Only Mostly Dead Poets Society

[ScarletBea]

I LOVE LOVE LOVE
“Only mostly dead poets society”

@Jmack, is it because these days you are "mostly dead"?
x

[JMack]

I LOVE LOVE LOVE
“Only mostly dead poets society”

@Jmack, is it because these days you are "mostly dead"?
x

How long the winter
Wind sweeps the empty landscape
Impatient sleepers stir

?

[J.R. Darewood]

I LOVE LOVE LOVE
“Only mostly dead poets society”

@Jmack, is it because these days you are "mostly dead"?
x

How long the winter
Wind sweeps the empty landscape
Impatient sleepers stir

?

Dawn kisses the winter darkness
and the tantalizing scent of coffee
draws the poet from his slumber
teasing possibilities
of a pallid white horizon painted with words

[J.R. Darewood]

that might be  a cleaner poem without the coffee line...

[JMack]

that might be  a cleaner poem without the coffee line...

I like the coffee. (I like coffee.  )

My own style would be to strip it down:

“The smell of coffee”

Then maybe add something interesting:

“The rough smell of coffee”
“The smell of last night’s coffee”
“The smell of unbrewed coffee”
“The lure of unbrewed coffee”
“A dream of unbrewed coffee”

Each of these has a twist in it that is more interesting than ‘tantalizing’. (Though the last two are too explicit and remove some of the twist.)
Tantalizing is interesting in its connection to Tantalus, but I think that would take the poem the wrong direction.

Meanwhile, I love the last line.
Could there be a connection rom the coffee line to that one?

[The Gem Cutter]

Very frustrated with this one. Rhythm kept changing in my head. Don't ask me where it came from, it just sort of ... arrived. Anyway, at least it's out of my head and on the page where it can't get me 


I know where you’re sailing. I know these seas well.
All its reefs and currents, tall waves and deep swells.

From the bow of my ship, as we pass in the night,
I sense your confusion, and also all your fright.

And you’re right to hold tight to your rudder tonight,
With sea legs all trembling as you face the long night.

I can see your ship’s course, know the rocks just ahead.
And I’d pay any price, to face them in your stead.
For my ship got its scars from those very same reefs,
Where the wind always blows and the currents run deep.

And I know what I know, and I know what you don’t.
I know what you should do - and I know what you won’t.
For I once sailed those shoals on just such an evening.
No moonlight to steer by makes distance deceiving.

Like you I once trusted in my own eyes and ears,
And knew that no captain ever sailed without fears.
For no sailor’s ventured to places worth sailing,
By turning around at the sinking sun’s failing.

I wish I could warn you of the dangers I know.
But we cannot stop here. We cannot even slow.
More waves always coming, there’s never enough time.
And too great a distance, between your ship and mine.

No advice could help you. You could not read my charts.
Storms are always coming, in spiteful fits and starts.
No good would it do you, the route cannot be taught.
The currents ever tug us, from the courses we plot.

Though you barely see me, I wave as we pass,
May good fortune find you, and your sailing luck last.

[ScarletBea]

I'm not sure it's welcome, but I'm going to comment...

I love the message, Gem - I feel it's written on behalf of all adults on looking at young people they care about start their independent life.
(I don't mention parents/children because I don't have any yet I feel the same sometimes towards some people)

[The Gem Cutter]

Thanks Bea, you're very kind. I may revisit and abandon the 6/6 structure I was toying with, which I found very easy to work with at the phrase-level but troublesome overall. It just doesn't flow and I like to try and make it, well, flow 

[ScarletBea]

To be honest, I tend to ignore the "format", and just pay attention to the words and message

[The Gem Cutter]

Is there interest to launch a monthly contest? It seems unfair to pit poems against prose anyway, and you must admit, it does not take long to read a poem. Just a thought.

[idledragon27]

that might be  a cleaner poem without the coffee line...

No I love the coffee line. It ties it down to the every day and balances the rest of the ethereal feeling which hints at a writers imagination.

Or have I just drank too much and am hyper on the caffeine.

Either way, its ace.

[Alex Hormann]

A little something I've put together:

It seems I’ve received some sort of invite
To an elusive yet inclusive club
Where folk pen poems to please and delight
And not formal nor informal are snubbed
I do declare this club could be for me
Since I write on a regular basis
I find it pleasant and often chore-free
I hope this place does not enter stasis
So I say long live the half-dead poets
May you have paper when struck by idea
Or a keyboard or pen to help flow it
Just keep your writing implements near
May your ink be always fresh and pure
And your place with the poets be assured

[The Gem Cutter]

Since this thread is about sharing poetry, I'll put some poems here that I may have shared elsewhere on the forums, and I hope that is alright. Some are a year or so old, so I can't recall if I shared them with F-F or not.

