Would you?

[Angeline]

<snip> stories.
<snip> ghost stories.

<snip> ghost <snip> room <snip>
<snip> leave <snip> room

<snip> leave <snip> room <snip>
<snip> within <snip> leave<snip>

<snip> within <snip>
within their <snip>

for that is <snip> like their voices sound to me--
quiet anarchy like a kaleidoscope.

There was a quiet ghost on Crematory Hill
<snip> Devil <snip> ghost.

Devil <snip> demons.
<snip> demons <snip> ghosts.

<snip> ghost <snip>
<snip> ghost </snip>

I took the liberty and added the words in red as a suggestion on how to keep true to the challenge. (p.s. I like your true version better).

You mean the original in this thread? I can't decide (ever the Gemini). I think in the one in poem a week I tried to smooth it over some and maybe that isn't the best thing for it. Is that what you thought?

 

[GuiltyPleasure]

No homework?

I must have been asleep that day
I don't recall the task you set
was it to write a roundelay?
or maybe learn some etiquette?

I heap apologies on you
and apples on your desk dear Teach
I know a failing mark is due
and beg your pardon for this breach.

The next task you assign to me
I promise to dispatch with haste
I will exert myself you'll see
your efforts will not be a waste

 

[butters]

Butters your subject is Looking in through the lit window of a house when you're standing outside at night

i am the night breath on your window panes
as you live
stranded
in the blue flicker of your 50" screen
hypnotised
by other lives
all script and SFX

i know
where you keep your keys
your phone
your cigarettes

and know
how you look in his eyes
before leaving a room

count
your footsteps
plot your moves
watch
as his hand slides up your thigh

in the dark
unseen
i bite my wrist

 

[HarryHill]

i am the night breath on your window panes
as you live
stranded
in the blue flicker of your 50" screen
hypnotised
by other lives
all script and SFX

i know
where you keep your keys
your phone
your cigarettes

and know
how you look in his eyes
before leaving a room

count
your footsteps
plot your moves
watch
as his hand slides up your thigh

in the dark
unseen
i bite my wrist

..
that's a keeper

 

[UnderYourSpell]

Harry your subject is Telling things you wish people would say to you

I wish someone would tell me,
it's all going to be okay,
that this reality was made to turn out this way
and all those lost gifts and regrets
were only making way for unknown largess
to fill the vacant need, like a hole in a dark yard
where no one should walk without light

I wish some one would say,
here is light for your path,
and a band aid
for your wounded soul.

*cries* must be Manopause, please pick something light next time.

It's your fault for making it 'heavy' ! but ok!

 

[UnderYourSpell]

i am the night breath on your window panes
as you live
stranded
in the blue flicker of your 50" screen
hypnotised
by other lives
all script and SFX

i know
where you keep your keys
your phone
your cigarettes

and know
how you look in his eyes
before leaving a room

count
your footsteps
plot your moves
watch
as his hand slides up your thigh

in the dark
unseen
i bite my wrist

Oh! Am I the only one finds that tres creepy?

 

[UnderYourSpell]

No homework?

I must have been asleep that day
I don't recall the task you set
was it to write a roundelay?
or maybe learn some etiquette?

I heap apologies on you
and apples on your desk dear Teach
I know a failing mark is due
and beg your pardon for this breach.

The next task you assign to me
I promise to dispatch with haste
I will exert myself you'll see
your efforts will not be a waste

Just this once because it's you
and we go back away,
I'll let this one transgression slip
but cane you anyway :caning:

 

[UnderYourSpell]

But he overused the letter I. It's eye-assaulting with all them damn I's.


ETA: Annie, can I get another prompt/challenge?

Ooops sorry Neo your subject is Write a poem from the perspective of a villain in a fairy tale

 

[UnderYourSpell]

Tess your subject is You are a werewolf!

 

[GuiltyPleasure]

Tess your subject is You are a werewolf!

*rubbing sore botty* Is there no depth too deep to which you will send me?


Okay.

 

[Tzara]

So. That Kenneth Koch book/article/thingy: did you remember what it was? Now I'm curious. I can google but mebbe you remember?

It's from Making Your Own Days: The Pleasures of Reading and Writing Poetry, specifically ths section:

The secret of writing well in meter—and of reading it well—is being aware of the two kinds of rhythm of any metrical line: the imposed metrical rhythm and the natural speech rhythm—which isn’t eliminated, but simply modified, by the meter. One doesn’t want the natural rhythm to be lost, or the line will sound “stilted” and stiff and deprived of the emotion there is in natural speech. One also wishes to keep the elevation and force and elegance that the metrical music can bring with it. So one writes—and reads—hearing both rhythms, in a way, at the same time.

