The Et Cetera Clause

We ♥ literature too.

2008-04-11T02:31:00.001-04:00

Welcome to the Tangst Prose and Poetry Page.

Due to the high volume of the poems on Tangst, we (the admins) decided that a separate site should house all the tangsty works. We've been working on this for a while (since mid January).

On this site, the disclaimers, legal notices, terms of service, and policies are basically the same as the ones for Tangst. Please note that by posting and/or commenting, you inherently agree to them.

This site is intended as a haven for the poets, storytellers, and general authors/writers of our growing community. It's a place to submit works and receive feedback and criticism.

Works posted on Tangst will also be posted here, just for a sense of continuity.

Happy writing!

Der Koenig des Totenreichs

2008-04-11T02:24:00.002-04:00

Der König des Totenreichs

Or Why I don’t feel safe in bed

He said - I am what I am
We lie through our soul
With brutal honesty
And ruthless control
(Du bist immer markiert, mein Bruder)

Truth is a knife
Cuts through the bone and the tissue of lie
Music binds a soul together
Your body will work
It pounds through your mind

Your pupils like cat’s eye
Glitter in darkness
You shine in iniquity
You barter in sparkles

You search through your language it comes to your need
You search through your heart
Ripe red and bleeding and pumping and sweating

Cloven hoof and silver chills
Roll down your tongue and your spine and you sense
Razor shard edges take you aback
(Broken glass hurts most on Sunday mornings)
Taken back to a sunny day

Where the sun shone through the clouds
(Forever and ever, Amen)
With horns black as pitch
And relentless you charge through your guilt
The endless drum roll and trumpet and organ scream
Announce your approach

While lightning strikes the opposition
White holy light burns your face
Your scream is passion as pleasure
Tonight your torture comes to an end

2006-07-29T15:17:00.000-04:00

I have a soldier,
a soldier boy sent off to war
to war
To warm
with fire-arm heat
his heart
might go down
in a b l a z e of glory.

But my bed is cold and empty.

Our connection as thin as the paper his letters are written on...
dirty, ink smudged,
worn out love.
My heart is his used bullet shell.

There are open arms offered to me here...
But if I took them.
Held them.
Let myself cry these oily tears...

That fragile dog chain between us...

Would snap.

Those hollow soldier's eyes.
Like two hour glasses
with all the sand run out-

would look out into the desert
dry.

Eyes thirsty,
For someone,
For some touch of home...
Would run dry
dry.

And he would b u r n out
in that b l a z e of glory.

For a traitor.
A traitor like me.
Weak-hearted heartland girl.

An enemy within.

O for the love of him am I put in such pain.
Odd that love should force such a breaking.
This breaking.
That will break both our hearts.

I have a soldier,
a soldier boy sent off to war
to war
to a war
while my mind fights battles of its own.

Anonymous
02:29:25 AM

2006-07-08T23:07:00.000-04:00

Love Poem #4: Time Travel,or Don’t Ask What Happened to Love Poem #3, or for that matter parts II and III of This Poem

I.
One night
I made the summer skyline stop changing.
the mountains were like
ripples in fabric
soft & explosive
and I reached upfrom the ground
with my free hand
and tied the moon to the pine trees,
and I unraveled the stars
and threaded them throughour hands
so we would have light wherever we went,
and I unwrapped
the black blanket of the sky
and draped it over our shoulders
so we would keep warm

And the vast green heavens
were exposed above us
and it felt like we were falling

so we held each other,
the starlight tangled among our fingers.

Nanotyrannus
7/2/06
1:11:11 AM

2006-06-28T15:18:00.000-04:00

i don't know if this is how we post, but oh well...

Twangs that rise and fall,
Notes meaning so much more than words can ever tell.
A passing thought beyond perception,
Captured in a sound as fleeting as the feeling,
What greater expression do the worldly posses?
No word can accurately describe such emotion.
And such is the precious value of song,
To fill in the gaps our language leaves behind.
~

Butterfly allies, glowing under yellow twinkle lights.
Cobblestone lanes, ivy covered walls.
Hanging flowers attached to terracota rooves.
Love in a green glass bottle,
Hold it to the light and watch it float and flutter.
Uncork the bottle, let the bug escape.
See it soar towards the swirly dotted sky.
Bye Bye butterly.
~

This is merely early waiting
For a time that is yet to come,
As the world unwinds and comes undone.
Early waiting in the shadows of the mind,
Stinging our early opened eyes.
Time unravels for waiters be-
The enders of life, humanity.
Gone with the early sight by impatient eyes,
The early waiters are but we,
Waiting for the end that has yet to come.
~

Anonymous
6/27/2006
01:15:14 AM

2006-05-31T17:01:00.000-04:00

Worn smooth by feet (and hard by weight),
The path is old that tread we now
But Blindness and the Light allow
That like all others, each with each,
We learn what (can’t be taught) can teach:
How, stumbling, Blinded, for (another) hand to reach.
And so it goes: what we can’t know, but only learn
Each day by day, to give what neither one can earn
And by those gifts be left with more.
–How curious is this untaught math
That governs o’er this unseen path,
Both known by many feet and hands before.

Anonymous
5/31/2006
11:45:45 AM

2006-05-24T21:59:00.000-04:00

A whirling dervish.
Oh for one.
And yet it rains with-
Oh for one.

A spinning top-
Of jeweled bells.
How it sparkles.
It rings the dells.

But purity is found-
Beneath sheaves of sound,
Attached on doors,
And piled on floors.

A whirling dervish.
Of jeweled bells in sound.
Of sounds that echo silently.
Of floors that glisten-
And spin.

Anonymous
5/24/2006
09:29:07 PM

2006-05-07T23:03:00.000-04:00

Love Poem #2

i do not know you but i know your hands.
i know fingers flowing along lines of touch discovering sandstone ridges of fingerprints i know joints and the curve of knuckles
rising
falling
steadily
i know the creases underneath the way i know the layout of my childhood home and thus i know that the bones beneath your skin could be my own.

Nanotyrannus
5/7/06
8:23:42 PM

Paper Mache Pizza

2006-05-05T17:48:00.000-04:00

I really liked Maverick's idea of combining the first lines from 10 random poems and making a new poem out of it. You can do that in the comments with your own poetry if you want, I'd love to read it. Here's how I did it: I put maybe 30 on my desktop, deleted their filenames, and then rearranged them, and then clicked on 10 randomly. That prevented me from choosing "the best" or "the most poetic."

well, it was winter
My grandmother went insane as her husband was dying--
Dressed in drapes and denim

Il y avait, une fois, une belle jonquille
I read somewhere that the world is nothing

When men upon the stormy sea
he came over but laughed
again again a gain. can one gain a cross across the grain? no.

Horseshoes thrown are sometimes kept in a sack.
Electronegativity

Kaleidoscope Collage

2006-05-03T23:13:00.000-04:00

I took the first lines from 10 of my poems and arranged them.

My pupils have shrunk to a size reserved for
Dawn.
If only the sun had a soul (It’d be one step ahead of you. One step ahead)

With a furious pen
I would wreak havoc
(And what rough beast, its hour come round at last,slouches towards Bethlehem to be born?)

As rain slants like mountain slope
You boast a living red
Oh Love,
Hush.
I have seen the doors to heaven

Maverick
5/3/06
11:13 PM

2006-05-03T20:23:00.000-04:00

People need the cover of another perfect wonder where it's so white as snow,
properly divided by a world so undecided and there's nowhere to go;
In between the cover of another perfect wonder where it's so white as snow,
running through the field where all my tracks will be concealed and there's nowhere to go.

^Snow (hey oh) by the chili peppers
I <3 music so freaking much
this is tangstworthy because of how happy this song makes me.

Anonymous
5/3/06
08:22:19 PM

2006-05-02T21:50:00.000-04:00

I wonder what I really look like in the eyes of others
Am I pretty or pretty ugly?
My obsession lies deep within my gut
I didn't eat today to make sure I would feel good tomorrow

I walk by the store front and watch myself go by
Reflections are horrible head-fucking monstrosities
Breakfast isn't an option, neither is lunch
Not if I want to feel good tomorrow

Many things are weighing heavily on my mind
My thighs, my toes and my hideous knees
There will be no dinner tonight
I want to feel good tomorrow

So, tomorrow is here.
I cannot break this cycle of self-loath
I smash the mirror with my angry fist
Bleed on my carpet and stare

Pain is release and blood is art
Beautiful crimson seeping so fluidly
I smile and know this is the way
Now I feel good

Anonymous
5/1/06
10:40:29 AM

2006-05-02T20:31:00.000-04:00

"Parking lots
cracked and growing grass you see it all
from offices to farms
crosses flying high above the malls
A longer walk
through Jesusland"
(ben folds.)

I love Ben. He is a prophet!

rashi's wife
5/2/06
08:29:48 PM

2006-04-26T21:02:00.000-04:00

It helps if you've read "Anecdote of the Jar" by Wallace Stevens.

I built a City on a Hill,
It’s Steeples stark ‘gainst stormy skies,
And all who lived there knew God’s Will,
And each dank valley did we despise.

For those below knew not of Truth,
Nor Faith, nor Love, nor Evening Tea.
Their men, broad and raucous, their women all loose
Placing vice and the body before God’s High Decree.

But even barbarians bow down to shame,
‘Til far and wide spread our renown,
‘Til each mother’s Morals and Joys were the same,
‘Til not one man danced. No one bellowed. None frowned.

