Calisthenics 1, Week 9

I've always been obsessed with this painting. I know, I'm a little sick.

Olympia

Olympia's Lover

Beauty challenges opportunity.

Beauty refuses to be home-bred.

Beauty would rather flower fingers

over chastity than accept bouquets

from wheezing suitors. Beauty, what blooms

in the hydrangea between your thighs?

Beauty, your chalk skin sweats me.

Take my heat like carnations, Beauty.

Let roses curve their petals to match

the floral mounds of your pillowed

divinity. Beauty are you a deity?

I could choke you better 

than any little black string.

I could skin you better than the milky

highlights Manet paints you with. 

I should wear you--

an engraving in the flat plate

of the little gold bracelet

you got from me last Tuesday.

I know how long those legs stretch.

Dirtied sheets, not by wooden slippers

but by the sweated anxieties of a business 

woman. When is your promotion?

When do your night hours come

to a close? Let me change you 

to a housewife or let me embalm

your night dreams to last forever.

My longing reflects in the vulgar

way you eye me, stab me.

Defy me. Dog no fidelity.

I want to hear you purr

the final phrases of a siren dismembered

from her redlight home in Greece.

Turn away the gifts, Beauty, then tell 

your niggerish woman to close

those jaded curtains from the saints.

And when my breath trembles on the linen

tell your cat to hiss the climactic ships

into the rocky bellows of the sea.

But before you're gone you tell them both

though the slippers cast there is no way

to keep your whorish, seeping vows 

anywhere away from me.

Classmate Response 2, Week 9

In Response to Kyley's Freewrite, Week 9:

Yeaaaaaaaaaaahhhhhhhh. Holy shit, Kyley. Haha. When you said you were going to write a sex poem I had no idea it'd mean this. Ok, on to the seriousness.

This exceeds shock factor. This explodes it into tiny little pieces and then reassembles it, only to shove inanimate objects into its holes. I think we need some major toning down here. I love the contrast between the hilarious baby Jesus lines (which I never even thought of one of us including into a poem so I hate you for thinking of it before me--but I love you anyway) and the disturbing quality of what happens. I also like how you did not reveal they were brothers until the last few lines and you did it in a natural matter so that it wasn't too glaring. To continue on with that, remove the line that even says the speakers are brothers. Let the last name at the end imply everything and freak some readers out. I like that idea.

Now what is going on is major in the explicit area. I think what you need is more of that comedic tone here. Make it seem funny. The situation itself will bring all the disturbia. So avoid heavy words like cunt, pistol, and whores. Make the images seem funny. Try putting some of that corny silent comedy music track behind this scene and describe it that way. And I forbid you to use swear words. Forbidden! Manipulate the letter format some more too, while I'm on a side note.

Reconsider "rightful." I have a feeling this image is going to live with me for the rest of my life. I'm laughing so hard right now. Hope this helps, Diamond.

Classmate Response 1, Week 9

Now into stuff I didn't do in my notebook this week. I shouldn't neglect you guys (as I have) so I decided to go ahead and do responses next. Sorry again guys.

Angela's Freewrite, Week 9:


First off, I like the colors you're working with in this piece. These colors alone reflect a mood you're trying to portray--very stoic but also natural. I like the several ways you portray white--plain, pearled, egg-shelled. A nice variety which I assume is what you're going for.

I would say that "Enveloped perspective" is a little too multisyllabic to open with. Though I like the word "enveloped". Consider using it as a verb and instead of stating perspective, how can you illustrate the "you" in this case--which I assume to be the reader-- and his (her in my case) perspective. Convince me, as a reader, that this is the perspective I have. For that, I need detail.

Position of power is somewhat cliched. I like that you describe that position using the clothing though, that is refreshing. Perhaps go in deeper into how the clothes represent the job and the position of power might be assumed. Did
I mention I like the words "thick brained" here? And whoopie-cushioned.

Overall, consider reigning in words with more than two syllables. And manipulate line breaks.
There's a inconsistent variety in the measure of lines here that disturbs the meter. Also consider playing up on the nostalgia you included at the end. I want to know more about these circles.

Overall, good job, and I hope this helps.

Free Write 1, Week 9

Did another madlib. Was listening to Three Days Grace and decided to change it up so that it wouldn't be so angsty and cliche. I removed most of the song to avoid repetition. I think you'll find them pretty different though I fear the angst remains in a degree.

Original lyrics:

I’m not sober all the time
You bring me down at least you try
Until we see this eye to eye
I don’t want you

I must be running out of luck
Cause you’re just not drunk enough to fuck
And now I’ve had it up to here
I don’t, I don’t want you

It took so long to see
You walked away from me
When I need you
Wake up I’m pounding on the door
I’m not the man I was before
Where the hell are you
When I need you
Wake up I’m pounding on the door
I won’t hurt you anymore
Where the hell are you
When I need you

(Cut here)

My version, still untitled:

I’m not face-value, I'm bargain brand.
You shop me up from a barrel, dust me
Until we eye the competition, partnered
but I don’t want you.