When the natural rhythm seems to be the main rhythm and the metrical rhythm is mostly unheard (seeming to give no more than slight highlights to the natural rhythm), one may have something especially effective and beautiful, as, for example, in Prospero’s lines to Ferdinand:

Our revels now are ended. These our actors
As I foretold you, were all spirits, and
Are melted into air, into thin air…

(Shakespeare, The Tempest)​

When this kind of meter (unrhymed iambic pentameter, also called blank verse) first came into English poetry, it had no such beautiful variety, subtlety, and nuance, and often sounded mechanical and robotic. Natural speech rhythm seemed blocked by stresses too mechanically regular:

Your wonted true regard of faithful hearts
Makes me, O king, the bolder to resume,
To speak what I conceive within my breast
Although the same do not agree at all
With that which other here my lords have said
Nor which yourself have seemed best to like

(Sackville & Norton, Gorboduc)​

This is meter defeating speech in the sense of keeping it from expressing feeling. It needs variations—and maybe something like Shakespeare’s genius—to lift it up.​

I've been trying to be less "mechanical and robotic," but it's a struggle.

 

[todski28]

I agree with my fellow fans (yes, I am one) and this is an excellent tale and explanation about that scarf.

However; I'm still lingering on this grammar thing and you should rephrase that damned S2L1. You need to pluralize the verb and personally, I'd make the feel of the piece more sinister by using sneakier language such as...

"behind her eyes lurk lust and need
blatant in mine glares an obvious 'Please.'"

I leave it to you to put your own particular todski spin on this, but please fix the grammar before you submit it...

signed,

C.C.
Grammar Patrol Constable

People are always fans of misfortune especially when it isn't their own

I really like your fix on the S2L1 and 2, permission to pinch it??
I must admit this was written at about 3am before I headed into work, thought it was funny and fit the criteria. as for grammar....my arch nemesis along with spelling and punctuation.

 

[Angeline]

It's from Making Your Own Days: The Pleasures of Reading and Writing Poetry, specifically ths section:

The secret of writing well in meter—and of reading it well—is being aware of the two kinds of rhythm of any metrical line: the imposed metrical rhythm and the natural speech rhythm—which isn’t eliminated, but simply modified, by the meter. One doesn’t want the natural rhythm to be lost, or the line will sound “stilted” and stiff and deprived of the emotion there is in natural speech. One also wishes to keep the elevation and force and elegance that the metrical music can bring with it. So one writes—and reads—hearing both rhythms, in a way, at the same time.

When the natural rhythm seems to be the main rhythm and the metrical rhythm is mostly unheard (seeming to give no more than slight highlights to the natural rhythm), one may have something especially effective and beautiful, as, for example, in Prospero’s lines to Ferdinand:

Our revels now are ended. These our actors
As I foretold you, were all spirits, and
Are melted into air, into thin air…

(Shakespeare, The Tempest)​

When this kind of meter (unrhymed iambic pentameter, also called blank verse) first came into English poetry, it had no such beautiful variety, subtlety, and nuance, and often sounded mechanical and robotic. Natural speech rhythm seemed blocked by stresses too mechanically regular:

Your wonted true regard of faithful hearts
Makes me, O king, the bolder to resume,
To speak what I conceive within my breast
Although the same do not agree at all
With that which other here my lords have said
Nor which yourself have seemed best to like

(Sackville & Norton, Gorboduc)​

This is meter defeating speech in the sense of keeping it from expressing feeling. It needs variations—and maybe something like Shakespeare’s genius—to lift it up.​

I've been trying to be less "mechanical and robotic," but it's a struggle.

Thank you so much. That is wonderful food for thought and now I want the book. The ghosts poem I wrote was a sort of first attempt at writing blank verse although I did fall off the wagon here and there and rhyme. But it was a revelation to see that I can attempt a line in iambic pentameter and not necessarily make it sound like a sonnet. I am on the cusp of paying a lot more attention to this and am excited by the possibilities.

And for the record, I think you're doing extremely well on the not robotic and mechanical thing. I am regularly impressed by how natural you make lines feel.

 

[UnderYourSpell]

It's from Making Your Own Days: The Pleasures of Reading and Writing Poetry, specifically ths section:

The secret of writing well in meter—and of reading it well—is being aware of the two kinds of rhythm of any metrical line: the imposed metrical rhythm and the natural speech rhythm—which isn’t eliminated, but simply modified, by the meter. One doesn’t want the natural rhythm to be lost, or the line will sound “stilted” and stiff and deprived of the emotion there is in natural speech. One also wishes to keep the elevation and force and elegance that the metrical music can bring with it. So one writes—and reads—hearing both rhythms, in a way, at the same time.

When the natural rhythm seems to be the main rhythm and the metrical rhythm is mostly unheard (seeming to give no more than slight highlights to the natural rhythm), one may have something especially effective and beautiful, as, for example, in Prospero’s lines to Ferdinand:

Our revels now are ended. These our actors
As I foretold you, were all spirits, and
Are melted into air, into thin air…

(Shakespeare, The Tempest)​

When this kind of meter (unrhymed iambic pentameter, also called blank verse) first came into English poetry, it had no such beautiful variety, subtlety, and nuance, and often sounded mechanical and robotic. Natural speech rhythm seemed blocked by stresses too mechanically regular:

Your wonted true regard of faithful hearts
Makes me, O king, the bolder to resume,
To speak what I conceive within my breast
Although the same do not agree at all
With that which other here my lords have said
Nor which yourself have seemed best to like

(Sackville & Norton, Gorboduc)​

This is meter defeating speech in the sense of keeping it from expressing feeling. It needs variations—and maybe something like Shakespeare’s genius—to lift it up.​

I've been trying to be less "mechanical and robotic," but it's a struggle.

