/lit/ - Literature

People seemed to like this one a few threads back, but what do you NOT like about it?

>>20670080
Here's my poetry:

https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0B4M98NTH

>>20670112
It's a bit too excessive for my taste... like you are jerking yourself off too much with the word play.

Anyway, here's my poem

A lunar halo crowned that night
otherwise a night like any other,
with heaven's ring light over me
I sat mid last month's fallen leaves
and lit my yellow spirit.
Smoke blew crossways in the breeze
as I thought about my fate that eve
but not quite long enough to fear it
for the glowing amber bud recedes
and when its gone I take my leave
thought or not ill have to bear it.

My life was a desert
as desolate as the morning fog
as meaningless as melted snow
in the rain

I drank and drank some more
follow me into the desert
where men are thirsty
and gods are born

The sound of stray dogs
machinery and cackling birds
kept me awake
reigniting memories

that time i ripped my pants
that time i fell off my bike
the time i told her how fond i was

does she still thinks about me
from time to time
or am i long gone
my love crumbling like Ozymandias
alive only deep in her psyche

>>20670080
Five guys, burgers and fries
a gallery of incompetent suicide
dead on the ground, surrounded by guns
an effigy of retribution by aging nuns

hand me the sword, penetrate the wound
reaching heaven and take me soon
if hell grips my legs and pulls me down
a mouth will open with cavernous sound

down to hell and upwards to heaven
a cross-stiched wound of the number seven
if heaven grips my arms and pulls me up
the hellmouth below will seize itself shut

>>20670080
Colonizer, Colonizer
Going To Rape Your Sacred Land
Colonizer, Colonizer
I am The Caucasian Man

Take Your Women, Lay Them Down
Undress Each Other, And Thrash Them Around
Colonizer, Colonizer
Bury Their Corpses In The Ground

This Land Is My Land
This Land Is Not Yours
Your Men Are Weak and Impotent
Your Women All Are Whores

I saw how my thread went down
With a single reply: ‘nice’
It went deep,
underground
It went there to die

Did it say all it had?
Did it danced through the soul
Of this place?
My post went down
To a maze
Of the archived

Aeons will pass
Perhaps
Yesbody will excavate
Handful of Gobekli Tepes,
Treasures and mountain air
In my shitpost:
Sunken Atlantis.

I saw how my thread went down
With a single reply: ‘nice’
It went deep
underground
It went there to die

Did it say all it had?
Did it dance through the soul
Of this place?
My post went down
To a maze
Of the archived

Aeons will pass
Perhaps
Yesbody will excavate
Handful of Gobekli Tepes,
Treasures and mountain air
In my shitpost:
Sunken Atlantis.

>>20671598
Go to /pol/, You're not funny.

>>20671654
There's a hint of irony to my poem. Figured a place like /lit/ would pick up on that but I guess you guys don't read so what's the use?

>>20671680
Also I don't post there anyways, intellectual wasteland.

>>20671598
repulsive and (worse still) does not scan

>>20670080
Prometheus
stonebound
parched pale like bone
by daylight
dreams

of a plastic bag flailing
forest fire smoking
choked up rubbish river
frenzied locust feeding
hypodermic crucifixions in the earth

until -
he awakens
to talon and beak
tearing insatiably
from navel to breast

Prometheus
closes his eyes
and feels the justice

in the blood running
warmer than the sun.

>>20671905
Good. Except for the last line, it seems insufficient.
>more fierce than the sun
Or even
>cold unlike the sun

Sometimes on his hill the salamander
Passes time by picking flowers
Prancing around

While each passing day does pluck another
Frightened little salamander
Out of the ground

With handles in her fists
by the train tracks and mist,
farewells follow, her friends
and the cat that she’ll miss
more than anything else
waiting on the platform.

Then a time later they
disappear with the hiss
of departure’s approach,
while sleepless and amiss
she stares out the window
of her compartment coach.

Awkward without pillows,
dream dazed she awakens,
in sweat, slowing down to
a halt—her coach vacant,
the train having arrived
at a stop far westward.

>>20670080
Open the treasures of your secret springs;
- Yes, - provided that entraining and torrents and streams,
Our love may be the one river, with wide waters;
- Yes, - if you love me more than a friend's shadow,
Than your mother, the sleeping coffin martyr,
More than a first child or a supreme farewell,
Than the husband in his glory, and thy daughter, and thy God!
- Yes, - if to death, in our charming wiles,
In the most divine moments of our confused souls,
You say to me again, with your forehead against my boiling breast:
"Friend, I have felt everything, but, you, you pass everything!
Enough, You, enough, let us guard against blasphemy;
Let a corner of the sky always shine to the eyes I love;
Let us fear to press too much the ground where our steps go;
The human veil is heavy, let us not thicken it!
If pure virtue hides her cheek for a moment,
Let not her golden girdle be untied;
Between the brilliant sounds of enchanting desire
The eternal sacrifice raises its sigh;

>>20670112
Styles like this have never been my thing, but this poem isn't bad.

