/lit/ - Literature

You can't convince me that this isn't the worst introduction to a fantasy world ever.

"One cannot raise walls against what has been forgotten.
The citadel of Ishuäl succumbed during the height of the Apocalypse. But no army of inhuman Sranc had scaled its ramparts. No furnace-hearted dragon had pulled down its mighty gates. Ishuäl was the secret refuge of the Kûniüric High Kings, and no one, not even the No-God, could besiege a secret.
Months earlier, Anasûrimbor Ganrelka II, High King of Kûniüri, had fled to Ishuäl with the remnants of his household. From the walls, his sentries stared pensively across the dark forests below, their thoughts stricken by memories of burning cities and wailing multitudes. When the wind moaned, they gripped Ishuäl’s uncaring stone, reminded of Sranc horns. They traded breathless reassurances. Had they not eluded their pursuers? Were not the walls of Ishuäl strong? Where else might a man survive the end of the world?
The plague claimed the High King first, as was perhaps fitting: Ganrelka had only wept at Ishuäl, raged the way only an Emperor of nothing could rage. The following night the members of his household carried his bier down into the forests. They glimpsed the eyes of wolves reflected in the light of his pyre. They sang no dirges, intoned only a few numb prayers.
Before the morning winds could sweep his ashes skyward, the plague had struck two others: Ganrelka’s concubine and her daughter. As though pursuing his bloodline to its thinnest tincture, it assailed more and more members of his household. The sentries upon the walls became fewer, and though they still watched the mountainous horizon, they saw little. The cries of the dying crowded their thoughts with too much horror.
Soon even the sentries were no more. The five Knights of Trysë who’d rescued Ganrelka after the catastrophe on the Fields of Eleneöt lay motionless in their beds. The Grand Vizier, his golden robes stained bloody by his bowel, lay sprawled across his sorcerous texts. Ganrelka’s uncle, who’d led the heartbreaking assault on Golgotterath’s gates in the early days of the Apocalypse, hung from a rope in his chambers, slowly twisting in a draft. The Queen stared endlessly across festering sheets."

Version 2:
>As life went, there was less of him in the world. Seclusion pulled inward, forcefully, as the scattered players of his life exercised a synchronized exit of his affairs; and soon the spaces his life drifted through shared the company of only himself.

Is this too much of a run on sentence.

it was a dark and stormy night and op was sucking his father's cock.

>Waking up to a loud crash rarely means something good is happening. It’s never “CRASH! Mom made pancakes!” or “CRASH! We decided to adopt a Golden Retriever!”

>>20443102
Some loser posted on Reddit bragging about reading 50 books from one of those fantasy writers; and I commented something along the lines of " What a complete waste of time. He could've read the entire western canon in that time and actually accomplished something. What a joke." And despite being the seemingly only negative comment out of nearly 2000 Reddit DND basedboys petting his ego, he actually took the time to comment back to tell me my "perspective was silly". To which I replied, "If you had spent your time reading books written for adults, you surely could've come up with a better insult than "silly". And he deleted his original comment. I'll dig up my screen grab if this thread stays up long enough. Blog post over.

>>20443126

*KNOCK*
*KNOCK*
*CRASH*
A burglar is in your home now, /lit/. Are you armed and prepared for this inevitability?

>>20443092
This is the beginning to a thing I'm writing that has a theme of evil existing only as the lack of goodness. This is what a character believes, not necessarily a belief I have myself.

>Darkness is the absence of light, and silence is the absence of sound. Though neither give a thing to hear or see, both remain perceived.

Bordold was surveying his estate when the wind blew him a rumor of Ashley's pregnancy.

>>20443129
You come across much worse in this scenario anon.

>>20443369
?? what the fuck, this doesn't make any sense

>>20443406
Which part went over your head?

>>20443406
>*woooosh* yo, Bordold, someone fucking yo bitch, dawg *wooosh*

>>20443403
I'm sorry you waste/wasted your time reading those books before understanding the sunk cost fallacy, anon. There is still time to change.

>>20443102
Christ, this shit is terrible.

>George’s allegiance to cold, dispassionate honesty had, until that moment, been absolute.

start of short story. rate.

>>20444914
>cold, dispassionate
Either delete a word, or get rid of the comma.

Damn, OP. That's a great intro sentence. I bet you have just a MASSIVE dick, too amirite?

>>20445585
what a weird way to start a novel

>>20445702
Weird? Care to elaborate?

>>20443102
Yeah I got this book on Kindle and that is one of the few times I've ever read an opening page and instantly fucked it off. Just comes across as fantasy technobabble.

