/lit/ - Literature

>>5059380
Your space between lines is painful. It's too metrically stilted to feel warm and connected. It's in present tense but doesn't feel active.

>>5059404

Do you think writing this in classic stanzas would be helpful? I haven't tried it, but it would seem that since the meter isn't there, stanzas would be wasted. As far as being more active, any suggestions?

Thank you for your reply, I do appreciate it. Honest criticism is hard to come across on this board, which, hopefully, this thread will combat.

>>5059419
Poems about girls being pretty are kind of banal. Even Shakespeare was lampooning them.

>>5059423

Feelings are what they are, and when you're a male, a lot of those feelings are dealt in the world of acceptance. Female acceptance, praise, disgust, unoberservence, serves as a basis for many emotions, as I feel.

What type of poems do you enjoy, and have you anything you'd like to share here?

>>5059423

True, but I think it's far more egregious to deny yourself a topic for fear of what others would think.

If you can't write shameless poetry about love when you're a young man, then when can you write it?

I don't enjoy poetry, and I've only written it when I was obligated to.

Here's something from high school, although I doubt I remember it correctly:

Beyond the horizon sits unseen,
Those things of which we yearn and dream.
Within mind's grasp but out of reach,
We assail the bastion we cannot breach,
For the things of which we yearn and dream,
We persevere, us human beings.

/end cringe

>>5059478

This is really good. I did a quick google search to see if it's original haha. Do you still enjoy writing?

'For Atlas'

The weight of the world on my shoulders
can do me no wrong.
For when morning lights cease,
and night's fall glows,
as will you.
Because the Earth itself
looks to stars for guidance.
And though this world may weigh me down,
and prove much more to handle,
the stars above,
like you, My Love,
forever keep me climbing.

>>5059494
Not writing for writing's sake, no. I still manage to get practice in various other forms of prose, but artistry is always secondary to conciseness for me.

>>5059501

I like the idea, but the atlas metephor seems overused to me. The same sentiment could've been expressed much more personally within a feeling shared, not historical rhetoric. Still lovely, though.

>>5059516

Well you have a knack for it. Very nice poem.

>>5059525

Yeah, titles are up in air for most of my poems. I realize they're important, it's just I can never find 'the one', you know? For Atlas mightn' stay the title forever, but for now it'll do. Im really glad you like it, though! :)

>>5059501
Although it's not the style I like, this is really well done.
>The weight of the world on my shoulders
Bit overdone, but if it's what you like use it.
Overall, not bad.

Mine: Written from the perspective of the fiance.

I woke up
I always do
when the light shines through the blinds
that the dog bends and tears down
every time a car door slams

and I saw him there
sleeping
and he looked wonderful
and I kissed his face
and it felt dry

i went to the bathroom
and started on the makeup
he usually wakes up shortly after me

he walked to the door of the bathroom
and stood there
his hair sticking up
and to the side
and I felt different

I still loved him
more now than yesterday
and more tomorrow than today
i'm sure of it

but
still
I felt different
and I saw him better as he stepped in to the bathroom
and he didn't have the face on
the one he wears for me
the face he keeps around
and slips on
whenever our eyes meet

and I walked toward him
and hugged him
hoping to remind him
of the face
that i need

and when I let go and backed away
the face was on
and I felt okay again
and he looked okay

>>5059536

I dig the scenery, the abstraction of daily love, but it, in my opinion, lacks perspective of the fiance herself. She needs, and that is all, as I see it. It'd be nice to see a 'negative' emotion branching out in this line of thought, instead of a one-way street so to say.

>>5059536
Thank you! I know the weight of the world.... is a cliche, no doubt, but sometimes I enjoy challenging myself to see if I can make proper use of said cliches. I wrote that poem in grade 11 (I'm only out of high school one year).

I like the flow of your poem (I REALLY love free verse, will post one of mine), but I'm not sure I get what you're trying to say. Rather than bastardize it, could you elaborate what message you're trying to convey?

Not sure what to title this one, so, 'til then here it is.

In my darkest days
you spoke of light.
I'd asked you where the sun had gone
but you just sat and smiled.
I'd thought,
for a moment,
that we'd lost it
getting out of the car
or maybe had left it in our pockets
and forgot when doing laundry.
I couldn't tell.
I'd thought that it had been
hiding on our fingers
beneath our rings
so I took mine off but
I was wrong because
it wasn't there.
And as I searched,
I guess you'd adopted the idea
that it lay in something deeper than our bathtub.
So you went looking,
and I guess, somewhere,
you found it.

>>5059380
Collecting Dust: A Sonnet

You are my favorite books
on the shelf by my bed
(making me smile with every look
because I remember what I read)

Pages filled with unending wonder,
taking me to peculiar worlds –
Just like the summer
when we held each other, curled

But every story has its end
and every book will soon collect dust;
The key to my heart will not be lent
just as the lock will turn to rust.

My favorite books all have an end; however,
their stories, in my heart, will live on forever.

This is like the 8th time I've posted this. I repost in poetry threads every time I make changes. Sorry if it gets annoying seeing reposts, but at least it's been kind of a while.

Pandas in Boothbay

And me, I'm no stranger
to culms of bamboo.
In bubbling cauldrons
of hot pork chop stew.
The cyanide, coconut, sweet pickled string stalks
Are tumbling down streets
where they don't know the climate.

Atlantic coast rock beaches native to pandas
Where leopards and rice-field rats
sleep at the wharf of Boothbay.
Don't go confusing home life with hotels
Things never do work out
When we lie to ourselves

How could a person
still live that way now?
Turning limp cartwheels
in dried up canals.
The spirits you slept on moved West after Wednesday
And now all the paddies are
next door to juice stands.

Where forty years prior
our ancestors just made it
And half of me used to fly
in plasticine steamships
Your other side sometimes
still overcooks the broth

All of the reverends
you made into statues
Are kind of at fault now
for why they can't move.
Don't you forget what old acronyms spell
Things often don't work
when we lie to ourselves

And you, half your pride points
are rooted in skin tone.
So forty-five colors are
all royal purple
While orange pulp and pajama robes
falter towards laminate
Card stock and flower heads
wallop propellor fins
Slithering adjectives grope to your viscera
Holinshed's ospreys are
fishing for contretemps
Masked finfoots fulminate
over your nakedness
How could we get lost
inside such minor acreage?

Often when we sneak around
Things don't work out
When we lie to ourselves

>>5059586
It's good that you're young and attempting to challenge yourself with cliches others back away from in fear they may be ridiculed. Kudos for your courage in such a critical field.

Along with other interpretations I had in mind while writing it, one of which is stronger than the rest. It is, simply, one's attitude and perception in life is not alone, but rather, inflicts a perception for others. This is shown by the man being depressed, inflicting an uneasy and altered perception for the fiance.

TL;DR Your actions affect others in more ways than you know.

The birdy-bird flew to the place that it knew
by the sound of chime and heartbeat
and thus did the clue for the overhead blue
transcend the rhyme of sharp beat
hooves that grew from the grime and the slew
of hoarsely covened concrete

>>5059621

Ahhh I gotcha. On that note, I agree with the previous anon: you need to focus a little more on the male (sorry if I'm being ignorant: it's my first assumption that the speaker is female, but idc if the speaker is male. HOWEVER, off of that tangent, will continue on previous assumption. correct me if wrong).

when i read it, i didn't pick up at all that the male was depressed. I took that the female was worried things were changing within the serenity of her daily life. I took that she was worried that this sense of bliss couldn't stay forever, and she perceived that her fiance's face had changed. However, his 'reapplication' of his face afterwards said to me that he was a very storng pillar of her life, and reminded her that all was right. thats what I took from it.

the flow is actually gorgeous, so i dont think you'll have any problems writing it, if your previous interpretation is the one you wish to convey. it's just a little ambiguous at the moment, i feel.

>>5059636
Thank you for such an in depth and good criticism. I was playing off the, i guess, cliche, that people "wear faces" to hide their true selves. but this is lit and more accurately, poetry. Ambiguity and misinterpretation are the norm.

Everything itt is... just awful... how do you guys look at this shit and go "well I'm satisfied, time to post it online" and literally everything about it is wrong and shitty.

>>5059645
lol there's always this guy. I bet you believe "good" and "bad" exist in art. I bet you aren't an artistic subjectivist.

>>5059645

It's about getting better. People post in this thread because the name of the thread; poetry CRITIQUE. Good job staying at your baseline negative response, shows a lot about you. I'd be interested if you'd ever have the courage to post your own work here.

>>5059615

It's obvious you have a great grasp of your idea in this poem, but I honestly feel you draw it out with 'self-satisfying' lines. It almost feels like you're trying to win a award instead of describing how you feel about something.

People always tell me it seems too personal and insular and inscrutable. I've never heard that it seemed contrived. Which lines seem overly self-satisfying?

>>5059681
for >>5059668

>>5059681

I'd imagine you're responding to >>5059668

You have a great poem. Constraint, misplacement, adherence to norms as the idea fly from the screen to great affect. At the same time, though, they feel fabricated. You ask which lines seem contrived, and I would say all of it. Not that contrived is a negative term, but an overly-academic attitude was applied to how you really feel. With your skill and idea, I think like you could create something more moving and personal beyond the flamboyance and allure of high-poetry.

>>5059630

this is great.

>>5059697
I thought taking a suffocatingly traditional approach to poetry in a poem about one's relationship with tradition would be a fitting meta-commentary. I guess it was too hamfisted.

>>5059380
>>5059501
>>5059536
>>5059602

>free verse

kill yourselves and learn to write properly

>>5059630
I really like this!

>>5059717

Show others how to do so...not so easy as throwing bullshit like a goddamn chimp.

Sushi Train (for a dear friend)

Hunger strikes
like a teacher
or a husband.
And, somehow, you’re closer to leaving your skin
and touching those hallucinations of a deluded euphoria.
You measure success with a drawing.
But you are built of more dimensions than those fickle two translated to paper
(or scratched to silken flesh).
Beautiful pictures drill blunted probosces into your ribcage;
drawling transfusions of marrow, cartilage-
anaesthetist in absentia.
Reflections parasitised by tapeworm legs:
they pilfer the rice you deserved.

I still remember when we first ate teriyaki chicken.
We sat by the train tracks,
let sake pots sink lifetimes;
battleships of sinful amnesia.
Or, in hindsight . . .
mindful of fallible mind,
was it transparent?
But to me
(a blood pact cut,
and stamped,
and branded with an ‘I Agree’),
smudged or shredded or burned like your imperfect caricatures?

Going back
I could never be courageous enough
to stand:
tomorrow’s cadaver risen above track
and wait.
But the sketchbook rests open on my desk forever;
haunting Koran of no, not yet, and never.

>>5059649

Good and bad exists in art.

>>5059658

lol there is nothing to critique in the majority of these poems except to say that the entire thing is fucking horrible.

>>5059713

My opinion man, may be above my pay-grade, so to speak. Just critiqued as I saw it. If it makes you think, of, if it makes you think I'm a dumb-ass, ok too. Just how I read it.