>>20670702
I like all of it except the last line. It feels awkward and out of place.

>>20672663
Anyways, here is my poem called Seneca

On nights like these when thoughts they seem
To seek the drear and dreadful dreams,
I think of ways in which to sway
alone amongst more calmer scenes.

Then past and nearly so dearly say
That all is lost and far away.
I take the chance, nonetheless,
To go outside and contemplate.

The moon, the stars, the silhouettes
Ease my mind though I see them less.
I breathe my breath and take a fall
To view a view I can’t forget.

The sounds, the blue, and almost all
Are nothing which in truth I call
A fiend of me and inner Gods,
But still I seem somehow null.

dead and bloated bodies blanket the land
smell of rotten meat in the winter sun
bleached bones of the dead
long forgotten fields of rusted guns

distorted faces in the darkness
writhing in anguish for all to see
bodies shaped like dying trees
a butcher shop of hanging carcass

beasts devour them all
teeth crooked and mangled
bodies snapped and tangled
moon sways in the water leering tall

Waterbearer's veins bear air
Heart of Herakles hard
Now Atlas kneels nowhere
Giants nothing guard

>>20672683
>more calmer

>>20673360
My dumbass had peaceful in there, and changed it to calmer with noticing a thing

>>20673383
without* I'm basically illiterate

>>20671766
Sucks to be you then

Is there a heaven for hail mary last ditch bridge hoppers and straw men?

Capable of no depth, just description

Foot falls asleep
Leg dozes soon after
Absentee limb, flesh
Wrapped in a starsheet plaster

Would the rest of me transcend this skin
and slumber soundly
turn the brain into a nightgown scrooge
Mumbling loudly:

“Let the ghosts prevail…”
Spectral mitts and sheeted groin
blown by a phantom wind
til *fwip*
No more noise

>>20674421
i like this enough to have instinctually critical thoughts a8out it
>Absentee limb, flesh
coma use too common. so is flesh. make the line interesting while having it flow.
>this skin
avoid having words that start with the sound the other ends with. take out "this"
>soundly
>loudly:
lame rhyme. may8e make use of slum8er continuing the rhymes 8efore.
>Spectral
>phantom
we get it. ghost. 8tw, not a straight rhyme 8ut ghost resolves to noise. keep it in mind
>til *fwip*
genious

stanza 8reaks seem unnecessary.

>>20674421
The interesting images and thoughts are enough to make it good and it seems accessible without being retarded, like mine are.

Rise all ye men,
who are still men yet,
made steadfast again
by whipping winds met
and harden thy breast for times to come.

Rise from your slumber
by red war drums roused
to see fire's ember
among wastelands doused
and strengthen thy heart for times to come

Rise from the shield,
carrying pale bounty no more
the bundled axe wield
oft wielded before
and sharpen thy blades for times to come

Rise to the daylight,
fulgora your armor,
with Indra's battle-might,
defeat the false charmer
and ready thy soul for times to come

>>20672843
>Waterbearer's veins bear air
>Heart of Herakles hard
>Now Atlas kneels nowhere
>Giants nothing guard
Sad. The heart of heracles is only waiting for new life though dude. You only need to give it a little shock.

>>20671639
A beaut

>>20672035
Nice

crickets chirped beneath the buck moon
Gabriel's trumpet blew, the earth was dying
the dead rose from their graves, many were crying
those left behind howling like loons

hells mouth opened up
sound of fallen souls screaming
earth was dying and i lay dreaming
blood runneth over my cup

Diamond of thy sceptre
Daemon
Of the Soul
In this world — a spectre
Noble resurrector
Who slipped through a hole

Refuge in the gutter
Right amidst the slime
It’s so rich, I’m strapping
Spirit to a rhyme

Boundless, Endless
.. Worthless?
In the eyes of mimes
Slaves who are deceitful
Never knowing Light

Truth-bombs cloaked as shitposts
Paradigm that comes
Chant exalted something
Beat courageous drums

card
if this is your thread
i have vowed not to curse people
8ecause everytime i do i get poisoned
i swear
8ut
all im asking
is that you stop stealing
and that i start feeling
8etter than i feel
and that i wont ever feel
this 8ad again

Old stories for silver told
Toothless dogs bark
River remembers times of old
Masterwork of Mouse-Bulwark

Let's not have this die just yet

>>20670702
>>20671590
>>20671595
>>20671598
>>20671639
>>20671905
>>20672035
>>20672092
>>20672173
>>20672683
>>20672810
>>20672843
>>20674421
>>20675064
>>20675554
>>20676497
>>20677305
>>20677406
RETARDED PSEUD TRASH
YOU WILL NEVER HAVE SEX

>>20679477
Yeah but I used a rhyme scheme though, and it's uplifting

>>20679477
Cool trash for handsome intellectuals. You will never produce trash as cool and sexually attractive as any of that.

