/lit/ - Literature

>>14266141
It doesn't even rhyme

>>14266181
Fuck...

>>14266141

3rd stanza works well as a satirical take on Rupi Kaur

>>14266141
What am I
What are you?
Place Death in front
and life behind
As though I could slip the limits
Of my time
Others give me hope
But others are my hell
Nausea flushes my senses
Until I'll hear that bell

Born again
Waves from the sea
Softly speak as your mouth just contours over mine
Dont mind the great poetry you see

The days go dwindling by
My life has gone awry
Women bore me
An insouciant routine implores me
But what is death
If only I could take my last breath.

I wait by the weight
Lying by the lyes lie
Earths dyes die
Breathing this breath

>>14266393
the i'll absolutely ruins it, the "l" sound of until clashes with it

>>14268134
Yeah you’re definitely right. Never was satisfied with the ending myself. Thanks for the crit

There once was a poster on /lit/
Whose opinions were nothing but shit
He'd post every day
With nothing to say
But pretend that his threads were legit

>>14268285

Sensible chuckle.

>>14268134
>>14268221

Just "Until I hear that/the bell" is an improvement.

My contribution, which is (pretty obviously) half done:

Two gifts has Man for his expression
By grace of God - or Chance - endowed
The Hand, for artifice profession,
And Voice, our Soul proclaimed aloud.

The Hand shapes myriad grand creations
All works of mind we could invent
All art and utile innovations
From some twinned forebear claims descent

The Hand made sword and plow and palette
Engraved the wooden stock of guns
And forged the brass machinist's mallet
That birthed yet further digit sons

While Hand-wrought works are impositions
A manifest of driven will
The Voice bears abstract compositions
A subtler power to move or still

From here, stanzas on the power of the human voice, then concluding stanzas on the beauty of writing and literature as a synthesis of Hand and Voice.

Desert crust cracked into shapes
Ocean waves marbled into gestures and patterns. Dark wine stains from cellar burned white. And at the center of it all, glinted like a pearl in the dim glow, was the... he couldn't think of the name... the tomb.
"If I'm going to be lonely for the rest of my life, I might as well enjoy it." He stared, not understanding what was happening... then, all at once, his nightmares evaporated away.
"Right... I'm leaving to find the Tomb of the Living Dead."

>>14268513
“All art and utile innovations” strikes me as a weak line. I like the imagery throughout the poem.

Puked this out in a few minutes for a girl, but I liked it.

I see your face on idle days;
In willow bark,
A delicate haze,
A drunken march into the sea.

I count not then the hours, but only the ways--
Green boulevards,
And emerald lanes--
Which might bring you back into view.

I think of things we've left undone
And realize they've been done already.

And so you must remain, my ivory flower,
Far off, and long out of view.

>>14268648
Poetry is an aural art form. I understand the impulse to ignore convention in pursuit of your art, but convention was developed as a means of most effectively achieving a set of similar goals. I'm not saying you need to write rhyming couplets in iambic pentameter, but you should at least consider how your poem sounds.

i woke up as i always do on a normal day, but unlike most i decided to sit out side today. i went out side and began to lay in a sweet old chair kept under the shade. as i lay still and un bothered i began to lose my self to the sparkling water. i inspected the lake from where i could see and suddenly i noticed a tree. a tree so tall and filled with life. but then i sunk into fright. i couldn't stop all i could feel was emptiness,just so unreal . but soon my thoughts would run away as i gazed back and seen it sway. the trance took me to another place, a simple sorrow still hung on my face. i stayed there for a moment or two longer until of course my thoughts began to wonder. its always this way the things that i see, they drag me down until i sleep. and in my dreams a pinch of hope comes crawling out when im on dope. i wanna live a happy life but chaos seems to be my strife. and no matter where i go i know, it will end and ill pretend.

Another day, another drain
The hours pass, I am to blame

Perseverance is key, procrastination the bane
I have failed to focus the days time, my life has failed me

I can't stop it, it's getting too bad
I simply disused the time availed me.

Like stumbling down the waterfall
I'm sinking deeper

I've failed so badly, failed so fucking badly

I'm falling down to my knees
Walking through the snow-covered grass

The pain is unbearable

I want to die.