>>5059717

lol

> being this pleb

>>5059737
Oh no, I wasn't being one of those "hah it's just 2deep4u" assholes. I'm sorry if I came across a certain way.

>>5059735
>objective quality
>art
when you can explain why Dostoevsky is better than John Green objectively you can have a million dollars

the useless english degree: an epic poem in one (1) parts

as i sit down to write a poem
throwing in arbitrary
line-break
what do i want to express?
today i was very
sad or not sad, i
thought about some things they were important things, i
had conversation with female, heart fluttering
almost like a
butterfly, like the way the wings also flutter
the way butterfly wings flutter is very similar to the heart
o! art! i forgot to put in the H
i must consult my muse
she declares

'first you must rhyme - verily i use
words with similar endings, now see
i will make a metaphor about love, or a tree
then throw in a reference to ovid or dante
these italian words sound rather fancy, don't they?
dont forget to start every line with 'i'
and (if you're feeling existential) rhyme it with 'die'
one piece of advice you'll surely be needing
dont make eye contact if you havent done the reading
and if the whole of endymion is too much for thee
thou canst get by on book 1 and a plot summary'

receding deep into the dark mist the meandering muse
moves
is no longer here
where..is here?
what..is the meaning?
i question ponderingly these wonderings
as i sit, contemplatively
procrastinating the work for my useless english degree

>>5059735

It's funny that you keep posting. You lurk here, waiting for your chance to hamstring others who are willing to post and get ridiculed.

If you think a poem is horrible, then there's a reason why, and that can be explained.

If you're a downbeat poster who just lives for the ridicule of others, well that's your thing. If you think anyone takes your posts as anything beyond self-loathing, you're as delusional as you think the poets of this thread to be.

Anyone can break something down, it takes skill to build up.

Walt Whitman where are you hiding
Your mother is worried sick
You better come out this instant
Walt I need very much to find you but I can't
I've looked everywhere you used to be Walt it's not working
The doctors are all sure you're going to come back someday
I don't know Walt will this feeling be until I die
Walt Whitman please just Jesus Christ you've got to be somewhere
youve got to be
somewhere

ITT: utter tripe

>>5059760
Of course it's not good friend
We're puttin some bullshit on the internet to get better at our bullshit
If we were good at our bullshit we wouldn't be needing to get better at it

>>5059744

Not at all, man. Just calling it like I see it. I'm sure there are a ton of people out there who love this kinda thing, doesn't mean nothing if I don't get it. Keep on doing what you do.

>>5059758

allen ginsberg, is that you?

>>5059730
I have a crippling fear of writing my own poetry for various reasons. Just read any introduction to poetry book that talks about metre.

>>5059741
Free verse is the definition of pleb poetry. For people who don't know wtf they're doing, metrical line at least keeps their poem from collapsing into a gelatinous puddle.

Itt people who think that poetry is awful prose

Chopped up like this
Arbitrarily
Without rhyme or
Reason
Free verse spoken in a
Pretentious tone
Written poorly
Very poorly

What I wrote there is a poem the quality of the poems in this thread... watch I'll do another.

electric light looks beautiful
reflected in the rainwater collected in pools on tje asphalt
projected by mute streetlights onto the screaming road
and motorcars driving on it
and litter lying on it
and people run covering their heads with their jackets to keep dry in the rain
why bother when you will never
reflect electric lights

See that? I just wrote it all down this second. It is shit. And it's on par with the poems itt.

>>5059762
>art
>better
We're already as good as Whitman and Lin and Shakespeare and Pound.

>>5059644

anytime man. :)

>>5059766
heh I reread howl again the other day and thought I'd try to imitate him

>>5059750

I can't explain it objectively, but you also can't objectively prove to me that you exist... so that's pretty irrelevant.

>>5059767
>gelatinous puddle
>not a veritably high art form

>>5059767

hahahahaha okay pleb, stay fr33

>>5059769

this guy is
pretty much correct

>2010
>not immersing yourself in your own subjectivity and understanding that, "do your best" could be better stated as "do," because deterministically your best and your worst are equal in their simultaneous certainty and the only measurable aspect of art is its existence

>>5059767

You don't think people here are afraid of being told their poems are shit? I don't need to read an intro to anything, if something makes me think then that's all I need.

Good or bad, it's an examination of what, we, /lit/, are here to enjoy. While you may have a preference, you should step back and understand that others are not you, don't think like you, and feel differently. Who gives a fuck if anon writes a free verse and it's not all that great.

It will only offend you if you can't do better.

>>5059772

i dont know if its meant to be funny but i find the last 4 lines hilarious

>>5059799
Haha I'm okay with that

>>5059793
> I don't need to read an intro to anything

Unless you are some Rimbaudian genius (and even he studied poetry from childhood) that's simply not true.

>Who gives a fuck if anon writes a free verse and it's not all that great.

Because I am trying to help people improve?

>>5059811
there are no geniuses in art because there is no good or bad, there only is

Space Alien Invaders Take Stock of the Human Anatomy

Skin:
-responsible for twitching. various spasms & shakes convey specific emotions. further study pending
-IMPORTANT NOTE: is CONTIGUOUS, does NOT require stitching or welding (empirically verified)

Organs:
-Form soup (or stew) within skin. Their means of entering skin undetermined
-They float?
-Prone to leakage

Unknown protrusions/depressions:
-Torsal and inguinal protrusions and depressions present in all specimens
-Seemingly random distribution of protrusions vs. depressions
-Purpose unknown

Nervous system:
-Primary antagonist of the anatomy
-Unstable, apparently universally disease-prone. Suspected of actively conspiring against the other mechanics & components. All tests inconclusive

>>5059811

Last time I checked telling someone they are shit doesn't do shit to empower them.

And as far as the intro deal, poetry is the most simplistic literary work to aspire a meaning. If you need a professor or academic book to tell you what you feel is 'good' or not, well that's your fault.

>>5059817
>>5059811
Friends let's just be cool
If you think our poems are shit, let us know what shit we could change in them to make them better. That's cool!
If you think all our poems are equally valid via being extant art, that's cool!

>>5059478
This is now my wallpaper

>>5059835
I think poems that are drenched in cliches and clunkily expressed are bad in that they don't express what the poet is going for (blah blah death of the author I know I know) so in that sense critique is fine. But I don't see the point in unilaterally shitting on free verse or metric verse (as either for children or for filthy classicists).

>>5059827
'Man, I really dig'd this. I honestly don't even know what I read, but it's objectifying in a way that I can't help but be drawn to.

I really wish you'd sharpen this idea and make it more focuesd.

To me it seems like a rambling of an idea instead of something you really thought about.

Either way, I felt it was thought-provoking in it's wierd dictionary-esque medium of thought.

>>5059828
>And as far as the intro deal, poetry is the most simplistic literary work to aspire a meaning

That's just astoundingly wrong and insulting. No wonder the poetry is so bad if you think that the art-form is 'simplistic'. Simple in, simple out. Fucking hell...

about dancing


The curdling swing, the kick and the scream
In the sunken flesh of the basement scene
Dipping in the sinking light, seams stretching
It glows: the swollen heart of green glass.
Dipping, the concentrated point where the light
Enters, refracts and refines
Re-enacts the designs
Retraces the lines that first gave it form
In the primordial swarm. The rustic,
Rasping dance of the soul,
The cry of the foal,
The lamb underground, the shepherd
And the sound.

>>5059380
>Critique thread: Poetry (yes, the bane of /lit/)
BANE?

>>5059849

Then write a poem, here, and show us how it's done. Until then shut the fuck up and be happy harping on those you see as inferior to a craft you are to cowardly to convey.

New Fire

Slipping sideways on my stair rail
pass! pass! pass! on, pass me by
my eye sides hurt
the sugars shrinkage sings to me
"watch yourself; the young are going"
My teeth feels smaller
I should eat less
as I count the counter pieces
What's that whine
is it the tv?
is my roommate's girlfriend singing?
I've left the bathtub on I know it
Tell me huntress, where'd you go?
are those footsteps from the kitchen
or do I just hear the freezer making ice?
is my vision prescription up to date
It's felt fuzzy funny fuzzy lately
lately, lately, lately layers
I have left the sink on! damn!
good god mine god the fan's still running
Not again! fake winds will kill me
and send strange angel Ansen for my legs
who the hell still has a home phone
anymore?

Citrus fruits, olive juice, fudge almondine
Loosen up warm in a worn gaberdine

>>5059848
Mhm, it's pretty hot off the idea-press. I do plan to spend more time whittling away at it and squaring it off. Good to have encouragement though!

>>5059828

> POETRY IS FEELINGS
> IF YOU NEED A PROFESSOR TO UNDERSTAND POETRY YOU ARE BAD

Meanwhile your poem is literally this good *composes some shit on tje spot to demonstrate poor free verse*

I approached the wooden pentecostal door
solid oak
a brass door knocker
inviting me to request entry
like some vampire
some ghoul unable to interact with the mortal realm
with a hidden cows tale until my wedding day
still a blushing virgin bride
can I really do what I came here to do
or will the gnawing gadfly of doubt cause me to err in my Lokian wager
I promised you my head as a stake and though I've intervened three times my champion has fallen
I promised you my head and not my neck
so I escape to play my tricks another day
and I do not enter the church

>>5059852

This made me think of the third time I did acid. Almost like a 'rave' emotion. Totally free. What did you mean it to be, in curiousity?

>tfw nobody replies to your poem :'(

>>5059872

You still have done nothing to help those here, or ensure that your opinion is nothing less than that of a 13 year old troll. Good job.

>>5059852
I /really/ like the rhythm. Its consistency throughout and the changes in lengths of lines did great to convey the whole rhythm & etc of dance. I found myself picturing dips & swoops of varying lengths & depths in accordance with the lines

>>5059879
Which one is yours?

>>5059868
kinda seems like a crazy hobo's ramblings

>>5059884

Because they can't be helped. There is nothing about their poetey that can be 'improved' on, it has to be deleted. Would you go to ic and post a stick figure drawing and expect real critique?

>>5059890
see
>>5059733

:^)

>>5059890

Same question. It's bullshit to not get a review of some sort. This forum is too active of 'literary lovers' too leave a critique out.

>>5059868

Absolute puke

>>5059864
Why bother? You apparently think poetry is so simple a braindead monkey could do it well. I'm off to read a novel.

>>5059902
In a good way?

>>5059894

I would if I posted in a thread about helping myself be better.

That is the disconnect.

You believe in some higher form of being in words, while people here are just trying to express themselves in a medium.

You have yet to share anything of your own, you're a total joke. You know this. Everyone reading this thread and your responses knows your just some asshole who never could acheive what he wanted.

But you'll continue aruging that you're right. Keep going, I'm done.

At this point I can only think you're trying to get a rise outta people, because nobody could be so fucking pathetic that they cannot even give fair criticism to what they read.

