"To keep the review thread clean..."

[flyguy69]

Here is the line. See
the masking tape? That's it.
You are on that side. Well we are.
and some day
we will all be
on the other side. Now some
people believe that the line
is mutable, that it gets caught
up in the vacuum cleaner now and again
and some people believe the line
is undermined by its own particulate
nature--everyone and noone
knows for sure.

Nonetheless, the one thing that is certain
is that we will know
when you cross the line.

You won't.

Damnit! I hate it when the kids track sand all over the carpet!


Congrats, Cherry!

 

[flyguy69]

She has vast, suicide windows,
like levees,
breaking with sunlight--
claws still hanging
in the loose screen. Her manx road it
to the pavement. And there are rumors
of a flatmate who didn't bounce--
just rumors.

But that's not why I decline
to room with Mona.
Her crocheted doilies are creepy.

Ha! This is very clever, KJ!

 

[ishtat]

lazybones

Thanks to Maria, Blue, Syndra and Le Broz for the comments on Unheard Unseen on 13th Sept. I didn't realise it was so long since I had submitted anything - must work harder.

 

[Sara Crewe]

............

 

[Tzara]

P.S. Tzara, if you post Sunday's poem tonight...you better find a good place to hide.

I'll do Monday's then.

 

[Tzara]

2-1-9

Reop

I look at it with a jaded mein
and wonder at the optimistic bent
that shaped my life before failure
within the heart of me skewed
my view and altered how I'll see
the next six years.

There's this panic that keeps
surfacing each time I feel the edges
slip and hear the steady rhythm
inside my head that too soon
I'll be doing it all again. I wish
this fragile existence stops
breaking down and then go on.

 

[Sara Crewe]

I'll do Monday's then.

Such a trouble-maker. You weren't one of those students who stood up and did a 360 when the teacher told them to turn around and stop talking, were you?

 

[Tzara]

Such a trouble-maker. You weren't one of those students who stood up and did a 360 when the teacher told them to turn around and stop talking, were you?

720, babe. 720. Redundancy is key.

 

[annaswirls]

Okay Mr. Periodic Table of the Elements, I think we can get 30 poems out of Dante's Hell (which you put me through whilst trying to interpret your sweet italian nothings you whispered in my ear)

I am going to try it. I am stating right up front, I will not be funny or smart or witty or wise, and I am not going to try to speak in biblical terms or style of Dante, I may never mention a beast but I will try to write something every day from a new circle of hell (of course, the ditches too) from a personal perspective.

I am writing this now to make myself feel that I have an obligation. I think I will be spending some time in all of them anyway at some point!!!



Anyone want to play go to hell with me?



Upper Hell: the Incontinent

1st circle: Limbo. Reserved for the souls of the just people who never knew Christ, and those (especially infants) who died without baptism and never committed a sin. Here Dante encounters the ancient philosophers and poets.

2nd circle: The Lustful. Dante talks to Francesca da Rimini, who tells him how she became involved in an adulterous affair with Paolo, her brother in law. Landscape: a violent storm which tosses around the souls. Minos guards this circle.

3rd circle: The Gluttonous. Dante talks to Ciacco, a Florentine, who used to be a parasite, as he was going from people to people, gossiping on everyone. Ciacco gives Dante the first prophecy of his future exile. Landscape: heavy steady rain. Three-headed Cerberus is the guardian.

4th circle: The Avaricious and Prodigals. No relevant character is found here. These souls, mostly clerics, go opposite direction, bumping into each other as they push big rocks. The guardian is Pluto, who makes no sense when he talks.

5th circle: The Wrathful and Sullen. These souls are submerged into the river Styx, which surrounds the city of Dis. The wrathful emerge from the dirty waters while the sullen are completely submerged. Phlegyas will take Dante and Virgil across this river in his boat. Here Dante talks to Filippo Argenti, an old acquaintance for whom he has no pity.

Lower Hell: Violence and Fraud

The city of Dis: High walls with closed doors guarded by devils, helped by the Furies and the Medusa. They try to stop Dante, but a divine messenger forces them to open the door.

6th circle: The Heretics. Dante enters the city and sees a huge cemetery filled with open tombs with fire coming out of them. One of the tombs contains the souls of the Epicureans. Dante talks to Farinata degli Uberti and Cavalcante de' Cavalcanti, father of Guido, the poet, and Dante's friend.

7th circle: The Violent. Introduced by the Minotaur, this circle is divided into three rings:

1) Violent Against their Neighbors (tyrants and murderers). These souls are plunged into a river of boiling blood: the river Phlegethon. They are watched over by the Centaurs.

2) Violent against Themselves (suicides). It is an unnatural forest with leafless trees. These trees are the souls of the suicides. Dante talks to Pier delle Vigne, personal secretary of Frederick II. The trees have no leaves because the Harpies keep plucking them as they sprout. Among the trees Dante sees the souls of the squanderers, chased by bitches.

