Posted: Mon May 19, 2014 7:34 am
Av - can't find the thread you refer to. Can you indicate where I should go [a search of this phrase didn't turn it up.]
Official Discussion Forum for the works of Stephen R. Donaldson
https://kevinswatch.com/phpBB3/
And for contrast/comparison, this not particularly well-known sonnet written by a 19 year old WW2 American pilot flying with the RAF shortly before he was killed. It's always struck me as an evocative mix of youthful exuberance and poignancy:W.B. Yeats wrote:An Irish Airman Foresees His Death
I know that I shall meet my fate,
Somewhere among the clouds above;
Those that I fight I do not hate,
Those that I guard I do not love;
My country is Kiltartan Cross,
My countrymen Kiltartan's poor,
No likely end could bring them loss
Or leave them happier than before.
Nor law, nor duty bade me fight,
Nor public men, nor cheering crowds,
A lonely impulse of delight
Drove to this tumult in the clouds;
I balanced all, brought all to mind,
The years to come seemed waste of breath,
A waste of breath the years behind
In balance with this life, this death.
And finally, IMO, Shelley's best, again in sonnet form:John Gillespie Magee Jr. wrote:High Flight - An Airman's Ecstasy
Oh! I have slipped the surly bonds of Earth
And danced the skies on laughter-silvered wings;
Sunward I’ve climbed, and joined the tumbling mirth
of sun-split clouds, — and done a hundred things
You have not dreamed of — wheeled and soared and swung
High in the sunlit silence. Hov’ring there,
I’ve chased the shouting wind along, and flung
My eager craft through footless halls of air....
Up, up the long, delirious, burning blue
I’ve topped the wind-swept heights with easy grace.
Where never lark, or even eagle flew —
And, while with silent, lifting mind I've trod
The high untrespassed sanctity of space,
- Put out my hand, and touched the face of God.
Percy Bysshe Shelley wrote:Ozymandias
I met a traveller from an antique land
Who said: "Two vast and trunkless legs of stone
Stand in the desert. Near them, on the sand,
Half sunk, a shattered visage lies, whose frown,
And wrinkled lip, and sneer of cold command,
Tell that its sculptor well those passions read
Which yet survive, stamped on these lifeless things,
The hand that mocked them and the heart that fed:
And on the pedestal these words appear:
'My name is Ozymandias, king of kings:
Look on my works, ye Mighty, and despair!'
Nothing beside remains. Round the decay
Of that colossal wreck, boundless and bare
The lone and level sands stretch far away.
yeah throw me a pm if you need an invite to the writers forum.Avatar wrote:Hahaha, I was actually confusing the one in U's first link with a topic in the writers forum, "Awesome hooks: Opening lines that we love..." which I can't link to since it's a private forum.
It's on page 2 in that forum if you have access. If not, we can add you if you want.
--A
Yesterday, I lay awake in the palm of the night.
A soft rain stole in, unhelped by any breeze,
And when I saw the silver glaze on the windows,
I started with A, with Ackerman, as it happened,
Then Baxter and Calabro,
Davis and Eberling, names falling into place
As droplets fell through the dark.
Names printed on the ceiling of the night.
Names slipping around a watery bend.
Twenty-six willows on the banks of a stream.
In the morning, I walked out barefoot
Among thousands of flowers
Heavy with dew like the eyes of tears,
And each had a name --
Fiori inscribed on a yellow petal
Then Gonzalez and Han, Ishikawa and Jenkins.
Names written in the air
And stitched into the cloth of the day.
A name under a photograph taped to a mailbox.
Monogram on a torn shirt,
I see you spelled out on storefront windows
And on the bright unfurled awnings of this city.
I say the syllables as I turn a corner --
Kelly and Lee,
Medina, Nardella, and O'Connor.
When I peer into the woods,
I see a thick tangle where letters are hidden
As in a puzzle concocted for children.
Parker and Quigley in the twigs of an ash,
Rizzo, Schubert, Torres, and Upton,
Secrets in the boughs of an ancient maple.
Names written in the pale sky.
Names rising in the updraft amid buildings.
Names silent in stone
Or cried out behind a door.
Names blown over the earth and out to sea.
In the evening -- weakening light, the last swallows.
A boy on a lake lifts his oars.
A woman by a window puts a match to a candle,
And the names are outlined on the rose clouds --
Vanacore and Wallace,
(let X stand, if it can, for the ones unfound)
Then Young and Ziminsky, the final jolt of Z.
Names etched on the head of a pin.
One name spanning a bridge, another undergoing a tunnel.
A blue name needled into the skin.
Names of citizens, workers, mothers and fathers,
The bright-eyed daughter, the quick son.
Alphabet of names in a green field.
Names in the small tracks of birds.
Names lifted from a hat
Or balanced on the tip of the tongue.
Names wheeled into the dim warehouse of memory.
So many names, there is barely room on the walls of the heart.
On my First Son
BY BEN JONSON
Farewell, thou child of my right hand, and joy;
My sin was too much hope of thee, lov'd boy.
Seven years tho' wert lent to me, and I thee pay,
Exacted by thy fate, on the just day.
O, could I lose all father now! For why
Will man lament the state he should envy?
To have so soon 'scap'd world's and flesh's rage,
And if no other misery, yet age?
Rest in soft peace, and, ask'd, say, "Here doth lie
Ben Jonson his best piece of poetry."
For whose sake henceforth all his vows be such,
As what he loves may never like too much.
Carlo C Gomez
Happy Chemtrails
In theory, the sky is falling,
Showering particles of merry madness and homespun delirium,
As we sleep in the formerly sealed
containers that kept us fresh,
But now leave us active:
Radioactive.
Actually though, this is more a soulless, weather modified masquerade,
Where we dance at funerals, drink to cloud seeding,
And play 'Guess Who?' retributions,
While locked in the closet with flight attendants left for kindling...
Rupert Pip
gore
Break my bones;
cut my throat.
Pull me open,
learn the ropes.
Breath me in;
taste the fear.
Shank my skin;
stand and cheer.
Kick my head;
let me bleed.
Unbolt my veins;
enjoy the read.
Gouge my eyes;
punch my face.
Wrap me up
in your embrace.
Innocent
Adieu
In my heart hides a small leaking hole
Which is used to control and cajole
I’m lulled into believing in hope
Feeling light, whispers, like a Kaleidoscope
Leaving me in doubt
Adieu adieu adieu