And now in the end we have no regrets.
What foolish misgivings could there possibly be?
Now that every town shimmers and each one is blessed.
Like everything else in Tennessee.

Anonymous
4/25/06
11:41:38 PM

2006-04-26T20:55:00.000-04:00

why do they mean so much
its not as if they
have done anything
worth anything
at all
Why does everything they do
matter so much
its not as if its
extra profound
or extra anything
why do we care so much
about they who are...
just there
is that what makes them so
unique
so special
so unequivicably awsome
they bring happiness
through something
that is
somehow super special
how is it that we
each percieve
different ones
as the ones
the thems
that our our
very definition
of super cool awsomeness
that one persons them
could be anothers
those

K'lam
4/26/2006
01:16:36 AM

2006-04-23T15:31:00.000-04:00

einstein
or: Poem #1 in the Style of TintedFragipan but not Gertrude Stein

i was i am not a Jew

i am i was not Elijah

i was not did have (have not?) a fiery chariot & ascended exploded to heaven & i am i am not have not genius because genius is heaven & i did not ascend & i had had not faith have faith in god & numbers & elijah inside e=mc^2 & i am i am not have have not ideas exploding now & inside & one day in deserts & one day in heaven with eliahu hanavi

i am did not was there with my brothers at a cramped oven desk writing formulas in ashes i was on a plane ascending exploding floating on e=mc^2 to safety, but not heaven & i was had not ideas exploding in fissures & chain reactions cracking open rocks & one day cities but never heaven &amp; i have gold & i have lead & i have not uranium or the love of god.

Note: It's still much more of an experiment/very rough draft than an actual attempt at art/expression. Criticism is appreciated.

Anonymous
4/23/2006
03:45:42 PM

2006-04-21T11:59:00.000-04:00

Perfection

What is perfection?
"No one is perfect"
They all say

In your own head
In your own soul
Everyone is their own perfection

Is one not perfect in the eyes
Of sociaty if
They have flaws?
What if...

It is the flaws
That make us perfect?

Is one not accepted
If they do done conform
To society?
what if...

It is our spirits
Our rebellion against
The giant
Of society
That is perfection?

Is it uncooth to
Break a law
To fight?
What if...

It is our very nature
That causes these
And that in itself
Is perfection?

"No one is perfect"
They all say
What if...

We are all perfect
In our own little way?

K'lam
4/21/2006
12:51:27 AM

2006-04-18T18:12:00.000-04:00

Squirrels are often found in parks.
Their tails resemble question marks.
It's just coincidental though.
There's little squirrels care to know.

Post any poem here that you know by heart and no cheating!

Anonymous
4/18/2006
03:53:23 PM

2006-04-16T19:16:00.000-04:00

One of my favorite poems ever by my hands-down favorite poet ever:

Memorial to DC.
by Edna St. Vincent Millay

O, loveliest throat of all sweet throats
where now no more the music is,
with hands that wrote you little notes
I write you little elegies!

Epitaph

Heap not on this mound
Roses that she loved so well;
Why bewilder her with roses,
that she cannot see or smell?

She is happy where she lies
with the dust upon her eyes.

Prayer

Be to her, Persephone,
All the things I might not be;
Take her head upon your knee
She that was so proud and wild
flippant, arrogant, and free,
She that had no need of me,
is a little lonely child
lost in Hell,--Persephone
Take her head upon your knee
Say to her "My dear, my dear,
it is not so dreadful here."

Chorus

Give away her gowns
Give away her shoes
She has no more use
for her fragrant gowns
take them all down
blue, green, blue
lilac, pink, blue
from their padded hangers
she will dance no more
in her narrow shoes
sweep her narrow shoes
from the closet floor.

Elegy

Let them bury your big eyes
In the secret earth securely
Your thin fingers and your fair,
soft, indefinite -coloured hair,--
All of these in some way, surely,
From the secret earth shall rise;
Not for these I sit and stare,
broken and bereft completely;
Your young flesh that sat so neatly
on your little bones will sweetly
blossom in the air.

But your voice... never the rushing
of a river underground
not the rising of the wind
in the trees before the rain,
not the woodcock's watery call,
nor the note the white-throat utters,
not the feet of children pushing
yellow leaves along the gutters
in the blue and bitter fall,
shall content my musing mind.
For the beauty of that sound
That in no new way at all
ever will be hear again.

Sweetly through the sappy stalk
of the vigorous weed
Holding all it held before,
Cherished by the faithful sun,
on and on eternally
shall your altered fluid run,
bud, and bloom, and go to seed:
but your singing days are done!
but the music of your talk
never shall the chemistry
of the secret earth restore
all your lovely words are spoken
once the ivory box is broken
Beats the golden bird no more.

Dirge

Boys and girls that held her dear,
Do your weeping now;
All you loved of her lies here.

Brought to earth the arrogant brow,
and the withering tongue
Chastened; do your weeping now.

Sing whatever songs are song
Wind whatever wreath
for a playmate perished young
for a spirit spent in death.

Boys and girls that held her dear
all you loved of her lies here.

While Thinking Of a Soldier in Iraq

2006-04-15T23:59:00.000-04:00

People say they joined the army
(and those are the ones who really
joined) for honor, or fun, or what
ever it is that they wanted but I
joined because it was the age of 19

and there I was with the bright decade
before me, the prime of my life, and what
did I have to look foward to but a couple
of years at the community college and a job
at Domino's and a couple of kids (ohyeah, and
a wife) every night and tired, down the street
from the little house my parents always owned.

they sent me a letter

dear/dearest Matthew (or, son.)
we got your last letter and we were
very happy to hear from you because
you know we are so
worried.

I would like to tell you that your
father got a promotion and lane is probably
going to go to Enloe too (even though
you never thought he would, but he will)
your grandmother is doing better she is
using some of her money--we are too
to buy you a new car and I know you cannot
wait to get it because your truck
was in
bad, bad
shape.

we pray to the
LORD
every night to keep you safe
and we know that we will see
you soon. please be safe.

love
Your Mom/Dad (mom and dad?)

I think of this letter as the
bullet enters my face (in goes
the metal and out flies the flesh)

I think of the car I will never drive
because now I am dead.

it doesn't matter anyway.
I had 40, 50, 60 years left.
and then I would be dead.

TintedFragipan
4/15/2006
3:21 PM

2006-04-11T23:59:00.000-04:00

I just got my fucking report card
w/ my c in spanish im like dude your a retard
I dont want to show my parents b/c i will get grilled and charred
why the hell does this elective have to be so hard

My teacher makes me so freaking angry
no matter how much i use my creativity
I even try to the best of my ability
I cant help she treats me w/ such atrocity

poems are hard im much better at rapping freestyle
W/ poems you need to sit and ponder a while
I am just a white boy who likes to make people smile
so excuse me if this sux and sounds a bit juvinile

I appriciate the time you give to critique
I thank you for pointing out whats strong and whats weak
even though my poems lack in good technique
I am just trying to expand my horizons and be unique

Anonymous
4/11/2006
09:24:29 PM

Your total is:

2006-04-10T23:59:00.000-04:00

I was there.
I was there with the money,
wrapped in an envelope
"for the limo", you said.
$110.06
We ate dinner, all however many of us.
$42.95
Then (there was) a welcome table. My sister was there, she took more money.
$80.00

then we danced to a hip-hop civilization

Photographs by the ornamated tables, Ionic columns, and ivy.
$20.00

The doors opened, anticipating exit.
The limo door opened, anticipating enter.

We cruised a skyline of asphalt.
$23.12 min.

Cigarette stop on Hillsborough.

You brought in two grinning bottles of vodka.
$Prom.

Fuck you and your alcohol.

Maverick
4/10/2006
8:03 PM

The Hungry Poet - a trilogy

2006-04-10T16:29:00.000-04:00

A Poem Born of Hunger and Time

I think of:
the bread--with firm, cracked crust
in two parts, a matched pair--
and hidden, pressed between
(but with a hinting flash
of green
or pink
or pale cream
that may slip from out the golden loaves)
the curls of silken ham
and thick, dog-eared pages of cheese
dressed with the sea-waves of crisp lettuce
and all softly concealing the treasure
of two or three gems--
the sweet pickles
whose juice spreads to fill the empty spaces
of the white, white gold bread
--I think of my sandwich
and how many minutes remain until I might eat it.

A Poem Born of Hunger, More Time, and a Taste for Rhyme

I think of:
Bread in two parts
matched; and between
the cracked crust: a heart
of greens, rose, and pale cream
whose colors (how bright!)
slip from out the two loaves
to adorn (such a sight!)
each round edge tinted gold
And within these fair slices,
folds of ham like silk scrolls
and crisp lettuce ices
like the sea as it rolls,
thick, dog-eared pages
of cheese are there pressed
Then--the treasure of ages--
this marvel is dressed
with two gems (or three?
perhaps four?); pickles sweet
at the heart of this medley
--succulent, exsquisite--
whose juice will drip yellow
to fill the dry spaces
within the bread mellow
and blandness erases--
I think of my sandwich
and of the minutes until I might be allowed to eat it.

Reflection on the Eating of a Long-Anticipated Sandwich

The pickles
were old
theire flavor was lost on my tongue
and now...

the cold wind whistles
and stirs the crumbs in my lunchbox.