"I had just finished using her back as an ashtray when I came to the inevitable conclusion that I absolutely hate women"

>>20443092
He was gay. She was straight. It was a cumulous adventure.

>>20443357
I like it but how are you going to tie in the absence of sound part

>>20443092
Roughly a year ago I wrote a short story about law.

>It happened that in the years of the twin consuls, in an abbey on the fringes of the desert, the student Nicetas was summoned for participation in a committee.

>>20443092
She was a super-soaker type of girl, a real squirter, and I had spent far too long in the desert.

>>20445988
Is the book a parody or written seriously?

>>20443092
Ok, you asked for this.

>I was jealous of their whiteness; of their youth, of their wealth, of their simplicity, of the sincerity with which they looked one another in the face, the clean cut of their well fitting clothes, the ease with which they went and the hands that happily held one another, the tomorrow promised them and the past fulfilled who nurtured them. I watched them with a hungry stare and bulging sanity. I was jealous of their congruity, I realized, and even if I could take it from them, I could never wear it myself. 'All the more reason to do it' I murmured.

Of all the creatures of the jungle, none are more noble, more ancient, than the python; the lord of his green kingdom, the amalgamation of the jungle's every fear.

I like to read poems sometimes, and recently got idea to translate some of them.

How do you like my translations?

August Night - Iwaszkiewicz

Second night like that one,
you will never live again.

Such god-given glory,
you will never live again.

Such sky,
full of stars,
you will never live again.

Stars and planets,
stay for a while

And never fade away,
for you are so lovely.

But stars and planet forever fly
when man elapses like a night

When mouth full of honeycombs
gets shut tight.

And happiness never lasts
for more than an hour.

It all passed away
and second night like that one you will never live again.

Wolf - Iwaszkiewicz

In winter nights like old wolf
i sneak up under shadow of house

and frost
and snow
and shaggy stars

I look through the window
what is inside

There high tenors sing
And dance and drink
They live

Windows sharing warmth inside,
And then door creeks,
And then its silent again.

They bring the water from the well
And they scream,
But what about me?

They play their violins,
build their happiness house,
They go outside
singing like the devil harps.

And now i am scared and mad.

Why i can't feel like that,
Then i howl

And they scream - wolf! wolf!

>>20446337

Baczynski ***

World like fire pillar. Whip has struck;
it crushes stone - knows not the time,
it sculpts dark souls blind
in heavy coffins of years

And painstaking whirling night
chocks fire under slanted sky
and gallows scream like cranes
in wells full of heads and hands.

And when marching boots roar
at wives and sons and mother grains
then every corpse is living child
who ploughs his own family grave.

We have our mouths - sword shaft,
from hunger dry, from fear white,
we have eyes that scream at death sight,
eyes which will always find the blame.

We have our hearts - hammer of hammers,
for ages it will beat the earth,
quickly like sharp beak of swallows,
and of eagles wings - eagle fly.

Through our eyes void of tears
Please my world! Flow your streams,
till every hand full of free earth,
will storm the time that is like,
ash of faith. We will build the house,
ironclad for our people, storms and dreams.

>>20443102
Lots of names and events I don’t know about or care about. Why do fantasy writers do this shit? Why do they assume readers will give two shits about their fake history? More importantly, why do they always copy Tolkien?

I was screaming; but was it In agony or relief.

>>20446308
It's a pretty serious fantasy series, the first one which is what this is taken from is called "the darkness that comes before"

Reuben hit a squirrel on his drive to work that morning and the tactile bump he felt when his tire rolled over the animal followed him all the way down the veering country paths to the highway and into the grocery store.

>>20446605
>It's a pretty serious fantasy series,
Ah, that's depressing to think that someone wrote that passage seriously.

Reuben hit a squirrel on his drive to work that morning and the tactile bump he felt when his tire rolled over the animal followed him all the way down the veering country paths and onto the highway.

>>20443092
Thoughts on the opening of my novel? Eventually, it is about rock climbing, but here the protagonist is working as a roofer and bumming around Southern California.

>>20446934
>two white crosses crowned twin domes
this is really awkward and I had to do a double take to see if I had read it right. Maybe change it to 'twin domes crowned with a white cross each' or 'two white crosses crowning twin domes' or 'two white crosses sprouting from a pair of identical domes'

>>20446164
I like it! Reminds me of The Canticle for Lebowitz, because of the abbey setting.

