Companion to the Five in Five

[TheRainMan]

Good to see you back and posting some great inventive stuff, RM!

thanks, El.

don't get here as often as i'd like. life conspires.

 

[Eluard]

thanks, El.

don't get here as often as i'd like. life conspires.

Yup, first it inspires, then it conspires, and after it just tires.

 

[Eluard]

Don’t get cocky with these toys.
They can get very Australian on you.

Never was a truer word said.

 

[PandoraGlitters]

It is so wonderful to read your poems, RainMan. This voodoo series is really wonderful and instructive! Can you post how-to photos with it as well?

Seriously, these are very enjoyable to read. Two more in the series I hope?

 

[bluebell]

Late, late, late- and possibly irrelevant, but I just went through the Five in Five thread (and the feedback thread- what can I say? I hate being unschooled) and there are a couple of things I wanted to comment on. Just because I kinda can, and also because I firmly believe that when you have something amazing or beautiful to say about someone, you should just say it, even at the risk of being thought a mountain of mush.

I truly hate sounding like a school-girl sucker-upper, but there is some frickin' fab stuff in that thread (and all around, really). I feel happy to have been able to read what I could. Thank you all.

That said, I wanted to say somewhere, out loud and in public, despite his likely non-presence, that I think sellthecookie writes wonderful and amazing poems. They're the sort of poems that might seem easy to think of as just, poetry- but if you pay them the most minor amount of attention, their beauty and poignance will multiply tenfold in your head. And stick there, like a starred punch-out in the black of your mind.

Liar's poems always stay with me as well, and this one was no exception. I can't recall if he's actually submitted it, but I still wanted to mention my admiration for his work.
I'm not sure whether he likes getting compliments, but for my mind his poems always settle in comfortably. Something in them is at once new and also friendly, like a person you are completely at home with, but who keeps showing you life's new edges. In wonderful colors and sounds.

Ange, I imagine you have a small idea of how fabulous your beautiful brain is, but just in case we needed a refresher, I found this poem bewitching. I'm still cowed by how clever you are- the mercury tears, - it just...makes so much sense and I can also see it...
I'm still geekin' out about it.
This one also makes my mind trip over itself. There's nothing so satisfying as not only finding that someone else has thought of the same things you've thought of, but also articulated them in a way that relieves you of the burden.
I find these words, in particular:
Plums,
those cold purple marvels
are eaten, their pits spat.
make me happy. As if they were waiting to be married forever and you eventually came along and did it.

Also, you said somewhere in here that you write all your best poetry in the car and then almost promptly forget it once you get home and try to reconstruct it.

Word.


Pandora- yeah, you know.

I always read Eluard's poems with fascination, awe, and with my mind in the best form possible. Thank you for raising the bar. And probably my eyebrows. Just, you know, a smidge.

Bijou- dear pixie jesus, what the fuck can I say? I bow.
Nyah and nyah. And all the other nyahs in between.
There are some people who you don't even have to wonder about. It's just there. Just, there. I appreciate that in you.
If growing up and having a brightly-colored rainforest of a brain were ever in my future, I'd be honored if any of it were 1/4 of what you put out there.
Me likey.

 

[TheRainMan]

It is so wonderful to read your poems, RainMan. This voodoo series is really wonderful and instructive! Can you post how-to photos with it as well?

lol

the chapbook will certainly be illustrated.

 

[Homburg]

lol

the chapbook will certainly be illustrated.

Your poems are full of Win. Damned good show.

 

[unpredictablebijou]

bluebell, shucks! Thanks! It's always really nice to see that people are reading the stuff.

I'm honored.

bj

 

[Angeline]

Late, late, late- and possibly irrelevant, but I just went through the Five in Five thread (and the feedback thread- what can I say? I hate being unschooled) and there are a couple of things I wanted to comment on. Just because I kinda can, and also because I firmly believe that when you have something amazing or beautiful to say about someone, you should just say it, even at the risk of being thought a mountain of mush.

I truly hate sounding like a school-girl sucker-upper, but there is some frickin' fab stuff in that thread (and all around, really). I feel happy to have been able to read what I could. Thank you all.

That said, I wanted to say somewhere, out loud and in public, despite his likely non-presence, that I think sellthecookie writes wonderful and amazing poems. They're the sort of poems that might seem easy to think of as just, poetry- but if you pay them the most minor amount of attention, their beauty and poignance will multiply tenfold in your head. And stick there, like a starred punch-out in the black of your mind.

Liar's poems always stay with me as well, and this one was no exception. I can't recall if he's actually submitted it, but I still wanted to mention my admiration for his work.
I'm not sure whether he likes getting compliments, but for my mind his poems always settle in comfortably. Something in them is at once new and also friendly, like a person you are completely at home with, but who keeps showing you life's new edges. In wonderful colors and sounds.

Ange, I imagine you have a small idea of how fabulous your beautiful brain is, but just in case we needed a refresher, I found this poem bewitching. I'm still cowed by how clever you are- the mercury tears, - it just...makes so much sense and I can also see it...
I'm still geekin' out about it.
This one also makes my mind trip over itself. There's nothing so satisfying as not only finding that someone else has thought of the same things you've thought of, but also articulated them in a way that relieves you of the burden.
I find these words, in particular:
Plums,
those cold purple marvels
are eaten, their pits spat.
make me happy. As if they were waiting to be married forever and you eventually came along and did it.

Also, you said somewhere in here that you write all your best poetry in the car and then almost promptly forget it once you get home and try to reconstruct it.

Word.


Pandora- yeah, you know.

I always read Eluard's poems with fascination, awe, and with my mind in the best form possible. Thank you for raising the bar. And probably my eyebrows. Just, you know, a smidge.

