not going to post any of my own stuff just yet (well, i've posted one thing but i'm not putting anymore) but this is a place where you can dump your poetry/short fiction, either copy pasted directly in or linked. i hope anyway. i like reading poetry, and i like discussing poetry. i duno. *shrugs*
I write a fair bit of poetry. It's usually the structured kind, because I like the challenge. I have a collection of Homestuck poems on my AO3. Mostly Shakespearean sonnets, but there's a couple villanelles in there too. And here's a terzanelle I wrote while angsting about my mental health! Spoiler: idk man Sometimes I think myself a foolish child Or maybe an asylum escapee My mind is broken, and my thoughts are wild Would that I were a bird, flying free But I'm a fool, naught but a crazy bitch Or maybe an asylum escapee I wish that I'd a way to scratch this itch-- I just want happiness, stability But I'm a fool, naught but a crazy bitch I feel so caged in my insanity As if the outside world weren't quite as bad I just want happiness, stability I find myself so often awfully sad And captive in a mind I so despise As if the outside world weren't quite as bad The world spins by before my grey-blue eyes Sometimes I think myself a foolish child And captive in a mind I so despise My mind is broken, and my thoughts are wild Aaaand here's a silly limerick. Spoiler: fuck me There was a televangelist Who swore we'd all go to Hell if We kept fornicating And kept masturbating-- Which all puts me on his shit list.
I sometimes like to "remix" poetry. This is my favorite: I was thinking of the nature of good and evil and of Blake's Songs of Innocence and Songs of Experience (one of my favourite books) and I mixed the Lamb (innocence) and the Tiger (experience) to talk about myself the tigerlamb, an autobiography little lamb, who made thee? what the hammer? what the chain? in what furnace was thy brain? softest clothing, wooly, bright, in the forests of the night? gave thee such a tender voice in what distant deeps or skies burnt the fire of thy eyes? dost thou know who made thee? when the stars threw down their spears by the stream and o’er the mead gave thee life and bade thee feed? and what shoulder, and what art could twist the sinews of thy heart making all the vales rejoice? he is meek, he is mild on what wings dare he aspire? tyger, tyger, burning bright, I a child and thou a lamb we are called by his name did he smile his work to see? did he who made the lamb make me? little lamb, god bless thee!
this poem should basically be called My Conflicted Emotions About My Certainty That I Do Not Believe In God Plus The Fact That Isis Is Destroying Cultural Artifacts Is Pissing Me Off Note: the opinions expressed here are partially my own, partially that of a friend of mine and partially an angry reaction to isis's actions in the middleeast/north africa. the gods we leave behind in blasted mosques and dynamited shrines in prayers made of bullets and sermons told from atop the mountain made of child soldiers and civilians lost if they were real more than just the childish fantasies of a species grasping for answers we cannot attain they would hate those who claim their names who kill in the name of protecting omniscient deities who can do fine by themselves i would think what good has god given that He has not then taken ten hundred thousand times away? with inquisitions and crusades jihads and holy wars the black flag of isil waving the cross that Christ was tortured on now the symbol seen as cities burn. yet i still cannot mock those who in the name of god do good.
An old piece (2008) - Afterburn Current flowing from my fingers onto the blank page - Burning the thoughts that cease my breathing into the white. Words are cinders, floating as ashes in the air - How long until the page bursts into flames? Shivers run down my spine as the spike abates, But still I feel the point at the base of my neck: Cold steel turning ever so slightly, threatening To draw blood from the ivory goblet’s veins. The sensation of drowning is frightening and cold; Liquid in my lungs, oxygen frozen in place: Ice turns to fire and it hurts no less. My eyes are wide - “do not resuscitate”? Fingertips twitch along the keys that feel like Teflon - No resistance against the rushing winds of my imagination Which, in its eagerness, chokes the beat of my heart And takes over, keeping me alive as an afterthought. Where am I going, what do I say? I long to meld this abundance of energy Into another’s mind - one who needs it - But I am stuck in the throes of inspiration I am slipping down into the blue, Spiralling into vertigo, my inner ear Pounding with the force of gravity. Forget up and down - let me fall. The surge has slid away, my eyelids are failing, Although I do not wish to sleep. There’s someone who needs me to stay And I shall, no matter how long it shall be.