I must be destitute. I must be drunk. 
There's no dregs of you left 
in the clear-moss bottles on the shelves.
Consumed what's left because I don’t want, 

I don’t want you.

It took so long to rock the faults
You cracked away from me, flatline
and jagged the nipping need

I had for you.
I wake up pounding the insides of a fourty,
chugging ashes of the man I was before.
There's no you at the edge of the glass.
I taste hops.

I wake up throwing
guts and trophies on the bedroom floor
and where the hell are you
to clean this mess?

Clean your mess
you left me swaddled in.

Improv 1, Week 9

Ok, yes, this is Dr. Davidson's calisthenic. But while I was writing it I wanted to practice juxtaposing different language together-- a la Fairchild so you can say this is my Fairchild's Madonna and Child, Perryton, Texas 1967 improv. It also branches out from that sestina I wrote. I think I like recycling ideas. Is that a sign of laziness?


How to Pick Up Women

It is from here on you must consider yourself a fisherman

who catches, devours, or mounts a woman’s hips, as if she’s

a prized bass from the Chilean Sea. Consider me

or this, brotherly advice. The wisest

I’ve ever given before I morph tongue-tied on the altar

in anticipation of the moment my tongue’s supposed to perform

in the sanctity of nuptial situations. Which could suck.

So beforehand, I relent those women you meet in bars, meet at parties,

meet in cars—backseat, toe-to-toe,  are less kosher than hillbilly ham salad,

despite how supple,  despite how chaste, despite how cherried her lip gloss tastes,

and no matter how many more legs she has than tables at Rockefeller’s,

you might profit looking for a woman in more spaced rooms.

In case you are confused, a girl with legs more crossed

than Christians is great, but avoid sneaking your dirty

loins into chapel on Sunday. One half of churched girls slip

drawls of sexed sin from Saturday night goblets , and the rest

are more interested in studying Jesus in red letter format

than deciphering the underlying message of your anatomy.

Take it from me, that girls like men who know curves

in the rims of pots and pans. They think a man who babies

orchids, has the same potential of blooming

two lips in his apartment. Women love sentimental shit.

And on her worst days that bitch might be a bitch,

but never is she a bitch by name unless you’re cool

with the hematoma to the left temporal area

of your head to be found fatal—which reminds me,

make sure she doesn’t own a bat. In fact, women are a job--

full-time, minimum wage. No union. Marriage is your promotion.

and when the vows are done, you know that sweetie snookum honey buns

will finally be scrubbing your nasty drawers until death do you part.

Apologies and Junkyard Quotes 1-4, Week 9

Yeah, sorry, I've sinfully neglected my blogger. I'll make sure it never happens again. I'll post those things I wrote down in my class notebook for my journal this week, and then move on from there.

1. "Me likey bouncy." Lois-- Family Guy

2. "Don't look so destitute."

3. "A life lived is a life lived rabid."

4. "a spell-screaming generation"

Free Write 1, Week 8

Wrote this by blending parts of Facebook news feeds. Makes little to no sense.

Why I Cheated On You

Nothing is more delicious than simplicity
in the realm of the paranormal.
A hard job supporting new episodes
of adoration on a couch cushion.

I'm out of ideas.

This is me, telling you
that sweet potatoes could multiply
in Buffalo in a few days,
but it'll amount to what you blame
me for when the tickets sell out.
I want a clean dog like that.
I want a pure trick on my 21st.

I want to hang-on mid-argument.

Discovering laziness beneath the drama
of a girl I know. Removed myself
that moment when I realized
I was stronger than a Spanish hen.

And I built my secret empire
on a scrap of corporal hocus pocus.

Calisthenics 1, Week 8

How a House Wife Hangs Laundry

Winter gone, my room longed for spring,
cleaning my crushing mess, remove the trash
by gathering the trinkets, gifts, and things
I could not collect and pawn for cash.

That eighty dollar Christmas watch
I half expect you to give away.
I expel a pile of hoodies, a swatch
among books, bears, and roses past their day.

And wasting the fabric on the earth
I released each armload into the sky
in a fluttering display of its worth,
I learned how well a wedding ring can fly.

And your shorts become a red flag on trees,
a banner waving to fidelity.

Improv 1, Week 8

Improv of Li-Young Lee's "Eating Alone"

Summer with Friends, 2010

I've found a place for last year's scrapbook.
Pressed between the dictionary and the history
book, complete with primary documents. I find
the way the scrapbook pages cry, as cellophane often does,
mocks each strained grin at birthday bonanzas and drunken
barbecues, each wail makes the album hard to open.

How long did the album sit on the coffee table?
Dust films the cover, mucking the black and white
lace pattern meant for wedding albums. I liked
the cover, not for matrimony, but for candid moments
of the time we dueled on the putt-putt course
with our golf clubs brandished like javelins.