With Apologies to William Carlos Williams

2006-04-10T15:21:00.000-04:00

I have taken
your virginity
on the eve of
your senior prom

and which
you were probably saving
for someone
better-looking

Forgive me
you were delicious
so sweet
and so hot

:)
Dedicated to Hannah for her bravery in speaking her mind this morning, when no one else in the classroom would acknowledge the obvious sexual allegory of "This Is Just to Say."

2006-04-09T15:39:00.000-04:00

I notice him and he doesn’t know.
(See the days passing)
I study him and he doesn’t know.
(See the weeks passing)
I admire him and he doesn’t know.
(See the months passing)
I love him and he doesn’t know.
(See the years passing)
I need him and he doesn’t know.
(Life is done)
He never knew.

Anonymous
4/09/2006
03:35:38 PM

2006-04-08T08:43:00.000-04:00

In a car is still
in the morning, yet
slowly the trees and earth
creep by (shoemaker’s elves)

behold the silent sentinels!
they pass, equidistant, radial,
like nautilus chambers--gray-
green. and indifferent but
they are the golden ratio

i have seen them standing
they stand, and stand and look
for the bus, their cool impersonal
eyes all turned in one direction
unblinking, unforgiving, they
say to me “I know, oh, I
know what you have done
and you are part of us, and
we are part of you, it is”
(
and here is where I pause
the eruption of my chest
tangible, what is that cotton in
my throat, why do my eyes
burn so,
i am not you, second grade girl
your pink overcoat, it was bought
one day, but not a special day
and look how it is frayed and
how you are longing, yes, i
know your longing and perhaps
i have known more, i have known
the stinging of a plastic lunchbox
the stinging of a plastic mediocrity.
)
“the way things are and the way they were mean to be.”

PC: This poem is unfinished and not very good. It's how I was feeling at the time, but I got interrupted and I had a big catharsis session with a friend. Now I want to fix it, but I'm having a hard time.

2006-04-07T23:59:00.000-04:00

you are totally tantilizing, ya!

beeso-besher
4/07/2006

2006-04-07T18:33:00.000-04:00

Love Poem #1
or: History Revised

You were painting blues
the color of smooth whale fins and
ocean water
the color of azurite, the Israeli flag,
the calm of the summer sky,
reflected moonlight, prayer books,
and half a million other things
that remind me of you.

I was painting yellows,
the color of rounded submarines
and fluid fins of fishes
the color of lemons, leaves in September,
cowardice like the belly of a snake,
blinding sunlight, post-it notes,
and half a million other things
that detail my days.

And so when we finished and wandered,
blinking,
Into the sunlight to wash off our brushes,
Our fingers mixed into green,
the color of seaweed wrapped around tide pools
or resting in the current
the color of spring and tendrils
of sage and snap peas,
displays of jade in Chinatown windows,
pine needles on mountainsides, and
the color like the mixing
of blue and yellow handprints.

Nanotyrannus
4/07/2006
08:11:43 PM

2006-04-05T17:43:00.000-04:00

A maiden wept and, as a comforter,
Came one who cried, "I love thee," and he seized
Her in his arms and kissed her with hot breath,
That dried the tears upon her flaming cheeks.
While evermore his boldly blazing eyeBurned into hers; but she uncomforted
Shrank from his arms and only wept the more.

Then one came and gazed mutely in her face
With wide and wistful eyes; but still aloof
He held himself; as with a reverent fear,
As one who knows some sacred presence nigh.
And as she wept he mingled tear with tear,
That cheered her soul like dew a dusty flower,
-Until she smiled, approached, and touched his hand!
-Dunbar

we like it.

Anonymous
4/05/2006
05:18:27 PM

2006-04-02T18:45:00.000-04:00

Deep within
I will plant my law
Not on stone
But in your heart
Follow me
I will bring you back
You will be my own,
and I will be your God

The beauty of these verses brought tears to my eyes in church today.

2006-04-01T23:59:00.000-05:00

I Refuse to Write Another Poem for Him

Florida gave me orange blossoms
(I am almost over him)
(but when he tried to speak to me today
I had to end the
conversation quickly
before I started getting throatclogged heartchoked achingeyed)

Florida gave me orange blossoms
And when Summer stole upon-
(I will be over him soon)
(I will be over the way his ear curves unevenly)
(I will be over the way his voice echoes in my own ears)

(Florida gave me orange blossoms)
I don't remember what he said
but it sounded low and soothing
like a smooth bow drawing across the lowest strings
and clear September breezes
(I am almost over him)

I will be over the way
his fingers curve around a pen
I will be over his laugh like June
and his slow August smile
I will be over the the kindness in his eyes
and the way his ear curves unevenly
(Florida gave me orange blossoms).

Anonymous
4/01/2006
03:11:01 PM

2006-03-29T17:28:00.000-05:00

so there's this guy.
and i sit next to him in English.
and we're...friends.
buddies.
we make each other laugh.
so OF COURSE we don't "like" each other like that.
but for some reason, our elbows...
always seem to run into each other.
after the first bump we always move the elbows quickly apart.
and hurriedly say sorry.
but somehow those elbows
keep magnetating towards each other
and the second time they touch...
we don't pull them apart quite as fast...

Anonymous
3/28/2006
11:58:49 PM

2006-03-24T21:30:00.000-05:00

From "A Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius" by Dave Eggers:

I tried about a million times to fix you, but it was so wrong for me to want to save you because I only wanted to eat you to make me stronger, I only wanted to devour all of you, I was a cancer--Oh but I do this for you. Don't you see I do this for you? I have done this all for you. I pretend that I do not but I do. I eat you to save you. I drink you to make you new. I gorge myself on all you, and I stand, dripping, with fists, with heaving shoulders--I will look stupid, I will crawl drenched in blood and shit, I will--Oh look at those birds, on their stiff tiny legs and--There is nowhere I stop and you begin. I am exhausted . . .

what does it fucking take what do you want how much do you want because I am willing and I'll stand before you and I'll raise my arms and give you my chest and throat and wait, and I've been so old for so long, for you, for you, I want it fast and right through me--Oh do it do it, you motherfuckers, do it you fuckers finally, finally, finally.

I realize this doesn't make sense if you haven't read the whole (very long) book. But oh my god.

2006-03-19T23:40:00.000-05:00

A Pamphlet For Modern Living

Turn up the blaring TV screen
And bask in the quiet of the din.
Sleep often and forget the dreams
You’ve hidden all your worries in.

While showering, turn up the heat
And hum a bland repeating song.
Please move by rote - keep up the beat.
Try not dwell, and you can’t go wrong.

For lengthy thinking is the bait
That modern workers must avoid.
Every sense you must satiate,
And there is much you can employ.

Ocean noises are a must
(electronic or otherwise).
City noises can adjust
For thoughts that fear and sympathize.

Scented candles: use with care
to fill the nose and empty brains.
Pangs of love can be repaired
With faster cars and faster trains.

Now in your hands are all the means
To free your mind from human sin.
Sleep often and forget the dreams
You’ve hidden all your worries in.

Anonymous
3/19/2006
11:31:36 PM

Crucify me

2006-03-19T21:41:00.000-05:00

I kneel to pray
I close my eyes
I fold my hands--
you fill me
behind closed eyes and between clasped hands
And then I return to catch the end of a Gospel-

"Praise be to God"

another message missed for you.
--and death's sweet time comes biding
and swings the souls on his chain like keys
I know not
what souls
are they
but that when we whisper of "heaven"
we speak of two places--
you are the only heaven I know now

"Forgive us our trespasses"

Forgive me, O God, for I have sinned
And sinned
And sinned again
-against what God, I know not
but by you, the god of my idolatry,
I have done no wrong-
in darkness
I offer
my prayers
to you
you who took the form of man
because you love me

"And lead us not into temptation"

touch me with your fire and scourge my Mother Earth
and driven back will we both be
to once when our gods were one and we were one and the earth and fire were one
I yearn for you--
No stale taste of wafers is your flesh
but the rich wine poured from the heart--

"Amen"

This is my body, which will be given up for you
Crucify me
that my blood may mix with yours
and point our way
to heaven

2006-03-18T18:46:00.000-05:00

My dear I don't mean
To sound rude or obscene,
But I'll wind your Victrola
If you know what I mean.

------------------------

I'm quite far from miffed,
But to return such a gift?
I'll finger your rosary
If you get my drift.

Anonymous
3/18/2006
04:59:16 PM

2006-03-18T18:45:00.000-05:00

Short Story Finalist!!!

*does a little jig*

Do you guys have any idea if they've announced the winner for Senior year? (enloe by the way)

Anonymous
3/17/2006
04:59:48 PM

2006-03-15T23:59:00.000-05:00

Okay, I wrote this haiku for English and it just cracks me up too much. *ahem*

Night
It is dark. Dark. Dark.
It makes it hard to see things.
Plus there are vampires.

But my friend thinks I should make the last line, "Like vampires." That's funny, but not 5 syllables, oh well!

Anonymous
3/15/2006
06:37:21 PM

Apocryphal Revelation

2006-03-14T18:59:00.000-05:00

The horizon exhaled her final hues
While night did don her blacks and blues
And as prismatic wards did purr
Summer awoke new adventure

You peered up at that dark sheet of night then,
Far too young to criticize anything beyond the phosphorus fields of fireflies
And how they hovered like fallen glitter from the Milky Way’s arts and crafts table
But that was too far from your driveway, a white spine of suburbia

I talked to you yesterday, when the air resembled blurry things of shadows (and their shadows)
You told me of how you looked into the eyes of stratospheric patchwork.
You told me of how you saw eternity.
You told me of how you screamed.