>>20679477
actually I've had six ex-girlfriends. you know nothing of me.

I’m about to post a very good one everyone hold on

>>20670080
>And a little bit of chicken fried
>Cold beer on a friday night
>Pair of jeans that fit just right
>With the radio up
Thoughts?

>>20677305
schitzo

>>20679908
I like that song

>>20670702
The last line sounds weird. The half rhymes are something at least, but the heavenly imagery with smoking is discordant for me.

>>20671590
I don't like it. The Ozymandias line is cringe I think, by referencing another poet in that way.

Penis zeppelin
Vaginal jets
We know what jappened
JAPpened
The man from the East is always watching

>>20671905
Is this Prometheus seeing our world and regretting his gift of fire? It seems like a cliché and shallow idea to me personally. And as other anons have said, maybe the last line could be
>hotter than the sun
Or something stronger

>>20672092
Is it supposed to rhyme or not? I think it should be one or the other, because the mixture does nothing for it. Especially the last stanza which only has a shoddy near rhyme. The rhymes are the best part for me.

>>20672173
It has a decent rhythm for prose. It does not read like poetry in my opinion.

Im trying to write a poem from the point of view of a schizo.

------------------------------------------------

misshapen faces lurking in the midnight city
they all laugh at me and i can hear my guts bubbling
im all alone some would find it troubling
my thoughts leap from my head broadcasted for all to pity

the man across the street is staring
he wore red to intimidate me
they know im the savior of this world
the holy ghost that watches over

>>20672683
A few tweaks could make it better I think. The first like sounds a bit awkward. Grammatically it should be "when thoughts seem" not "they seem". I could be wrong, but it sounds off to me. But I like the rest of it. I like the rhyme scheme. I've done similar stuff before. But I think the first line of the second stanza is also off. The rhyme of nearly and dearly are either too close together in the line or should just be removed. It is also metrically too different. The 3rd line of that stanza could also use some metrical tweaking. Maybe
>I take the chance though, nonethelss
It sounds more metrically correct to my ear. Using view twice so close together is a bad use of repition I think, in the 3rd stanza. I also think the "fall" is different from the other imagery and seems kind of out of left field. Might be what you want. The last line is also metrically lacking. Perhaps instead,
>But I still seem somehow null
I think it sounds better, but is still lacking compared to the first two lines of the stanza. You might want that effect with the context of the line, especially ending in the word "null".

>>20672810
I like the idea of a poem with strong horrifying images, but the rhymes are haphazard, and much of the imagery is kind of boring actually, not shocking enough.
>distorted faces in the darkness
>writhing in anguish for all to see
>in darkness
>for all to see
This sounds dumb.

>>20672843
What does it mean anon? I'm curious. I can't think of a message besides a general sad feeling.

>>20675064
I think the lines could be tweaked to sound better and the refrain is boring, not strong enough. I think it should be changed.

>>20675554
Runneth is out of place. The Revelations-like stuff isn't working. Moon and loons is a bad rhyme, it sounds like you forced a line out that would rhyme with moon.

>>20676497
It sounds cool but I don't get it. It sounds like it could be a good poem outside of /lit/ if not for the "truth-bombs" and "shitposts" at the end.

>>20677305
Whats with the Bs everywhere 8s should be?

>>20680626
>he wore red to intimidate me
This is a good line, your poem doesn’t feel like the rambling of a schizo.
You should prob lurk on /pol and /x/

1/5

I. Conclusion

At the Chiming of the bells
We’ll go and eat, rosemary
chicken will be served with
carrots and wine. Fair Ofilia
will accompany us and
we will devour her white silky
flesh, pale against the red moss.
The snow, it’s gathering at
the steps of the cathedral in front of
the cafe, the smoke rises
spreading its wings at the cross
besides the bells.
At the chiming of the bells
we will gather at the cafe
to drink spirits and smoke
demons, to walk in the shoes
of yesteryear, and make
the food of tomorrow.

Way past seven in the evening
poets will recite
and we will fall
an opium induced dream
and see the birth of a new age.

>>20677406
What is a mouse-bulwark?
>>20680626
It sounds like you are trying to write as a schizo, but schizo posts are much less sensical than this.

Just did a bunch of crits, so I'll post some now.

>>20680692
This one's thrown together MGTOW kind of stuff, perfect for these threads.