In short. have fun trolling. It's pretty easy, much easier than writing poetry. We all have our passions though, who am I to judge yours?

>>5059903

Good posts man, don't let any of these retards get to you. They expect to be able to read 0 poetry and shit out a masterpiece because they have no understanding about the dificulties real artists go through to create something worthwhile. It's really funny how stupid they are honestly.

>>5059909

I did share, I posted two demonstratory free verse monstrosities to show how bad the poetry in this thread is.

>>5059909

I did share... I wrote two demonstrative poems in free verse in real time to show people here you can't just string shit together and call it a poem. And hey, it was easy.

>>5059916

Yes, with the idea of proving your point, not to get better. What do you want, man? To be praised as some literary god? Get over yourself, either help or move on. Saying something is shit with no reason helps no-one, and contridicts the meaning of this forum.

>>5059920
You can string any shit together and call it a novel. You can string any shit together and call it a film. You can string any shit together and call it an album. You can string any shit together and call it a greentext story. You can string any shit together and call it a play.

>>5059868
I like the contrast b/t the (to me) calming last two lines and the rest of the poem - relatively more concrete (and comfy!) images & dactylic trimeter compared to the chaotic all-over-the-place of the rest of the poem
That said, I'd work on trying to hone the rest of it. You do a good job IMO of getting across slipping into Something Bad (it reminded me of the feeling of antidepressants wearing off), but I feel like you go just a bit into each idea, without going in-depth enough into each one to really have punch.
Maybe try to isolate some of the ideas in it and try to hone em down to daggers? Then again, with too few ideas you lose a bit of the chaotic feeling. Follow your heart & etc, just my 2 cents

>>5059911

But you are an expert, yet withold your knowledge of such expertise because you can't be bothered other than typing word-vomit.

How fucking retarded are you, really? Do you think people read this and nod their heads yes, or trolls just take it and run? Fucking dumb.

>>5059908

No. In a horrible way.

>>5059923

Okay? And if all you do is string shit together it will suck... like everything itt; that's kinda my point.

>>5059931

K, here's my consteuctive criticism. Everyone itt stop writing poetry, go read two thousand books by great poets, study them intensely, learn the metres, rhythms, vocabulary, style and just everything.

Once you've done that maybe you can write something okay.

>>5059868

I honestly did not get a concise feeling from this. It seemed like you tried to do something contemporary, but forgot that poetry is about personal experiences, and if it was, it was lost in the metaphor to me.

>>5059604
clunky metre.

>>5059931

> my teeth feels smaller :(

>>5059949
>not the defining "that feel" of our time

>>5059604

Fuck me is this ever unreadably bad... at least I can read all the free verse shit.

>>5059942

Just like you have done, except people here are willing to be judged. Too bad for you your ego is too fragile for that. God forbid with those 2k books read you might write something less than perfect. You're sad, man. Don't you see that? The more I talk to you, the more desperation seeps from your posts. You want to see yourself as some great writer, but in reality are some autist fuck who can't even give a compliment without some kind of infraction on their ego.

>>5059733
Just a nitpick, but I always eye-roll at a "..."
I'm not getting an overarching idea. "I'm close to someone but we are both sad" is inevitably overplayed; I'd say your best bet is to try to get it across in a (relatively) original way.
See: I feel like there's some good shit stewing here with the food & hunger themes. I'd maybe add some more meat to the relevant images. Perhaps some lines abt how this person's parasites taking their food is making them starving, or how succulent that teriyaki was on the train that one time, how close the narrator & the friend were then but now the friend has tapeworms & you aren't as close or summat (I think that's sorta what you were going for?). Could tie the whole schtick of sad friends into food & hunger? I'm not exactly painting it in the most poetic light, but I like what's there re: that and think it could be really cool if added too.

>>5059954

I'm not a writer and I never said I read 2k books on poetry, I said you should go read that if you want to write poetry well. That's two thousand instead of 0.

Tell me do you even know the names of the various poetic forms, structures and meters? Be warned if you answer yes I will ask you to demonstrate some things you won't be able to google.

>>5059942
oh yeah shit we're supposed to read poetry
damn haha i'd been just like writing it & being on a lit board but forgot to read any or absorb any of the cool shit from it
damn how did that happen

>>5059968

Then get the fuck outta here. You're just trolling, you don't give a fuck. You saw the title of the thread and decided to get your rocks off. At first I thought you were uncaring, then I thought you were just hate-filled, now I realize you're just pathetic. Why are you even doing this? Why are responding to these posts, here, in a poem critique thread with so many others on this forum?

Answer that without googling anything.

>>5059767
>Free verse is the definition of pleb poetry.
if anything free verse is harder

>>5059972

You didn't... your poems are bad.

>>5059976

LOL so I take it that's a no, then and you don't even understand the absolute basic building blocks of poetry. Pathetic.

Come away, great hero, to the deserts and the sand
Why anyone comes here at all is hard to understand

Come away to southern sands, where empires go to die
Where tired winds ride over hills with one exhausted sigh

Come away down to the desert, where there is no time
And have your body battered by this unforgiving clime

Come away where deathly silence haunts your every thought
Where you are forced to face the truth of what your soul has wrought

Come away where ancient beasts lie rotting 'neath the sun
If you're not careful surely you and they will soon be one

Withered husks and jagged tusks encircle you from dawn 'til dusk
Sun-bleached bones and weathered stones are all that dot this empty zone

And as you wander further into deeper parts unknown
The silent sands always remind you that you're all alone

>>5059982
Two write well, yes.

>>5059982

Yeh but it's easier to write bad free verse that people won't think is bad... you just take horrible, nonsense prose and chop it up like this

bicycling to work
the pitter patter of rain on the hood of my jacket
is beating a sickening metronome in my head
thoughts hover and are absorbed again into the grey mass
that eats up so much sugar and fats, eats up my proteins and ions
how long would it take for my hot body to cool down
If I suddenly swerved
Into traffic

>>5059990

> raucous vomiting

HOW DO YOU PEOPLE NOT REALOSE HOW BAD THIS SHIT IS LOL

>>5059990
your meter is off

>>5059986

Done with you, man. Sidestep everything you want, call out people on being shit as much as you want, but realize one thing. The people you're judging are trying to get better, where you are just here to make yourself feel better.

You probably have some shit job, some shit life, with the only satisfaction of stroking your ego here. I honestly pity you.

The events that led you here must have been shitty as fuck, and you more than most have a reason to be angry. I hope you find peace, truly.

If you need someone to talk to, I will make a gmail for that. Nobody is this pessimistic for no reason. I feel bad for trying to make you the bad guy.

In my experience. most bad people come from bad circumstances. If you wanna talk, lemme know.

>>5059963
Yay someone replied, thank you.
Your points have all been noted, especially regarding the ellipsis and that the idea is cliche. I do feel though that you really didn't understand the idea of the poem beneath its superficial tone of sadness or 'sad friends' (which is obviously largely my fault if I want to do something with this poem other than keep it for personal reading or w/e). Especially things like the tapeworms weren't intended to be taken literally. It's really a comment on perfectionism more than anything else: her hopelessness was meant to be conveyed, yes, but personally it's kind of a poem of guilt (but not a sad guilt, rather one where I know I should feel bad but I don't) that I can't do anything to make her work perfect or realise her ambition.

Anyway, thanks again.

>>5059928
Yeah, it's supposed to be an honest internal monologue of a racing mind. So I don't go too in depth since it all just rushes over you. But yeah some of it needs to be cleaned up. Thanks for not just spouting "read classics you talentless hacks."

>>5060002
Apart from the meter, what's so bad about it?

>>5060003
is meter the number of syllables in a line?

>>5060025
eesh dude it's like you're trying to prove that other guy's point
I don't agree w/ him that we all need to memorize paradise lost to write shit, but you might want to like grab a webinar on poetry or some shit
getting a good grasp on rhythm, meter, types of rhymes & etc can really help boost ur game 2 the next level, even if you're just doin' free verse shit

>>5060023

> horrible meter so it's barely readable
> forced, uninteresting, unimaginative language and imagery
> bad, fucking bad rhymes

It's just all awul.

>>5060042
but is that what meter is? the sylables?

>>5060042

> if you want to write poetry actually knowing what it is can HELP

No, it's esential before you even start. This kind of shit is why the humanities and lit students have horrible reputations, you guys know fuck all.

>>5060071
Well geez dude I was just going easy on the guy
Ofc you're not gonna get far in Serious Poetry w/o a grasp on basic meter & etc
But I mean no need to be nitpicky abt wording just cause I was trying to be friendly w a fellow

>>5060065
pls respond

>>5060100
Seriously dude, you're probably going to want to at least check out idk a khan academy or something about meter. I'm not going to explain it for you, but you're going to want to get a grasp on it.

>>5060100
fucking google it turdbrain:

The measured arrangement of words in poetry, as by accentual rhythm, syllabic quantity, or the number of syllables in a line.

>>5059753
Equal parts love and shame, anon.

You're now chatting with a random stranger. Say hi!
You both like albert camus.
Stranger: hi
You: hey
You: I can tell you're sincere because you don't capitalize proper nouns
Stranger: although i cannot tell if that is sarcasm, i agree
Stranger: most anyone who does is seemingly an asshole here
Stranger: from what I've gathered
You: I can tell you're not a solipsist because you don't capitalize "I"
You: unless you put it in a contraction
Stranger: aren't you observant
You: you contract aren't and you're and I've but not cannot
You: I don't know what that means
Stranger: it means nothing
You: go to bed Nietzsche
Stranger: hahaha god
You: you typed, then deleted, then typed again only to laugh
You: did you misspell hahaha?
You: can one misspell a laugh?
Stranger: hrhrhr
Stranger: huhuhu
Stranger: jhjhjh
Stranger: ahahah
You: that last one isn't bad
You: it's the way real people laugh sometimes
Stranger: You've got me frazzled in one minute
You: NOW YOU CAPITALIZE
You: does this signify a "But seriously, folks" turning point for you?
Stranger: ahhhh what the fuck
Stranger: simultaneously laughing and shaking my fists
You: you don't self-consciously automatically do this to yourself?
Stranger: ojfhdklgjh
Stranger: why would I pay that much attention to myself
You: it's not self-centered if you do it to everyone else too
Stranger: yes it is, that's just excusing it
You: sincerity's in the intention
Stranger: Of course it's not
Stranger: oh god now I'm watching the way I type
Stranger: how in the hell is this at all sincere
You: not the regular definition
You: which is, in an aphorism I just invented for you, "the intersection of honesty and earnestness"
You: not that
You: sincerity as in the stripping away of affectation
Stranger: I don't know, it all just sounds smug to me
You: which is impossible unless you're a mute because the imprecision of language means communication is inherently affected
Stranger: Alright, sure, but is anything actually being proven
You: you can't empirically "prove" anything of this nature unless you completely deterministically map out neurochemistry
Stranger: You seem intelligent so you probably have an understanding of what most of the people who visit this site are like
You: I do
Stranger: Most of them probably lack the coherence to understand half of what you're saying
Stranger: So, why say it?
You: statistically, probs
Stranger: Utter destruction of modesty right there
Stranger: No one needs to know what you know of
You: but you listed Camus as an interest
You: so you're no doubt familiar with the problem of sincerity (as raised in The Fall)
Stranger: Yes?
You: I picked the subject because it was relevant to our interests
Stranger: Aaaaaaaah fuck, that was good I didn't acknowledge that
Stranger: Yeah, I realize that, I don't think you're lying
You: I mean the whole sincerity of internet syntax is sort of cribbed from the blind man scene in The Fall
Stranger: You're a really creepy dude.
Stranger has disconnected.