May my life end like a snowstorm
Feel the cold touch on my flesh

Answering the unanswered

I know very little about poetry beyond what feels intuitive to me, so take my advice with a grain of salt.
>>14268653
I like the imagery a lot. I like the rhythm of the first stanza, but I think it would work better if you could replicate the dactyl of "delicate" somewhere in the fourth line.
>>14270331
I really like the simile of the snow-covered grass. Some of the lines feel a little clunky though, like the third and fourth. I feel like you could prune those down a little, or separate the stanza into two if necessary.

This poem is a work in progress, but I like what I have so far.

Her hair cascades like fertile slopes
that, distant, crest a desert land.
Her dryad eyes exalt my hopes!-
as though I've touched her amber hand
when such a sapling bright as she
is ever in my company.

Behold her if you seek the fates
of Siproites or Actaeon;
worse yet than any death of mutts-
Still Artemis the Maiden.
My love for her more isolate
than isles Lesbos or Crete.

I gaze down on her foothill crown-
her eyes and lashes, skin and lips
A thousand different shades of brown
Oh Gaea! My eclipse!
What cruel inverse of universe
to cast me so perverse!

>>14268513
great poem, my favourite by far. As for critique, same as >>14268651.

>>14266141
i had a go

The morning sun creeps upon on my sweet Selene;
Radiates from her fair cassette.
A flawless panoply which shines modestly;
Pure from the blood she lets.

What might this Selene gain from one such as me?
One such as I who does not,
Hope to compare to what only seems fair,
For one such as she so sought.

So pray tell, Selene, is it more than a dream?
Can I hope to make room in your heart?
Your fingers dance on to my tired old song,
And are careless for the pain you impart.

>>14272022
Maybe it's just me, but I feel like internal rhymes should be used rather sparingly or else it begins to sound like a children's book.

>>14272310
what if that represents the childishness of viewing a romantic interest, especially one unrequited, deistically and without flaw?

jk i just like internal rhymes

>>14266141
I tumble down the brook, tail-a-beating.
Across the woods I follow the flowing course homeward.
Running down the shining stream my bite meets the fisherman's hook. I fly upwards through the water.
"How is it that you still come to bite my hooks?" he asks.
The fisherman pries, and between his fingers
the sun shines on my many marks of victory.
"Look on my marks, fisher. I have conquered your hooks and reaped many rewards."
With a snicker he lets me fall,
My latest victory standing beside the rest.

>>14272908
lucky fish

>>14266141
terrible.
>>14266393
slightly less terrible
>>14266841
not sure if this is a joke or not
>>14266849
fourth line and last line are fucked, at least you actually tried though
>>14267042
stupid
>>14268285
best in thread
>>14268513
namefag didn't read
>>14268648
umm the first verse was okay, but then did you forget you were writing a poem?
>>14268653
>Puked this out in a few minutes
cringe, get behind yourself, faggot.
>>14270331
>ME SAD!!!
>>14271563
actually isn't a leech/10 and critiqued others so i'll actually give feedback
the first stanza was good, you actually had a meter and painted a picture in my mind, then the second stanza, you broke down. you tried to cram in way too many references and i feel like you probably just recently read mythology by edith hamilton or something similar. what you tried to do with the fourth and sixth verses didn't really work and it ruined the flow, and the last two verses don't work very well at all, how can a love be isolated? and even if it is, using the world "isolate" as an adjective is not how to convey that. third stanza: the first verse could technically fit into the meter but it doesn't really in practice. the reader naturally wants to emphasize "down," especially since you ended the verse with "crown." i say dump that mid-verse rhyme and just switch "down on" to something else like "upon." down doesn't really work anyway since before you were comparing her to a far-off hillside, its like you somehow teleported on top of them from the desert where you were before. you started of with a simile, then in this line you turned the comparison into metaphor so its confusing. the second verse is kind of creepy desu, then the last three lines don't even make sense. you namedrop yet another greek god, and then you admit you're horny for her??? is the eclipse the sudden transformation of admiration for her beauty into lust? i guess it could work, but you need to draw it out longer. in the last two verse, you use the suffix "-verse" too many times. "inverse of universe" doesn't work at all, least of all when you rhyme it with another "-verse."
>>14272022
fedora-tier
>>14272908
could almost be considered a poem if it had a rhyme or two

By view, pencil pour, bylaws hordes, shattering lead
Of cleaving maul on the thin, it's white:
By my letter whence I prorate the clever
Cattle of consistence that dropped lot
Of what-- the funeral of relief, the joyous soul
So voice, so pray, it words slither pen fight
Emptiness waters in prayer, priced.