>>20446309
I want to read more, but only to be sure you're not another supreme gentleman. You shouldn't hate people for the things they were born to.

Opening to “Call of the Arcade” by F. Gardner. The book only gets increasingly insane after this.

>>20446326
>the amalgamation of
delete that bit, and great opening

>>20446934
Write this less like a fruit, and more like Hemingway, and it's gold.

>>20446981
Look, dude. You had your shilling campaign. You forced yourself semi-successfully as a meme here by buying ad-space and spamming your shit. Congrats. Really I mean it. But it's over now. You've done it already. Move on.

>>20446934
Here’s another paragraph from later in the first chapter, mean to describe a certain type of person who gets into climbing, the protagonist fitting into the type somewhat

>>20446934
>>20447467
And a final passage, toward the end of my LA section

>>20447001
>implying I’m f gardner

Sorry bro but I am not your meme man

The black man fled across the watermelon farm, and the shopkeeper followed

>>20447467
that type gets into climbing? I think that type just works and has no energy for a hobby like climbing. youve gotta be somewhat naive and innocently hopeful, and honest, to get into any hobby. your "condemned men", if they're anything like the ones I'm thinking about (and am on the border of being), would see it as a futile waste of energy and just a nuisance, a chore. that type isn't into life or living.

>>20447467
>>20448205
anyway anon this is actually something id wanna read. how far along are you on it

>>20443129
>Some loser posted on Reddit bragging about reading 50 books from one of those fantasy writers; and I commented something along the lines of " What a complete waste of time. He could've read the entire western canon in that time and actually accomplished something. What a joke." And despite being the seemingly only negative comment out of nearly 2000 Reddit DND basedboys petting his ego, he actually took the time to comment back to tell me my "perspective was silly". To which I replied, "If you had spent your time reading books written for adults, you surely could've come up with a better insult than "silly". And he deleted his original comment. I'll dig up my screen grab if this thread stays up long enough. Blog post over.
Chandler, Hammett, and lots of other genre writers were considered “worthless” at one time.
Now those authors are considered “greats”.
The fact that you don’t understand this, shows that the redditor had better understanding of literature than you.

ashes i took from a hearth’s nook, muttering a mysteries as i went about an old city, where the winds, the birds, the ocean floods even the city’s voice itself, seemed echoing on and echoing on.

as the kha of a bird so I heard the shuffling of feet and the yell of the merchant his wares and the passing of coins, some passing minor treasures of silver knife and plate, others brocades weaved with foreign signs.

as I passed along as a stranger my eye was caught, for a man had about his head a white turban and he wore a robe of saffron, but pure they were not for both was inscribed with words in an unknown script.

taken back by the arabesque quality of his garments I neared him to see his wares, seeing him speak to others and though there was no booming of voices nor of feet, I could not make out any of his words.

he then gestured to me and said with a voice of many accents and without accent “I hear you and you do not hear me, you see me but do not see me, I see you but with another eye, do you wish sight?”

he then lifted his left hand which held a disk of a mirror large enough to see the face, but around the black circumference of it was carved the words “ Apepi rahu nachash saap typhon ananke aemeth”

i took the mirror in my hand and looked into it, seeing myself, as I went to give it back to him, he was gone. mirror in hand I returned home, entering the gloom I lit seven candles in the room.

examining closer the mirror, it seemed made of something akin to horn, it was adorned with the figures of serpents circling the names, the names seemed faintly red, aglow when one looked directly at it.

i stared at myself and as I stared the red light seemed to dance and circle with each peripheral glance, deeper and deeper into trance I fell as my face seemed deforming into simplicity as I stared.

grotesque yes, my nose seemed to flatten, the reflection shaked and stirred, the arms shriveling to nothing, the skin becoming darker, and in my eyes I saw the eyes of my self reflected aglow with the same red.

my own voice spake but with another tone, from my lips? I do not know, saying “say what signifieth this sign mine face and thine which contorts serpentine and seems sublime with secrets ophidian to your eye.”

“I know not what means the sign nor symbol nor the face of yours nor mine, nor did I call you here nor have I been given your name-“ to which he replied “you lie for my names are aflame about the rim, blazing red.”

“speak my names and truth you will know.” thus I repeated the names Apepi rahu nachash saap typhon ananke ameth, Apepi rahu nachash saap typhon ananke ameth” and mingled my breath with the names.

my eye reflected his eye, my eye reflected my eye, the red light passing between us, back and forth, And as two mirrors reflect endlessly an abyss of reflection, so did the serpent become boundless.

