his eyes, and you wish you were above him so that you could do that. you want to hide from his stare. the dead-weight in your chest is unfurling, quickly, too quickly. it feels like fire, an explosion within your ribcage - an implosion, then - and each time your heart beats the aftershock rings in your ears. it's too much, so you pull his head up level with yours and suck at his lower lip, try and pull his tongue into your mouth to stoke the flames. they licklicklick into your bloodstream, and you melt into the bed, limbs pooling off and dripping away somewhere far, far away. he crawls on top of you as your hands slide up his shirt, his thighs at your hips and his lips now on your jaw. heat, blessed heat blooms there, everywhere. everywhere his body connects with yours. you drag your nails over his skin lazily, and when he hisses, you picture steam rising into the air as if you'd thrown ice water onto hot coals. the shirt slips up and then off, his arms raising above his head. your palms slide over his chest, silky tan skin with wiry muscle beneath. they twitch under your touch, like coiled promises trapped beneath marmalade. the soft click of the door echoes like a gunshot, and you play dead like only you know how.

[Lauren]

Jay, that is lovely. I love the style and descriptions and yeah. Just lovely.

[allison]

was it her, her, her?
or do you miss the body
and the sex

proper haiku version:

was it her, her, her?
no; here's what you miss the most:
the body and the sex

[jay]

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.