>>20680694
Forgot pic lol

>>20680692

>>20680699
as a nude and probing knight,
some fearsome fiend i find to fight
and cum so hard it hurts my pride
i fuck my horse, a pounding ride,
"A ruthless raping," the poor folk wrote
BGC sowing oats
"And the maidens, madly wet
did squelch so lewdly as his probing met"

>>20680796
Laughed out loud at the horse rape. Thanks for the parody anon

>>20670080
obtuse. if you dont see that then you are too.

>>20680859
meant for you beotch >>20670112

Thick frog, oh I see you.
All on display, charmer
although don't whip it out in front of the farmer.

Begone thots for this frog is thick and looking for dick.
And with a hurry he was off in a flurry looking for a mcflurry.

>>20680653
The ancient giants have nothing to guard because people don't believe in or value anything. You don't even believe Atlantis existed. The waterbearer is the bringer of life and what the next age is named after.
>>20680687
>What is a mouse-bulwark?
It's a funny name for a man that lived around 970 AD. According to the Sagas Músa-Bölverkur redirected a major river in Iceland around his fort which changed the entire landscape of the area. People didn't really believe it but I found the location and figured out how he did it last week. He didn't even need to dig a ditch, he used another small stream to do it for him.

>>20681762
According to the story he was named Bölverkur and nicknamed Músa-Bölverkur. Bölverk is a composite. In English it's mostly associated with forts as in Bulwark but it can mean calamity as in the redirection of the river, a "bad-work".
He built a small fort and caused a small calamity doubly living up to his name.

>>20681762
>>20681821
Cool stuff

O the Spring field is a Weird field
That mothers a funny brood,
And its comical arms hold whimsical charms
For the lazy, the strange and the rude.

And wise men trust in the seeds and such
From the place that sells farmers feed;
But the much known store would be quite a bore
Were it not acquired by Sneed.

Now, the joke is quite clever for those who endeavor
To understand the humorous deed.
What was formerly Chuck's, by some strange luck,
Came to be Sneed's Feed and Seed.

The change in owners of the store near Homer's
Family farm where the boy grew up
Created a rhyme in its name, but the real game
Is that previously it did not rhyme enough.

Now Sneed sells feed and also seed
To the farmers of Springfield's country.
To be succinct, if you stop and think
You'll find that it's really quite funny.

No, I am not gay
Name one single instance
No, that does not count

2/5

II. Artifice

At the chiming of the bells
while looking through
the fragments of colored
triangles of church windows
winter brings us back to our
amniotic state, where we are
able to swim with the gods.
There Europa with her ever
grey eyes
takes us in her bosom, where
it is warm, it is love, it is birth!
Her marble hands caress our
forehead and cheeks, her fingers
are cold, smooth and our bodies
are feverish. We walk in the great
hall of ancient phoenicians
again Europa with her storming
grey eyes tells us to bathe and we do
and she comes to us and clothes us,
and calls us Arachne Sisyphus. And tells us

‘Oh gentle creature, men, your time
has come. You that loved and believed
in us Gods, you that worshipped us
for millennia, oh men so noble and frail
you have turned your back on us,
you come and challenge us, now
you’ll killed us’

There you hand her
a gift, a tiny wooden horse.

>>20682031
Many poems here provide quality entertainment and insights but can anyone really top this masterpiece? All your idols have been dethroned. Future history will rest on this moment.

>>20681997
The first stanza sound actually like a serious poem. Good job with this. It is well out together until the last stanza.

Bump

>>20670112
Pretentious

Liquid sharts on marble steps,
Bubbling moors and misty braps,
A flame, a sound, a sudden flash,
A body, writhing, turned to ash,
The smell, the taste, the tasteless cum –
A madman's cry, his mistress' song.

Your a herbivor
I an carnivor
You eat grass
I eat ass
You eat onions
I leap with joy
You're rage a resentment
Myne a potency that pierces thorugh heaven and makes god cum

>>20682533
>>20680684
3/5

III. Pilgrimage

At the chiming of the bells
banners and saints will
be erected, and we will close
our eyes and someone will
lead us, and we will walk
shoulder to shoulder and some
will pray and some will sing.

At the chiming of the bells
we’ll rush out, rampaging olympus
the sphinx and the moon pyramid
will crumble.
What dynasties are left,
none, we have succeeded
science will have the final word
every year we shall gather
at a certain latitude
we’ll walk to Newton’s tree
and call the universe
with burning hearts and nuclear
pink lighting the sky.
Silicon Valley will be our Mecca!

1/2

No, none of that ruckus should step past the doormat.
I'm tired, I'm sleeping: so get the driveway clear!
No, don't twist my words: no, I never said that.
Let everyone know who lives here, who lives here.