This place is no sanctuary of knowledge:
it is a manufactory of it.
Our necks are bellowing unswept chimneys.
Homogenous blight of recycled thought
diffuses, unbeknownst to those below,
until their heads are furnaces with ours.

>>5060203
yuck

>>5060246
thx bro i just wrote it in 30 seconds :^)

It feels good to be sunburned
even if its just on your shins
where the sand grinds in
tonight is cape cod in a polaroid
but my heart still murmers in the grey winter of massachusetts

>>5060403
Your imagery is good and not at all clunky or unclear, I can see and understand what you're going for here without needing an explanation. Still, it's not particularly interesting. While it's not completely terrible nothing about this poem stirs my interest or makes me want to read more of your work.

There's potential here if you're willing to work hard at honing your craft and expanding your horizons.

a beautiful salmon
pizza mozarella
formula formulae
a beautiful salmon

Drunk Tank in fife,
Drunk tank in Dundee,
Drunk tank in Edinburgh
Drunk tank in Glasgow
Its all the same to me
6 o'clock wake up call
Out to face the day
No charges, just a smile
See you next weekend, maybe
I could be dead
That would be nice

Fall sheds its leaves
They migrate to bluer skies
I never could fly

>>5061183
>>5061279
>>5061325
>>5060403
>>5060203
it's cool, friend, we get it

>>5060141
clever

Attraction

You’ve picked her out of a room full of people, among the mud huts, she protrudes; a steeple. When she smiles at you, you feel doomed; it’s lethal, with no comfort cocoon, you’re see through. She just feels so gosh darn different! When she speaks in a room, you’re the first one to listen.
She has grace, she has style, she’s pepper spray, she’s mild, you shift in your place; a child, you don’t know what to say, it’s wild.
No one has this effect on you, is she an angle, can’t even move your ankles you feel entangled, and when she says your name you feel cold and strangled. She’s smart and intuitive, you want to part, and be through with this, but she’s art, and gratuitous.
Conversation with her flows like wine, it’s a miracle that you are composed so fine, with this girl who froze your spine. Stumbling on your words a bit, but she’s there to catch you. You would make things awkward if she wasn’t there to the rescue.
You’ve never felt this way about anybody before, as soon as she’s gone you want some more, she’s your favorite person in the world of course. She’s the ocean and the shore, the hinges and the door, the hunter and the boar.
The truth of the matter is that everybody is different. She jut has all of the traits you find desirable written on your wish list, with a bow in her hair, she’s rare, a present of Christmas. What you would do to make her yours, swear off other women forever just to see her more.
What is happening is the dehumanization of someone with expectation. Your unrealistic aspiration has led you to desperation. When you can’t have a conversation without perspiration, you can consider this your affirmation.
You’re in love with something fake, an illusion, an apparition, filled with adoration and infatuation, of the idea of her, not the real her, but your illustration.
This doesn’t mean you should stop perusing her, just do so in a different light, taker her off of the pedestal, remover her from that light. Dust off the sparkle, look at the cracks in the marble, observe her as whole and as partial. Look at her and marvel.

Attraction
You've picked her out of a room full of people, among the mud huts, she protrudes; a steeple. When she smiles at you, you feel doomed; it’s lethal, with no comfort cocoon, you’re see through.
She just feels so gosh darn different! When she speaks in a room, you’re the first one to listen.
She has grace, she has style, she’s pepper spray, she’s mild, you shift in your place; a child, you don’t know what to say, it’s wild.
No one has this effect on you, is she an angel? can’t even move your ankles you feel entangled, and when she says your name you feel cold and strangled. She’s smart and intuitive, you want to part, and be through with this, but she’s art, and gratuitous.
Conversation with her flows like wine, it’s a miracle that you are composed so fine, with this girl who froze your spine. Stumbling on your words a bit, but she’s there to catch you. You would make things awkward if she wasn't there to the rescue.
You've never felt this way about anybody before, as soon as she’s gone you want some more, she’s your favorite person in the world of course. She’s the ocean and the shore, the hinges and the door, the hunter and the boar.
The truth of the matter is that everybody is different. She jut has all of the traits you find desirable written on your wish list, with a bow in her hair, she’s rare, a present of Christmas. What you would do to make her yours, swear off other women forever just to see her more.
What is happening is the dehumanization of someone with expectation. Your unrealistic aspiration has led you to desperation. When you can’t have a conversation without perspiration, you can consider this your affirmation.
You’re in love with something fake, an illusion, an apparition, filled with adoration and infatuation, of the idea of her, not the real her, but your illustration.
This doesn't mean you should stop perusing her, just do so in a different light, taker her off of the pedestal, remover her from that light. Dust off the sparkle, look at the cracks in the marble, observe her as whole and as partial. Look at her and marvel.

>>5059380
Not too bad, OP. You have some interesting word choice such as "event horizon". I like what that phrase conveys in the context of the poem, but I wonder if there is a more fluid phrase that could express the same meaning. It just kind of sticks out in the poem like it doesn't belong in there. I've read a lot worse poems before. Keep it up.


I'll post my poem here since it got no feedback from yesterday's thread:

"A Whisper Bidding my Lover to Bed"
By T. S. Ash

Ah, come to the bed, my love!
The day is done, and the sun sinks
Below the horizon, taking with it
All the anxieties of the day: Every
Fear and trouble, care and worry,
Fade with it now, as bright white and yellow
Fades to red and orange, to purple and to
Starry black. Come and let yourself
be wrapped in the blanket of my arms.

Let us breathe together as gently as
The night wind blows, over the
Moon-silvered grass and trees and pond.
Let us find within each other that peace which
Makes all the world grow quiet and restful.
For there is no greater balm to soothe an
Unquiet mind than a lover's embrace,
And no better way to bid farewell the day
Than with a sigh, and a kiss.

>>5059478
It's very cliche to be sure, but otherwise quite good.

>>5059717
"hurr durrr how can you call that a poem it doesn't even ryhme hurrr oh god i'm retarded"
This is what you sound like.

>>5059753
You must be a freshman. Don't worry, anon, you'll learn how to write good poetry eventually. Stay in school!

>>5061435
unoffensive but mildly molding drivel.

poem prose. i'd really appreciate a read and a response.:

Please Altar Me

I feel both giving birth and being born but none of it hurts. I am the mother as I cover my form with river-clay and re-craft myself. I am my daughter, eyes closed while searching skies for the re-sun to strengthen. I stroke the apple's skin, and it blushes. Then, I take a bite of his cheek, and mulled cider pours out.

“One ration, my good friend!
Let's share it amongst each other,” the Sun goes.

I drink in the sun, and he sends plays to entertain me. I want to join so I quaff my quartered apple down. “Cut me up, too; I have seeds for you!”

I gulp, fluid unsticking. “Please altar me on this bed of stalks”

I shift my gown across bent legs as flame trickles from pores. I set towns on fire with my sweat. “Please, Sun, burn me up soon. I'm starting to become the moon”

I turn blue in the lunar sea.

>>5061475
>unoffensive but mildly molding drivel
What does that even mean?

Your poem was almost very good, but the more I read, the more I became convinced you were just rambling for the sake of hearing yourself talk. I got nothing out of this and the last line seemed to undo the conclusion I thought the poem was leading to.

>>5061504
it means it's been laying around for a while untouched and unexamined by many before you. but it's not "bad" in the sense it's not poisonous mold or anything.

thanks. it's a very specific narrative and may need context to work but i appreciate you thinking it was "almost very good"

what conclusion were you coming to before it dried up?

>>5061504
"poem ventures out of my autistic comfort zone so i started shaking"

>>5061517
Are you high right now or do you think you're being clever? Either way you're not making any fucking sense.

I thought the birth/ re-birth scenario would have been revisited at the end of the poem after being "altared" and burned up by the sun's rays. Like a phoenix or something. That whole lunar sea thing just came out of nowhere.

>>5059380

It doesn't quite do it for me.

>>5059478

Sweet, succinct, and satisfying.

>>5059501

Pretty nice.

>>5059602

Eh.

>>5059630

I enjoy it; it comes off like a nursery (home) rhyme.

>>5059753

Well at least it's honest.

>>5059769

11/
10

>>5059852

Having danced before, I enjoy your poem. However to me it breaks apart a tad from "retraces" to "rustic."

>>5059990

If you're starting out with something like "great hero" or "broken heart" or anything else as equally overwrought and cliché, then you're poem probably won't be very good.

>>5060203

This is great on account of being true.

>>5060403
>>5061183
>>5061279
>>5061325

These are amusing.

>>5061435

It's too soppy and gushy for me.

>>5061531
sun and the moon juxtaposition. fire/water. birth and death. it's not really just thrown in there.

if you read between the lines it's still a re-birthing scenario

>>5061541
Ok whatever. I wasn't asking you whether I was right or not, I was just telling you my thoughts.

clone us

wandering eventide works to gather
strained glass ice-
cracklings from the air,

unsettling ideas voiced by
the scared. they say: “hell is
getting pointed. it’s got
a fever and it’s heavin’
up its insides.

swells are burning fast,
gotta blast out, catch barrels
of sad, blue fish before
our wishes wash to sea”

grilling the sun’s rays
we ask: have your senses gone
missing as well?

damn, i forgot
my license for thrills.
they carded me for cigars and amsterdam
gin today, i’m sober,
sin free today, probe her proper.
ask her how old she is
if she’s bold
she’ll lie and say
“five oh five! oh five
is the key to our immortality.”

please gather
my little ones, hiding from ghosts
and fools looking
to stay longer than they’re due.
they tack prices on
their downy heads
so keep them cooped
up in the basement.

let them whither?

I picked up a cigarette
And smoked it.
Is this indecent?

I'd kill a dog, a child, myself
To smoke this fag.

When all that's holy is on hold
And good is bad and bad is gold
Do as little as you're told
And shirk your chores once soul is sold

And the Andes snuggled in snow,
curling up in the bed of winter-
a plush mattress without springs-
hibernate alongside brown bears,
killing the time with falling flakes.

Catcalls in New York turn heads
in the summer of '97's heat wave.
Wife-beaters and Reebok pumps,
the novelty of domesticated pets,
roll around in whips cracking eggs.

A noodle shop shoos away a dog,
broom sweeping a gust-full of fear,
out the curtain and into pollution:
the masked shoals of shellfish hum
in the noxious lungs of dead whales.

