Archival Review

[LeBroz]

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Now while in the preceding post the third line turned the haiku into a senryu, this is more a zappai right at the outset. First, the original:


haiku: big dipper
by poetboy824©


kids running ahead
flashlights aimed at the night sky --
big dipper!



While this poet's work with haiku and its variants is quite good, I'd suggest a couple changes to strengthen it:

kids run ahead
flashlights aim at sky
big dipper!

Change the verb tense from past to present; gives a more active feel to it. Don't need to call it the night sky, that's implicit with the addition of the third line as well as the presence of flashlights.

Taking the idea of writing a haiku and its attendant difficulties one step further that Liar's description, it is brutally hard.

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[LeBroz]

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Let's wrap up this series on the haiku form. It just seems that this is a genre that brings out more discussion per word than any other form of poetry.


haiku: the train
by poetboy824©


ten years same train every day
for a moment
the first time

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[LeBroz]

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When I read this, the image that came to mind was not about the off-Broadway show but an image of a woman whose biggest problem was that of having a bad hair day.


hair
by smithpeter©


one strands next to another
they are from a common country

their language is goofy
we lie to them, they are sister, brother, mother, father,
great fuckin unkle

you see?

they are slightly askew,
many hide among us
converting our nomenclature
impregnating the weather
on perfect golf days
wishing us to keep things
the way they are becoming


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[LeBroz]

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We're having a hairy day today. Here's one from one of Lit's greats that is easy to understand and enjoy for this early in the morning. The heart shape that appeals so much to the male's visual stimulation...


Hair Chick
by smithpeter©


Hey, it's Valentine's Day!
I can look at that hair stylist's ass
Walking down the hall dumpster bound
If I want to, after all
It is a perfect heart shape

If she worked for my boss
She wouldn't be wearing
Those tight, high waisted,
Thigh clinging, erection bringing,
Cobalt hued jeans

I asked her to trim my mane
Three years ago, chickened out
-Quite a fuss over a hair cut-

She must be miserable with that
Bubbly baby and husband
Muscled, beaming, smoking in bed
Next to her exhausted smiling body,
His brand: "AfterAll"
His slogan: "After Anything, AfterAll"

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[Anschul]

Leon,
Does this work?

Summer eve--
Sun descending
Scarlet sky

 

[LeBroz]

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Anschul, your question is addressed on the Archival Review: Haiku thread. Don't want to muddy up this thread with more of my ramblings.

Now here's another hairy poem; it brought to mind a time when the place I was getting my hair cut had a woman who managed to rub up against me in ways no man would. Hell, if she wanted to rub up against me more than she was, she'd have had to climb into the chair with me. I wouldn't have minded...


hair cut
by oxalis©


I felt it fade away
while urinating
the greatest ever poem
rich in crudeness

high in cholesterol
much fatty chunks
destined to float
up my old blood stream

the barber shop quartet
will always grasp after me
to make me their patron
near bald, my pony tail
in their grinder

their attractive daughter stands
and hits fist to palm, otherwise
silent. she is damn cute
she is damned, cute as hell

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[LeBroz]

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Just look and see, there's poetry in all of life's most mundane events.


Halden Transit, Saturday to Sunday
by MinorMonster©


Through double glazing reflection,
the little girl and the old man
merge
across generations to become
a single being with ghosts
of each origin hanging over
its shoulders.

One ghost turn to whisper
in the other's ear
and one ghost giggles.
The face in between
a Picasso mosaic,
forward and sideways at once,
of secrets and smiles.

Outside, rain cling to glass
to sprinkle the triple headed
benevolent monster
with pearls.

It's still a long way to end station,
roads wind on ahead in the night.
Soon she will rest her head
wearily on grandpa's shoulder,
and I wonder how that
will reflect,

through a double glazed window,
heading north.

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[LeBroz]

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Sometimes you can see the power of therapy working in the written word.


Half of Me Is Gone
by average gina©


This is the most personal poem that I have posted. I may share other things that I wrote in this period of my life in the future. I am putting this here because I realize that putting this out there may help me heal. Comments are welcome.

Half of me is gone
But she’s still here
Wanting no pity
Pulling herself up
Trying to do things
Her way
Even if I could
Her way is the way
Period

Half of me is gone
But she’s still here
She’s at the hospital
I want to go see her
But I don’t have a way
Everyone’s too busy
Should I walk
Thirty miles to visit her
No
Because she is not there

Half of me is gone
But she’s still here
I look in the mirror
And see her half
Her part in me
Her crooked pinkies
Her button nose
Her wry smile
Half of me is gone
But
But
But


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[LeBroz]

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So that's why she sells sea shells by the seashore — all in a vain quest for The Truth.