The aching on one side, on Sundays especially,
The dull tugging stomach-knots following ecstasy,
The clear autumn sky, saying, “Here is your way out,”
All offer a mirror: so put them away now!

Yes, I am an expert: though words are just alright,
Step right up, step to me, O you who abhor me!
Who wills it, who wants it: let him be my guest tonight!
Past crooked frames, peeling paint, let him step towards me!

In soreness like after when he and his love first danced
As mythical creatures that peopled his backyard pranced
He’d toss to a turn and murmur and mutter,
Get up from his nap time and enter another.

His sword was a shapely, magnificent specimen
Not forged by the Hephaestus but faultiest chancing
That had in its best days beheaded some better men
Efficiently, modernly, without romancing.

>>20684170
2/2

But those were all younger days: then it sat idly
‘Til when it swung slowly, always justifiably,
And chopped up a carrot, or made the trees logs,
Or subdued a eunuch and finished the job.

On asphalt he ventured as faulty as verses
Or barren as bodies that starve their own muscles.
His errant companions would mutter him curses;
He listened instead to the yellow leaves rustle.

At present it was an unbearable burden
To drag through his day’s work what no longer served him,
And cradle it carefully, polish it well,
And ask himself: when do we all go to heaven?

But sometimes a rushing wind rose from the Hudson
And hushing the sounds of the street overhead
Made mincemeat of all of his hopes of a pardon
And battered his body until he was—still alive!

On one night it lifted him out of his context:
He glimpsed the horizon, the stars, and the fairer sex.
That was but a moment: he never told anyone.

So in a last effort to wear out his tires
He drove in a circle for millions of miles
And sent east his heartache to follow the rising sun.

No, no one is worthy—and least he!—to end it.
The wind carries on, just as no one intended,
And disturbs forgetful sleep.

(The Ballad of Tony Soprano)

Will rate others in a sec, hold up.

An anon made a thread 2 days ago asking people to write a poem on the sheer joy of reading and I came up with this in 20 seconds.

Reading, is it sheer joy?
Or just another ploy?
To occupy the lonely mind
Like a horse soldier in troy

Someone replied saying it was the best in the thread and that made my day, I have no idea if it is shit or good though. I never write anything but a few years ago I came up with a poem here before that got a few replies with praise, I don't remember it though.

>>20684175
Okay, here I am with critiques.

>>20680684
>>20682533
>>20684127
You take your topoi seriously, which I like. But I don't really get what the distinction between the parts is. I like the introduction (invocation?) sections best. I feel that your own voice can get lost between the procession of themes.
Maybe you're building up to something, which could be cool. But you would already have lost me by now in a magazine, which is unfortunate, since your short, varied line length is fun.

>>20684197
>To occupy the lonely mind
>Like a horse soldier in troy
Ha! Could be phrased more elegantly, but I really like this double sense. You should write more! This is more creativity than most people in these threads have.

>>20680695
>>20680699
>>20680626
Eek.

>>20684212
>Ha! Could be phrased more elegantly, but I really like this double sense. You should write more! This is more creativity than most people in these threads have.
Thanks a lot anon, I will pick up a notebook next time I am out and just see what comes to mind.

>>20684263
That's how I write everything. That's how most people who write poetry without forcing it do it. Frank O'Hara would dash into typewriter shops to bang out poems when they came to him on his lunch breaks.
It really is like shitting. Best to let it out smoothly and as soon as possible after your body tells you you have to.

>>20684269
Yeah over the years there have been a few times where I randomly think of a clever poem but don't bother to write it down, then I forget it and wish I had written it down. The encouragement I have got from this latest one from you and that other anon is pushing me to start doing it so thank you.

>>20680692
>>20680695
>>20680699
Just reread all three of these to figure out what disgusted me so much. No offense, anon, but your good ideas are squandered like this. Poems are first and foremost sound. It's fine to play with meter, it's fine to write blank verse, but this is utter cacophony.
Do you speak another language? If not, learn one. You don't have to become fluent. Just learn to a halfway decent reading level. Then practice by translating poetry, being conscious of every decision you make and trying to stay at least minimally faithful. This is the poetic equivalent of weight-lifting: one rep does very little, but you will notice fast progress from many.

>>20680626
Never, please, please, never try to write in the voice of a madman, unless you are a madman writing in your own voice. You sound like a child going "bla bla bla bla I'm so crazy" in the cafeteria to impress other children.

a fart in the night

a fart in the night to break the silence
a fart in the night to startle the cat
a fart in the night to soil the sheets
a fart in the night turns into a shat

>>20684170
>>20684175
Like the poem. Great cadence though you don’t follow it through.
Really cool lines
>The clear autumn sky, saying, “Here is your way out,”
> Or barren as bodies that starve their own muscles.
>His errant companions would mutter him curses;
>He listened instead to the yellow leaves rustle.