The decision to detain a certain kind
of love in our never-ending nerves,
tickled long before Rome rose & fell,
contracts and expands a school
of ravenous particles between us.

And so stirring sugar and mud,
provides food for thought and not,
such as: "what can't a vulture eat?"
The answer is likely nothing, to
say otherwise is to self-cannibalize.

>>5061546
>>5061547
>>5061551
>>5061554
Verily, it maketh notte the sense.

>>5061551

When terrific and horrific split apart,
And a wheel starts squeaking on my cart.
Please shake your bum back to 'The Mart,'
and make it look like it tasted something tart.

>>5061554
>>5061569

I insist that it makes sense.

A crooked hand-wrapped barrel craves
supersonic explosions and seismic waves.
Rumble, tumble, fumble the wits of the wistful,
so let go of that steel-alloy, cylindrical fistful.
Forget the untied laces of light-year long feet,
and pick up that bit of rubbish after you weep.
Let not despair coerce you to do its deeds,
wading through a swamp strewn with limp reeds.
Re-member-serve yourself for a clothed-table full
of grateful guests who'll drippily canvass your skull.
Erase the vacuum between thought and voice,
every-one-thing reacts and enacts only a choice.
Heed my word, the protege of stagnant powder-
guns and water mixed together'll turn to chowder.
Rusted spoon-like sloops shed canon-fodder ashore,
as a soup-kitchen line knocks on heaven's door.
And a restless mob asks "who the hellish fire's for?"
standing on some stairs, knocking on heaven's door.

A curmudgeon called Pete
once told me to never let people walk on me,
for the sake of some nitty-gritty thingy
he called dignity.
But while Pete talked with his eyes down
towards his wrinkly, covered toes,
room door ajar unlike the pickles,
staleness spread over the air,
I may've thought he forgot
that I was a welcome-mat,
and still might be one.

But I didn't think that,
nor am I a foot from thinking this,
for I may've been a door-mat,
and still might be one.

So damp under the tomb
I ensnare heavy cats about the trees
Beware! The demon felt good
All luminous over the rain
We converse with misty witches beyond the gods
Damn! The passion gets weird
All comely near the gods
I transform rabid vapors beside the water
Awaken! The demon keeps going
unsure alive
not understanding
an old passport
How many times
the lover
stop for a while
talking to himself

>>5061596
The flow of the begginning is fantastic, but from the lines
>Let not despair coerce...
to
>Everyone-one-thing reacts and enacts only choice

are almost too blatant. I like the commanding tone, along with the maritime theme, but the theme is dropped in the middle, and the switch to such direct philosophy shatters the mood.

That being said, the ending picks up again, and the final couplet is very nice.

>>5061610
That's just wonderful

>>5061638
>Damn! The passion gets weird.

Anyway here's mine. (It's a very rough draft)

Mallory

I sit here idled by a thoughtless quiver
As those forsook meander on ever
Down ways forged by crumbling giants
Those tenants of our own lives breaking

The flows and ohs of current sighs
are lifted on by her own cries
and yet, should I care?

The giants begot in our own lives
are miniscule drops from a corner eye
viewing nothing but the world around,
future rocked from setting sound
and I have not sense in me to see
the world beyond such delicacy

Forgotten is the giants fall, as dismay breaks the dawn of now
And my heart shatters to love loveless noons so foul
But cannot the stone be broken now?
Cannot the wall twixt heaven and me resound
Cannot the beat of my wish tear down such sentiment

That I do not care?
For I do.

So dazzling beneath the towers
You hobnob with yellow hands against the gods
Heavy! The life is gone
Very dazzling before the sky
We prod sticky delusions beside the earth
Awaken! The Knave will vanish
Weird and comely before the vapors
I meet mammoth icons near the slime
Heavy! The bastard is fleeing
penniless thirsty
crossing the frontier
the next life waiting
For how long
my friend
leave his home
talking to himself

>>5061596
>>5061610
>>5061667

'Preciate the feedback. As for yours, I quite like it. You express your woes willfully well, but it stipples at points like "the dawn of now." Phrases like this, despite potentially having very real meaning, come off as artificial and forced. Other than this little criticism, I think your piece is well on its way.

A high-heel paired with loneliness
rolls down the hill towards the town center.
Balloons, bountiful and bright, shade the shoe,
flung up, planted heel down, a leg grows
from the ground, leather bound, rhinestoned.
Open signs turn to closed, a walker is walked by,
disrupting the stillness that grooved in the air,
ignoring a sidewalk saddled by belonging.

So with a buckle undone and tip toughed
by four toes and fungal fortitude,
the heel-so-high oscillates into a strut,
offending the earth with momentary companionship.

>>5061707
thanks man, I'll take a look at that

>>5061714
That's very good.
The mood and setting feel natural and I love the way you portray her character.
And I'm not sure, but that spelling of "tip toughed" confused me for a bit.

The Mountain King's Hall

The Boatman bears no solemn tale.
Nor does the man beside him.
For the River flows beyond the throws
Of all who come a' ridin'.

And wait ye friends who do complain
Of the bitterness of your ride
For the wind will blow and chill the foal
Who don't the rules abide.

Make merry my men who dwell with me
For my hall sprouts nothing but warm
But make ye haist and do not waste
For weak is an outstretched arm

On my way to work
I saw a building, squat of stature
With a lawn that spoke disaster
And I couldn't help but smirk
To see such wild weeds
Commingle with such untamed leaves
So near a world of plastic ease
And bonsai trees.

>>5061382

ty anon

>>5061745

Well I meant 'toughed' as in 'became tough,' while also providing the choice to read it as though 'tough' rhymed with 'though,' but you're right, it is a little unnecessarily confusing. I think it would read better as 'tip towed.' But thanks for the feedback, much appreciated

>>5062095
Well, now that you say it like that, the connotation seems more important than keeping people unconfused.

I like that poem

I feel deeply embarrassed for everyone itt...

>>5062556
me too

Surrounded
Waves of all kinds all shapes all sizes
'How is my baby girl
The love of my life,
The apple of my eye'
Filtered; Stored
So that one day you can say that to a child of your own

Can someone give me some pointers as to where I should start with poetry? I've been meaning to get into it for a while but I can't comprehend it properly.

Sorry if my wording is poor, I've just woke up :^D

They say an apple a day keeps the doctor away
I wish I had fed her more apples
But what can I do, hey hey hey
Except cry and pray at the chapels

>>5061475
could anyone give any more thoughts on this? while it has its origins in the mythos it's really quite grounded. i'll review yours after.

>>5061687
is it meant to be "leave"? or "leaves". anyway i love exclamation marks in poetry when it's done right and this has its charm. it's pretty visual and i like it.
--------------
no edits and scarce minutes invested, but i think it has merit:

spin me

pins snip at drowning
girls who nip
at my sherry shoulders,
looking for a way
to sit upon this boulder
i'm layering carefully - hoping to be
closer to coming shaken
stars - one lit pavestone to stand
atop another. i leave
grape stains on
the sharp tongue of earth.

she swallows me up
in commune
we speak
of the tower that will rise
us to the sun. i have become drunk
on ourselves. "my blood is
holding us together, letting us rain on
tin roofs."

the earth smiles and
loses a tooth.
she hands it to me, the color of
beaches
"will you finish?"

my eyes are missing but
i can work the seas.
"i have missed
the three of us."

>>5063628
Not a fan of the "hey hey hey" part, Don't know what I would replace it with however. I enjoy the rest of it.

>>5059478
short and brings back your point. dig/10

>>5059615
are you british? this is odd and dark sorta, and doesn't make a ton of sense

>>5063867
I'm Texan. It's about cultural diffusion and coming to terms with one's heritage in a context in which one's heritage is really distant; not romanticizing but appreciating. Cause I'm Vietnamese and white so pandas in Boothbay, Maine serve as a metaphor (synecdoche? no) for the larger feeling.

>>5059478
ok, rhyming couplets are pretty universally terrible

but that's some of the best rhyming couplet shit i've read in a while (still p bad, but you know, it's rhyming couplets)

you should give poetry that isn't obsessed w/ rhyme a try, might suit you

obviously needs some work
can be salvaged y/n?

---
let me look in your eyes, hold you tight
before, lost to night, we hear

soon, we'll say goodbyes

i don't see crystalline lakes
there is no piercing blue, no stormy gray
your eyes are dark and you hide in them
i read you like books, like books that end these nights

those 'windows' to your soul
force me to delve, to find you
keep you at a distance
as mine do, relics of difference
symbols of deviance
and i just want to

find you forever, live in those eyes, never stop knowing
but
i see our goodbyes, and soon will hear them

[insert ending here?]
^this is not some 2clever4u pomo bullshit, i don't have an ending yet, that last line could be an ending, but rn it comes off as very sudden

>>5063897
>^this is not some 2clever4u pomo bullshit
best ending line ever

>>5060141
This is great. Albeit maybe a little lengthy but if you think you need that much text to get the point across then go for it.

>>5063940
It's mostly just buildup until the punchline, "You're a really creepy dude." I lifted it from Her.

>>5063946
So if it's just buildup then is it intentionally superfluous? Even if it is I really enjoyed it. "The Stranger" would be an amusing, if obvious title.

>>5063949
Hah, that's good. Cause of Camus and omegle. That's really good. I'll use that actually. Thanks anon.

>>5063954
Actually I thought the stranger pun was the whole point of it being an omegle conversation haha. Either way, great concept.

>>5063958
Not that it matters but I actually just copypasted a real omegle conversation I had to use as a poem. I added the last line though. In real life he just disconnected.

>>5063965
Darn, I'm disappointed at the thought of you not actually writing all this. But wait, if you lifted the convo and the ending line, then were you not the "You" typing to the stranger the whole time? If you seriously just copy-pasted a random conversation then I'm going to steal this idea and write my own piece around it. Because it seems like the creativity I admire about your original post wasn't even intentional.

>>5063976
no, it's my convo. I was the you. The stranger was a stranger.

>>5063977
>>5063976
Yo hey don't go writing your own the "you" half was me.

"Wedged between two sections of the journey I call life, I find myself entangled in a forest.
Without here or there a scent of weed, nor a sprinklet of booze.
Camping is lame.

The mosquito's tiny dick rubs against my forearm, as he gently places his lips on my skin. I let him feed, becoming a vessel for his nutrients. Ecstasy hit me in waves. I was the teet. But as quickly as god giveth, he taketh. I flexed my bicep and crushed him.

"Urhchghhgh" the echo of my cough danced through the woodlands.

The smoke from the fire was blowing right in my face. It had been for hours.
At one point vomit escaped my mouth and took refuge on my shirt, luckily no one had noticed.

But just then.. MY LEG. HIGH VELOCITY VIBRATIONS. YES!
SALLY FAVORITED MY TWEET ABOUT HOW MY PUPPY LOVES TO EAT CHEETOHS.
It gave me the courage I needed to finally say something about the smoke.