Half Truths
by submissive kelly©


You with a gull’s beak
Pecking at my
Dry bone skull
Embarrassing to think
Of our words
Naked as jelly fish
Flung on the beach
Left open to the tortures
Of a child’s curious stick
Words which reveal
But never the whole truth
Lies that need
The ocean to breathe
Like fish gasping
For air as they
Wreck against sand and air
We tell our half shell
Truths like open meaty
Clams that have been eaten
Hollow by the salty winds.

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[LeBroz]

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Well now, just look at what I found ~ a poem from the Grab-A-Partner Challenge that didn't appear on any listing {maybe because it was submitted late?}.


halos and hellfires
by SeattleRain©


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late partner poem:
PatCarrington ~ Seattlerain

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Only the brightest illumination can
leave the retina burned and black:
sunspotting, staring too hard
at halos or hellfires.

I still see you long after you have gone.

Blinking doesn't help anymore,
or sunglasses, or sleeping
or even painting faces
on the shadow’s silhouette.

I wait for the shape of man
to blend into midnight darkness.

That is when he finds me, empty as a vase.
Waiting.

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[LeBroz]

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This seems a bit dark and disturbing way to start the day.


Handprints On Plexiglass
by Randi Grail©


How many times did you cry my name
before the new day conquistador
heard your voice and decided
that enough is enough?

Is enough not enough,
when padded cell embrace
and holy haze
hallows the hollow habits
closer again closer?

You know that sound better than me,
the the tin can echo of unbending steel
coming closer closer closer.

Closer than you ever been before
to my ear, please
sing it ring it say it all
right now.

But now, right now,
not even a whisper
escapes.

How many times did you cry my name
before,
then,
ago,
when it did not quite matter?

When this anti-matter solid wall
of nothingness between
raised it's irrefutable membrane
of so close
but so far away.

How many times
will you cry my name,
and watch my face
cry yours?

Just a wingbeat
an eternity away.

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[LeBroz]

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With my warped sense of humor, here's something heavy to delve into on this Friday evening.


Hands Feel Your Poetry Burning
by Liar©


For those who can notice such things,
these walls must roar
in echo of sentences never spoken,
and other ungodly expressions never exclaimed
into the stale air, this perpetual stench,
indecisives' sweat impregnated
in eiderdown, oak and leather.

Amateur Hour recorded rhetorics
whispers past failures back at us.
Not that I listen anyway,
my focus strained to your voice
and your voice alone.

I knew you would choose your blues
for this karaoke kick with too much care.
It is open night on spit, and the mike
that is my perception, erect, anticipating
your growl and grip, is primed for action.
Satisfaction is a deepthroat grunt
of passing thresholds unknown to science.

And I wait, I wait,
I god damn piously wait for you
to stop talking...

...and start speaking.

You own the words... you carry them
like nitro, locked in a Pandora's Box,
suppressed to oblivion and shame.
But as tangible as your name.

Words you could never commit
to runes linked - they would scorch paper,
and wreak havoc if digitally committed
to transport through a fatal pixel push.

But spoken,
cutting and fusing new neural paths,
they would static charge your spine
and taste like scotch and semen
on your tongue...

...a semantic Sangreal spell that would
let me tear that skimpy see-though
Freudian slip right off your burning blush,
and pin your self promotion banter
to the nearest wall.

Teeth would sink softly into succulent flesh,
and god almighty, if you scream
and sing the way you can - between whimper
and borderline laughs - my Kool-Aid plasm will
once and for all purify into the true red
that paints your cheeks
in the complexion of clandestine claims.

One breath would drown in the other's salt,
and there would be no safety fuse...

...not since you scoured your closet
for the perfect mask, a deck of trump excuses,
and found that beautiful veil.
The only reason we'd ever need
to unleash each other's beasts.

Only then, you see,
only then can we cast aside
the robes, Jante's fine tuned straight jackets,
and leave this room as true humans...

...who didn't cower and shrink
to misconceptions of disapproval dreads,
who have no chains and will carry,
with pride, halos of splinter identities
in a sand paper smoothed world.

Speak, I beg you, speak those words
and shatter something still unknown
inside of me into glass dust
that can burn my veins clean,
tear those optic synapses apart
and let your ethereal fire forge me
sapient once more.

If those words and this room,
whatever it is that so desperately needs
to resound in here, can't heal us,
right this moment,
nothing ever will.