>>20443357
Useless comma in the first sentance, imo fren.

>>20443092
>They'd been living for the orgasms since the age of eleven. That's all they knew at this point: the orgasms, the heroin, the combination of the two. And the strange creature: half millipede half octopus with the injecting venomous probe that had caused them so much anguish yet so much indescribable pleasure and that had now duplicated and embedded itself in both their wombs. Gestating, larvating, it was coming for the next girl. It was coming for the world, hopping from prepubescent doe-eyed girl to prepubescent doe-eyed girl, no matter the color, no matter the "flavor." It was a vampire of pleasure, it gave and it took. It left the girls looking like zombies, hooked on its hook, on its claws, and its cock, which lived inside of them and controlled and fed off of them and sent them interminable waves of pleasure in return. By the time they were twenty, they were wasted and finished, and the creature had moved on into the next fold of virginal flesh and the tragedy began anew, but so did a form of pleasure that no human, no girl, was designed to endure, and therefore powerless to resist. By this method it controlled them, by this method it took over the world. One interminable orgasm at a time. The world ended neither with a scream, nor with a whimper, but with a girl of twelve in the indescribable interminable throws of pleasure that became her grave and ours.

>>20443406
His wife's water broke and the wind wafted the spray over to him like a cool mist

The Diamond Dozen grouped around a table discussing the reign of cats and dogs.

>>20448205
Are you a climber? It is a sport that attracts outsiders and people who do not buy into the rat race. Some of the best climbers in the world are living in vans on shoestring budgets while climbing crazy shit just because they want to, not for money and not for fame (except perhaps fame among climbers). Anyways, it isn’t a hobby to the type of person I am describing. Why would I write a novel about a fucking hobbyist? This type I’m writing of, for them work is just time spent saving money so they can fuck off and go climb for a few months.

I’m basically finished with my first draft, but the last third is much rougher than the first two thirds which I rewrote a lot in the process of completing the draft.

>>20449418
Many writers were considered shit in their time who became great, your point is redundant.
Modern genre fiction is an expression of a decay in a mode of human thinking, it has no precedent in history.

The cum dribbled out from his death gripped cock into his faded gray nut rag that was once a shirt, worn down from to many dryer cycles, and an overly acidic semen ph, that only a true none attachment to diet and perm press cycles could bring about.

Roadkill. An animal splayed, organs out blackened by tire treads, its head still gawking in awe of the mechanical death creature, eyes glazed and face mixed of dried reds, grays, browns. He looked at the animal shaped meat the same way someone looks into a mirror. His eyes glazed and unworried, just passing a glance for a moment of awareness, awareness of breathing, seeing, being. Being no more and splayed across intensely hot tarmac.

On the way out of Supreme, two of my teeth began to hurt. It wasn't as if I didn't go to the dentist, really, I went last week. No, I just had to get punched in the face by a short man, probably a Bolivian by the tone of its skin color, in front of all of my friends. To the offense, the resulting 'why' that tried to swim its way out of my bloodied mouth sounded like the wailing of a small animal. Why did you punch me? Why now, and also, why in the face, for that matter? I admit, I was quite handsome before the punch (and still am), but come on, everyone needs teeth. You would presume my day was ruined from that moment on, but my determination to shop wasn't going to be deterred by a man the size of my little nephew. I swallowed my instinctual responses and immediately found peace within myself. Yes, Louis Vuitton awaited me next. And Chanel. I took one of my fleeing friend by the arm and resumed walking. The Bolivian was flabbergasted at seeing a man resume his shopping as if nothing had happened after getting a full punch to the face and tried to address me in broken English, probably to extort my wallet or something. I didn't listen, though. Eventually, after a dozen strides at a pace he couldn't keep up without running, the half-man left. Fuck Bolivians.

On the way out of Supreme, two of my teeth began to hurt. It wasn't as if I didn't go to the dentist, really, I went last week. No, I just had to get punched in the face by a short man, probably a Bolivian by the tone of its skin color, in front of all of my friends. To the offense, the resulting 'why' that tried to swim its way out of my bloodied mouth sounded like the wailing of a small animal. Why did you punch me? Why now, and also, why in the face, for that matter? I admit, I was quite handsome before the punch (and still am), but come on, everyone needs teeth. You would presume my day was ruined from that moment on, but my determination to shop wasn't going to be deterred by a man the size of my little nephew. I swallowed my instinctual responses and immediately found peace within myself. Yes, Louis Vuitton awaited me next. And Chanel. I took one of my fleeing friend by the arm and resumed walking. The Bolivian was flabbergasted at seeing a man resume his shopping as if nothing had happened after getting a full punch to the face and tried to address me in broken English, probably to extort my wallet or something. I didn't listen, though. Eventually, after a dozen strides at a pace he couldn't keep up with without running, the half-man left. Fuck Bolivians.