i'm pretty happy with this one overall (although not quiiiiiiiite happy enough to have it associated with my main account haha) lines five and six are bugging me, but i'm not sure what to do to fix them :/ I fear that we are like the chymists of old Who held that Mercury’s poison, though present from its first formation in the Earth Was not inherent in its nature, And proposed by Art to finish what Nature left undone And render it harmless, nay, better than harmless: A force for good, the miraculous Water that Does Not Wet. And when at last they had finished their labors And raised their flask in triumph to their lips, They found that it was but Mercury after all Elemental, Indivisible, And poison.
A poem I wrote while thinking about the fool tarot card: Spoiler: Eidolon Eidolon you share the lightness of the small-eared soul wandering behind your lifting heels - they’ve never known the touch of ground. nor dirt nor stone have brushed against them. and your eyes need not lift towards the sky; your head is already haloed by rings of rocks and light not unlike a planet or a god. but you haunt across this rough earth watching and you never change a whisker or speak a whisper. it seems you’ll meet your death long before you meet your fate. And another short poem: Spoiler: Poem With Long Title A Writer Is A Medium For Those Who Aren’t Real It’s hard to exist as myself when I’ve been other people for as long as I can remember: I was a murderer one long summer And a spirit the next. For nights one year I was burning for the dead Leaping off cliffs for broken promises Shuddering at phantom trains hurtling ever closer. I sleep better on other people’s couches than I ever slept in my own bed. I have more that I could post but these are my favorite recent ones
For my part, @misplaced sock, I quite like lines five and six. The breaks in line six ("Water that Does Not Wet") contrast nicely with the flow of the rest of the sounds. The whole thing sounds Gaimanesque to me. :)
@wixbloom Thank you so much :) What did you like about them? Also, I too agree with Kaylotta about misplaced sock's poem.
Found some more! Here's one I did in 10th grade as a school assignment--we had to write an introduction for a modern-day pilgrim in the style of The Canterbury Tales. Spoiler: The Actress Next was the Actress, tall and tan in hue, Who wore her fine designer jeans and shoes Upon her slender legs and dainty feet. (She was so skinny 'cause she did not eat.) She carried a Chihuahua in her bag. She was a spoil'd and nasty little hag. She'd acted in a thousand different films. She lived in a big house in Bev'rley Hills With her sixth boyfriend, father of her child -- A talented man, and quite meek and mild. But she'd had sex with tons of other blokes, So their relationship was on the ropes. Her name was Paris Spears, or so I'm told; She was a lass of twenty-three years old. But in those years she'd done so much cocaine That it had nearly driven her insane. And here's a kinda freeform one I scribbled down a while back. Spoiler: I Don't Miss You I don't miss the way you talk And I don't miss the way you walked away Or you I don't miss you No, I don't miss the way you fuck And I don't miss you tucking in Our kid I don't miss you I'll say so, maybe if I say it Enough, maybe it'll all Come true I hope Oh no Oh no No I still miss you so
@Acey I just read part of the Canterbury Tales not too long ago and I have to say that that first poem is perfect
I write a little poetry, although I'm only getting back into it after a few years of not-writing. Here's two of my recent ones I like. Spoiler: Rot She peels off her face, And there is nothing underneath. A long time ago she hardened, Like an artery, like a lava flow, Becoming jagged and hard To protect her tender heart. She softened! Her heart sagged like an overripe fruit, Swelled like a dead pig, Became a garden of mold. Bright colors ran together as it liquified, Sloshing in the hard shell of her skin. She peels off her face And her heart gushes out Emotions cascading down the marble curve of her neck, Sticky sweet and cloying, Drawing in the flies, As she is left A husk. Spoiler: Sparks Throw yourself to the fire. All it can do is transform you. You grew strong and tall in the dark earth, Water coursed through your veins. Your fingers strained to touch the stars And caressed the moon. When the first bite came it was unexpected, A sharp pain that made you weep and tremble, You cowered in response to the assault of the axe, And when you were felled it was without fanfare. Now, as the flames touch your core, Boiling away your softness, Kissing you as softly as leaves in the wind, You can rise with the smoke and the sparks And become one with the heavens.