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[LeBroz]

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Is he your spouse, lover, and friend first or a handyman and a paycheck?


Handyman and a Paycheck
by lil_elvis©


Handyman and a Paycheck

Not long ago
I’d pull in the drive
Happy to be home
Glad to be alive

Screen door’d slam
Sundress as your sheath
You’d hop in my arms
With nothin’ underneath

Nights of passion
Beginning to fade
New obligations
For family we’d made

But like a good captain
Goin down with a shipwreck
I’ll be here to the end
The handyman and a paycheck

Was it too much?
Happenin’ too soon?
You’d lay in the dark
And cry with the moon

The rent is due
That screen needs mendin’
I gave you my heart
Seems you were lendin’

You’re at the mall
I’m fixin the light
When I said, “I do.”
Did you mean I might?

But like a good captain
Goin down with a shipwreck
I’ll be here to the end
The handyman and a paycheck


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[LeBroz]

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Let's try something this evening that feels rather softly sensual.


Hanging on the edge
by Petme©


Silent words,
I say little
afraid I've fallen to the night
a flightless bird,
no wings just soft feathers...

Scattered in the air,
the cloudless moon playing my nipples.
Without asking I touch you,
from left to right.
no fingers, just my spirit.
Memorizing your body,
a poem put to use,
the patterns of your breath
sustain...

I touch you more ...
... softer than louder,

hanging on the edge
of a sigh.

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[LeBroz]

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Here's a poem so descriptive of a lazy start for Sunday, so, be lazy.


happy sunday poem
by air2o©


woke my dog
laying on his back
like a bat wing glider
masturbating against the thin air
his altitude thick
the atmosphere in room dissolved
cat was curious but non chalant
so sleep became order of day
that and being fucked by a stranger
met on the internet
here in my home
pointing at the ceiling
its cracks
loose slutty plaster over lath

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[LeBroz]

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Continuing in this lazy Sunday vein...


Happy Thoughts
by SlidingInSilk©


Soft beams of luminescence
Drape my windowsill
Dancing with the dust motes
And cutting through the chill

The cat lies in the pattern
Shining on the rug
Stretching languidly
And batting at a bug

I sit reading
In my old wingback chair
What a beautiful feeling!
Don’t you wish you were there?

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[normal jean]

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I don't know about you, but seeing a splash or two of a romance language in a poem makes it seem so much more sexy.

Giulieta's Ghost
by Lauren Hynde©





Ti amo nel silenzio
and listen to your shallow
breath
in the dark

The revelation of
your movement I feel
the weight of
your words

I hear the blood running
mi abbandono
to the body resolved
breathe in the life I am
still
this silent fountain

The true voice
of love

La mia vita​

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I am way behind in your thread and when I got to this, I realized how much I miss Ms Hynde's presence here. I hope her new life is as wonderful as she deserves. And I hope she knows that I always appreciated this poem.

hugs to you Lauren, wherever you may roam.

 

[LeBroz]

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Here's something to soften Monday's harsh edge, a little softly sentimental birthday poem.


Happy Birthday
by Sir_Nathan©


Candles, cakes, and whistles unfurling
Memories of families smiling sitting in silly hats
Tender thoughts echo
Another milestone is passed.

Another chapter written
Older, wiser
Needs and wants evolve
Emotions rise and fall.

Definition plays tricks on our eyes
Sometimes our past catches up
But mostly it's in
Photo albums.

We make our destiny in our own image
Choosing what we can and can't be
Clouds make amazing pictures
Or it looks like rain.

Grow and watch
Smelling the flowers sprouting around you
Be yourself and they will come
To share.

Take risks
Be wise enough to know which ones
And be as honest as you dare
With those you love.

Happy Birthday little one.

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[LeBroz]

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Hmmmmm, that's quite a description for this place — drowning in a sea of poets. Drown in this one; not quite as softly sentimental as the preceding post.


harpoon- dropping the anchor
by SeattleRain©


passion upload #2-

goldilocks
jumpin’ on beds
breaking chairs
never finding the right fit
slip into sleep

squeeze into
dark room everyone has
new black shoes
some shine some buff
not mine
alone, nothing on toe

try again

with the new sofa delivery
singing rat animatronic cardboard pizza
playdate and metabolife
women watch and wonder why
my breast still belongs to a 12 month old

today my breast belongs to no one
drowning here in a sea of poets
with bubbles that sink
steel that floats over waves
and me hovering between
riding the current

dressed in parka
dodging anchor and
what is the goddamn name for that thing
you use to shoot
animals
in
the
ocean


still try

grind me down
whetstone and metal,
cut in two

the shape will never hold
just seem to melt the mold

wishing I actually
existed
somewhere

~
that poem that echoes_s was referring to in Anchorage- all of a sudden passion suddenly

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[LeBroz]

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Coming three months too early, it's harvest time today. Just look at this view of the harvest from Boo.