>>20449932
Funny but he seems too observant and self aware to be that type of person

>>20449932
Bolivians are short and stocky because they're from the Andes, it's an evolutionary adaptation to Andean heights. Everything has a reason and purpose. Bolivians are Native Americans, their traditional language is Aymara. Btw, some of the handsomest people you will ever see are pure Ecuadorian Native Americans.

>>20449418
I really want this to be trolling, but I know you hold that opinion genuinely, and I am anguished.

"Fantasy" isn't a genre either, by the way. Tolkien wrote the only "fantasy" novel, and the world should've moved on after that, not worked for nearly a century trying to plagiarize his idea in "new" and "interesting" ways; the exhaustion of which we are experiencing now.

>>20451588
What a terrible take.

>>20451588
Fantasies older than Tolkien, whether as the genre we know now (dudes like Tolkien creating entire fantasy mythologies and so forth.) or if we go further back to the fairy say of writing and folk tales, in which case Shakespeare is even among the practitioners, Blake’s mythology certainly is.

>>20451915
> dudes like Tolkien creating entire fantasy mythologies and so forth.

Sorry multitasking, I meant to write dunsany. ER Edison also did the same thing but before Tolkien and they knew each other.

>>20443129
And then everyone clapped?

>Call me Anon.

>>20446309
This is pretty good, good job anon.

>>20449523
You have my attention

>>20446347
It's a relatively recent trend. Writers conflate lore with narrative. It's like show don't tell, but rather than showing you anything, they tell you about things they refuse to show.

>>20443092
For sale: a copy of bestselling Infinite Jest, unread.

>>20443092
How's this?

>The end of night, what shone through the bloody bandages of our subject, enfeebled and lame, the distinctive clatterings of a yet forgotten charge afflicted with an ailment all too familiar for its terror, some many nights spent wailing and giggling about memories warped and unfamiliar, that the tongue and chords may be confiscated is no deterrent for our idiot apprentice's son, too sedated to cry, too stupid to be denied a dream.

>>20448133
Why did no one laugh at this

>>20445993
Umm based?

>>20443092
>Cnaiür neither flinched nor moved. He was a Son of the People, a prodigy orn of desolate earth, sent to kill, to reave. He was a savage from dark northern plains, with thunder in his heart and murder in his eyes . . . He was Cnaiür urs Skiötha, most violent of all men.

>>20453759
I swear, you fantasy fags need to kill yourselves for the atrocious naming of your characters.

>>20443108
1. Should be "synchronized exit from his affairs"
2. Consider using "performed a synchronized" rather than "exercised a synchronized." Synchronization calls to mind dance, and it also feels more like a divergent occurrence than deliberate ostracisation, sort of like the way atoms instantly communicate with one another through seemingly impossible distances.
3. That is not how semicolons work. You use it to join two complete sentences whose ideas are so similar that when spoken aloud you wouldn't necessarily pause. Worded as it is, it should be a comma. However, it's wordy, and I would omit the "and" and just use a period.
4. Consider using dashes rather than commas around "forcefully." It still has the desired result of offsetting the word, but the typography of " - forcefully - " has the effect of almost being pinched inward.
5. I think "shared the sole company of himself" just flows better.

As life went, there was less of him in the world. Seclusion pulled inward - forcefully - as the scattered players of his life performed a synchronized exit from his affairs. Soon the spaces his life drifted through shared the sole company of himself.

>It was the best of times, it was the worst of times, it was the age of wisdom, it was the age of foolishness, it was the epoch of belief, it was the epoch of incredulity, it was the season of light, it was the season of darkness, it was the spring of hope, it was the winter of despair.

It's from Dickens, and no one can beat that.

>>20443108
>>20453785
I would also change the second usage of the word "life" to "existence." "... the spaces his existence drifted through..."

>>20453786
This post >>20443102 disproves it.

>>20453759
You writing a warhammer fanfiction or something?

>>20449523
ok groomer

>>20443126
kek'd

Heaps and heaps and heaps of men toiled over the same land that their fathers and their fathers and their fathers toiled, the same land their sons and their sons and their sons will toil, all together, all a marching mass of men distilled to their push and their pull, all contributing their drop to a hole that will one day shame the oceans, all in the name of a man they knew only in epithet.