Now you sleep with a ceiling of above you,
No longer lofty ambitions.
And a blanket of restless sleep and panic,
Alarm clocks instead of teddy bears.
You sleep knowing where Adam came, and how far Adam has to go.

Maverick
3/14/2006
06:33:00 PM

2006-03-09T20:26:00.000-05:00

Improv Poem.. and irritation.

In a great land so very far away
A child laughed and fell in the hay
And as he hopped, and jumped about
From his pocket some silver did fall out
A goblin then, who was hiding in the grass
Snapped it up, though his demeanor was crass
Zits and all, the goblin made his escape
While the saddened child, proceeded to go ape
And the ferocious matriarch shouted from the door
Get away from my child, and bother us no more!
With a wink and a howl, goblin sullenly fled
But returned with an ogre and orc in his stead
In reply to such a voracious attack
The mother slew them all, with a magnificent smack
Wiping grease from her cheek, and the axe in her belt
The child was amazed and yelled as he felt
Then the mother turned 'round, and swallowed her kid
Nobody was to know just what she had... did. (bad grammar)
She leaped towards a tree, and climbed its branches
Trying to constantly rhyme is hard... Ranches
I feel that this poem somehow didn't hit
In fact it has turned to a pile of shit.

2006-03-05T23:42:00.000-05:00

There's something disgusting about projects for class
Especially from Language, makes me want to eat grass
We overanalyze the books, get the characters wrong
I'll never read Medea now without heaving a long
Deep sigh, because, I know now that Hera
Was the real villain, while steadily nearer (neara?)
Lurks the trial date for our dearest Medea
I'd rather do an in depth report about Chia

I'm so grateful that the Medea trials are over.

Anonymous
3/05/2006
09:31:25 PM

2006-02-25T19:44:00.000-05:00

A ball of clay
Violet, with gentle thumb prints
Pressed by loving fingers.
Warm hands soften clay
Giving shape
Many colors
Multiple forms
Twisting together, shapes
Not just twisting, objects
An exercise in craft, love
A dim lamp
The light cuts through the dark, Scattering dust
Into their air-born dance
A human face in the clay
With loving thumbprints
On the mouth
On the eyes
Carefully molded
Enamored with its form

Anonymous
2/25/2006
05:19:53 PM

2006-02-23T21:40:00.000-05:00

Microphone and Piano

The man sings his song
With a passion.

The microphone feeds
The words to his mouth
As he swallows them whole
And they bounce
Off the chords
In the back of his throat
And are rocketed
Out through his eyes
With the pain
Of a faraway heart.

The piano keys
Shake his hands
Which in turn
Sway his wrists
Which in turn
Send his body
Writhing and slinking
Like a broken dancer
Dancing to the beat
Of invisibility.

The man plays his passion
With a song.

Anonymous
2/23/06
07:28:49 PM

2006-02-23T15:22:00.000-05:00

Ah, you wretched fearful lovers
As you drift across this night
May your hearts be filled with wonder
And your dreams remain as bright.

I like to write this on slips of paper and leave them in public places.

Anonymous
2/22/2006
10:38:33 PM

2006-02-23T15:21:00.000-05:00

My seven year old cousin got
saved tonight she said
now shes a little lamb of god
oh godohgodoh G O D. why is
she A HYPO CR ITE? my mother
almost cried but I remember being
7
so I said "what is you baptized"
and she said "i is baptized born again"
(it's a synonym, but really, the
black suited, black hatted lovers
and haters of the soul don't care:
they don't don't don't careeee)
and i said you is born Again?

her mother-ivorysoapstonestatue
with a touch of red on each cheek
puffed out like apples and seventy
seventy seventy seven babies come
and come out! oooh she is bleedeeng
baybees. oout they ooze.

please cut the foreskin, circumcise the heart of this girl and throw it at the feet of MOSES or Harriet Tubman. hm she's just a little lamb and Mary has her, full of grace and white as snow, and every where that mary went the lamb is NOT IS NOT A
goattttttttttt
that is, hail mary.

unless you're like a little child said jesus, that demon
comes out by prayer and fasting
and fast is the child who grows
up in the sight of the LORD. ALPHAOMEGA beta-testing.

the desciples broke open that 7 yr
old head and out popped 7 foods
two fish five loaves and a whole
lot of wholly water. she's multiplying
this sinner sinner hypocrite
and every day there's more and they
are FISHERS OF MEN with their
soft soft drift nets

sleep in the bosom of jesus.

Anonymous
2/22/2006
09:35:03 PM

2006-02-18T17:18:00.000-05:00

Victorian

It’s that quintessential moment
At the crowning of the night,
As my eager coachmen lingers
‘Neath the foggy streetlamp’s light.

There you step out from the darkness
With your pompadour flipped high
And those striking stick pin diamonds
To match the glittering in the sky.

There’s that naughty done-wrong feeling – there,
From which none can refrain.
Ay, it creeps up on our faces
And our smirk is just the same.

And arm and arm, and lip to lip
We steal down English streets,
Our tawdry minds both filled with sins
Confinéd to the sheets.

Our names and lands are on the line.
If these devilish acts were known.
But it makes it all the sweeter
Knowing you’re a woman - and not my own.

And those champagne nights and cheap delights
Of which we both abhor
Are swept away in single kiss
And the slam of a bedroom door.

Well…I might be a common man
And you, not a duchess in gems.
And this is all a fantasy.
No champagne and no Thames.

This may just be my fantasy
But this, my dear, is true.
I want to get Victorian
And cheat on her with you.

Anonymous
2/18/2006
02:41:26 PM

2006-02-15T19:25:00.000-05:00

Okay, the visual, spatial aspect of this poem as I originally wrote it will be lost in this format, but hopefully the sound of the words will still come through.

A deep red sliding along a silver line
in mirrored unseen unison with hands sliding over flesh
one heart gleams a burgundy from the facets of its dark depths while another
overflows with warm
hot blood
coursing through veins beneath pale, soft white skin
rent by white ivory
harshandhardandohsosweet
lean back
and feel the bones within the flesh of searching fingers
tighten
against the curve of your spine
and glide
over
lands
you never knew…
caress
and gently,
gently…
until you see through touch
in the glowing light of a shared soul

the beauty no mirror could ever make you see.

Anonymous
07:19:20 PM

2006-02-14T23:05:00.000-05:00

♥

Anonymous
11:59:55 AM

2006-02-13T00:29:00.000-05:00

The ache that follows his form,
That chokes the giddy song behind the sternum,

I would not trade this
For sanguine wrists
Or cigarette burns.

Sluggish taps in the chest
However painful, however slow,
Declare that the heart has not turned to granite
just yet.

Anonymous
11:12:53 PM

2006-02-12T19:13:00.000-05:00

"Math People Are Not English People"

They use different sides of the brain

But there is a rhythm in
sin(c)=tan(e)

and beauty in the way
the derivative of
x^4
curves like dune crests
and shark vertebrae
slicing the water

and something more than
a little poetic
in the arcs and angles
of a sliced circle.

Anonymous
07:10:29 PM

2006-02-07T23:59:00.000-05:00

These are my final thoughts
I've spoken too much already
wielded as a blade
your words have pierced me for the last time

Its my turn to fight
My turn to scream..
Yet my cries fall on deaf ears..
Listen! Goddammit why won't you listen!?
No medicine is strong enough for this
Nothing can dull this pain

I'm your sister
making another mistake
I'm your daughter
yet again disappointing
I'm your friend
Hoping you will see through my smile
I'm your student
Striving for Perfection

I am an angel..
fallen from heaven and stuck in this hell

Anonymous
10:19:34 PM

2006-02-05T23:59:00.000-05:00

Ugh, secret:

During church today we were talking about lust and when I was focused on to answer a question all I could think of was Walt Whitman's "I Sing the Body Electric."

So when it's like "Hey, do you have something to be thankful for, sir?" And all I can think to say is:

"The expression of a well-made man appears not only in his face,
It is in his limbs and joints also, it is curiously in the joints of his hips and wrists,
It is in his walk, the carriage of his neck, the flex of his waist and knees, dress does not hide him,
The strong sweet quality he has strikes through the cotton and broadcloth,
To see him pass conveys as much as the best poem, perhaps more
You linger to see his back, and the back of his neck and shoulder-side."

or

"I knew a man, a common farmer, father of five sons...
When he went with his five sons and many grand sons to hunt or fish, you would pick him out as the most beautiful and vigorous of the gang,
You would wish long and long to be with him, you would wish to sit by him in the boat that you and he might touch each other."

So instead you don't say anything and you sit gaping mouthed and look stupid, and think awkwardly that everyone can read the thoughts inside your head.

Yay for poetry :P

TintedFragipan
01:36 PM

2006-02-05T23:58:00.000-05:00

I am a doll with
sparkling glass eyes

I am the envy of
girls who pass by

I am beautiful and perfect
in every way

but boys don't play with dolls

Anonymous
09:14:09 AM

2006-02-04T23:59:00.000-05:00

Ahhhh, even as I write these very words, TANGST IS DOWN.

I am crying, on the inside.