Harvest Moon
by BooMerengue©


In the fall of the year all was ready to be picked,
or plucked, or dug, or skinned and dressed; put up for the cold times.
In the dark the prayers offered to the Earth Mother, the thanks given,
when under the Harvest Moon my mother gave birth to me,
on her own birthday, her harvest, her legacy, another girl child,
to pick and gather all the fruits to keep her tribe alive and well,
and in my own time another girlchild, in the cold times.
Luna in her Harvest dress provides the harvest
for those of us who look to Her, and choose to give.
For those who choose to be the Harvest.

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[LeBroz]

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Now here's a lady who's oh so busy making sure her garden's well tilled.


Harvest Of Futile Fertility
by ruminator©


The lady surveyed her garden sadly
and a bit too longingly dismayed,
Softly grown long from inactivity
now too seldom the grass was layed
by the excited visitor or laborer who often came.

At one time the path was worn
to her wet and fertile beds
She kept a village wondering of
the succulence exhausted workers all had said
was the reward of harvest when work was done.

She was tilled and tossed many times per year.
Hired hands lined up for the chance to work her.
Too were the times she was left only with a tear
as a remembrance of their time together,
leaving her garden stripped bare of all her fervor.

Through the years of harvest seasons
She turned a chore into a pleasant trick, so well
there were many who knew her pleasured plowing.
But crop rotation is best reserved for younger
fields which yield and are naiively more allowing.

She looks back into her pantry at the empty space unused
..and smiles to herself a secret.
The feast of his lifetime from her years of harvest,
unkown to the wayward stranger who is soon to be served

When they both are full and on his request,
the stranger doesn't leave,
the new need to plan for each day's desserts
is her harvest well deserved.

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[LeBroz]

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After a first line like that, what else is there that I can say?


hating things
by 2rivers©


toilets, they catch shit
self deprecating porcelain
a thing of beauty
to an engineer

it is art for engineers
a joke

that artist’s loft is noisy
too much glass and clanking steam

the artist I see is covered
for a peek, a finger point
a mouth full
drawn down to an edge

so this poem ends in want
not hate
want and beginning


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[LeBroz]

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I'll add to the following list, taking a decongestant for that stuffy head, laying down for just a couple minutes in mid-afternoon, and waking up six hours later.


Hatred
by Remec©


I hate that.
Of course, that...
all-encompassing word
such as it is...
varies from time
and place

Cars pulling out
when the road is clear
to the horizon behind you,

Shopping carts,
laden with a week's worth
of clipped coupon savings,
pushed into the
express lane.

Words and phrases
that dance their way
through my brain,
or over my tongue,
but never seem to make it
beyond my fingertips
and to page or screen.

Memories of events...
special times and people...
who the very thought of
makes the throat ache
and the eyes water,
dimming down to nothing
but emotional
reflexes

I hate that.

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[Senna Jawa]

haiku: big dipper
by poetboy824©

kids running ahead
flashlights aimed at the night sky --
big dipper!
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[...]I'd suggest a couple changes to strengthen it:

kids run ahead
flashlights aim at sky
big dipper!

Change the verb tense from past to present; gives a more active feel to it. Don't need to call it the night sky, that's implicit with the addition of the third line as well as the presence of flashlights.

LeBroz, you're applying certain rules in a mechanical way, but your version is poorer. The first line, English wise, is not working. And due to the psychological circumstances, you get a very pale image at best, almost nothing, and even the exclamation end-mark does not help it.

But indeed, the poetboy nice haiku above is still not optimal. Here is a stronger, sharper version:

night
kids' flashlights puncture the sky
-- big dipper!

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Now it's perfect and optimal. Let's also observe that the singular version would be neither better nor worse:

night
kid's flashlight punctures the sky
-- big dipper!

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In Japanese (or in Chinese) you'd have both versions in one!

Best regards,

 

[Senna Jawa]

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Let's wrap up this series on the haiku form. It just seems that this is a genre that brings out more discussion per word than any other form of poetry.


haiku: the train
by poetboy824©

ten years same train every day
for a moment
the first time
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This one is very-very good, very nice.