>>20449531
I'd like to read that. What is it about?

>>20443092
>I am a rotting corpse. I am not alive. My body exists and functions with a heart that pumps thick blood through my veins and my mind operates with a dim consciousness, but my life ended years ago, if it ever really began.

Henry watched the cars in front bump into each other at the stoplight, knowing it would delay his return home by a few minutes at the most. He could not know that these minutes would be the most significant in his life.

Opening of “Call of the Arcade” by F. Gardner.

>>20443092
What are some cliche and bad ways to start a novel? I want to avoid them, I know the classic wake up from a dream is bad, but I'd like to know some more thanks

>>20457487
The first post is a good example on what to avoid. >>20443102

A teacher, whom his pupils respected and loved because of his lively nature, caught one of them one day in the lesson in a snare, about which he became extraordinarily angry. The pupil, who had the misfortune to incur his teacher's displeasure to such an extent, had hitherto been the favorite pupil of the man whom he had carelessly deeply offended, but from now on he was an outcast in the teacher's eyes, whom the latter cruelly belittled and miserably beat up day after day before the whole class, a treatment which the enraged man promised the poor boy would continue punctually and faithfully. Undoubtedly, the teacher had a personal hatred for him, and the adult went too far in this towards the little boy. The boy, who had so suddenly been thrown from the soft seat of benevolence to the hard bench of disfavor, and who had so unexpectedly seen himself transformed from a praised pupil into a notorious villain, did not know how to help himself. Meanwhile, after having endured for weeks, as bravely as he could, the sad fate of a
the sad fate of a fallen favorite and the cruel and contemptuous treatment associated with it. To bring about a change in the almost unbearable situation, he took up his pen and wrote to his grim persecutor and tormentor the following:

"Since I am not allowed to make a confession to my dear parents, because I do not want to add to the many worries they have, I can turn to no one but you yourself to try whether it is possible for me to regain some favor from you. Perhaps this letter will cause you to stop covering me with shame. Since, as I have already said, I cannot complain of my suffering to my parents, I will complain to you. Since I do not want to ask those who love me to protect me, I make the request to the one who hates me and vents his anger on me. So I ask for protection from the one to whom I seem to be defencelessly abandoned and ask for protection from the one who, because he feels offended by my behavior, treats me ruthlessly. I have the courage, as you see, to complain of my suffering to the one who inflicts it and to confide my pain to the one who causes it. I have no more joy at school."

The teacher, to whom the contents of the letter gave all sorts of things to contemplate, behaved more mildly towards the student again from then on.

>>20446337
I would like to see the original so I can know if it was metrical and what alliteration and so forth existed but I’ll try to critique these as original compositions

August Night - Iwaszkiewicz

>Second night like that one,

This line is actually tearing me in two ways, like that one sounds somewhat clunky, but I like that it is alluding to another night that is akin to what shall follow, it’s a good dark implication, I like the sense but I feel the sound could be better, definitely a very hard call.


>you will never live again.

This is fine, not remarkable but fine.

>Such god-given glory,

Nice alliteration but I want to see if it’s in the original, the alliteration actually feels rather bright in contrast to the night of the previous lines.

>Such sky,
>full of stars,

Perhaps in the original such sky worked, but it feels barely English, I’d at minimum make it “such a sky” full of stars is fine but I’ve seen it too much elsewhere.

>But stars and planet forever fly
>when man elapses like a night

Perhaps you’re using elapses for meter, when MAN e-LAPses LIKE a NIGHT, but It feels like elapses doesn’t fit the tone and simplistic language of the rest of the poem, I would try to find the same meaning if possible in monosyllabic form.


>When mouth full of honeycombs

“When mouth” doesn’t feel good, I would modify it to “when the mouth full of honeycomb” just say the line with “the” the rhythm is a lot better.

>gets shut tight.

I like the unexpected rhyme with night, puts emphasis on the stop of the flavor of the goodness of life.
Wolf - Iwaszkiewicz

>In winter nights like old wolf

Again the phrasing comes off harsh, “like old wolf” something simply like, “like an old wolf “ would both fix the rhythm and the actual sentence structure, your scansion is

Cont

>>20457797
in-WINT/er NIGHTS/ like OLD/ WOLF, and while adding an extra stressed syllable can work to imply more force, I feel like it would be better if you continued the iambic style with in-WINT/er NIGHTS/ like an OLD/ WOLF

The double iamb imo simply sounds better.


