Kevin's Watch

Call, Redux

I cross the room and
Pick up the receiver.
The dial tone buzzes in my ear.
Noise breaking empty silence.

You ask me to give myself up.
I am poised to sacrifice
Some part of myself.
I hesitate, stand cradling
The receiver in my hands.

Is this what I want?
I hesitate, pace restless
across the empty floor.
I do not think I want this.

I put down the receiver
and move back to my chair.
I do not think I want this.
I try to forget, but you asked me
To give myself up for you.

Is this what I want,
To forget? I do not think
I ever want that. The phone is
In my hands again. I call you.

I need you.

I have no regard for rhythm, consistency, structure, or coherency. Some idiot said I wasn't as bad at poetry as I thought - look what that made me go and do.

And that idiot was absolutely right. I like the reptition of the line "I do not think I want this".

For somebody who supposedly can't write poetry, this is a pretty good job.

--A

The one remaining stood looking across the field of carnage, from underneath which he had so recently crawled, on his body smears of blood and bile describing undecipherable messages - perhaps the owners' final cry for help, unheeded. All around: broken bodies, shattered vessels, ragged deaths. Their destroyers were effective, but they were not, sadly, thorough. Thus he had survived when he should have died along with the rest of these lost selves, blasted and torn, that lay before him. His mind was yet to return, lost in a silent scream of terror, a flight from the sound of rending flesh, primal screams, the fraying edges of torn lives. He stood, uncomprehending, sheathed in gore, perhaps hoping somewhere, deep in his subconscious, never to return and understand upon what he planted his feet. He was a long way from home.

Hmm. Not sure what I think about this.
Kind of as a joke to myself, I submitted Call to poetry.com's competition, not expecting to hear or think of it again. I've received a letter now saying that it's been picked as a semi-finalist, and offering publication in a book (with a "small typesetting fee", of course; I'm going to say no, it seems like it's probably just one of those crap money-making things). But still, it's a little odd. I don't even like the poem much any more; I've gotten over my initial reaction to it. Chances are they probably let thousands of people into the 'semi-finals' just to get them to pay for a book.

Yeah, unfortunately, it they ask you for money, they're doing it for them not for you or the poem. *sigh*

--A

A fragment I just wrote, based on an image I've had running through my head recently, which was itself based on a line in a book that was repeated often enough it stuck up there.

He soars through the great wide blue, held aloft with majestic sweeps of golden wings that shimmer and shine in the sunlight of the up-above. His feathers long and swift dappled with bronze among the shining gold, his skin a deep burnished brown. A harness slung across his back carries his four curved swords, wickedly sharp. His face an image of noble beauty smiles with sheer joy as he swoops and flits and flys among the big white swirls and shapes of cloud, the mountains and valleys and veils of vapour that glitter in the glare of the sun on high.

The image of the flying, four-armed, winged sword-wielding figure was originally for a rather vivid image of Death I was trying to come up with, hoping to maybe build a story around a few slightly surreal and macabre images. It was inspired by the phrase "Death came swirling down" which is used quite often by Scott Bakker in The Thousandfold Thought and IIRC is a reference to Homer's Iliad.
This is a slight reimagining of the same figure. I've been toying with the idea of naming him Spider, since he has eight limbs.

Dipping downward he plunges, into and through the cold dark white, and out, droplets streaming from feathers, hair and skin. His wings folded, arms crossed tight, his body angles toward the ground and plummets, faster, faster, air rushing roaring and ripping away the moisture of the cloud and streaming back in his wake as he falls and falls and his eyes water and his great dark locks whip about his head and he falls and falls fast and falls faster and up comes the wide hard earth and his wings snap out-- and banking, lifting, he glides level with the plain, and his wings dip to touch the earth and with a final great flap, his bare feet touch the earth.

I think I may have gone a little overboard with the words this one. Tell me if you think it holds together. Should I edit out a few fasters and falls?

Edit: oh, god. "Great dark locks"? *groan* I'll fix that sometime.

Perhaps a little purple...and a few too many "falls".

If it were me, I'd take out some of the "his" as well...like "Wings folded..." Instead of "His wings" and "Gliding level...wings dipping" *shrug*

--A

Murrin wrote:Hmm. Not sure what I think about this.
Kind of as a joke to myself, I submitted Call to poetry.com's competition, not expecting to hear or think of it again. I've received a letter now saying that it's been picked as a semi-finalist, and offering publication in a book (with a "small typesetting fee", of course; I'm going to say no, it seems like it's probably just one of those crap money-making things). But still, it's a little odd. I don't even like the poem much any more; I've gotten over my initial reaction to it. Chances are they probably let thousands of people into the 'semi-finals' just to get them to pay for a book.

Avoid poetry.com like the plague.