I can read that and hear the rhythm until it gets to the last line when I feel like I want to leave out the word 'best' and need another word instead ....... I don't know what word mind you it's just that word seems too hard, If that makes sense!

 

[UnderYourSpell]

*rubbing sore botty* Is there no depth too deep to which you will send me?


Okay.

Not saying you have hairy legs or anything!

 

[Tzara]

I can read that and hear the rhythm until it gets to the last line when I feel like I want to leave out the word 'best' and need another word instead ....... I don't know what word mind you it's just that word seems too hard, If that makes sense!

It's because the line is shorted a syllable and there are two stresses in sequence with no relieving variations of the basic foot. I would scan it this way:

Nor which yourself have seemed best to like​

So, disregarding the context, the line might sound better to you like this:

Nor which yourself have seemed at best to like​

Koch's point, I think, is that the lines are not only robotic but ungraceful, especially when compared to his example from The Tempest.

Graceful metrical writing makes everything sound natural, while having an underlying metrical base.

It is very hard to do well. Obviously.

 

[Tzara]

*rubbing sore botty*

This comment seems to beg for a smart-ass (sorry!) response, besides leaving this correspondent kind of, well not exactly drooling, but close to it, for your response.




So I'd guess you're not yourself Mackem (that right?). There some other localising term (see? spelled coreckly ) for where you're from?

 

[UnderYourSpell]

It's because the line is shorted a syllable and there are two stresses in sequence with no relieving variations of the basic foot. I would scan it this way:

Nor which yourself have seemed best to like​

So, disregarding the context, the line might sound better to you like this:

Nor which yourself have seemed at best to like​

Koch's point, I think, is that the lines are not only robotic but ungraceful, especially when compared to his example from The Tempest.

Graceful metrical writing makes everything sound natural, while having an underlying metrical base.

It is very hard to do well. Obviously.

I remember a while back submitting a poem and two of the comments were much the same that to them it read as if it had a rhyme in it but there was none, trouble is I can't remember which poem it was!
By the by shouldn't I be making you work in here too?

 

[GuiltyPleasure]

This comment seems to beg for a smart-ass (sorry!) response, besides leaving this correspondent kind of, well not exactly drooling, but close to it, for your response.




So I'd guess you're not yourself Mackem (that right?). There some other localising term (see? spelled coreckly ) for where you're from?

You're so sexy when you drool.

(Well done hinney!) My accent is an ironed-out BBC, no regional give-away, veddy boring. Now it has Canadian under tones. My audio's bust so don't know if this works but here's my accent.

 

[champagne1982]

You mean the original in this thread? I can't decide (ever the Gemini). I think in the one in poem a week I tried to smooth it over some and maybe that isn't the best thing for it. Is that what you thought?

Just the one I tossed words into. It's always better in the poet's own voice and never mind as someone else playing with edits, I think.

 

[WillOtheWisp]

I was very tempted to give you the subject of one loooooooooooong sentence but decided if you're writing sonnet that would be just too mean so WillOtheWisp your subject is a love poem to an inanimate object

Where is my lovely gizmo thing? I'll
wager in the couch while nachos heat,
while the world is regaled while
my screen is void, sitting dark beyond my feet.

Ah! I spy your grey gun-metal toe
peeking coy, your cracked plastic console
pierced through by stars-your backlit knobs aglow.
Seeming at once so remote yet in control.

I squeeze you and behold! Glimmers and glares!
and then we in inanimation mate
and commend the world to our blank stares,
and will all our vicarious passions sate

together upon my lovely couch, lodged
twixt her leathern cheeks, the trois of our menage.

 

[butters]

..
that's a keeper

thanks

Oh! Am I the only one finds that tres creepy?

good - it's meant to be haven't a clue as to title, though - 'stalker' seems just toooo obvious.

ta, annie

 

[Mollie_F]

if it works? never!

Never! When I got set a gunfight I had to make up words!Love the poem too

I make up new words all the time in poems. Sometimes you just have to go for it.

Phew

I've loved reading all the responses to this challenge, it's been fun to do.

 

[todski28]

thanks


good - it's meant to be haven't a clue as to title, though - 'stalker' seems just toooo obvious.

ta, annie

Try

*I Spy* as the title?

 

[UnderYourSpell]

You're so sexy when you drool.

(Well done hinney!) My accent is an ironed-out BBC, no regional give-away, veddy boring. Now it has Canadian under tones. My audio's bust so don't know if this works but here's my accent.

Lovely to hear you