Your sister's wedding picture is here.
I was not there, but I liked the way she looked
in white, and you in red. Your faces forge
each other in the snowy drifts. She smiles.
But you look off, not at the camera,
but into the fourth wall, staring down dimensions
into planes we promised we would never cross
or wring a ring, just lines that marked boundaries
implied by the edge of a polaroid.

I drag a finger into a thick line of dust
admiring the dull sheen of ignored plastic
before I slip it into place beside
the novel about our founding fathers.
Beside Merriam-Webster. In front

of a promise of another album that you and I

will not be in together. The perfect spot.

Tangible forget-me-nots, forgotten between
meaning and the pursuit of happiness--
what more can I, a young girl, want?

Sign-Inventory 1, Week 8

Li-Young Lee

Eating Alone

I’ve pulled the last of the year’s young onions.
The garden is bare now. The ground is cold,
brown and old. What is left of the day flames
in the maples at the corner of my
eye. I turn, a cardinal vanishes.
By the cellar door, I wash the onions,
then drink from the icy metal spigot.

Once, years back, I walked beside my father
among the windfall pears. I can’t recall
our words. We may have strolled in silence. But
I still see him bend that way—left hand braced
on knee, creaky—to lift and hold to my
eye a rotten pear. In it, a hornet
spun crazily, glazed in slow, glistening juice.

It was my father I saw this morning
waving to me from the trees. I almost
called to him, until I came close enough
to see the shovel, leaning where I had
left it, in the flickering, deep green shade.

White rice steaming, almost done. Sweet green peas
fried in onions. Shrimp braised in sesame
oil and garlic. And my own loneliness.
What more could I, a young man, want.

--repetition of the "y" in the first line, "year's young"

--rhyme of the lines, "The ground is cold,/ brown and old."

 --the first stanza contrasts these images of hot and cold with words like "flames" and images of red "cardinals" in composition to the "icy metal spigot."

--Both the first and second stanza open their lines discussing years past.

--the adjectives of the last line in the second stanza are lumped together and coupled with several commas to slow the reader's recitation of the line, just as the hornet is slowed.

--The third and last stanza launches into this brief remark about color: "deep green, white rice, green peas..."

--There is a repetition of the word "young" in this piece, that contrasts the image of the "creaky" old father in the second stanza. 

Classmate Response 2, Week 8

In Response to David's Week 8 Freewrite:

You have an interesting concept here and I'm wondering where you fished this up from? I'm glad you love me so much or I'd be force to kill you to figure out where you stole this--I kid.  I do, though, love crazy old people. That aside, I also think you handled this relatively well. Not too heavy-handed, even tone. Nice.

That said, I think this piece starts at the second stanza. You might have weird, if not, somewhat interesting things to say about trains, but whether a train attacks somewhat has little to do with the rest of the work. That's why I think you can start with, "On a day..." and changing the attack in the second line to include and become "train attack" so that we know what the speaker is referring to and so that we as readers can draw our own conclusions as to whether trains attack. I will relent that because of some of the interesting points you make in the first stanza, you can incorporate a small amount into the rest of the piece, but there is a point where you reach overkill on an idea and that first stanza as a whole does it.

I love the informative style this piece takes in contrast to the concrete images, but I feel some of the sentences could be condensed. For instance, "on a day that was both sunny and windy, she heard the news from the radio before her family could call her, and the attack that she laughed about would later pester her into insomnia and wide-eyed she would stare at walls" can become, "on a day that was both sunny and windy, she heard the news from the radio, and the train attack she laughed about would pester her into wide-eyed insomnia." I'm also debating whether we even need to know what kind of day it was...

Did her family actually serve a purpose in this piece? You go on to mention the walls later so is it ok to condense this part? There is a lot of repetition. Go ahead and cut some away, that way, each line does not get bogged down in unnecessary information.

I'm wary of funeral pyres. I'm only half-convinced. Seems... archaic in a sense? and heavy. Perhaps that's just me.

I like the negative progression of certainty here. She heard about it, maybe she heard about it, it might not have even happened.

All in all, enjoyable. Just do some condensing. Hope this helps.

Classmate Response 1, Week 8

In response to one of Queenie's many Freewrites for Week 8, Interrupted:


I love how you play up sounds in this piece, repeat consonants like in "motor mounting" and "snap sizzle." These sounds bounce the speaker's words when coupled with the double syllables of the first line and I automatically slip into a rhythm. I feel like the rhythm changes up a bit, muddled in the second line only to pick back up in the repetition of the third, before it finally dies out around the 5th, 6th line. This rhythm shift is not necessarily a bad thing, I'm just pointing it out.