I will post something from a novel, that I could relate to:

"In a strange room you must empty yourself for sleep. And before you are emptied for sleep, what are you. And when you are emptied for sleep, you are not. And when you are filled with sleep, you never were. I don't know what I am. I don't know if I am or not. Jewel knows he is, because he does not know that he does now know whether he is or not. He cannot empty himself for sleep because he is not what he is and he is what he is not. Beyond the unlamped wall I can hear the rain shaping the wagon that is ours, the load that is ourno longer theirs that felled and sawed it nor yet theirs that bought it and which is not ours either, lie on our wagon though it does, since only the wind and the rain shape it only to Jewel and me, that are not asleep. And since sleep is is--not the rain and wind are was, it is not. Yet the wagon is because when the wagon is was, Addie Bundren will not be. Jewel is, so Addie Bundren must be. And then I must be, or I could not empty my self for sleep in a strange room. And so if I am not emptied yet, I am is.
How often have I lain beneath rain on a strange roof, thinking of home."

-Darl Bundren, from William Falkners As I Lay Dying.

TintedFragipan
07:44 PM

2006-02-02T18:25:00.000-05:00

hey i wrote a poem today, totally random, just stream of consciousness type thing.

IT LOOKS LONG BUT TAKES QUITE A SHORT TIME TO READ. it may not makes sense to you, but just give it a shot please? :)...

Noodles

I remember…
Being inside
A small crate
With love empty and superficial

I remember…
A wall
A long low gray wall
Stretched

I remember…
Staring through the carpet
Endless rows of feet
Pound over
Over
Over fragile fibers

I remember…
A scream
A soft little cry ate
Through my bones
Eyes I could not see,
But I felt
Deep eyes, soft eyes
Turned thin and brittle

I remember…
Opening a door
Key?
It doesn’t matter
The room is not even there.
I miss that
Room.
I no longer understand.

I remember…
That I stopped
For one blink I stared at
My innocent feet
Neatly packaged in their
Red
Shoes
I then realized I was moving
Away away away
From where my heart wanted to go.
But oh!
My feet had given up
Though my heart had not…
I drifted down
Down the long way I had come.
Why the journey?
I do not understand but

I remember…
A sweaty dark space
A jacket
Whose?
Where have they gone?
The buttons, the pockets
All brown brown brown
And smelling of loneliness

I remember…
A bowl of noodles
Round green bowl
Sweet golden noodles
They mocked me.
That one noodle
Laughing its bright, sharp
Noodle-laugh
My air scattered away

I remember…
The rough bites of wood
The soft sloughing of falling scraps
Why this transformation?
The purpose: some other game
A pencil
Sharp
For the sake of others?

If it were up to me
I think
I would like
To be a dull pencil.

But I do not remember.

Anonymous
06:16:21 PM

2006-02-01T09:49:00.000-05:00

We make plans for big times
Get bogged down, distracted
We make plans for good times
All neon, all surface
So kiss me before it all gets complicated

--Plans by Bloc Party

Live for the moment, yeah?

Anonymous
12:24:29 AM

2006-01-30T23:59:00.000-05:00

Short story entitled "The Lock and Key Theory". A little too angst to submit to anything, but now here for your critique.

This is how beginnings are started:

She watches people race by beneath the giant pendulum, and she counts the seconds and minutes that pass by, her youthful time unspent. She watched him walk by, hunched over, at a pace slightly slower than the others. Her eyes follow him as he turns the corner. These were the things she couldn't -- and wouldn't -- understand; they were inexplicable and illogical.

She turns to return to her work, piling day by day upon her desk; obligations unwanted but slowly whiling time away. She turns back to feelings of familiarity instead of unwanted insecurities that would plague her at times like these.

This is how insecurities bloom:

She doesn’t know what to do. She finds her eyes unwillingly trailing his motions, awkward as they seem. Her friends catch her doing so and she cannot disregard them. He is a nobody, to her understanding, but seems to be everything to her. She's caught in-between time and space, enraptured with the sight of the otherworldly angel caught in turmoil ready to take the dive, the flight into the unknown, the oblivion.

This is unwanted and awkward confrontation:

He catches her in the library. The angel without wings turns and their eyes meet. She cannot turn away. They wait like this, minutes and hours confusing each other, until traces of Aurora threads weave through the brightening sky. Dusk into day -- it's quite simple now, the congregation of space and time and everything else in-between. The pendulum stops swinging, but only for a second. But words -- answers – usually superfluous, are naught today.

This is their congregation of time and space:

They don't see each other during the quiet weeks as peers but as strangers. They coexist without speaking and share the tiny world they live in. They do not speak.

She observes him and takes note sometimes, writing down in her perfect cultured handwriting that he regresses slowly as the pendulum swings. His limbs, typically slender and sinewy, have gone limp. Her concern for him grows. Her friends do not utter a word upon glancing at her face.

This is the realization:

She encounters him one day. Trapped within a corner, he is a wildcat. His gaze steadily holds her. Blue meets brown. There is a silence for a moment. He turns his head to leave, and she wonders—this caged beast, trapped within bounds, completely unapproachable by society’s standards-- if she thinks about it long and hard, there is a metaphor staring at her in the face and it all makes sense.

This is wrong:

They continue to talk in muted tones and shifty eyes. Should someone see them would the reaction be an enactment of chaos? Speaking to each other in hushed tones as if the world outside is silent. She knows she is a coward.

This is the end of their beginning:

They both are cowards – turning back to an enclave where neither can be found. Where people turn their backs and overlook their differences. But they turn to face the severe light, glaring at them with its evil eye. Too many people, a hundred against one, predator to prey. They're vulnerable. The walls are quickly tumbling down.

This is the end in which all things spring:

They part their ways. Neither looking back to the place where all things originated: where insecurities will lie forever dormant, where a secret can be kept and an oath never broken. Remorse and regrets tossed aside into a gale, a whirlwind of emotions. Society frowns down upon them.

This is coincidence, chance, fate at play:

They're back where they started. The red string of fate has knotted them together. Pressures rising, soul escalation, nerve endings electrifying and senses on overdrive. In a broken world, divine interventions are only cracks and minute dents; they bear no positive effect except to exist. In a broken world, where fate frowns upon them he will take the dive. And she? She will go after him.

This is the intervention:

The pendulum stops swinging for the two. It is a cruel cycle that both should want to abstain from uttering a word in order to save each other in front of the world.

This is the end of their storybook.

… Now all things fall into place.

Anonymous
10:03:57 PM

2006-01-28T23:59:00.001-05:00

I was gonna write a poem for ELO, but it got too angsty, so now it's a Tangsty poem, I guess.

well, it was winter
(dawn, one morning, and i was
eleven. it was saturday)
the hard-slant rays were
cold and golden and they
made blue shadows… darker
than black somehow

i saw my dog lying, sleeping?
no, she was not sleeping
i slid over the grass on my knees
still conscious of my new khaki
pants and touched a flank
with black-gloved hands

i must admit i was little
expecting to see death but a little
curious to see it too—I was so
young then and the glassy eyes
were more beautiful... than painted
marbles, but i could feel the cold
through my glove. so terrible
i screamed

o, i screamed! and my voice
cracked with pain and cold and
puberty and i could hear the footsteps
of my mother on the back deck
(still in her multi-colored curlers, a
magenta nightgown, her glasses on).

and as i looked back at her
i felt her relief that I was not hurt
it was just . . . my . . . dog
how i hated her, then!

TintedFragipan
05:24 PM

2006-01-28T23:59:00.000-05:00

"“the farmer theory”

and, how many days has your
socialite hand flourished?
black fingernails have found their way into
your breast pocket;

the rustic-plaid flannel
with ragged holes on the elbows
has endured all your
cadaver mistresses, one
by one.

and oh,
whatever happened to your
stoic nature?
epicureanistic tastes overwhelm me

slowly
d.r.a.w.i.n.g
this frame
black & white--
you add red.-and white.-and blue.

personable natures are so alien in your bubble and you don't know how to cope.

maroon petticoats flash
above my knees,
and your geisha
-hungry ice-eyes forget your place.

i like to paint my fingernails black.

what do your all-american levi's think of that?"

I didn't write it, but it made me happy on this night of all other nights. It just goes to show that some days, when you're so lucky it's unbelievable, you can find something worth reading on FictionPress.com

Anonymous
11:04:05 PM

To my secret love

2006-01-26T23:59:00.000-05:00

Jenny was the prettiest girl I'd ever seen,
And I wished that someday she'd be mine.
'Cause it was like dacin' throgh a heavenly dream
Just to look into her deep blue eyes.

And the sound of her laughter was church bells ringing,
and bluebirds singing in the spring.
And every time I saw her my heart would flutter
Like a butterfly on the wing.

Jenny was the sweetest girl I ever loved,
And I secretly hoped she loved me.
Because having such an angel from heaven above,
Was almost too good to believe.

And the sound of her laughter was church bells ringing,
and bluebirds singing in the spring.
And every time I saw her my heart would flutter
Like a butterfly on the wing.

This is for all of you out there who are loving (or being loved) in secret.
Hopefully the day will come when that hidden love will be revealed, and the joy will be worth the wait.

And for Jenny, the one secretly loved: If only I could tell you how I feel inside. I sit by, watching and waiting, always wanting to speak the truth but never able to. Know that I will always be there beside you, supporting you through good times and bad, weathering the storm with you, waiting to tell you the truth.

May faith keep you all, and forever hold the magic of your minds.

knight_racer979
07:13 PM

2006-01-23T23:59:00.000-05:00

Can I suggest
that you invest
in something more
than hopelessness
before you learn that
the ride
is over

Anonymous
01:05:18 PM

2006-01-23T23:58:00.000-05:00

Last Night I Swore I Saw Myself In The Gravel

Click-click.