>i sneak up under shadow of house

Shadow of house makes me wonder if this is a stylistic choice or not, if it is I would need more exposure to how it sounds after reading a few pages.


>and frost
>and snow
>and shaggy stars

I like the idea of the stars also being unkempt and wild like the winter frost, but the association of shaggy with hair harms the imagery and makes one think you chose it for the alliteration of snow shag and star and not actual meaning,

>I look through the window
>what is inside

Utilitarian but effective, I like how the stanzas break creates tension to what is going to be seen, paints a good image.

>There high tenors sing
>And dance and drink
>They live

Love this stanza but I’m a sucker for this kind of drinking eating and singing, jovial imagery, they live feels a little bare though.

>Windows sharing warmth inside,
>And then door creeks,
>And then its silent again.

Really mixed, I actually really like the sound of windows sharing warmth inside but the other two lines feel prosaic, but they do paint a good image.

>They bring the water from the well

From the really does feel like padding for the rhythm but maybe it works due to how faint the scene is meant to be.
>build their happiness house,

While it’s more generic I feel like happy house would fit more so with the rest of the poem’s common wordings.
>And they scream - wolf! wolf!

I dislike the wolf ending but I’m sure it’s in the original.

>>20456450
>their drop to a hole that will one day shame the oceans
wtf does this even mean

>>20446342
I’ll read this one in a bit

>>20456503
Rewrote this to give you some ideas.

I am not alive. My body animates with a heart that pumps thick blood through shriveled veins, and my mind calculates with faint consciousness, but my life ended years ago, its beginning evidenced only by a rotting corpse.

My name is not important... What is important is what I'm going to do. I just fucking hate this world and the human worms feasting on it's carcass. My whole life is just cold, bitter hatred... and I always wanted to die violently. This the time of vengeance and no life is worth saving. And I will put in the grave as many as I can. It's time for me to kill... and it's time for me to die.

>>20443092
>>Castello, the local mob boss, was fumbling with the little girl on his lap who had just downed two individual sized bottles of coke. She really had to go and was squirming anxiously in an effort to get free of his strong grasp without having to say the embarrassing thing: that she had to pee real bad. But Castello wasn't blind, in fact that had been his idea all along when he offered her first one pop, immediately followed by another. Her mom, a very comely woman of about thirty, with gloriously aerodynamic bombs-away-breasts, had tried to discourage the child from taking the second pop, but she had been quickly overruled by Giovanni Castello. Now the pantyhosed child in the short Shirley Temple dress was at the point of bursting and Castello had already begun to tickle her mercilessly in a feigned attitude of avuncular joi de vivre. Suddenly there was a sharp cry followed by the sound of a very strong stream of pee that splashed obscenely all over Castello's left leg and crotch. Watch it you little hussy he growled in feigned anger as the child began to cry even as the hot jet continue to splash boisterously on Castello's lightweight Merino wool suit pants. Angela, come here, he screamed to his secretary. Get this little hussy off of me, before she ends up drowning me in pee! Angela knocked into the girl's mother, who had stood up with the intent to retrieve her tragic child. Sit down, Mrs Rossini, he said sternly, Angela will handle this! Angela take Felicia to the bathroom and get her washed up, then change her into one of the Shirley Temple dresses in the front window display. Yes, sir, Mr Castello! Come Felicia, let's get you out of those soiled clothes, they already reek! The girl, red-faced and bawling uncontrollably, was led away by the secretary. Amara you owe me, you owe me big! Io sono il capo di questa città! You and that little hussy of yours have embarrassed me! Come here and help me get out of these reeking clothes! Mrs Rossini did as she was told and helped Castello out of the ruined Merino wool pants, even as she tried to look away while doing it. Suddenly she felt his large hand on her haunches. Then the other began to paw at her sweater-clad "tette a bomba." No Castello, non ora, ti prego, la bambina tornerà presto! Bend over and lift your skirt Amara. You owe me! No, I beg you, Don Castello. Please not today, spare me the embarrassment, I'm wearing yesterday's drawers, they're unclean! I said bend over, you hussy, and he took out a whip...

>>20457902
Lackluster.

>>20456450
Pretty shit, anon. I tried to rewrite it for you less shitty.

Tumbling heaps of bodies toiled the land their forefathers toiled, the same land their descendants would toil, together a rhythmic mass of men distilled to their push and their pull, flowing through generations in the name of a man they knew only in epitaph.

>>20457902
Wow honestly super shit. It's a great exercise trying to improve these.