3) Violent against God and Nature. Blasphemers, Sodomites, etc. Virgil talks to Capaneus, king of ancient Crete, stricken by Zeus's bolt for his rebellion. Then Dante talks to his teacher Brunetto Latini, and later he sees three Florentines, at the edge of the circle.

The river Phlegethon cascades into the eight circle, and there is no path to go down. Dante and Virgil are carried down by a three-nature monster, Geryon.

8th circle: Fraud. It is called Malebolge because it is divided into ten bolge (ditches).

1) Panders and Seducers. These souls are scourged by horned demons. Dante talks to Venedico Caccianemico.

2) Flatterers. These souls are immersed in excrements. Dante talks to Alessio Interminei and the ancient Thais.

3) Simonists. They are set heads down into holes in the rock with flames burning on their feet. Dante talks to Pope Nicholas III, who mistakes him for Boniface VII.

4) Diviners, Astrologers and Magicians. Their heads are turned backwards, so they have to walk backwards. Virgil talks to some ancient people: Amphiaraus, Tiresias, Manto and Eurypylus. Among the modern: Michael Scot,.

5) Barrators. They are plunged into boiling pitch and guarded by ten sneaky demons (Malebranche) led by Malacoda (evil tail). Ciampolo of Navarra (a sinner) succeeds in cheating the demons in a hellish context.

6) Hypocrites. These souls, mostly monks of the Jovial order, walk slowly, clothed in heavy caps of lead. Dante talks to two of them from Bologna.

7) Thieves. These souls keep changing into snakes. Dante recognizes (among others) Vanni Fucci, who predicts the defeat of Dante's party, the Whites, and his exile from the city.

8) Fraudulent Counselors. These souls slide away in the ditch as flames. First Virgil talks to Ulysses, the Homeric hero, then Dante talks to Guido da Montefeltro, a turned saint sneaky character.

9) Sowers of Discord and Schism. These souls are physically torn apart. Dante talks to a few, among them Bertram de Bornio, who holds his severed head like a lamp as he walks along.

10) Falsifiers of metals, persons, coins and words. It is like a huge hospital with people with all kinds of deformities. As in the previous ditch, this too is crowded. Master Adam is the most colorful of them.

9th circle: Treachery. It is divided into four sections. The sinners are in a frozen lake, Cocytus. This circle is surrounded by the Giants. One of them, Antaeus, takes Dante and Virgil and puts them down into the ice.

1) Caina: Traitors to Kin. These are immersed in the ice with head down. Dante talks to Carmiscione de' Pazzi.

2) Antenora: Traitors to Homeland. Dante sees one who keeps biting on another's head. He is Count Ugolino who is gnawing the Archbishop Ruggeri's head. He tells Dante the account of his death.

3) Ptolomea: Traitors to Guests. They are head up in the ice, which is freezing their eyes. Dante talks to Fra Alberigo, who is there while his body is still alive, for having killed his guests as he invited them for dinner.

4) Giudecca: Traitors to Benefactors. These sinners are completely immersed into the ice.

The ice of the 9th circled is kept frozen by Lucifer's six flapping wings. Lucifer has three faces, with three mouths, each chewing on a sinner: Judas is in the middle mouth with his head inside, Brutus and Cassius are in the side mouths, with their heads hanging out.

 

[TheRainMan]

4-23

god, anna.

now, that is something i look forward to reading.




.....

 

[TheRainMan]

4-24

.....

 

[cherries_on_snow]

this is SO how I felt yesterday after arguing, pleading, guilting, reasoning with and very occasionally teaching my 25 students.

passion spent
on working days
kids at night
no time left
down for the fight

all that's left
tired muscles, body and mind.
reasoning left, at the door.
output no match for input
just stand aside, I do it all.

chasing my tail
work work work
when I want to write
all that comes out
blah blah blah

writing live
rerun adventure
hit rewind
start this show again

 

[Sara Crewe]

I'm getting the sense that you are not really all that afraid of me Mr. T. It's quite disconcerting.

This is Not My Sunday Poem

If it were, Sara Crewe would deter
me, with a rock or something hard.

A baseball bat, perhaps, or more like
a hockey stick, since she's a chick

from Canada, our neighbour to the north.
Her slap shot traps the stick's head

against the ice, the pressure bends
the stick, imparts ferocious charge

to puck or poet's head. I'm dead,
in fact, if she whacks me thus, so

I'll keep Sunday's poem abed
till Sunday, when her wrath has fled.

 

[arienette]

Okay Mr. Periodic Table of the Elements, I think we can get 30 poems out of Dante's Hell (which you put me through whilst trying to interpret your sweet italian nothings you whispered in my ear)

I am going to try it. I am stating right up front, I will not be funny or smart or witty or wise, and I am not going to try to speak in biblical terms or style of Dante, I may never mention a beast but I will try to write something every day from a new circle of hell (of course, the ditches too) from a personal perspective.