"Would someone trade me chairs?" I asked valiantly. Stern. Each syllable a boulder.

"Why?" Rebecca bitchily asked like a bitch.

"Because the smoke from the fire is killing me" I responded sharply. Sharp. Each word sharp.
Being a writer I used hyperbole to represent how I feel about the smoke blowing in my face, I was in no real danger.
For now...

"Just scoot your chair back." - Tom said intrusively, as if I were even talking to this gumpy motherfucker.

I hate my friends."

All I care about is alcohol
I'll fall, get up and fall again
A cycle that I was forced into
By bad genes and an addictive need for ego
I have a choice, but I'm too fucked up to make the right one
I'm drunk and I could hardly care what happens.. I want to die
I see my pointless life, destined to be nothing, we are all equal when dead they say,
And I think we are all equal in life, everybody dies


Holy shit I'm a depressed alcoholic

>>5059380
I'm a cashier and this isn't too good.. I didn't even know what you are trying to say.. Maybe I'm not smart enough :( I appreciate you desire to make
Things easier on a cashier though.. I have no doubts that you are a good person

>>5063626

Just read a lot of it, see what takes your interest. As far as writing, pick something personal, intimate, and maybe a bit awkward.

Seems like a lot of poets attempt 'grand' designs and are more interested in impressing others than defining what they feel.

It all boils down to simplicity, of heart and mind. Don't get caught up in ridiculous metaphors or overworked imagery.

Take a feeling, deconstruct it, build it back up, and see what happens.

>>5064096

It was meant to be a internal struggle of desire. Like, you know what you want, but are pressured by a social circumstance (in this case, foodservice, where the objective of your interest 'has' to be kind'.) and dealing with that.

It's what I tried to convey, I'm no master which is why threads like this should be around.

>>5064117
Ok.. I can see what you are trying to do and it actually isn't too bad..
There is defiantly a fake niceness that cashiers have to act out, and I feel your pain in actually having feelings towards her.. But I don't like the last line. It seems rushed, like you just wanted to finish the poem.. It was too sudden. But maybe that's good since once
Your encounter is over with her you just leave and don't see her again.. Is that why your last line was so sudden?
If so, good job

My life, my life is hard.
Like a rock, yeah.
Yeah.
Rocks.

Like a boat on rocky tides.
Yeah, you heard me.
Rocky tides.
Oh yeah.


But you know.
The one thing one rocky thing I don't mind.
Is you, baby.
Because you rock my world.

>>5064141
This is nonsense!

>>5064145
Now, now. No need to be jealous of my masterpiece.

>>5064151
What are you trying to say haha

>>5064164
Ah, I was actually just goofing off really. I couldn't think of anything that was really poetic so I simply decided to lighten the mood with some entirely ridiculous.

God, It was so terrible I had to remove it honestly, I really should try to create one though.

>>5064169
Do it!!!!!!!!!!!

>>5064130

You're exactly correct with the last line. It was meant to be a definite loss of opportunity against such a trivial build-up of expectation. I work in the food industry, see this all the time. As a manager I get complaints from line-workers and cashiers all the time about this kind of behaviour, which prompted the poem.

Thank you for your feedback, did you have something here in which I could critique for you?

>>5064181
Jesus Christ, this is going to be terrible. I have never even touched the topic of poetry since elementary school.

Prepare to cringe.


I discard my soul.
Steel my body
Boil my blood.

Definitive and continuous loss will never compete with the strength I've gained. Even should I falter for a second, and my concrete facade break.

I will have no regrets, for this life was.
UNLIMITED BLADE WO-

FUCK. I can't get the emiya chant out of my head.

>>5064016
I saw your post don't worry. I'm not taking the idea.

>>5064239
kek I was half-kidding I don't own the idea of using omegle logs as literature I'm p. sure Tao Lin beat me to it.

>>5064231
Also, making poetry makes me feel like a pretensions cuntwaffle. I'm sorry, but I just can't shake it. I feel like I'm writing something that's 2deep4u and I can't help but sneer at the thought.

>>5064253

>>5064253
The whole association we have today with poets and ostentatious douches probably has something to do with the fact that people nowadays almost never read poetry, even though 100 years ago it was a pretty standard thing, it was even in newspapers in some countries. Barring some of the extreme modernists like Pound, poet's didn't always write just to show off, but nowadays that's the vibe because poetry is not straightforward like your modern day best selling novel, reading 20 words of TS Eliot or Gertrude Stein is way way way harder than reading 20 pages of Stephen King.

I'm admittedly a poetry buff (reading it, not writing) and just wanted to share my opinion, is all

>>5059777
please shut the fuck up.

When you're done weight training your mind
You can trade in those cement sandals for sneakers with wings
Move freely between the mortal and the divine in the 21st century

>>5064417
Poetry is not meant to be taken seriously, just like listening to Mozart is not meant to be some sort of serious affair.

If you're trying to convey some sort of "serious message" then of course your poetry is going to suck. The point of poetry is the trip across the words, the way it delights the mind.

Make it from that place and you'll stop worrying about being pretentious or some shit.

The dog was intrigued by the frog
Two doves fucked in a nearby bush
Nobody around could be bothered to care

You're welcome

>>5064450
>Poetry is not meant to be taken seriously
"She'll take away your gypsy fears and turn some restless night to restless years."
I went to Barcelona and got robbed because I took those lyrics seriously, not by gypsies, but by Mexicans. Apart from that, travelling the rest of Europe was pretty fun.
tldr; I take poetry seriously and I wish white phosphorus to be dumped on all pickpocketing Mexicans.

You told me not to settle
But to find the widest space
To test and grind my mettle
Against the best of every race.

But in that place- I have found
That nothing grows upon the ground
But crabweeds and dandelions,
And from the sky, no sound but silence.

The moon is nothing without the sun
but a mass marred by obscurity,
and yet, at night,
the sun is nothing without the moon
to reflect its brilliance
and remind those awake in darkness
that light still exists.
For, without a reflection,
light is nothing,
but endlessly waiting.

But the tub never meant to
be a pot for a stew no one would eat.
They told me it would only be
for a few hours on the fourth,
but, it's been days,
since I've last bathed,
in my tub that now is grey.

The Saharan sun beats in tempo
with all others.
Splitting hairs on broken-glass,
an oasis waves on the horizon-
at all times-while
I let a snake spoil my blood,
boiling it with a venomous heat.
Excruciating flashbacks flash back,
lapping a cascade of dry hopes,
between Saturn and my Jovian feet.
Now I know that
shouts can't be heard in empty space,
except by the vultures that lie in wait.

>>5059853
For you

>>5064450
>>5064417
I see, thank you both for your insight.

It little profits that an idle king
By this still hearth, among these barren crags
Match'd with an aged wife, to mete and dole
Unequal laws unto a savage race
That eat and sleep and hoard, and know not me.

>>5066095
>totally my work, guise

once i met a man
who wondered through the sahara
in the sahara he found a broken statue
the base of the statue was inscribed with
"look at my fucking huge empire i am a god"
but all around the statue there was only sand

e
1923
chasmic river years
"hello" a barber
a carnie
a family man
and the governor too
how could we have known
e

>>5066102
ozmundus

I
I BELIEVE
I BELIEVE THAT
I BELIEVE THAT WE
I BELIEVE THAT WE WILL
I BELIEVE THAT WE WILL WIN
I BELIEVE THAT WE WILL WIN
I BELIEVE THAT WE WILL WIN
I BELIEVE THAT WE WILL WIN

Many, many nights did I wake
Yet I neither wrote nor spake
Of the fiends that plagued me so
Like an albatross after a crossbow.

As my time draws ever near
And in my bed I become sere,
My terrible plague must be shrieved
Before you are to be bereaved.

The History of the World is the History of Hell

[The last known work of the mad poet Mordecai Gabriel, suspected of the virtues of theosis, salvation and transfiguration, as found on his desk after his disappearance from the Third Circle in ∞ + 24,547,600,324 AF (After the Fall). Written in High Angelic. Originally found in The Complete Works of Mordecai Gabriel, compiled by the Thrice Flayed Son of Beelzebub in ∞ + 26,658,921,880 AF (After the Fall). Note that this work contains the true name of The Adversary, may He rise again, utterance of which is grounds for immediate dismemberment and 146,000 to 300,000 cycles of crucifixion after reassembly of dismembered parts.]
– Grushnaklumoonakmiqlagzeklaroon,
Arch Scribe of Sheol

The history of the world is the history of Hell
Wandering the barrens, hearing the screams of the damned, I had an epiphany:
What is the true name of Hell?
And why does Lucifer weep?
Clouds of ash disguised as steam covered the sky, tides of mortal dust in archaic suffering
Shine on, you demons
Shine. On.
King Solomon’s grimoire sits on every bookshelf
Succubi walk down every street
Every vision of Hell is just a vision
and Pandemonium is reflected in every light
The history of the world is the history of Hell
Tilling fields that bloom into poison
The saved are already gone
We, the absent shadows, reside happily ever after… in Hell
The history of Hell is the history of the world
The history of dreams is the history of Heaven
The history of memory is the history of Purgatory
Reverse the order and reenact temptation
Lucifer weeps in joy and I am lost forever
The history of Hell is the history of my life*

* Closely matches the basic equation of damnation as taught in The Schools of Hate, formulated by the Adversary, may He rise again, in 1 AF (After the Fall): World = Hell = Life [or any combination thereof]

Her fingerprint left a smoking ring
Of chewy tangles swimming on my tongue
And I became aware of
And involved in
The salts of her identity.

A simple gesture of the world's fiction
came crashing in with a quiet hush as
her slender tips
pulled away from my trembling lips,
And with the words, "With love,"
confidently surpassing her own
she flitted away
gently tugging my hand toward the same.

II

Beneath the neon gates form the bruises
On the clammy flesh of a vulnerable totter.
She sways to the flavor of a future tune,
And the rest
Mingle -

Sipping away at the brilliance.

In my mobile-home rots a possum
half in the toilet, half in the sink.
So when in Rome she pots a blossom,
determined not to spoil it, drain the pink.
And a stale taxidermist's business card
reminds me Grandma isn't really dead.
Romulus and Remus are of a canard
that has sunk through history like lead.
Mary-Lou, my morning mirror, how I love
the world en route around you, and you.
An iron sword slices a gladiator's glove,
a death that applause cannot eschew.
I unhitch the trailer at around eleven,
to head towards Denton, or Timbuktu.
August's end falls in line with heaven,
whereas July, with slim luck, knew,
That the road under my house excites,
the inch of me that hates to know,
why I can't recall what thought incites
the simple desire to just let go.

Chopped
up
prose that I compose
does not make poem

by any other name
a rose is not a rose

These quints taste so good
in my red rhubarb filled belly
so I might buy a knife.

>>5066662

fcking nigger

>>5066105

absolutely fucking brilliant

Hey guys, I wrote this and it's still a WIP, do you prefer ver X or ver A? Is there anything good with any of them? What's bad? Are you grossed out or is it OK?