The slick slip on the tip of your tongue
Tapping your teeth
The taste of love on a cold city street

Everything is over when the sidewalk loses its substance.

Sweet respiration
After a night’s desperation
Find salvation in penetration

Lovers always linger at the train station.

Flickering street lights
Cut through the black
Like a butter knife

Spread the rumor with a bang.

Just remember that it’s best executed
When your thumb is folded
Back into your hand

TransferStudent7
12:39:01 PM

2006-01-22T23:59:00.000-05:00

A two part poem, I wrote this when I was feeling particularly exultant and arrogant, and it's an exercise in rigid rhyme and meter. If I were to title it, I would call it "Iambic Tetrameter, Bitches."

I.
O, through the pine-wall'd corridor
Where never man has walk'd before
(except for one last happy night
so long ago), and where no sight
of man is seen, or woman seen,
among the needles evergreen:
that is where we two now must go--
through silver barks and hostile snow
drifts (some are piled five foot high)--
until at last we touch the sky
and you and I become, as God!
The rulers of this earthly sod!
There in the holy sacrement
our days eternal shall be spent
and all shall fear our name.

II.
The sun burns high in firmament
An eternal stalwart testament
That sends each ray of light between
The cells of all the grasses green
Helios, omnipresent eye,
You make your route across the sky
And tell me that if I would dare
To look through daunting solar glare
That I could grip your solar flare
And take the rider's fiery chair

But where then would your horses go,
With master whom they do not know?
They’d snort and toss and roll their eyes--
For to me love or me despise--
Or perhaps all things would go well
And with my exultant heart would swell
To look from thence and see the ground
While flying the whole world around
And in my ears the mournful sound
Of glowing angels rustling gowns.

What changes wrought upon my stop,
Which would I find were made atop
The world, upon that golden seat?
Would people I met in the street
Back away from my transcendence
(Moses’ face, out of God’s tents)?
It would be trite and so mundane
To return back to earthly plane
and rendez-vous with shadow’s stain:
The sons of Seth, Abel and Cain

TintedFragipan
04:04 PM

a little rose petal for your bedside

2006-01-19T23:59:00.000-05:00

Nocturne for a Soprano

It's not my heart I feel in my throat
Whenever you deign to glance
On a lost companion --
One of better days.
Instead I feel his liver
And bilious anger coursing through
When we have all found our way...
Will we yet remain lost too?

I, child, am in the proverbial candy shop.
Discouraged by my elders
From sampling the goods arrayed above
Stacked haphazardly on translucent shelves
They smell so sweet, perhaps just a taste...
But I am commanded to refrain.
Would the best man try this well?

Every childish misconception
May never be erased.
I spoke to Pan on the subject
He said that time is not given
By the alligator's clock.
But it is given by sweet needles
That thread us to our shadows.
Will I ever find a shadow?

Shall you dream about
What you will never be allowed to touch?
The choicest morsals
Are out of my reach - forever.
But sometimes our lives last longer.

Your judgement is not wanted
But still I understand.
Our roles are not so laid out,
That we can shift the duties around.
But sopoforics are recommended
Whenever I step lightly.
Whole lives concealed in a single wor(l)d.
You conceal them too.

The childish sadness descended
"He cries at the strangest things."
The thought of every day
Brings a bone-weariness
Exhaustion cannot be tamed -
It finally re-asserts itself,
The earth begins to slip.
But who can blame such a one
Weren't you ever hungry yourself?

DoctorAnonymous
09:18 PM

For he whose name was writ in water

2006-01-19T23:58:00.000-05:00

" A quarrel in the streets is a thing to be hated, but the energies displayed in it are fine"
-John Keats

Alas, Grecian urns are forever more cursed
to be fated with the same avaricious consumption
as the Potter himself.
How fickle is man to boast his origins of clay.
And still how radiant that earthen odor is to he who knows
not yet his beast is broken.

Alas, the astral titans grow weary in their chambers
Begging for a banquet of sound to satiate their solar tongues.
The stardust of their gardens blinked their way
and the silence screamed in violent contortions
the void shrieked (with heart of harpy and health of dove)
Through stalwert and stoic labor pains

Maverick
07:12 PM

2006-01-14T23:59:00.000-05:00

i was in the parking lot when
Armegeddon came and you were
gone. everyone was suddenly
gone and where the sound of cars
had been there was nothing but
the sound of crickets.
i was left alone--
the king of the parking lot:
my paved pavilion and the stately
pruned trees watched my parade…
until the sun began to rise.

i fled into the grocery store and hid
beneath a yellow can
of green peas
the silver-fish befriended me
and spoke to me their little language,
(it tasted like pinto beans)
their life span was short
so i was their god eternal
but when the sun went down
(and they died)
i went back to the parking lot

years had elapsed beneath
the green beans
and sprightly pine trees
were pushing up through the cracks
the deer crushed them! crushed them all!
on their mad stampede to get to Me
{their yellow eyes were rollllling
and i admit i was afraid
until they nuzzled me}.

redeemer, they
whispered.

i plucked out their soft gray
tongues and ate them
what delicacy! in the parking
lot and Me alone as the king of
it.

TintedPragipan
10:39 PM

So your body is a temple...

2006-01-08T23:58:00.000-05:00

Your yawn beckons a chasm
(No doubt the queen of darkest alleys)
And utters a sleepy spasm
From your lungs and pagan valleys

Where apathetic are the saints
Who worship what each idol paints
I have never been moved by any a sermon
Of second hand grace
And communion bourbon.

Maverick
10:25 AM

2006-01-07T23:59:00.000-05:00

Open Heart

by Kris Lynn

If life's so full of changes,
Why does it always stay the same?
I wanna get out, I cry for freedom,
but I'm stuck in this place I hate.
It's the Truth she's against,
but it's me that she's trying to break.
She is blind to the fact
that our friendship is at stake.
I put myself down,
cuz that's what I've come to know.
If these things aren't true,
then why does she tell me so?
She ridicules, she brings me down,
My emotions run on high.
To the point where in my mind,
I think of taking my own life.
I fight myself and flush the pills,
but then hate myself still, even more.
How could I have come to this place
I've never been before?
Even to this day these thoughts
still enter into my mind.
There's days when I look in the mirror,
and hate is all I find.
Thoughts run through my head:
"I'm beautiful. Why can't anyone SEE?
Will I go through this life without
anyone to love ME?
"I'm searching for someone to love me,
JUST the way I am.
I need someone to listen,
but also understand.
I know that I am young
and have so much more to learn,
But I want someone to HOLD me,
yes this is what I yearn.
All of you cynics out there,
I won't mention any names.
You are probably laughing,
'cause you think that I'm insane.
But YOU grow up without hugs and kisses,
and tell me YOU don't want,
Someone who will hold you tight,
and tell you that you're loved.

Kris Lynn
11:25:15 PM

2006-01-06T23:59:00.000-05:00

What Causes Cold?

Welcome, children,
You’ve made it to the world.
But I’m sad to say
That all the autographs have faded
Off the walls.
All the tomes
That you picked apart and analyzed
Were based upon the theory
Of The Loss of Innocence.
And, children, now that you’re here,
You can lose that innocence again
And again and forever.
It’s hard to find what’s lost.
And I’m sorry to say
That all the photographs
Have evaporated up
From their slots on the walls.
Oh, but don’t fret.
The beautiful people,
They still exist.
But you should hurry on up
Before their frail frames die.
Will your end be the same?
Oh no, don’t ask me,
The decision is yours alone.
Just don’t search for salvation in yourself.
You’ll never find the stamina
To be perfect.
I’m sickened to say
That these ravenous ghosts
Will never cease
To search for and strike at your senses.
You see, the weather report
Isn’t the only reason that you shiver.
Do you know what causes cold?
It’s a lack of heat.
Warm up the world, please.
The sun can only shine
On one half at a time,
And while you bask in the sun’s light,
There will always be another child
Saying prayers in the dark.
I’m sad to say
That Marie Antoinette
Didn’t really let them eat cake.