As a writer, Queenie, you seem to like to play on the juxtaposition of interesting words and the images they create. From my own perception, this work seems to go more for a shocking and refreshing image as opposed to any real meaning before we reach the 12th line, where the focus seems to change. Perhaps consider something concrete for the reader to grasp on to. A mood is created and the images are there, but they become simply lists without something to connect it to. It's hard to understand what the speaker is referring to from what I assume is a drunken night with a man (I assume this is a man of course, what is it called--heteronormative?) who the speaker doesn't want to leave.

"Smell your sweat" though it might not be something typical to say, falls flat and almost expected in contrast to the rest of the images provided here.

I'm also rather curious about these repeated references to motor vehicles? Is the guy a mechanic? I'd like to see this played up more.

"Tiny" and "little" together in the last line slips somewhat into excessive, but I love this ending. Keep up the good work, hope this helps.

Junkyard Quote 1-4, Week 8

1. "intensive psychotherapy" --so clunky, so unpoetic

2. "It cures a multitude of ills." --Audrey Hepburn on laughing.

3. "A Tightly Knit Network..Says Network Analysis."

4. "Civilization is the limitless multiplication of unnecessary necessities." Mark Twain

Free Write 0.5, Week 8

Not a freewrite I actually intended this time around. Just an old improv (of William Stafford) I wanted to edit some. Italicized are things I want to change later.

Waking Up At Night

My fingers traverse blankets of darkness
and find disappointment in barren bedsheets.
I roll over, because staring at your empty pillow
usually evokes that Valentine's you forgot to get me a gift.

Thoughts pulse. I leave you a sliver in the back,
of junk drawers and drooping eyes, illuminated 
by the translucent glow of a Droid,
your name and face dances light in nightmares
until it too disappears beyond the recesses of the backlight,
soon lost deep into the void of the frigid pillowcase. (delete?)

How could I forget I no longer own you?
My lease is up on that armed shelter.
The heat's been turned off, and the bedroom's flooding
but I never got a bill and there is no insurance

that you'll ever come back, I don't
want you back. I can't forget I left you
for reasons that turn the downy comforter
to tattered fragments of faked polyester blend.
I can't forget that all those times
I thought we slept in the finest linens
we were really squatting in muslin tunics,
until those too burned into wisps of hemp. I can't.

I don't forget the times you fell
silent on phone conversations as I spilled fears
into the receiver of a future I knew
might never happen, because of a past
that repeated on itself like a cross-stitch. 


I won't forget the times that you yelled
"I'm still here" even though you were miles
ahead of me, in a memory of a girl 
who might've stood a chance
if you met her first.


I can't forget your heat. I won't. I shouldn't.


I did. 


I flip my pillow over to the cool side
to ease the tossing, and cease the turning
because I sleep better this way.

Free Write 1, Week 7

Windex

And that was when I realized
that I really fucked up this time.
when the windex bottle beat
a blue stain into the Berber carpet
and I was left standing wide-mouthed
in an open-mouthed doorway.
That long hall never seemed so short.
That fuming man never seemed so tall
and that was when I realized that what I did
I never really remembered anyway.
How quickly did my mistakes,
or lack thereof,
transcend through the contents
of that plastic cleaning bottle?
When did it explode
onto the scene and leave a trail
of Oh-My-Gods or
You-Fucking-Bitch's that I was quite prepared for?
Did I ever really know how to duck
the verbal abrasions like I learned
how to dodge that bottle?
Or did the bottle dodge me?
Maybe if it had hit me
I would have become clean
and without streaks I could have glistened
into a transparent pane
on a rectangular plane.
Why couldn't I disappear?
Why couldn't the words hit me
and bounce off like birds?
They left smears, greasy trails
of You-Dirty-Little-Whores
and Get-The-Hell-Outta-My-Sight's.
and as I slammed my door shut
to FD&C Blue No. 1
daddy's little girl turned blue too
and with my eyes closed
I couldn't see the glass fragments
of my insides shatter anymore.

Junkyard Quote 3-4, Week 7

"Proper for a Black girl."

"There's this polka-dotty napkin I like, but this one dog pukey-dutied his lunch on it."

Classmate Response 2, Week 7

To Samaria's freewrite, week 7:


I love those "s" sounds you're manipulating in this piece. Though the meaning of certain lines get muddled, the "s" sound moves this piece along without there even having to be a reason. The repetition of "yes" really bogs that word down, much like the speaker is bogged down by his/her usage of the word "yes."

I like the use of outlandish questions. Can I eat your favorite tee-shirt, of course, being my personal favorite.

I wish you would continue the "no's like boomerangs" image. And I'm unfamiliar with D-Rose, but that doesn't mean you should change that part unless that is something that might not be widely known?

By the time the piece hits, "How else can I understand..." I as the reader begin to become confused with what is being communicated. I can no longer see images or understand conversation and I'm wondering if there was an attempt to mix words around in this section that there was with the krispy kreme donut and the shirt. It's hard to because as a reader I am not tapped into the speaker's train of thought.