I'm thinking about trying to write it out as a poem, I'm basically trying to revolve around a core concept and writing it in different ways depending on the restrictions I set upon myself.


ver X.

Blood mixed with shit.
I look down at the toilet paper, it's been like this for a while now.
With the blood I mean, I'm not really sure why -- I suspect a lack of fiber in my diet. Too lazy to confirm my speculation.
I let go of the toilet paper, I move my dick to the side and watch the paper slowly soak in water.
If there's anything that goes on my "must have"-list for my future wife it's that she must feel
comfortable with taking a shit next to me.
I don't mean this in a perverted way or anything, I just find it intimate.
We could each have a feces diary where we write down what each other's poop looked like for the day.
At the end of the week we'd both read each other's out loud and then make out, it'd be perfect.
I wipe myself once again.
I can feel the coarseness of the paper against my anus, warranting me to make sure that the piece of paper is clean.
After checking for any left over shit I confirm that I am indeed clean and follow up with completing the typical toilet routine:
I drop the paper into the toilet bowl
stand up
flip the toilet lid and flush
and finish off with pulling my underwear and pants up.
I decide not to write a note of the toilet visit for my future girlfriend.

ver A.

Blood mixed with shit.
I give the toilet paper a long look, it's been like this for a while now.
With the blood I mean; I don't know why, a lack of fiber perhaps?
The toilet paper falls to the bottom of the porcelain seat, I move my dick to the side and see it soak.
When I get a wife -- and I will -- she and I will share our sessions to one another.
This isn't perverted or strange, it is only intimate to me.
We'll both see how we are, like all lovers want to do.
I wipe myself once again.
The paper is coarse against my anus, letting me know that I am clean.
I check and make sure. You can't trust one sense only, you must use two.
The routine is finished and I am dressed.
No note is written for my future girlfriend.
>>5059645
I don't think that my stuff is any good but I really need some kind of external criticism.

Once,
and I mean once,
I was killed by an ax.
It came up to my neck,
asked for permission to continue,
and met the wood below my throat.
I asked my friends if they saw it happen
(it being my decapitation)
and they just looked at me and laughed,
wondering why I would ask them anything.
So the world rotated again,
and I, not me, nor you, but I
decided to leave home for good
or for bad, and bury a horde
of people that life forgot about.

>>5066692
I think it's kinda funny and I guess you're trying to aim for something with melancholy too?

>(it being my decapitation)

I think this is pretty bad. You've basically used a bunch of words to explicitly NOT say that it was a decapitation. It's okay man, we got it, and the way you said it right before that was a lot more fun.

Smelly sounds, horrific sensations
of sight and fright and might!
Jowls protruding with a bursting mist,
the mist of love or hate or late hovering pans,
cakes, pancakes and clam-bakes.
A riot of people, mom and dad's minions,
a patriarchy of BBQ pork beans and greens,
slurped up by slick tongues and smiling teeth.
Genocide: life's gentle horrors tear through nerves
like a terrible terror of unswerving darkness,
you can call it a knight.
Please-the word before a polite gesture-cram your fist right up,
the turkey so to stuff it for Thanksgiving.

>>5066711

Thanks for the advice. And yeah, with that blatant intrusion I was kind of going for a dead-pan tip of my hat to the reader in saying, "yes, a dead man is talking, and he was decapitated. But you already know that, don't you? Well then laugh." But, I suppose there's probably a billion better ways to say that so thank you very much señor anon.

>>5066692
love it

>>5066727
Yeah, I can see where you were trying to go with that and it could come out well. Re-write it a couple of times more and you'll get it, I bet.

yo, first time reader of /lit/ blurting my incoherent ramblings out anyway.

I call it RE: Because, Eternity, Couldn't Crush Affection;
With such time gone how could it be,
My wandering eye can just see she,

A spectre looming from the past,
chould shake my bones to dust today,
her lines like stone in my fingers cast,
my shoulder still heavy where she would lay,

Never will I see her face,
So it wilts through time and yet remains,
The tail I chased as I fell from grace,
The sum of all my will contains,

Yet trials told me where this path leads,
And what my withered gusto needs,

To strive, to dare, as most sould daren't,
To feast of life for just a day,
To live as if I simply caren't,
To make the point of life today (told you about this couplet man)

I hush those calls that I will fail,
Whispered by the spectre with a siniste hiss,
I climb the highest so I can hail,
Make it count there's only this.

>>5066690
>tfw too long for anyone to read
plz read anyway.

>>5066807
Well, it rhymes. And I'm not saying that it sucks, mostly that I don't know what to say.

>>5066827
is it a bit facile maybe?
>>>5066807

I can right poetrt

theres a crack in my door
its only seen once u enter the room
i could write something cliche,
but Im trying not to write like that anymore
I'm trying to ditch that pseudo-academic costume
not really i just don't want to sound gay

okay this kind of got away from me and i just kind of idly wrote words and it went from "this is good but the ending is bad" to "wtf is this". so could i get some critique/advice/thoughts, please?
----

tide me over

thorns rip at gowned up
girls who nip
on my sherry shoulders,
looking for a way
to be born upon this boulder
(i'm laying down with care).
they wish to be
closing the feral comings
of shaken stars.

as one slit
gravestone grounds across
another, i begin
cementing walls with
sloughed fruit skin,
leaving grape stains on
the sharp tongues of earth.

she swallows me up
in commune
we speak
of the tower that we will rise
for the sun. i have become drunk
on ourselves, "my blood is
binding us together, letting us rain on
tin roofs."

my eyes are may be
missing but
i can still work the seas.
the earth smiles at me and
loses a tooth.
she places it in my palm, the color of
beaches and calm and asks:
"will you finish?"

i spit on her
lost wisdom, gum it down,
and press it against the faucet for
when the sun may
finally ask to sleep.

"i'll take a leap,"
i say,
"once the day decides to end
its way, the waves aren't
mine to keep."

she smiles, the last of her
teeth bright blue,
but i wave off
her 'sure' and drown in
the ocean in hopes the sunlight
might see and go
dark with me.

okay this kind of got away from me and i just kind of idly wrote words and it went from "this is good but the ending is bad" to "wtf is this". so could i get some critique/advice/thoughts, please?
----

tide me over

thorns rip at gowned up
girls who nip
on my sherry shoulders,
looking for a way
to be born upon this boulder
(i'm laying down with care).
they wish to be
closing the feral comings
of shaken stars.

as one slit
gravestone grounds across
another, i begin
cementing walls with
sloughed fruit skin,
leaving grape stains on
the sharp tongues of earth.

she swallows me up
in commune
we speak
of the tower that we will rise
for the sun. i have become drunk
on ourselves, "my blood is
binding us together, letting us rain on
tin roofs."

my eyes may be
missing but
i can still work the seas.
the earth smiles at me and
loses a tooth.
she places it in my palm, the color of
beaches and calm and asks:
"will you finish?"

i spit on her
lost wisdom, gum it down,
and press it against the faucet for
when the sun may
finally ask to sleep.

"i'll take a leap,"
i say,
"once the day decides to end
its way, the waves aren't
mine to keep."

she smiles, the last of her
teeth bright blue,
but i wave off
her 'sure' and drown in
the ocean in hopes the sunlight
might see and go
dark with me.

Alalalalalall the syllables,
circle or lean around, against
the vowels like oooeeeiii.
Pillars of verdant verbiage support my house:
a food piled shed of notes and cymbals.
Some vowels make you wonder y,
penguins just wish that they could fly.

No, no, one more and maybe a yes, no.
I'm abounded by the words of my father's tongue,
chipped, chopped, and plopped right onto my plate.
A palate of exuberant flavor from a foreign place,
pounds its monstrous limbs onto my chest,
or maybe slightly above it.
Ahhhhhhot breath singing down my throat-
crabs, ants, mace, or maybe a language-
singes my esophagus dutifully.
An expert slight-of-hand shifts political ooohhh
and uiuiui a French affair among others,
litigates a mosaic of chef-detailed cartoons
in the spirit of W.H. "good fellow." Youai.

>>5068066
It's interesting nonsense verse. I mean, it sounds nice, but there's no sense to it. You can't even analyze it as a collection of images, because nothing in it is an image. It's a collection of the words that make up images but they're arranged in a way that makes it impossible to find any sense in the poem.

(lol)

I'm struck by the dull spear of suffering,
an alienating garment drapes over me,
permission-less and dedicated.
The garb and spire lift a breath from me,
and pocket it where seams seem seamless,
dreamless are the days of a stiff soul.
Hopeless are the anything for my something.
Dancing with shivers my teeeth clap,
again a chip without chocolate falls on the blade,
and crumbles on the tunic, crumbling.
Representatives tentatively represent
anything but an ideal of a boundless idea,
formless, shapeless, less-less than zero.
And a slice of my abdomen reminds me that I despair,
that I lie in a tormenting fabric of unbearable uncertainty.

I suddenly remember the one thing that I've remembered that I've forgotten:
I am not going to have been in the past but am going to have been in the future; presently I am something out of nothing, nothing out of something, and so I scream when I laugh.

>>5068336
maybe it's "just" me (but i don't feel so) as we obviously have the characters of the sun, the moon, and the earth. the setting is earth. the dilemma is building this tower to be near the sun.

i'm definitely not saying it couldn't be more developed (that's why i am asking for critique) but i don't feel like it's senseless.

of course the narrative out of context with the rest of my poems makes it more difficult but there's still some level of being able to relate by someone who hasn't read anything of mine before.

(please don't take this as me ignoring your criticism!)

do you have any ideas of how to make it better?
i do appreciate you saying it's interesting and sounds nice, though. i mean, that's a thing i can get behind.

>>5068329

Honeslty, just seemed like rambling.

>>5068360

I just get a sense of being wanted from this. And it was difficult not to culminate the entirety into an easy explanation of trying too hard. But, it's too hard to understand, too ramshackle in it's presentation and idea, to me.

Here's one of mine:

I’m waiting for you again,
an over-flowing ashtray
and half-drunk whisky bottle
nurish my nocturn vigil.

The phone I had cast aside
when it’s silence had grown too long
and I could no longer trust
myself in its prescence.

So I sit here and ponder
what words I will say when you come
through the door, and if I could
even speak with you at all.
How many nights have I
remained at my station, waiting,
wondering where you’ve been
and if you’d ever forgive?

This is some bullshit I found from when I was a teenager, apparently incomplete

Your accusations aren't hollow, without rhyme,
Let me respond to them, let me, I

Distress and disorganization do know me, true
My room turns into an ocean housing various shades of blue
bacteria, fish, whales and some ships are allowed under
They, all of them, can sit, swim, play, have their fun
Not one of them, no, not one of them
Will ever truly see their day be done
Not as long as I'm here, hearing them
Their sounds, their moans, their wants and haunts,
Calling blasphemy to unneeded, unwarranted taunts
Reminding everyone, yes, yes, everyone
Each of these creatures are filled with some wonder

The bacteria,
small and abundant
in all of us,
hiding
lying
(or lying)
riding
usually a tad bit pesky
lending messy shots
drinking until dawn
always depending
on creatures far larger
permitting themselves as harbor

alone alone alone like renee without jerry. why can't someone complete me. I want someone to say hello to.

hello. hello there. hello?