Beverage breaks, battering knuckles clock
Of streets into house, lights to sewage twice;
Contentment comforts hold, holding it's adobe
That content cause, causation loss, loss irk
Already alight, feeling wisdom by placation lost,
Where experience gone

>>14273067
A lot of people critique in separate comments from their poems, you nagging moralist retard.

A Furry on a Hotel

The furries had a convent
Decided they should meet
I didn’t know about it
I walked out to the lobby
It was the furries inn

That night I watched the savages
Rush through the hotel halls
Screaming and knocking in others people’s doors
The wolfs the squirrels chaseth
The doorman had no other option
And so he called the cops

At last they were arrested
The rest of them kicked out
I slept until a nightmare
Did turn my skin to fur

Upon walking blindingly through marches,
My maiden's latching drearily morose,

The candles wrap themselves in sashes,
Listening the songs of peril's home,

To ‘muse myself I say devil claim my wife,
And let him know that she forlorn this life,

But not his own, a mere disciple,
For I shall' never dare repeat the cycle.

>>14271563

The first stanza is really good, great floe and imagery for the reliable ABABCC format. I have to imagine that one occured to you coherently and inspired the work (since that's usually how my brain works). Second stanza needs work, "fates" and "mutts" don't jibe, and the last three lines don't feel built as naturally out of the first three (contrast with your first stanza). Third stanza is all right, I agree with >>14273067 about the random internal rhyme, it feels out of place since it's the only occurrence.

Also, >>14273067 I'm sorry to namefag, I'm hesitant to do so. But it's because I actually value the input of anons on /lit/ and I think casting aside the veil of anonymity a little will help me to develop a more consistent voice in expressing myself, since you all can hold me to account if I'm retarded. I'd really like your input, since you did a good job critiquing this poem.

>>14272022

>>14272022

I like the opening line, the "ee" in creeps and sweet is repetition that works. Panoply and modestly don't quite jibe. I disagree with >>14272310, I think your internal rhymes are a nice attempt, but it throws me off that in the third stanza they're in the first instead of third line (which is a shame, because I think the third stanza is the strongest). Also, I think "careless for the pain THEY impart" or "are careless OF the pain you impart" would work better; former to give agency to the fingers in uncaring, latter implies obliviousness to pain given from Selene.

>>14273521

I'm actually surprised by how much I like this. I feel like the insanity of modern culture is ripe fruit for freeform observational verse and you did a good job. Well done.

>>14268651
>>14271703

Thanks! Would, as a replacement:

>Great Art and humblest innovations
And changing "claims" to "claim" read better?

Also, have another one (with the sunset that inspired it):

NOVEMBER ON THE LAMOILLE

God, the grandeur of this glow
Of the setting sun through falling snow
The countenance of November fair
Brushed by flakes on the falling air

Silence, first of Winter's gifts
Life transfixed in a season white
This cyclical beauty still warms and lifts
Man's frigid soul to a greener height

Oh, solar aura so sweetly diffused
Across this early flurry
In a tempered, genial fury
You and I, stranger, linger suffused
In a moment that's far less fleeting
Than the breadth of time in our meeting

>>14272022
I'd be wary of certain words you've seemingly pushed together to rhyme.
Also, avoid 'panoply' in that line
>>14272908
Your first line is wonderful.
The dialogue is a little fetch. Try to use even simpler language


Here's one:

In the line on the pushing rows
That look like themselves by their names
A wind has just blown through
And has opened a cloudy window
Over the very stretch of a day.

Turning to look at the finish
Of all of a tired day and work
A willow has passed.

>>14266141
There was a man who was erratic,
He drank too much, he was neurotic,
Before too long, he said some’ wrong,
And beat them to a pulp o’ Potty,
I seen him drunk on streets and sunny,
Don’t listen now he is nobody,
A hare that’s living with his son,
A hair on top his golden crown,
He’s beaten him at noon today,
And Jonathan now very gay,
Pretending now he’s Iroquois,
But in his room, forgot the keys,
Which lead to wild Nevada.

>>14274016
How's this?