I feel like there could be more to the piece. Perhaps some scene to illustrate the yes/no issue. Maybe even some type of conflict--though nothing dramatic of course.

I'm tossing between the last line. I love the completion the last "s" in chest gives, but I feel there was a jump to getting to that line that the piece was not ready for, otherwise it seems heavy and unattached. How can we manage that leap from dreams to what I'm assuming, is the inconvenience of the heart? Hope this helps.

Improv 1, Week 7

Improv-ing the coupled lines of Albert Goldbarth's 2,700 Miles. Giving myself a 10-12-syllable requirement. I didn't particularly like this one.

Frisky and Whizz

My sister and I had owned a hamster
before, but it lost its breath in an ooze of blood.

So to cease the sentiments for the dead,
we decided that an upgrade was logical.

These two replacements rattled in boxes
and we peeped through holes to see them scamper inside.

They curled, like round balls of golden cotton
and there eyes gleamed like painted globes in the dark.

I opened one box, and a nose peeked up
that rattled in a tempo for salsa dancing.

And two pairs of eyes stared at each other.
And a golden puddle grew under hamster cheeks.

And I closed the box in fear of the smell
of hamster puddles, and a creature now dubbed Whizz.

Which was better off than my sister's pet,
who took the more rabid approach and bit at

her fingers. The same fingers that released
Frisky the hamster, as he soon came to be known

into the rainy grasses of the wild,
the day he turned up nesting beside the baby

who was still learning to roll off his back
and its mother let out those screams those mothers do.

and my sister and I, hands full of soft
twitching hamster bodies sank into the bushes

and our nose made snuffling noises
as we bid our goodbyes to the escape artists

who would never see a cage again.

Classmate Response 1, Week 7

In response to Dawn's Calisthenic, Week 7:

You're right, it is pretty interesting to see just how different a take we took on this assignment, as well as to see the steps we took to get there. What I also find intriguing are the lines both you and I chose to keep, like: even a fool like me can see your broken beauty. That probably speaks most significantly about the strength of these particular lines and images, as well as for its versatility.

Before I move onto the things with substance, in your second line you put "you're." I think you meant "your." Now moving along.

I love the fifth line and the repetition of that great "p" sounds. Some of the lines play more as imagery than actual logic and creates some weird phrases, like "You fake Egyptians" I have a slight issue with the cohesiveness of the 6th and 7th line. To say "you" liquefy men and then to describe him as cake--which is not very liquid is difficult to understand and liquid is a little redundant, but I like the idea of having a list there.

I like the phrase "sexing ash and nylon."

The first line of the last stanza is a little syllabic.

You have some really alluring images here and I love the intenseness of some of these images, paralleled with the intenseness of the ending. You're right though, it's so cool to see what can happen from this calisthenic.

Junkyard Quote 2, Week 7

"Our cats go on a silverfish safari at night." --Dr. Davidson

Junkyard Quote 1, Week 7

"Bought life, without a return slip."

Calisthenic 1, Week 7

Original:

Kevin Young

Ode to Boudin

You are the chewing gum
of God. You are the reason
I know that skin
is only that, holds
more than it meets.
The heart of you is something
I don’t quite get
but don’t want to. Even
a fool like me can see
your broken
beauty, the way
out in this world where most
things disappear, driven
into ground, you are ground
already, & like rice
you rise. Drunken deacon,
sausage’s half-brother,
jambalaya’s baby mama,
you bring me back
to the beginning, to where things live
again. Homemade saviour,
you fed me the day
my father sat under flowers
white as the gloves of pallbearers
tossed on his bier.
Soon, hands will lower him
into ground richer
than even you.
For now, root of all
remembrance, your thick chain
sets me spinning, thinking
of how, like the small,
perfect, possible, silent soul
you spill out
like music, my daddy
dead, or grief,
or both—afterward his sisters
my aunts dancing
in the yard to a car radio
tuned to zydeco
beneath the pecan trees.

Step II:


 skin
is a leather sack for organs, yes,
a sagging sack, because flesh holds
more precious sentiments than it meets.
The heart of you, for instance, is something
I don’t quite get but don’t want to or else risk
sacrificing the mystery of that rhythm
you thump your hips to. Even
a fool like me can see your broken
beauty, like the swaying gait of your alien
sashay, each step a new path to mark the way
out in this world where most
things disappear, lost in places not here.
Perhaps they've been driven into ground. Not you though,
because we cannot lose you in the depths
because you are the ground already, & like rice, resilient
though they try to pull you over, you will rise.
Pay little testament to the drunken deacon,
who on Sunday mornings prefers to eat his eggs
with broiled cocktail weenies, sausage’s half-brother,
and if you add a little spice it could be jambalaya’s baby mama.
You are so capable you bring me back to the beginning.
You skip me along to where things, once lifelike, breathe and live
again. You are the homemade saviour, that made miracles with yarn,
and baked repentance in chocolate chip cookies.
I remember the day you fed me, it was the same day
my father sat resting, his eyes shut tight, under the wispy shade of flowers,
white as the gloves of pallbearers, before his momentos were tossed on his bier.
Soon after, hands will lower him into ground, moving mounds of soil richer
than even you. For now however, I'll treat you as the root of all
remembrance, as one brief glance at your thick chain
sets me spinning, thinking of how these efforts
because effortless, like the smallest idea or the most
perfect point, begun from a possible notion, and settling silent
structures in the soul until a flood moves in and you spill out
from the stereo speakers like pop music, my daddy hated.
That even while dead, or simmering in grief,
or perhaps he was both—either way, it was not until
afterward that his sisters, my aunts, were caught dancing
in the yard to a car radio tuned to zydeco,
hip hopping beneath the pecan trees.

Step III:

skin

is just a leather sack for organs, yes,

a sagging sack, because flesh holds

more precious sentiments than it meets.

The heart is something risk

sacrificing the mystery of that rhythm 

you thump your hips to. your broken

beauty, like the gait of aliens  a path to mark the way 

out in this world. driven into ground. the ground resilient

will rise to.

Pay testament to the drunk,

who on add a little spice to Sunday mornings 

once lifelike, breathe and moan like homemade saviours,
under the wispy shade richer

than the root of all a possible notion, that settles silent

structures in the soul until a flood moves in spills out

 like pop music, tuned to the pecan trees.

Step IV:

Skin is just a leather sack for organs, yes,

a sagging sack, that holds

more precious sentiments than feelings.

It throbs with movement, pulsing under

the thumping coughs of the heart, yes,

the heart is always at risk of

sacrificing the mystery of rhythm

to your broken beauty. Beauty

like the gait of aliens, becomes a path to mark the way 

out of this world. And beauty, under 

the hollowed crow of time expels all youth

until it is driven into ground, 

where new beauties rise in petaled shoots.

Until then, make the most of Saturday nights

so that the hangover may pay proper testament 

to the drunk shriveled up in church on Sunday.

His hips, once lifelike, breathe and moan like homemade saviors,

under the shade of richer fabrics than what he wore last night.

His eyes dart inward and watch the splay of his insides

intertwined like the root of all possible notion, leaving nothing settled

until the soul floods into his throat and the holy ghost spills out.

Junkyard Quotes 1-4, Week 6

So I'm having a pretty exciting day today, apparently. Just found out that one of my friends has been keeping up with my blogger without me having to prompt him. If that doesn't make you feel loved, nothing will.

Ok, to quotes:

1. "So broke, I can't even afford a mistake right now."

2. "open discussion about pooping experiences"

3. "Fuck that other girl and her couch."

4. "By daily dying I have come to be."

Calisthenics 3, Week 6

A Shar Pei named Blue

China's royal lap dog lapping dew
in the Half-Native backyards of Carrollton.
Blue, as she might have been collared,
was ratty like the tattered scraps of tomato vines,
shriveling under the habanero drought.
It took all the dew from Blue
and soon that Chinese lap dog curled
like a grain of jasmine rice.
Holly-baby, don't cry for Blue--
all brown and puffy like squished hamster cheeks.
You're a Taurus. Grab that bull
by the horns and drag that sack
through the Californian woods.
Wait until the lushes surround you
and the pines bury you in scented branches
until the leaves blend into the soft silks
of Indian sari, and that blue rice grain becomes Poha
blended in savory breakfast spices.
Bury burdens and drown its trunks in hops
and as the floral scent surrounds you,
Holly-baby let the gardens of dishonesty grow
uncultivated in the realms of relativity.
Dishonesty is relative, after all.

Free Write 1, Week 6

I keep coming back to this piece for some reason, but I'm trying to edit it and maintain that roller coaster feeling Tim suggested in his third dispatch. I seem to be mentioning you quite a bit lately, Tim. I'll try and stop. =)

Title is the same placeholder, I might try and brainstorm some more appropriate titles when I don't have to run off to pick up my sister from work. If you don't know the first version, look here for differences Basically (Version 1.5)


Basically (Version 2)


I remember the sagging blue nightgown
with nothing underneath.

Suggestive phone chats winking
ideas that transcended denim and Tuesday panties.
That electric connection through the speakers
circuited in a spider web of intermingled, intertwined, and satisfying--

I remember wanting to see everything
but your darkness blocked my view.

creeping on sacred slabs, sandwiched
between a lawn mower and a beach ball.
I let you in and you and I contemplate birth
marks on the planes where darkness sleeps.

I remember squirming against you
but you became a wall.