These are some of my favourite.

In the first stanza, you should pick sleeping or tired and repeated so it echoes “who lives here, who lives here”
You can also do it with “step right up, step right up”

In the stanza ending with “follow the rising sun” you could get rid of sun, kind of how in Sopranos there’s a cut to black.

Other suggestions
>so get the driveway clear!
So clear off the driveway!
>Get up from his nap time
Wake up/ awake

You should read your poem aloud a couple of times and you will improve its rhythm.

>>20683681
You were doing good til the onions/joy
>>20683640
Bubble braps
>>20681997
Good fun poem

4/5

IV. The Cathedral

At the chiming of the bells
the cathedral will open
its doors and the cold winter
air will rush in as all the people
from all walks of life and
from the most far remote places
will walk orderly inside.
At the chiming of the bells
the gathered, mass will begin
and we will all pray and sing
together and joy will blush
in our face. Our bodies
will be showered with sunlight.
Shredded wax melting on the altar
The pipes of organs will release our soul
and the virtual world will welcome us.

>>20684354
Thanks for the critique, anon. I do break from the amphibrachic meter intentionally a few times, most obviously here:
>And ask himself: when do we all go to heaven?
>And battered his body until he was—still alive!
>And disturbs forgetful sleep.
What do you think of these?

>>20684408
>And ask himself: when do we all go to heaven?
>And battered his body until he was—still alive!

These two work, the first one is great because the break sounds natural. The second takes me out of the poem because of the exclamation.

Good job anon.

>>20684212
>Eek
What gives you that reaction?

>>20684302
I like this kind of poetry, so I'll continue in a similar vein, but incidently I am planning on learning a language

>>20684634
>planning
Stop planning start doing.

The Governor of Yen-Men Marches
Black clouds bore on city gates: gates that wished to fall;
Fish-scaled armor flickered in cold sunlight as it crawled.
Bugle-horns resounded in the autumn-tinted sky;
Upon the pass the mud had purpled, frozen in the night;
Wind battered the red banner as soldiers reached the river Yi;
Frost layered—and the voice of drums gasped out in the freeze:
Repay our prince’s faith to us, our oaths at Huang-Chin-T’ai—
Now clutch your jade dragon sabers, men: ready to fight and die!

A translation from Chinese poet Li Ho. Please critique on its legibility, even if you can read Chinese.

>>20684807
Really cool. Seems dated, idk Li Ho. Reminds me of the late Romantics.
I think this line needs to be reworked
>Repay our prince’s faith to us

>>20684912
>Reminds me of the late Romantics
Funny you should say that. He's compared to Baudelaire, Rimbaud, etc. quite frequently. But he lived in the 8th-9th century.
>Repay our prince’s faith to us
Yes, thank you for catching that. Very messy how I've written it. It will take some brainstorming.

(don't ask)

When at first God on high hobbled the serpent
And stuck to the soil his victim deserving,
Though the fetter of footlessness seemed very sound,
The tormented tempter still writhed ‘cross the ground.

What was his sentence? That seeking revenge he might
Confound forever the slighter and slighted,
Forget at last who first that flame ignited,
So far would Eden soon drift from his sight.

So the unseemly beast with his venomous tongue out
Prowls his prey and springs up from the floor.
Then when by saints or snake-catchers he’s run out,
Thinking injustice done to him, he suffers yet more.

My desire is like that bad reptile too:
Once struck down it searches for victims anew
Through the dust underfoot.

The lower it sinks, the meaner it gets;
Lashing at mercy, responding with threats
To even a look.

>>20681862
Thanks. By saying I'm cool you gave me permission for a self-serving rant, sorry these are the rules. The 4 line poems I'm doing are based on the structure called ferskeytla in Icelandic. There are strict rules about which words should alliterate and how many syllables a word in each position can have but I don't worry about it here.
>>20672843
I'm happy with this one. Each line has many meanings but like people pointed out >>20680653 I can't expect anyone to get the schizo connections I'm making. I think it's still decent without the explanations, then it conveys mysterious sadness, which works. The starting point for letting the thoughts roam was thinking about Atlantis.
>Waterbearer's veins bear air
The future is bleak and our hopes of bringing life to other planets is fading. The waterways of western Sahara that used to be the lifeblood of the civilized world are sand and hot air blows instead of water.
>Heart of Herakles hard
The men with the potential to be romantic heroes are nihilistic cynics instead and the heroes we're presented with in the new mythology from pop media are also nihilistic cynics. The physical pillars of Herakles now guard hardened salt flats with no significance, lake Tritonis in Tunis.
>Now Atlas kneels nowhere
Atlas holds up the world like the structured logic of our models of the world begin with first principles which hold up the rest. The world Atlas was holding is gone, somebody lost it apparently. He also doesn't rest on anything himself, he just floats in space aimlessly. We removed the foundations for the traditions of thought we have and their conclusions, now pointless ideas float empty in space with no relevance. God is dead so people kneel nowhere in front of nothing, they worship the nothing. The Atlas mountains now don't protect anything but sand and have no special significance in the world. Like the pillars they're just rocks.
>Giants nothing guard
Atlas doesn't carry anything and we don't give him anything to carry. Heroes have no responsibilities and tradition has no value. The pillars and the Atlas mountains geographically protected Atlantis which is now insignificant desert, partly due to our lack of imagination and hardened hearts. The giants include the modern day Herculeses that work every day to guard things of no significance, corporate profits and the proliferation of greed etc instead of some ideals or even just the future.