I tumble down the brook, tail-a-beating
Sliding downstream to claim my prize.
I bite, and meet the fisherman's hook.
With a jerk I fly upwards,
His shining hook stripped of bait.
"How is it that you still come to bite my hooks?"
He pries, and between his fingers the light shines on my many trophies.
"Count my marks, and see I have won many times."
With a laugh he lets me fall,
My latest victory standing beside the rest.

>>14273067
>fourth line and last line are fucked,
Meaning?

'Foreplay- Star of the East'


•••North-I was walking through the shore one day wondering what I
could look for in the midst of day, when the horizon called me
again and it began talking to me in many voices without consideration.
•••It told me stories of various sizes that could go around my body lice
and other ticks might tell me more about the future if I listened to the
sea when it stopped talking to me.But only then did I understand what it meant.
•••I knew I couldn’t listen to it for long because they would lie to me. Always and
always and always, they would lie to me about the future. As I have no prescience,
my children are overseen. Sometimes they tell me stories of then sun but it can
never get me going. I am made out of alabaster after all. But that’s why I decided
to come here in the first place. To share some of it so I might fare well after I’m done.
•••But I could not fathom being alone too long. That’s why I was overseen in the first place.

•••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••
Ordering towers of cancer grow a the bottom of my empire-boat,
I am a freighter made or mirrors, against reflection I see the tumour, I am the tumour,
Spreading, I eat the brow, the mast-head made of my mother’s guts,
God that I am the shallow rains of cancer-veins shall watch me eat the darkpain,

Why has my second hand foreskin the adoration of whales the liquid lungs?
By the time my body stops growing paint of pints of baleful lymphs,
I will be made of gangrenous cancer that shall inherit the sea,
Where my people the Demiurges shall chant the ballad of pains,

A tumour’s on my mind again but not a single soul may recognise the torment that I marry on,
My backless bones of children homes violated the chains of longing distant bridges,
On horizons chairs I see the ships and want to cut the feet that gnaw ripping at my spine,
While perturbed I cannot fathom calling along shores, I hear mother calling but she had no vocal cords,

Hear me say, I, an umbilical cord in the sea, an endless torment carries me,
Through the pus of spermaceti whales I see my lord; I hear him yet the chantless gore,
Damned, as my arrival is, I can only feel the scent of piss made by my crew,
Much and behold, bellow at the bells inside their livers as they push through carrying my children.

•••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••

>>14274523
All right, let me try again, but less schizophrenic this time:

Eighteen gallows drawn to its tenebrous draft,
Where unpleasant cartridges sink silently enough,
Where drafting eighteen palmers’ sorry work flows,
But running in tence slops my ink blows,
To whence I aim beyond the tome,
I carry on, return to home.

>>14273067
poems don't need to rhyme idiot

>>14273067
you're a bad critic and a big retard

>>14274016
>I'd be wary of certain words you've seemingly pushed together to rhyme.
can you give me an example besides panoply?

>>14273635
>it throws me off that in the third stanza they're in the first instead of third line
I tried rhyming "on" with "song" for a softer rhyme in the third line, but i understand why it would sound jarring considering the first line's rhyme.

>>14268648

Based

God sent us a redeemer;
He redeemed, and went away,
and like a widowed dreamer
we still pant for him today.

We nailed him there to keep him there,
keep him tethered to the Earth;
but still he rose into the air,
our God of the virgin birth.

God came and changed the world,
but the changed world stays the same.
[incomplete]

I'm new to poetry -- give names to my mistakes.

How come lit isn’t that engaged in poetry?

>>14274966

Line eight flows better without "the", IMHO. Otherwise, nice. I think the repetitive words actually work well.

Dirty panes, rapid vibration
The city bus drives past the station
A shadow flits on my tired head
My half-closed eyes easily led

An aeroplane transits the moon
Passes behind the buttress, soon
The view was spoilt by dried mud spray
The sight obscured by masonry

I wish, unwish, for an alibi
A lens so clear as not to lie;
That aircraft, but for the wall
Would not have caught my eye at all

So as the orange flare repeats,
The audience takes to their seats
So does prepare, for friendless sleep
All icy blue, the endless deep

will critique some in a bit, just got in from the bus home

Every lack and need,
We seek out rather than within,
The inconstant can never fulfill you,
The inconstant can never satiate you,
Like a mirage, chasing an illusion in the hot dessert,
Your percieved paradise lies within
Always listen, listen within

>>14275893
the rhyme scheme is kind of basic. also you spray and masonry dont rhyme at all