Anonymous
11:29:35 PM

2006-01-06T23:58:00.000-05:00

he came over but laughed
do you even take biology
he said and i said
no
but ive studied some with
you and i think ill really like
it
he understood--pulled out his
book

we opened it slowly
trembling hands at first
and oh it was warm and soft
the soft warm soft knowledge
of biology
was at our fingertips
and we were (are)
so young
i began to pump my hands over the
pages and pump faster and
faster
trying to rub the information out
of your
biology book

i still didn't understand but
suddenly (so suddenly)
it hit me! from behind--
BAM i understood
and the knowledge came
and came inside of me
(it was the shape of an
amoeba, simple protist)
i laughed (weakly) and said
i thought we'd read
some more of the book before
it just
hit
me like that (from behind)
sudden knowledge can hurt
but its a good hurt
and we lay in the warm after
noon after
glow of our sudden knowledge
of biology

and you were a man
and i was not
quite a man (but i
wanted to be, believe
me)

TintedFragipan
08:16 PM

2006-01-05T23:59:00.000-05:00

Even though this isn't my poem, it's still my secret. I was happy when I came across it. This is an excerpt from Blue Spruce by Mark Halliday:

Secondly,--and here's the real charmer
among the attractions of verse:
it's so much easier to write than prose!
Poets don't admit this, of course,
and why should they?
If they're not going to get paid
they should at least be allowed to
milk the public for a little respect;
and in this country people respect work
That's right, I said work,
and no funny business. So a versifier,
in order to win any lasting respect
(beyond the glow of a few chuckles)
has goot to seem to labor.
Yet the secret fact of the matter is,
as indicated above, that verse is no sweat
relatively speaking; because

you don't have to plug all the holes;
in fact you're supposed to
punch out
new ones;
you can leave loose ends dangling
all
over the
bed
the
kitchen table,
your lover's
body
your
parent's lives,
and people accept them as part of your game.
In verse there is no final judge,
and they know it, and you know they know it, and as long as you tie up every fith string,
rougly, your readers and your listeners will imagine
that some of the four strings
are probably tied up, and who knows which?
Oh, it's a fine life, this making verses;
PROSE IS SERFDOM
in poetry the freedom is a blast.
("Blast"... do I mean that metaphgorically?
do I intend some ironic overtone of explosion?
Or is blast here simply a colloquial term
which I resort to for a touch of comic relief?)
Just leave them baffled
and they'll treat you right!
It's so easy when you get the knack,
I could die laughing about it sometimes--

(And there's more, but I'm probably too long already. Anyway, I feel like this a lot.)

Anonymous
11:39:01 PM

A Hymn for Lost Love, Found Again

2006-01-05T23:58:00.000-05:00

As I was out walking, one late lonely night,
Looking for something like love,
A beautiful Lady appeared by my side,
With a loveliness dreams are made of.

She looked in my eyes and she saw through my mind,
She said "I know what you need,"
And she held my face in the palm of her had,
And whispered these words unto me:

"I will love you completely with all that I am,
and I will love you without restraint.
I will love you because of the love I can give,
and not for the love I can take."

She drew me down softly and held me so close,
it was almost a dream coming true.
But as we lay queitly in each other's arms,
something was missing I knew.

Then she lifted her head from my shoulder and said,
"If you want all that love can be,
Then just as I've given myself unto you,
So you must give yourself to me."

"I will love you completely with all that I am,
and I will love you without restraint.
I will love you because of the love I can give,
and not for the love I can take."

I woke with a start, in the depths of the dark,
and I found it was only a dream.
Then I realized, as I looked in your eyes,
You were right there beside me.

We were all linked in a loving embrace,
You and the Vision and I.
And I swear by the lesson I learned in my dream,
I will love you like this 'till I die.

I will love you completely with all that I am,
and I will love you without restraint.
I will love you because of the love I can give,
and not for the love I can take.

All for the love I can give,
and not for the love I can take.

I will love you because of the love I can give,
and not for the love I can take.

Knight_Racer979
07:05 PM

2006-01-05T23:57:00.000-05:00

"And All Participles Will Grow Weary and Stop"

My pupils have shrunk to a size reserved
For polysyllabic units of measure
I am not paralyzed with fear- this is a
Comatose tragedy
The air sighs relief having dodged screams afire
I am terrified
I pray to anything pure of this life
That I will not falter
Through the floorboards of this remorse
And I shudder to discover
That this pen now
Fails to grant me solace.

Maverick
06:26:07 PM

2006-01-04T23:59:00.000-05:00

Unfortunate Lack of a Poem

I will write on the sky,
With stars for a pen.
I write on a scale
Unknown to mortal men.
I write Homer's Odyssey,
Along with other epics.
Stories that give insight to readers.
I write about the adventures of man.
Stories that give God-inspired motion.
I write about two people.

I write how the with stars in her eye,
Smiles and manages to shiver my spine.
But the smile is not the story here.
There is no romance, she is no Juliet;
It's been twisted and broken since first we met.
It won't matter at all in the long run of things.
There'll be no reminder men eternally sing.
On and then off…
Perhaps it will never
Mean that much to you, reader of these letters.
And you won't understand why it matters.
With this preface, I give a caveat.
This poem will waste your time,
As it has wasted my heart.
You'll lose your place,
You'll put the book down.
Reader beware, there's no story here.

I cry as I write because I know it is nothing
There was no love, or even seduction.
But you won't cry, the story is not sad…
Because there is no story.
There is no epic.
There is no love, there's no affection.
There are only these thoughts of a lonely boy.
Sitting alone they get out of control.
And the love that he wishes for so much.
Is a stake in his heart as he sits with his pen.
I write on a heart
With flames for a pen.
With hopes it will cauterize,
And the love there will end.
I write a simple ode,
To a wonderful .
A story set in early October.
I write about trees weeping,
Losing their leaves.
I write about two people.
One of them is me.

DoctorAnonymous
08:57 PM

2006-01-03T23:59:00.000-05:00

A Good Knight’s Ideal

I’m as sleepless as the New York skyline
And just as weary of the morning fog
Oh! But what an entrance for a sun such as the one outside
The mercurial urbanity of this place will soon be lost

The sun only leads to pale moonlight
So your glow may be glorified throughout the night
And the snow only falls, knowing ahead,
That your brilliance will transform it to dewdrops instead

I will discard my Yankees cap for a tophat
And my scrawl for the cursive
That echoes your curves
I will be the smell before rain
The calm before the storm
Aramaic
A good knight’s ideal
The silhouette of every good thing that has graced this earth.
But never for myself
No, never for myself

Maverick
08:55:41 PM

"Stop" Poem

2006-01-03T23:58:00.000-05:00

Electronegativity
Ions, none, and metal burns
it’ll take your tongue
and leave you with nothing
no hydrogen or hydroxide
in selfish stability
Ionize, ionosphere, and hear the northern lights

If my tooth fell out
would you make me drink vinegar
and would it mix with the blood
like static electricity, electro! negativity
e=mc^2 and the theory of relativity
I can taste the vinegar on my tongue
faster than the jump of an (synapse!) electron

We’re all just byproducts of
our constant, ceaseless entropy
we’re screeching metal. rock and dirt
and to dust we will return because
the universe hates the taste of metal
but loves it when electrons jump
into an early grave.

Anonymous
08:44:02 PM

2006-01-01T23:59:00.000-05:00

Trip's Contemplation
She laughs, she moves
Bright lights flash the window
Illuminate her lips
My heart, for a moment, leaps.
She pauses and she smiles.
I miss a beat.
We go on talking, we're having fun.
Our life together has just begun.
How cute when she speaks.
I know that she'll always make me smile.
That 's eyes tugged at me that night.

We walk up her stairs.
She begins to hypothesize.
On things of unknown importance.
Her stance suggests my hope
Her easy glance.
She reaches down and touches my hand.
All the scenarios never equated to this.
I pause for a moment and believe.
Life is love, it isn't pain.
Everything in the world is right again.

or is it...
reality hits.

I'm as always, all alone
Bright lights blind me, remind me
Illuminate the empty seat.
An empty place inside
Like a mouth poised to devour my heart.
I'm just driving, no emotion.
Block it out ****(my name), too much pain.
What could have been... stop.
I can't express the pain inside
I try:
grinding gears, acid-etched, destroy my heart.

I walk to my room
Blurry-eyed imagination of a never-life.
Never knew how much I wanted this before.
Her smile.
I reach up and wipe encroaching tears.
For years I've wanted that
Times before, disappointment.

DoctorAnonymous
11:44 PM

2005-12-21T23:59:00.000-05:00

Nostalgia Wears Red with a Black Belt

I am six.
But first I am a Power Ranger.
My friends and I protect imaginary lands from
Imaginary things.

I am six.
But first I am watching Aladdin.
I see with wild-wind eyes the tale of
Bravery and beauty.

I am six.
But first I am a LEGO architect
Constructing illustrious castles which
Are reserved for long dead kings

I am six.
But first I am a student
School is out, let summer sound, for I am
Forever free from duty

I am seventeen.
But first I am alive
And finally I understand that
Imaginary things
Bravery and beauty
Are reserved for long dead kings
Forever free from duty.

Maverick
11:39:41 PM

2005-12-19T23:59:00.000-05:00

Photosynthesis

Would her eye blink,
The sound would be a whisper to her frenzied footsteps
So black a blanket she wraps ‘round her ancient Mother
The waves (both shoes and shore) hurl her masochistic tears toward heaven.
And Grendel’s teeth do gnash in kind

Second hand smoke echoes second hand shine
Bidding apocalyptic turpentine
And that same fire, that brilliance, that ire
Blinds the sky with blood of dawn
And Hyperion’s gaze so fierce flares on

Accelerated ambition, shadowless and brave
Mature both in lens and length
A whisper to the grave
This is the din in your mouth
And this is the double helix spiraling towards the sky

Maverick
11:31:49 PM

2005-12-18T23:59:00.000-05:00

At the peak of my pendulum I
felt the flash in your soft, indefinite
colored hair. And your lips burned
at the corners (I could tell) where
the spittle had leaked out of your con-
temptuous smile and froze.

The phoenix left your throat as you
yawned wide your facial chasm
and streaked into space like quick
fire. For a moment I hung at the bottom—
inertia is not—and saw the meaning of
your burning song in my ear, the nuance
of your vocal penetration.

Wet sand on my feet, friction melting
me like glass and then I stopped and stood
under the blue fluorescents and glanced at
you: male form in relief against the green-red
diamond field. I said “let’s get some nachos” and
you laughed, not understanding. You paid for them.