The ceiling trembles in a sigh into the floor
But the world outside is bored.
Who is snoring on top of us right before
the baby screams? The screams, the noise, God, my noise

I remembered your jacket used to be soggy
sweating scents of Gillette and mold.

hovers in frozen intensity. You finger
every scrap, every morsel, devoured slippery pieces
of my hesitation like a foaming dog in spring.
Then the pain becomes too clumsy to endure,

I remember the salt of unsanctioned prayers.
Christ had never tasted so seasoned.

our driving need for completion squashes
under knowledge that this moment isn't it.
That silent tears on basement floors
are best for days not mid-November.
Nights can't hurt this bad.

And I remember the glorious return
of that sagging blue night gown
hiding everything underneath.

And instead of dancing, I remember we swam
in the atom juice of my basic joy.
And our bodies are knocked down
to the smallest levels of animalism and awkwardness.
I could have drowned in awkwardness.
And in asphyxiated dreams hover trophies
of our almost accomplishment.

If you feel there are some things that still need work or if I might have sacrificed something in the transition even, please do relay critiques and concerns. 

Improv 1, Week 6

Doing a mad-lib esque improv, removing adjectives and nouns.

Original:


Aimee Nezhukumatathil

Canticle with Sea Worm

Blessed be the curly-haired lady at Penn Station
who directed me to my train in a sea of angry

trenched coats. Blessed be Brazilian hatchet fish
that leap the lake together for a snack of gnats.

Blessed be juice and raspberry vodka.
Blessed be the first day of the year for sandals.

Blessed be driftwood with mysterious eggs
inside. Blessed be Tess, the 50ft. Woman

with Visible Organs standing outside of Los Angeles.
I pulled over because of her neon sign,

the postcards, the t-shirt possibilities—
& had the cup of coffee that kept me driving

in between the lines. Blessed be the eunicids,
the tiny sea worms mouthing on bits of sand

& shell thanklessly at night, spitting up whole
platforms for the Great Barrier Reef to spread.

Blessed be any mother with cancer spots
on an otherwise perfectly milky x-ray. Ghost

of a heart large & light, just a trace of her supple arms,
a wedding ring. The silence of her children studying

the delicacy of a new fern, the crispy gift-foil around
each potted plant. The silence of waiting by her bed.

Improv:

Diamond Forde

Auditioning with a Dancer

Blessed be the guitar string at strum

who directed hymns to my insides in a sea of twisted

line transition. Blessed be the G chord

that leaps the basics together for a final bow.

Blessed be rhythm and thrums.

Blessed be the first day of the year for understanding.

Blessed be lyrics with honeyed metaphors

inside. Blessed be music sheets, the 50ft sprawls

with scribbled pauses standing outside of verse.

I drifted around because of her melody,

the notes, the a capella possibilities—

& had a beat that kept me driving

in between the meter. Blessed be the chant,

the hallow cadences mouthing on bits of Spain

& divinity thanklessly at St. Benedict, spitting up muffled

progressions for the sanctity to spread.

Blessed be any choir with heavenward sopranos

on an otherwise perfectly chalky baritone. Minuet

of a fluttered trapeze & limelight, just a trace of her triple time,

an assemble. The silence of her ballerina studying

the delicacy of a postured nocturne, the wafting curls around

each laced bodice. The silence of waiting by her upturned skirts in ostinato.

Calisthenics 2, Week 6

First attempt ever at a sestina. 

In Picking Up Women

A fisherman, lining a prize-winner, Chris

may eat, or mount, or catch Angela's

hips and do multiplication on tables

because after arguments you extend the olive

branch. And brunch is lucky charms,

magically delicious in the steeping pot.

Pirate booty steeping in the pot,

stewing a brew more bejeweled than Christmas.

Who could ever resist your charms?

Flex up against heaven, my Angel.

Lift your words in an impediment for Olive

Oyl. Then collect girls in a charming tableau.

Look for ladies with more legs than tables,

and who knows the rims of pans and pots,

and can sizzle sautees in oiled olives.

May her knees be more crossed than Christians

but mistake her for no low-flying angel

less she betwixt you with her charm.

Only McGorgeous has arched arms

though Lady Liberty in crook carries tablets

more green than two lips bloomed in Angela's

garden. Sprouting roots in their flower pots,

their leaves intermingling and criss-

crossing in shades of forest and olive. 

Never admit to her that our love

is every grain in the Sahara charming

thoughts of equation. Unless Chris

is sure he's Mr. Right angle on cornered tables.

Farm roosters in the cock pot--

crock pot, wafting alien smells to Angela

who's purely out of this world, this angle

and corner of a earth rounder than olives.

Hotter than spring greens in a summer pot

we sizzle in your hunka hunka burning charms.

All a game until we turn the tables

and then all things become ludicrous.

Then girls are not angelic, but become hexed charms.

Gamble over martini olives, and play skillfully at tables

to chance the jackpot. And tips the scales away from Chris.

Calisthenics 1, Week 6

Attempt one at Tim's calisthenic. I think I have too many adjectives. Apologies.