I am writing this now to make myself feel that I have an obligation. I think I will be spending some time in all of them anyway at some point!!!



Anyone want to play go to hell with me?

I'm in, I'll start tomorrow.

 

[annaswirls]

god, anna.

now, that is something i look forward to reading.

curious to see which circle I meet you, my friend?

 

[Seduceros2]

Belated gratitude

Too much time has passed since VampireDust mentioned my Thigh poem and COS said such kind things about "After the Party Before the Ocean." I'm not truly a cad, I merely play one in the talkies. Thank you both, and both please forgive my slow response time.

Seduceros2

 

[annaswirls]

I'm in, I'll start tomorrow.

oh what a lovely travel partner! see you in hell, arienette!

 

[Sara Crewe]

............

 

[WickedEve]

anna's Nursing the Drought

your ONLY problem
09/17/06 by Maria2394
and its not really a problem, of course , is yuo are so fucking honest!! and some people do not know how to deal with that. GDP's comment also is honest.

I dont really like "that part", but its necessary to the rest of the work, showing what the young woman went through in her bloodquest.

sometimes you are too good for your OWN good

xoxox

maria

----------------------------------------------------
Maria, I hope you don't think the giant dripping pussy couldn't deal with blood, shit and piss. (you know what I mean... )
I just wonder if those words come across like shock value.
Or like passion and desire--easy to use.
After the gdp and I reread it, I realize they probably do fit this poem. I still wonder what other words may have worked.

 

[WickedEve]

One more thing. Erotic category? Not saying it is or isn't erotic, but since it's about a girl (guessing she's under 18) then should this be in the erotic cat. at lit?

And by the way, I do like the poem and gave it 100, and I don't know why I feel the need to defend myself. I just do!

 

[annaswirls]

One more thing. Erotic category? Not saying it is or isn't erotic, but since it's about a girl (guessing she's under 18) then should this be in the erotic cat. at lit?

And by the way, I do like the poem and gave it 100, and I don't know why I feel the need to defend myself. I just do!

You shouldn't feel the need to defend yourself, it shouldn't be in the erotic category. I usually err in the other direction. I am not going to defend my decision to put it there as my reasoning was flawed in the moment of a snap decision. If I had thought about it at all, I would not have put it there. I will ask Laurel to move it. Your reasoning is sound.

I still don't know what to do about the shit blood piss because it needs to be said but to use little girl language would sound silly.... I dont know what a 5th grader calls/ed it. Maybe go with my grandmom and her number 1 and number 2.... making the vagina about a 1.5 I guess?

grandmom could not bring herself to using words
number one or number two?
In the summer before 5th grade
I realized
blood does not even get a number
just don't talk about it

 

[WickedEve]

You shouldn't feel the need to defend yourself, it shouldn't be in the erotic category. I usually err in the other direction. I am not going to defend my decision to put it there as my reasoning was flawed in the moment of a snap decision. If I had thought about it at all, I would not have put it there. I will ask Laurel to move it. Your reasoning is sound.

I still don't know what to do about the shit blood piss because it needs to be said but to use little girl language would sound silly.... I dont know what a 5th grader calls/ed it. Maybe go with my grandmom and her number 1 and number 2.... making the vagina about a 1.5 I guess?

grandmom could not bring herself to using words
number one or number two?[/I
In the summer before 5th grade
I realized
blood does not even get a number
just don't talk about it

I wondered about a girl saying shit and piss. Maybe kids do now?
It is a very real and very good poem. I wouldn't want to tackle it. I remember mine starting on Sunday morning and I thought it would get me out of church, but no! lol

 

[Sara Crewe]

I wondered about a girl saying shit and piss. Maybe kids do now?
It is a very real and very good poem. I wouldn't want to tackle it. I remember mine starting on Sunday morning and I thought it would get me out of church, but no! lol

My kids are in 5th, 3rd and 2nd grade and they would all say poo and pee.

You hear piss and shit from high school students but mostly from the guys, at least at the schools where I have taught.

 

[annaswirls]

My kids are in 5th, 3rd and 2nd grade and they would all say poo and pee.

You hear piss and shit from high school students but mostly from the guys, at least at the schools where I have taught.

yeah poo and pee here too I just cannot bring myself to putting them in a poem!!! ahh!!!

 

[Tzara]

I wondered about a girl saying shit and piss. Maybe kids do now?
It is a very real and very good poem. I wouldn't want to tackle it. I remember mine starting on Sunday morning and I thought it would get me out of church, but no! lol

Unless I'm mistaken (which I very often am) the narrative voice is that of an adult reminiscing about a childhood experience. So I think the words work in context. They aren't a quote. They are a remembrance and would accordingly be couched in adult language.