We could bring water back to the Sahara and revive an ancient paradise. If we're unable to do that how can we bring life to other planets and fulfill the promise of the waterbearer?

how about some poetry?
strange and colorfully wound
a suite of image and sound
how nice could it be?

why do it badly?
draw from strife and treason
not simply, nor by reason

why follow, full of rage
just to try and fill a page?
why not write of love, peace, and affection?

alas, it is but a section
of all the works abound;
there is still a lot to be heard
of beautiful, peaceful sound

>>20685094
All the snake and mutilation references make me think that this might be about a bad breakup. Not a complaint; I like the pacing very much.

Anyway, here's mine.

We stayed behind Wednesday
scarring our names into a burnt wall.
You left little scratches all around
and the bottle shook as you lifted it.

I was a vampire to you, or nothing,
taking the last half-gorge away
so you wouldn't drown again.
You stopped inviting me in.

I kept slipping you twenties,
even though I knew where
you were putting them,
it never stopped either of us.

When I dropped you in
you said you'd never talk to me
again. You said you were finished.
You always said that.

We stayed behind Wednesday
scarring our names into a burnt wall.
There's no tremble in your scrawl,
no dregs in half-empties now.

But there's nothing in you now,
what was taken away was
never given back. Our father
who was in Heaven.

>>20685121
It is cool, anon. I got that impression from the last 2 lines that the world is no longer the same, and that is a common feeling nowadays. Are you from Iceland?

>>20684638
Thanks for the good advice

Bump

>>20685268
I enjoy the ash Wednesday motif. However it's for a reason that we're told not to mix metaphors. I think the vampire one in particular could be further and better developed.

>>20683595
In a metaphysical sense, yes.
Also in the way you meant, probably.

>>20670112
This is good, keep at it.

Ordered bodies in endless procession.
Wild flowers are growing amidst concrete cubes.
For an untrained eye that is all.
There is another hall,
As insistently pointed in ancient legends.
My neighbourhood in my imagination —
An Oblivion,
With traces and corpses of the Time that is no more.
Its rot nourishes coming singularities:
The double of a friend you knew decides to take another road.
The vanished come back exalted.
The horizon opens differently.
Switch worlds as channels,
This TV comes as a gift.
This world seized by myths.
And suddenly life has a new meaning.

A diaristic piece. This is one I *know* is insufficient on its own. I'm rather posting it to see if there's any thought in it that anyone here would like to see expanded. At present I simply don't know what to do with it, though I'm reluctant to throw the first two stanzas out.

Saltwater eating away at the concrete
Beneath our feet. Still sweat spills,
Oiling the crawl of the night’s drafting dry heat
Across the windowsill.

The eyes’ blurred focus in the heat waves;
Currents that tow us in the heat waves
Towards long summer nights’ perilous pirate-swarmed harbors;
Burnt rubber wafts; pigeons bathe.

Cardamom, vetiver, cedarwood, bergamot
Mixing with notes of vanilla and lavender
Crowd up and cloud the night’s course off the calendar.

Earlier, alcohol, rubbing or flavored,
Spilled on the floorboards and ruined the favor
That someone bought.

>>20686397
This suffers from ambition. Even the word choice seems desperate to impress rather than say. You're probably young.
Don't try for big concepts like this. Pick single subjects that you have something to say about and let your voice come out through them. And read more Romantics and Metaphysical Poets. The world didn't start from Modernism; the Modernists didn't invent themselves; the "meaning" that the Modernists wanted to recapture was after all something to *re*-capture.

>>20670080
Fast money
Lost my dollar
Last honey
Chewed through the collar
Beat down
Feeling blue
Seat crown
Found a shoe
Breathe deep
Feel the day
Seethe heap
Gone away

Three translations from Chinese of which I'm quite unusually proud. Ironically, I don't have any particular fondness for any of these poets, except for Hsin Ch'i-Chi, whose entry in this series I find clearly the best.
Maybe I should work on things I don't care for more often.