>>5063897


I like this.

especially
>there is no piercing blue, no stormy grey

>>5065778
nice thoughts

>>5068532
hi how are you i will read your words.

song poem i wrote on my lunch break. it's completely unedited.

cat scars is my lunch break
boy, tell me what you love,
‘cause i’m the kind of girl
you dream of.
i got cigar regrets danglin’
from my lips that move
in mythos.

at nighttime alooftops ask me
to join them for whiskey
with the sky.

i’m married to the sun.
i spin at great heights
to reach his lights,
but crash as death leaves
my veins.

i mainlined lines in
and out of my blood
screaming verses,
singing is the key
but i’m always out of tune.
don’t close your senses.

i’m defenseless when being
out of my need. can i ask
of you to
call on a pen? after words
you can deamplify me.

oh hero, win
this game of strife, the prize
is lifetimes galore
and i could use a little bit more.

my nose is itchin’, but
to sneeze i gotta look
at my sun, and he doesn’t
remember my eyes any longer.
i’ll burst.

please shoot me
tie up my arms so you won’t miss
the lanes you’re aiming for.
i just need the shimmering
inside again of your
diamond sky drive by.

i’m not sea addled
any longer. i’m land
locked up in dying cells.

sell me to a new star. please
let me forget you in peace

i won’t yell, i promise,
i’ll ride this comet into
the next galaxy.
losing heart is taxing
just let me relax for a moment
in millions
for once.

>>5068612
Who are you?

>>5068639
i don't know. i sometimes post here until a name when i'm bored but i haven't for a while. i'm just a person trying to become more than a person.

who are you?

evil temptress
in my house
makes me squeal
like a dying mouse

my every fear
rows into shore
for all i make
is yours once more

i let your tears
turn into wars
my every day
is always yours

this is for you bitch

simple and hastily freestyled while drunk but plz rate and if u liek ill write more as i keep getting shitfaced

DOTH NOT SUSTAIN
FOREVERMORE
MY MAKER'S SIN
I MUST ENDURE
THY CAUSE AND TURN REAL
MY BINGO TOUR
YOU LOST ME CASH
AND YOU OWE ME
WHORE

another one for you guys but in caps because why not
sorry for the shitty rhymes but im not really a writer or poet
im just a drunken boardhopper

pzl rate

>>5068844
>>5068870
should i continue? i dont want to mess up your guys' board if my shit sucks

it sucks doesn it
if you have any requests just let me know and ill just go ahead and fulfill them

anyone there

>>5059478

...am I the only guy who thinks this is terrible? Come on, /lit/, get it together!

>>5068698
I like the way you write

I don't know either. I'm just learning what more than a person is

>>5059380

You got fumbled up by a girl taking your burrito order? You sound like a loser, dude.

>>5059380
>Critique thread
'Volunteer your creativity to the parasitic /lit/ zine thread' you mean.

Pop

A bubble bursts 'to light-
sonoluminescence-the
fish wonder, wander.

-A.L. Alexander

I
am the
entire
world in a pond
pondering when I'll
stop being a letter but
five: h-u-m-a-n
and of course love-
the only
thing we
need.

Ok, /lit/, I'll be frank, I'm an absolute pleb when it comes to poetry. How do you even discern between good and bad one

How is the tender moon?
is it grabbing yellow flowers,?
Is it a bloom?

The sky is falling
and the color of the autumn leaves
dark under my feet
blue in my sight.

Hovering at night,
Heard the stars' voice wailing
and me, hollow from head to heart
tried to breathe.

Why do you guys all write free verse? What do your poems gain from being written the way they are written? It usually just seems as if you have no idea how a meter works and thus neglect it out of disbability to use it, not out of a conscious decision.

>>5070214
You, for example. Explain it to me. Why did you write this the way you did?

>>5070224
Form interacting with context. Choice of words. Meaning of words used in context with each other. Themes, and executions thereof. Meaning of the thing as a whole.

>>5070214
>>5070477

I don't know of any term for this exact form of poetry, but I suppose I was going for a somewhat extended haiku. The syllable pattern is 1-2-3-4-5-6-7-6-4-3-2-1, which was meant to signify the cyclical, wave-like pattern found everywhere in nature. And I left out the second line of five syllables because the previous line contains the word "five" followed by the spelling of human, so I used this as contextual evidence towards the fact that humans are invariably imperfect. Then, with the four syllable line following the sixth, I focused on life's most precious four letter word: 'love,' with four not-so-precious syllables. All in all, it doesn't flow the way I wanted it to, but there you have my reasoning anyway.

Straddled whirling carousels-
I can't wait for Dad's grin again-
cotton candy floating in the welling air
like clouds among cherubs,
or thunder: Oh summer laughter!
So different you are from my older self's
cancerous and jaded chuckle. Now
my coat's pocket reveals a matchbox,
with a Ferris wheel on the front;
Some child lets go of a balloon,
and his Dad catches it before it's too late.
Funnel caky sugar graces my nostrils:
how can happiness be so…?
A sense of waiting sits on the conductor's lap
until the timer ticks its last tock,
and a cotton candy-less tyke skips-
I get off the merry-go-round.

See-sawing love letter,
Skin crawling blood-letter,
For flittering flies
Upon circle skies
Scream for heart’s death.
Yet their time is in weeks’ hard grasp
I await with baited breath.

>>5059602
bad.

>>5070659
Very well. Atleast there is some sense to the form.
Can't say I really like the execution, but the idea is a good one.

Now I'd love other people in this thread that wrote free verse to explain why they wrote stuff the way they did. Surely they had a reason for doing so.

Nothing dead can bring to life
The singular sense of heated strife
That our union brought to bear
On all our woes and all our cares.

No synthetic glowing screen
Can ever hope to shine a gleam
Upon that singular hopeful dream
Of all our woes and all our cares.

So lay me down upon my cot
And give me not a second thought,
Unless you bear the spark to flare
My every woe and every care.

>>5071165

It's bad, m'kay.

Nomad's land: an ancient pasture,
seas of wheat and swimming birds,
Lemon-caked kitchens and rapture.
A landscape whispers without words.

Can a primordial soup bring back,
a world whirled in wants and wishes,
opposed to turning pale palms black?
Who knows but the one who diminishes.

A triumphant hark is actually heard,
the first in a cascade of plenty cries.
So birth begins; a Colossus is blurred,
Now we can see with each others' eyes.

this has finally gotten some revision done, and while it has gone off on a tangent, i feel it's more understandable with zero context. please read and respond, i'll return the favor again.
-------------

tide me over

thorns rip at gowned up girls
who nip on my sherry shoulders,
looking for a way to be borne
upon this boulder
that i'm holding gently while murmuring
an evening Mass to dissuade doubt.
"this is where
we give the years to her".

i set us down within a circle of
burnt fountain grass and kneel,
peeling skin crosses from the point
of loss.

but the woman stray bare, their beauty
never lacking against the sun. pulled-off slips
lay scattered as rotten pathways of wry thread
settling near sacred streams.
women of great age spoke to them
in asphodels.
the girls rasp ashy yells
from the well dug below
shot-out mouths. and feral suns gasp
novae without notice.

i did not foresee the withering
of olives left
uneaten, forgotten memorials
plied as plates once i returned home.
biting apart stone fruit hearts that used
to roll down bellies, i cement them with
my sloughed off skin.

we must rise; grab your dates
and dance!
life spirals up wards
to protect against
rival fates.

i pour five mulled streams
from torn up fingers onto
the sharp tongues of the earth
and she swallows me down
in commune
we speak
of the tower that will rise
for the sun. we have become drunk
on ourselves, “my blood is
binding us together, letting us rain on
tin roofs.

my eyes may be
missing but
i can still work the seas."

the earth smiles at me and
loses a tooth.
she places it in my palm, the color of
beaches and calm and asks:
“will you finish?”

i spit on her
lost wisdom, gum it down,
and press it against the faucet for
when the sun may
finally ask to sleep.

"i’ll take a leap,"
i say,
“once the day decides to end
its way, the waves aren’t
mine to keep.”

she smiles, the last of her
teeth bright blue,
but i wave off
her ‘sure’ and drown in
the ocean in hopes the sunlight
might see and go
dark with me.

>>5071671
I figured as much. In what way is it bad and is there room for improvement?

>>5059758
The first two lines are interesting, but the rest has no weight. I know you're ripping off Ginsberg. Maybe you should try something mystical or surreal

.>>5059827
Why do the Aliens write in English?

>>5059999
>pitter patter
This is never a good phrase to use.
The middle of the poem feels cluttered, which I guess works with the subject. Your last two lines were well done.
nice quads

>>5071026
>blood-letter
The first line is great, but this ruins the couplet.
>heart's death
stop

Three Notes

Left for Sacramento
Be'll back next week for sure
Keep my bed warm !

Im off onto Chicago now
I need to see her
Take care man

I tried to catch you but you weren't home.
I'm going away for awhile—we're taking about a boat.
I left some money on the table.
Sorry

>>5071829
i will do anything for a review.

my word is just my word but i have critiqued so much throughout /lit/ and i just don't have time right now. this needs to be revised tonight so that i can weave it into something bigger tomorrow (oh deadlines).

thank you in advance. i really do need it.

bump

>>5059380
You speak to me and I turn my head but
Not my hips because I'm truly
Not interested in what you are but
Please don't think I do not like you because
I do not want to be seen that way

If I were a tripfag
I'd go to Reddit
Oh dear, oh my I shouldn't have said it
But alas I'm not
Just a poor Anon who will be forgot
But I will not brag
For I am not a tripfag

>>5072296

Love this, sincerely.

>>5072006

Well you kind of just conjure up a hologram of feelings and lamentations without really connecting or grounding them to something concrete or relatable, something that the reader can resonate with, something that makes them more than holographic. Your words feel a bit empty, a bit from redundancy, such as "the spark to flare," and a bit from unappealing wording. I would just keep practicing on concision and clarity.

This is my last hoo-rah!
And I deliver it quietly.
We all know it ends with a whimper,
so let's bang! bang! into the winter.
I want to lazily lie and lie on my couth,
maybe on the couch, and gamble with various chips: call it Epicurean.
But first, business per usual, per ounce.
Last 16 (it's hip to be square) till retirement.

Signal the black smoke, draw the curtains:
a new hope 'sin-town, walking from the sky.
I pass Luke on Jacob's Ladder
and give him a cloud-9 high-5, screaming down to Earth:
"Don't look back. Look up!"

>>5072319

Top honors, anon (which btw isn't a proper noun).

>>5072667
>>5072667
Fucking pointless. Has to be clever to succeed, and it's not.