[ArhiX]

This is what I wrote for my GF's story. It's originally in other language and I tried to translate it to english... I hope it's not very bad (hard to keep the meaning and find good rhymes when you do this frist time). And thanks to this piece I now know that there is no word "hidement"...


We will greet you, between life and devastation
Grant you a gift of sufferring, or a gift of salvation

And when you will stand, at the voids rim
Will you smile and laugh, or will you scream?
Are you other people, or your own creation?
You were born a man but do you deserve damnation?

Ours is the judgement and we hold the chains
Ours are fiery wings, and the blood you hold in veins
There is no escape and no mercy in our heart
Shatter the bones into ashes, gut the flame of life

Is this the way to a new life... Or end of your existance
We are Fire. We are death. We shall sunder your resistance
There is no place to hide and no time for atonement
Stop running and face the flames, of our eternal judgement

Will your ashes fly to haeven. Or to hell... down low
Between life and damnation, you will be greeted in Limbo

[The Gem Cutter]

Life-Saver

Spoiler for Hiden:

There’s a woman out there somewhere who is living still today.
And a man who stands upon the Earth who beneath the ground would lay.
Had a stranger not been waiting, not been there on that day,
Who might read the signs between the lines and keep the dark at bay. 
All they’ll live to say and do will now still be done and said.
And their children have their parents still, not gravestones in their stead.
And forgotten now the road that led the stranger to that place.
It's gone under starless shadows and vanished with no trace.

Survivor's Anniversary

Spoiler for Hiden:

Just a few hundred days from that day to this. Some things well remembered.
Some things lost unmissed. A dozen short months from this day to that.
You've come ‘round the corner to find where you're at. Not so far
From the start as many might think. A word or a thought, then
A shuddering blink, and back you slip up the long road,
Reversing your trek, to the edge where you stepped
Out into thin air, and started your plummet,
To this place from there. From the heights
You swept down over shadowy vallies,
Made your way through the battles,
Where even brave ones can’t rally.
You climbed up the mountains,
Left the shadows behind, And stand
In the sun and the wind, And now find,
That what you lost since that time when your fortunes
All turned, what you found on the long road,
What you saw, what you learned, has marked you
And changed you. And now you see clear, there’s no distance
Or difference, between there and here. For the road never mattered,
From your before to your after. Let the sun dry your tears, the wind carry new laughter.

My Life

Spoiler for Hiden:

If I met with my school friends, what could I say,
Of the places I’ve been to since those distant days? 
How could I tell them of all that I’ve seen,
The souls I encountered, the places I’ve been? 
Would it thrill and enthrall them to hear of my travels?
Or would it just bore them, a thread that unravels?
 
I walked with giants in faraway lands,
And we ruled the nighttime with fire in our hands. 
We tasted the wind of dark starless nights,
And leapt through the clouds from ponderous heights.

Through tension filled silence we watched through dark nights,
Awaiting the thunder and dawn’s early light. 

I once lay my hand in a track that was left,
By a hungry young lion in a dry river cleft. 

Tongues foreign and strange I made my mouth master,
Learned the words that come first and the words that come after. 

I chose always hard paths and sometimes I thrived,
But sometimes I stumbled and merely survived. 

I fell through the ice and sank in the mirk.
My wings once entangled, high above earth.
I leapt a crevasse on a cold northern shore,
Where the waves never tire and the winds always roar. 

I slipped on wet sea-grass on a high barren cliff,
And pitched to the brink where I dangled as if,
Suspended on wires that were woven of fate,
Glimpsing the world as the hour grew late.   

I welcomed screaming new life to the world,
And watched as the light in old eyes finally furled. 

If I met with my school friends, what could I say,
Of the places I’ve been to since those distant days? 
Would it thrill and enthrall them to retrace my steps?
Or are our paths just our own, in a world that forgets? 

How could I tell them of what I have learned?
Of the glory and shame and the fortunes that turned,
That the purpose of life’s like a dance – just to do it,
And the joy of the dance is itself what is truest.

Pirate Maiden

Spoiler for Hiden:

Windswept seas before me, star bright skies above,
Burning ports behind me, tiller held with love.
Not for hate or hunger, I chose blackened sails,
Fleeing farms and farmers, seeking sharks and whales. 

Bringing dread to sailors, reaping what they sowed,
Preying on the weaklings, no debts ever owed.
Handsome men I often pulled from burning ships,
Tested strength and courage, tasted trembling lips. 

Oceans vast and empty, winds that struck like bombs,
Gales that snapped the masts off, endless windless calms,
Canon fire and sword points glinting in the sun,
All of them I mastered. All of them save one. 

Lady Luck that other maiden on these seas,
Ended all my sailing, brought me to my knees.
Corset ripped and dirty, rough the rope holds tight.
Staring boys will dream me, later on tonight. 

Not for fear or sadness beats my heart so swift,
Fearing not the hangman, welcoming his gift.
Best to end my voyage swiftly like I sailed,
Windswept seas before me, spirit never jailed.