My name is insignificant, but my plans are not. I'll have my vengeance on this bloated corpse world and the worms who feast upon it. It's time to kill as many as I'm able and achieve the violent death I've always dreamed - two birds with one stone.

>>20456542
Rewrote this.

Two cars bumped beneath a stoplight. Henry anticipated the ensuing few-minutes delay, but he could not anticipate its profound significance.

>>20457797
>>20457805
>>20457821
Thank you for your time. I am no poet but I had this idea, I have this and if I ideally translate one poem every day I will get enough intuition that I will be able to write own poetry and to better appreciate it in general, do you think it's good idea? Bye do you know polish? I can paste originals here no problem, or maybe I will try to find another translations to compare

>>20458619
*I have this anthology
Its "From Staff to Wojaczek" - best polish poems 1939 -1989 or something

> "Amish? I'm not Amish," the man protested as he peered at me over the rims of thick spectacles. "I'm a Hasidic Jew!"

>That did it. The fucking did it. That fucking doo-daw did it. I let out a piercing cry that descended into a long guttural gabbling as my larynx melted and reformed. Rivulets of flesh and hair poured down my face as my skull emerged only to split asunder revealing not brain matter but row upon row of serrated fangs. The smile of my skull vanished as the teeth burst apart to be replaced by squirming nerve endings that in turn grew and thickened into proboscis like pseudo-tentacles, ah fuck it let's throw caution to the wind, and call them ACTUAL tentacles.

>>20449932
On our way out of Supreme, my two front teeth began to hurt. It wasn't that I didn't go to the dentist; I went last week. No, I'd been punched in the face by a short man - probably a Bolivian, by the tone of its skin - in front of my most important friends. The ensuing "why" attempting to swim its way from my bloodied mouth sounded like the wailing of a small animal. Why did you punch me? Why now? And also: Why in the face? I admit, I was quite handsome before the punch - still am - but everyone needs teeth. You might presume my day ruined, but my drive to shop could not be quelled by a pygmy. I swallowed my instinctive response and cultivated peace. Yes, Louis Vuitton awaited me. And Chanel. I took one of my fleeing friends by the arm and resumed walking. The Bolivian, flabbergasted by my demeanor, tried to address me in broken English to extort my wallet or something, but I didn't listen. After a dozen strides at a pace he couldn't maintain without running, the half-man left. Fuck Bolivians.

>>20453785
Thank you, anon; genuinely.

>>20448133
>>20453630
I thought it was good lol, reminds me of a Norm MacDonald joke. Which novel is it supposed to be spoofing? Moby Dick?

>>20457891
Not that anon, but I want a turn too.

I do not live. I am a pale golem animated by a venal slurry and directed by bird thinking. I might've lived once, but the certainty waned as age waxed anew; a was-rotting, now bleached life.

>>20457902
Postal was better, though I respect Hatred's effort.

Three boys spoke in hushed tones, stooped in close to one another as they hurried along. Suddenly, the big one threw the side of his fist into a locker door. "Somebody fucking told," he hissed at the others, "how the fuck else would they know it was fucking us?"
"I'll bet it was that f-f-faggot h-Harley," the smaller of the three suggested.
The boy of middling height said nothing, his brow furrowed as he scanned the ceiling.

>>20456503
Soul
>>20457891
>>20460729
Soulless

>>20460593
The Gunslinger by Stephen King.
>The man in black fled across the desert, and the gunslinger followed.

>>20461605
Fair, though I wonder how much of it is the nature of derivative work.

It is easy to gulp down a disgusting truth, if it is taken like medicine; all at once. If it is sipped, your soul can't smother the ugliness of it in time. The good lies won't have time to wrap up the ugliness, and hide it away from judgement. No, if you need to be accepting a lie, wash it down right at the beginning; before it festers like a wound, unattended. It's only bitter on the tongue for a moment. Then pride disperses among the other inner drives that burn inside man's will.

>>20457902
the "I fuzzy love this world" version is better than the original.

>>20443129
You could have read one of many classics in the time you spent shittalking on Reddit.

>>20446984
Could he just say:
>"kingdom, amalgamate of every jungle fear."?

In 2122, no one owns their own weapons. No one steals. No one shoots up elementary schools except the military, when they engage in some overseas operation in some forgotten backwater nation. When that happens it is called an "intervention" or "counter-terrorism". In 2122, no one is racist. No one is homophobic. In 2122, no one uses the word "gender" because no one has one. In 2122, everyone works the same job, with the same hours, for the same pay. In 2122, no one thinks.