>>20687249
>chewed through the collar
Chewed collar

>>20686937
Great first stanza.
It’s like a retake of Poes poetry.
The list of spices is very intriguing.
The last stanza is weak, I would delete it and continue in the lines of the third stanza.

5/5

V. A New Breath

We are become eternity.
Your ancestors have
the same hopes and dreams
as your descendants.
Let yourself be drowned
for you’ll be given
a new breath.
At the chiming of the bells
the light will rain down on
us, and fresh morning air
Will come and lift us up.

>>20670112
Ahem...

The Seeping Bunghole of Rodrigo
-------------------------------------------------
Follow you? But where?
Are we off to a mystical land of legend and lore?
A place filled with pixies, faeries and more?
Be there adventure, vile dragons to smite?
We shall face beasts, hearts as black as winter night?
Will there be fair maidens to emancipate, treasure to plunder?
Tell me, what shall we find in this place of wonder?

Ahem...
The Seeping Bunghole of Rodrigo
-------------------------------------------------
Follow you? But where?
Are we off to a mystical land of legend and lore?
A place filled with pixies, faeries and more?
Be there adventure, vile dragons to smite?
We shall face beasts, hearts as black as winter night?
Will there be fair maidens to emancipate, treasure to plunder?
Tell me, what shall we find in this place of wonder?

Blacks.

The Harsh Realm
-------------------------
Follow you? But where?
Are we off to a mystical land of legend and lore?
A place filled with pixies, faeries and more?
Be there adventure, vile dragons to smite?
We shall face beasts, hearts as dark as winter night?
Will there be fair maidens to emancipate, treasure to plunder?
Tell me, what shall we find in this place of wonder?

Blacks.

ctrl + f
No ozymandias
Do you even read?

>>20687703
No, my head's fucked because I smoked too much weed.

>>20687721
thats what weed does to you

>>20687736
But I was told that it's fine; that I'm one of the unfortunate few?

>>20687761
There is more than a few of you. I hope you will cure your addiction and forsake the devil.

>>20686937
Surely, you're not a gamer.

>>20687771
Thanks for the kind words. I can see that you're on the level.

>>20687776
What?

>>20687803
He's never played an 80's fantasy text adventure. That's fine.

You know how this is:
if I look
at the crystal moon, at the red branch
of the slow autumn at my window,
if I touch
near the fire
the impalpable ash
or the wrinkled body of the log,
everything carries me to you,
as if everything that exists,
aromas, light, metals,
were little boats
that sail
toward those isles of yours that wait for me.
Well, now,
if little by little you stop loving me
I shall stop loving you little by little.
If suddenly
you forget me
do not look for me,
for I shall already have forgotten you.

>>20688901
This is Neruda watered down

Bump

Some context: I've done something terrible to someone I loved. Nothing illegal (or I wouldn't be posting it here), and nothing that I think will be hyper-traumatic, but awful enough that I feel forever dirty. She'll forget about it and me in time: I hope sooner than later for her sake. I have to keep living on as this person.
Working on a series of poems on this theme. Here is my intro/"justification":


I sung loud these dirges more turgid than turgid
To confess a crime that can never be purgèd.

Poems by predators? —When have they not been?
Why make the matter worse? —Singers are such.
Unsayable! —So you would rather the sin?
How praisable! —Calm down now, that's a bit much.

Based? —No, never, and into the pit with you.
A defense? —For this soul no defense will do.
Debased? —But debasement's a godly affliction.
Your conscience? —Lies much less than reason's sweet fiction.

Inhibited! —Too bad I can't draw a picture.
Dangerous! —Who reads will have no nice impression.
Derivative! —Build your shop without its fixtures.
From the wrong view! —Aha! Now at last a good question.

To those who would judge that the wrong one here’s weeping:
That’s right; I agree; that’s the reason I’m speaking.
Let song be my witnesses: here I stand guilty.
Let guilt be my albatross, lighthouse, and destiny.

I am H. M., howling music in harmony
With everyone else who would justly wish harm on me.
I hoist high and mightily this lightest mantle
And holler misgivings out when it’s mishandled.

Get up, you anapests, dactyls, and amphibrachs,
At my command fall in form and in time,
To abuse these innocent feminine rhymes:
March in good posture now out of my barracks.

They speed into battle in slim single file;
Their bayonets sway for a cause they detest.
The censorious chuckle, the moralists smile:
This enemy combats this enemy best.

In such a battle, the price of their victory
Is very agreeable: either it's them or me.
So much had they hoped for, always from the start:
So much does art foster, and long is this art!

If there's a better way out, then it's you I implore:
Hypocrite reader: you’ve heard this before!

>>20687388
Oh that is better; I was just dropping something off the top of my head.