Marines like Romano

We eat pizza, swallowing smoke,
and you tell me you're immortal.
And the cheese tastes like contacts stuck
in a clog in the back of my throat.
You tell me, "Hun, it's all for you,"
and I sag and wheeze a whisper
of how human you look today.

I want to return your black gifts.
Your dedication in fatigues,
gift-wrapped in serviceable form.
This cheese dodges consumption in boots
and with every bite reminds me
there's no customer service room
exchanging returns for receipts
because you signed away your name.

"I know you can handle it."
You assure your marinara
and then parmesan reminders
that once you're in, you're in for life.
And I nod--I have to agree
because while I'll be chugging cheese
you'll be frontline peppering men
and reminding me you'll never die

because, "Baby, I'm too stubborn."
Too obstinate, like pizza cheese.

Classmate Response 2, Week 6

David's Week 6 Calisthenic focusing on recursives:



Your big ol' blocks of text are so intimidating. Especially when the entire thing loops upon itself so much, it is incredibly easy to get lost in and I had to reread certain lines a few times to regain where I use to be.

What I'm getting from you is that you like to rant, and I think you're right, the recursive method is right up your alley. I also believe that for a lot of your works you have this same pattern of going off at full-speed without stopping. Granted, I say "a lot" and not "all" because I have read a few things from you that demonstrate a successful manipulation of flatter language and I think you have some talent in manipulating tone. Your work about the sex Q&A and rape victims really worked well with this language. But when it comes to something like the recursive method this particular piece tends to come off as lyrically elevated, and I wish you would implement some of that lesser tone.

The reason I say this is because in this particular piece, it is a huge block of text. With recursive, I feel like ideas run together and as a result the period almost seems null and void in this situation. So you have a huge block of always going text and as a reader I feel like the speaker of this work is nearly shouting at me. What's more, I think while reeling in on these things, you might want to consider how many ideas you are packing into one sentence. I'm impressed you managed to reuse so few ideas so many times, but it is difficult as a reader to keep track of all the reoccurences when there are three or four of them per line.

My best advice is consider shorter sentences. Not necessarily write this entire thing in shorter sentences. I think that would disturb some of the twisting intrigue you have here. But consider giving your readers a mental break. Give them something short and digestible in between all the commas.

I hope you don't find this as a personal criticism. I am simply trying to make a judgement off of what you have given me thus far and what you have here.  As I always say, I hope you find some help in this.

Classmate Response 1, Week 6

In response to Queenie's fourth free write, week 6. I find this funny because some of the stuff I suggested she do is some of the very same things I struggle with:

All right, a couple of things. You have an interesting list here and none of it has anything to do with rice--so clearly you're doing something right here. I feel like there's a few things you can do to make things stronger. For one, what you have here is a long lyrical rant. And when you jump into a new idea there is no distinction and it is difficult to follow the train of thought from one section of thought to another. Perhaps consider more narrative. For instance, break up the tangent with something with a simple sentence every now and again. For my Introduction to Poetry piece I had a lot of odd language juxtaposed together and Dr. Davidson suggested I change it up by adding simple sentences like, "You know this is true." Maybe not necessarily that sentence, but I hope it helps illustrate the point. For instance, "The button sprung up from cook to uncook." Compared to all that description this section pauses the reader. The rest of it comes by as a rush when reading so the reader does need a pause.

The line: "It's like as if liquid sugar" Too much happening there for your opening line. How about "It's liquid sugar" or "It's liquefied sugar." "like as if" borderlines on excessive, unless you're trying to create a certain tone then I would suggest manipulating the tone in other ways.

Hope this helps.

Sign-Inventory 1, Week 6

Shit. Week 6 already...


Those Winter Sundays 
Robert Hayden

Sundays too my father got up early

and put his clothes on in the blueblack cold,

then with cracked hands that ached

from labor in the weekday weather made

banked fires blaze. No one ever thanked him.

I’d wake and hear the cold splintering, breaking.

When the rooms were warm, he’d call,

and slowly I would rise and dress,

fearing the chronic angers of that house,

Speaking indifferently to him,

who had driven out the cold

and polished my good shoes as well.

What did I know, what did I know

of love’s austere and lonely offices?

--The poem is about five sentences long

--The first stanza uses alliteration repeatedly, as in "blueback" and "weekday weather."

--The poem changes subject from the first to following stanzas by breaking the complex sentence structure with a simple sentence, "No one ever thanked him."

--The second and third stanzas are connected in an continuation of one sentence. 

--In the first stanza, the syllabic structure is 10-10-7-10-10. 10 syllables also end the final lines of the second and third stanzas. 

--Only the final line poses a question throughout the work. 

--There is a repetition of cold and warmth throughout the work from the "blueback cold" in the first stanza to the "driven out cold" in the last stanza.

--Lines in each stanza follow a 5-4-5 scheme.