Anonymous
07:58:08 PM

2005-12-17T23:59:00.000-05:00

I’d Sooner Date Your Shadow

If only Fate would commit
To what irony would see fit,
But then you’d be smothered by your own wasted breath.
So in honor of your perfection,
And to prevent a resurrection,
I’d love to mark your time of death.

You would want that right?
For me to pay attention to details?

You were always right.
You were always right.
You were always right.
You were always rightfully ignored by all of your imaginary friends
Despite your desperate attempts to impress them.

But
I will support you.
I’ll be the couch you’re laying down on
When the psychologists announce that
You’re clinically insane.

I will heal you
I’ll be the surgeon for your heart transplant
Because studies show that black holes
Fail to give adequate circulation
Fear not. As always,
The bill’s on me.

I’d give you the best care.
I’d give you the best care.
I’d give you the best care.
I’d give you the best charismatically aggressive anthem that my vocal chords ever would have dared to recite.
With a tone that could reach your elegant ears
and words that would ignite the airwaves ferrying them.
And your eyes will see truth.

You have the most beautiful eyes.
You have the most colorful eyes.
You have the most sobering eyes.
You have the most sadistic isolating stare that would cause God Himself to cry…
Out of self-pity

We are both train wrecks
But I will stop dead on my tracks
And in a shower of sparks and deafening din
I will shout to the world of mice and men
“I am no Jesus”
And I will proclaim to the cities
“I am no Caesar”
And I will tell to the people
“I am no James Dean”
And I will whisper to myself, most quietly of all:
“I am no better than you”

Maverick
02:52:12 PM

2005-12-15T23:59:00.000-05:00

Owed to Love

Oh Love,
Rear not your hoary head.
Wander not with wretched rags
From plagued paupers bought.

How faithful are you, Love,
To leap and jump from
Couples to couplets,
Never staying longer than a last breath.

Were you so noble Love?
Selling your soul to
Patrons and patriots
Under the eyes of eagle, souls, and sun.

Where is your saga now, Love?
You launched a thousand ships,
Drove souls to drink poison
And propelled odysseys

Men once died for you, Love.
Now they but spit and grind roses in your name.
Have you sunk so low as Hell,
To do all but obsess o’er Heaven’s gate?

Maverick
08:48:53 PM

"Cookie Jar" by Jack Johnson

2005-12-02T23:59:00.000-05:00

Now we turn on the tv
But it’s so embarrassing
To see all the little people
I don’t know what they mean
And it was magic at first
When they spoke without sound
But now this world is gonna hurt
You better turn that thing down
Turn it around.

Well it wasn’t me says the boy with the gun
Sure I pulled the trigger but it needed to be done
because life’s been killing me ever since it begun
You can’t blame me cause I’m too young.

You can’t blame me sure the killer was my son
But I didn’t teach him to pull the trigger of the gun
It’s the killin on this tv screen
You can’t blame me it’s those images he sees

You can’t blame says the media man
Well I wasn’t the one who came up with the plan
No I just point my camera at what the people wanna see
Man it’s a two way mirror and you can’t blame me

You can’t blame me says the singer of the song
Or the maker of the movie which he based his life on
It’s only entertainment, and as anyone can see
The smoke machines are making man you can’t fool me

It was you it was me
It was everyman
We’ve all got blood on our hands
We only receive what we demand
And if we want hell then hell is what we’ll have

Now we’ll turn on the tv, but it’s so embarrassing
To see all the other people
Don’t even know what they mean
And it was magic at first
But let everyone down
And now this world is gonna hurt
You gotta turn it around.
Turn it around.

Anonymous
05:41:47 PM

2005-10-25T23:59:00.000-04:00

We will stand in that room one day

a rosy room that smells of cinnamon

and frustration. and I will reach out my hand

slowly toward the wall; I should think

the pallor of its knuckles is alarming.

Once steadied I will ask you if I

can touch your face or pour the tea.

I’ll laugh because you don’t drink tea

ever since the time you spilled it

and the dark black stain consumed you.

and once among the apple trees,

while sitting in the verdant breeze,

i was sure not to make a sound:

i watched you lie upon the ground

placing a long and soul-wrought look

atop the burdened orchard brook

what dark regret that held you there

i now know not, nor do i care!

save that it was to think of me

and us: we two who cannot be

one? o say it so! else i shall die!

to be crushed by the silver sky…

One day

in that room

as fire sears my veins to ash

throughout the idle pleasantry…

I think I’ll laugh and pour the tea.

Anonymous
08:13:23 PM

2005-10-11T23:59:00.000-04:00

Well you were sitting around
Like you were looking for something to do
And I'd come strolling by
'Cuz that had been my situation, too
So I came up behind you
And leaned on the back of the seat
It seemed so long I talked with you
Before you were on your feet
And off again
In the wind
While I'll never know if you were real
You really taught me how to feel.

Anonymous
10:13:37 PM

2005-10-10T23:59:00.000-04:00

Your tears do not solve anything at all
They merely make your eyes puffy and red.
It does not matter where the droplets fall—
In public show, or in one’s private bed
They still have no pow’r, no magical charm;
Tell me when salty tears have done as much
As stopping death, disease, and physical harm,
Can tears mimic a mother’s soothing touch?
There is no plant which in that water grows
And there’s no beast that drinks from tear-fed streams
Would merchants trade my tears for food or clothes?
And could those tears fulfill my weakest dreams?

But then somehow still, down my dirty cheek,
I feel the trace of a droplet, a sparkl’ng creek.

Anonymous
09:51:47 PM

2005-10-10T23:58:00.000-04:00

Inside this broken body
There's a heart that yearns for you.
And inside that broken heart,
There's a secret love that's true.
A secret that should not be kept,
And a lie to be untold.
Inside this broken body,
There's a hand that meets your mold.
Your fingers know the story,
And your eyes know my own face.
My broken heart is losing ground,
Your own's my saving grace.
Inside this broken body,
There's a terror to be swayed.
Because I'm so scared without you,
Unsafe and so afraid.
My fear, it does survive me,
And I'm wanting for your guide.
Inside this broken body,
There's a heart somewhere inside.
And even though it's broken
And even though it's cold,
I cannot think without you,
And my mind has grown so old.
I'm careless, unaware,
I'm kissing you away.
You're locked away, a memory;
And a memory you'll stay.
Inside this broken body
There's a stranger you don't know.
And inside that broken stranger,
Is the girl who loved you so.

Anonymous
06:45:59 PM

2005-10-10T23:57:00.000-04:00

Life -- The Elusive Bitch

It's got its peaks
And its valleys
It's got its highs,
And its lows.
It's life,
The elusive bitch.

Why must it taunt me so?

She brings me happiness,
And joy.
She comes bearing euphoria,
And a laugh.
Then she beats me down.

He bears guilt,
And fear.
He hates my guts,
And feeds on my soul.
Then he compliments my style.

Why does life taunt me so?

It build me up,
Only to dash me against the rocks.
It nurtures my soul,
Only to cast it aside.
It's life,
The elusive bitch.

Will it ever end?

Anonymous
06:35:67 PM

2005-10-10T23:56:00.000-04:00

My Sighs

Why do I do this to myself?
Why do I let myself be dragged in time and time again?
He has no idea what he does to me
Every time he speaks, every time he smiles
Every time he laughs, or even breathes.
How come when I think of him,
I can't help but smile?

Why does this happen to me?
Why do I get that fluttery feeling when I hear his name?
I'm the only one who knows
That I get thrown off kilter
Every single time.
How do I fix that,
Make it stop?

Why does he do the things he does?
Why do I fall for it every time?
I can never be mad at him.
He'll frustrate the hell out of me
But then he cracks a joke
And with a smile, the world is right again.
How do I end this cycle?

Why does this keep happening?
Why do I keep drawing these scenarios in my head?
I should just talk to him already.
Let him know his actions have consequences.
Let him know that he's driving me insane,
Slowly killing me, my soul.
How do I tell him that?

Why do I go on this way?
Why can't I end it, once and for all?
I need to, I've got to, and I must.
Before this thing becomes my doom,
Eating me alive until I disappear.
But my problem is the leaving, the absence.
How do I say goodbye?

Why do I let him continue on?
Why does the cycle repeat on for forever?
I thought this would be over by now.
It's lasted long enough, the relentless torment.
This self-torture, this self-pity, this self-loathing.
I should have walked away months ago.
But how can I do it alone?

Anonymous
11:17:56 PM

2005-10-09T23:59:00.000-04:00

What I Would Tell Him…

I would tell him that I think I’m in love with him,
That I’m not quite sure, but it’s probably true.
I’d tell him that I think of him at odd times
And that the strangest things remind me of him
Like a Bible, or postcards, or even Bismarck.
That whenever I hear the sound of deep, stunning laughter
I get this funny, aching feeling in my heart.

I would tell him that I miss him whenever he’s not around,
That I miss him to a point somewhere beyond distraction.
I’d tell him I can’t focus on anything except him
And when I try, I just end up feeling frustrated and alone.
So I'll go running, which is very stupid of me
Because I'll just start thinking of him again, his voice in my head.
Telling me to keep moving, despite the fact that I hate it.

I would tell him that this is too hard,
That I need him to go already, and break my heart.
I’d tell him that he should leave and never come back.
And that yes, it is necessary.
That I don’t think I can go on with this existence.
Smiling, pretending everything is alright while I’m screaming inside.
Maybe I just won’t tell him anything at all.

Anonymous
01:58:27 PM