i don't know if i still like this poem? Spoiler: warning for upsetting stuff sort-of-about autism, like, probably a trigger warning for that I. an epidemic of changelings is sweeping the nation, a plague of not-right-ness. something must have snuck in, something must have taken it, our real child, or swaddled it in strangeness ‘til unrecognizable, silent and stimming, staring, startling. peel back the skin. peel away the fey tricks, reluctance of the lips, the young face, squinting at the light. cast out the heavy metals and the needles -- too late. nail down the fluttering hands, nail down the body, all-wrong, quiet the fluttering hands -- what could they have to say? it cannot speak to love you. burn and bleach the body-all-wrong -- sift for the soul in the flesh. can you hear our real son in the screaming? II. his parents didn’t say: this is not right. his parents didn’t know, they humored a hatred for cold iron and eye contact, because he was smart, because he could speak to say i love you. and still he grew up scared. he says now: this is not right, and sometimes he can speak it. sometimes he can stomach screaming, saying if you dismantle your child all you will have are the pieces.
So... umm... I am actually really hesitent about putting my poetry on the internet but thats not what I am going to post about here... See, this semester I am taking a class called small press editing. Basically, we learn how to create a literary magazine from the ground up. That being said, my college has two lit mags. one for masters and one for undergrads. I'm part of the undergrad one. We have two publications, Zaum, which is the print and calls for submissions happen in the fall semester and Zaum xs, which is the online one which takes submissions in the spring semester. I thought I'd bring this up here because we are still open for submissions until march 17th 11:59pm PST. If anyone is interested in submitting, go to zaumpress.net and check the rules and such (but for the love of god, please don't look at the horror that was last years' zaum xs, I'm not sure they knew what they were doing...). Or... ask me about it? (we're looking for poetry, prose, non-fiction and art).
This is a world setting poem, from a series of twelve (I am currently working on the second poem) Kelehëu's Tower Far in deepest sands Almost buried a tower stands A tower made of stone Crystal glass and bleached bone A hundred stories high Legend of the tower tell Of a people which once rose and fell Before their death they took their power And sealed it all within the tower Long before Beladi reign A thousand years have come and gone Greatest deeds have since been done But no matter where the thieves have crept The tower all its secrets kept Along their drying husks Sometimes when the sun grows dim A traveller comes and brings with them A desert rose, a gear, a star Stories and tales from way and far And whispers of the tower They walk into the riddler's den Never to be seen again Like oh so many done before And after them will many more To catch at least a glimpse Of who buried riches wants to claim Only skull and bones remain Of those called no single thread Legend tells they are not dead But welcomed into the tower The storm subsides The mass divides A traveler comes from the sands Battered, weary, and in her hands A bloodied desert rose Feverish she tells her tale Succeeded where others failed Ventured through the halls of stone Crystal glass and bleached bone And came across no soul From the light into the dark Dared not to light a spark Straight paths curling through themselves And in between a thousand shelves Every deed which had been done Parchment, paper, leather, hide Words in reddest ink inside From the first dawn til today But the silent halls betray Only the chosen remain unscarred Her last words are of bronze rings Etched markings and other things It spins around a sun of glass A model of the planet's path Made to show and teach the called Kelehëu's tower is its name And like moths to nightly flame It draws the greedy of any kind Some are killed, but the knowing find Admittance to the tower
May I Live in Your Pocket? Muted and dimmed I could bear it then That din That thin Mote filled beam Working in Through woof and warp Lulling me Curling me Heart of me Tuckered out Tucked in lookout Homunculus Mouse, I.