Bijou- dear pixie jesus, what the fuck can I say? I bow.
Nyah and nyah. And all the other nyahs in between.
There are some people who you don't even have to wonder about. It's just there. Just, there. I appreciate that in you.
If growing up and having a brightly-colored rainforest of a brain were ever in my future, I'd be honored if any of it were 1/4 of what you put out there.
Me likey.

I just saw this. Thank you so much, not only for the compliments but also because I totally forgot about both those poems. I do that with these threads sometimes. Uh more than sometimes. I have a feeling they may show up in Annaswirl's May challenge thread.

There are so many fabulous poets here. I feel lucky to be around them all because I know it's a big part of what inspires me to try harder.

 

[TheRainMan]

Your poems are full of Win. Damned good show.

kind of you to say. thanks much.

.

 

[Eluard]

RM and Tzara — I'm keeping you company. Port and cigars will be served at the end of each day.

 

[TheRainMan]

RM and Tzara — I'm keeping you company. Port and cigars will be served at the end of each day.

really nice start, too.

 

[Tzara]

RM and Tzara — I'm keeping you company. Port and cigars will be served at the end of each day.

Why do I feel like the kid with taped-up glasses and floodwater pants seated between the class president and the captain of the football team?

I do like port, though. Nice first poem, El.

 

[unpredictablebijou]

*sending a bottle of port, three glasses and some good cigars to the three distinguished gentlemen at the corner table, compliments of the Bistro*

Most excellent work in there. Rainy, you're way too cool to hang about in the squalor, so you probably missed the note, but I did compliment your #1 in there last night. That one took my head off.

bj

 

[Eluard]

Why do I feel like the kid with taped-up glasses and floodwater pants seated between the class president and the captain of the football team?

I do like port, though. Nice first poem, El.

Oh we know how this works out: the class president is indicted for insider-trading, the captain of the football team turns into Al Bundy, or worse, Ted — and the geek with the propeller hat and taped up glasses has gone on to invent velcro or start a company called Google.

Thanks Tz.

 

[PandoraGlitters]

Gentlemen, you are making my eyes wide and my ears drum with your beautiful poems. I will be reading this challenge over and over I think. I love today's page in so many ways it would take all night to enumerate them. More! We thirst!
And for poems more than port.

 

[Tzara]

Oh we know how this works out: the class president is indicted for insider-trading, the captain of the football team turns into Al Bundy, or worse, Ted — and the geek with the propeller hat and taped up glasses has gone on to invent velcro or start a company called Google.

Or Microsoft. I'm older than Larry and Sergey.

Thanks Tz.

You're welcome. Can I have another glass of port?

 

[Eluard]

Or Microsoft. I'm older than Larry and Sergey.
You're welcome. Can I have another glass of port?

You're over your limit I think!

 

[Tzara]

You're over your limit I think!

You're over your limit I think!

Oh, gosh! I've been standing on the table, gesticulating again, haven't I? Seeing double, even.

Sorry.

Sorry, sorry.

I mean, I was a theatre major at Princeton. It contaminated my blood. Friends told me you are not Macbeth, bud. But! Then further confirmation. My Muse said, Avoid strong drink. But I was weak. I am always weak. It's in my nature, actually.

And Birnam Wood is still fucking not at Dunsinane. That always pissed me off. Like a suburb would encroach the city. I mean, really. Think of the tax consequences!

Oh. Yes. Pardon.

I hope I can retain my seat at the Triumvirate. Just serve me coffee. Really.

Or tea. I'd prefer tea. English Breakfast or something like it. No lemon or sugar. Thanks, though, for the offer.

Oh and thank you, but no cigar. I don't smoke.

Great poems, you guys.

Excuse me. I'm so nervous that I'm sick. So, poem:

He Wishes He Was a Bowerbird

I feel like a bowerbird,
with this poem my nest. I try
to spread these shiny verbs just right
to get the girls to see the blue
of my heart and truth. But, well,
I am a different animal
and, woe, the girls are too.​

I think I will just thread several needles and walk vicariously about.

 

[TheRainMan]

. . . Most excellent work in there. Rainy, you're way too cool to hang about in the squalor, so you probably missed the note, but I did compliment your #1 in there last night. That one took my head off.

bj

thanks, bj . . . hope you got it back on okay.

 

[TheRainMan]

Why do I feel like the kid with taped-up glasses and floodwater pants seated between the class president and the captain of the football team?

you never do give yourself enough credit, Mr. T, though everyone here knows what you can do. i read all your poems, in all your incarnations, with rapt interest. i think you're the bomb.

and i'm so with El's velcro/Google comment. if you start a company, i want a pile of start-up stock certificates.

 

[Tzara]

i read all your poems, in all your incarnations, with rapt interest.

Wrapped interest?

Well, in plain brown, I hope.

Hey, seriously. Some superior poems from you, as per usual, TRM. You should publish a book.



Oh, wait. You've done that. Three times. Good show.

 

[Eluard]

you never do give yourself enough credit, Mr. T, though everyone here knows what you can do. i read all your poems, in all your incarnations, with rapt interest. i think you're the bomb.

Quite agree. I like your range: from whimsical to playfully sincere; it's a breath of fresh air. No one else can move quite so effortlessly within those different modes.

 

[Eluard]

Welcome to the 5/5 Sassy. A good start! Pull up a chair and pour yourself a port — always remembering that the port bottle must go clockwise around the table (ancient superstition!).

 

[sassynyc]

thanks El, for the welcome and the port. i have a question about the 5/5. i would guess that we can do whatever we want with a poem after it's been put on the thread. can we use a poem that has already been submitted to Lit.
likewise, can we submit poems from the thread?