Young Writers Society

Day 26

Neuköln

Neukölln
here we are, nailed to the same rood.
a son set, coloring faith in flavors of ethanol,
seeping blood french kissed to limestone tongues,
holy begger of babels dreaming, smeared in sterilized
skin wrinkles and scars left open and festering
down a prodigal shepherd's back back home, where melting
ice cream feeds vermin and homeless, but purged
on gluttony like models reaching thirty in vanitas,
whispering “forgive yourself your sins,
you knew not what you did” as the sun dims, death
viewed from the sewers, a rood rots in men

Day 27

Adonis

Soft jealous breathe on fresh bread molds,
red rivers creep like rancid wine, vinegar
drains from a Christ's bobbing key-chain veins,
hung on a cross with rear-view regret. A dipped
baguette for peace pipe treaties, sucked youth,
bewitching goddesses luring myths to a flame,
they scream "fuck death, dames ain't game"
with a mouth full of moths, dripping
as wax in the museum of lost tragic
lovers pleading "who mourns for Adoni"
heart held moldy, drunk dry, and - I
baker's exception, conception in theme of
resurrection in the womb of a prophet's
writing block, writhing in tarred-wrists
"and I die?"

Day 28

self-seving NaPo so far, maybe I can save it with the time left and actually improve. Will be gone for a few days

The Willow Calls

he glances, eyes glazed,
through an open window
still, dreaming of nursery days
skipping to wandering willows,
that day the sky flickered rainbows
and they say he caught it in his hands,
cupped the prisms of life in a single glance
he dreams it over and over again while mother
narrated, holding his hand should he ever wake.

---

Day 29

Lose

the air
traced across the microbes
I left laughing in your skin, skin
tossed around like confetti, did
it dance across the nerves that interlaced
the stitches of your heart? or was the cliche
just more salt on the wound, between
the noise in the room
and the silence you can't replace

Day 30

Tired of the styles in my thread personally

Old Man

there's nostalgia sprinkled on the letter
held in the hand taking the letter
buried in the gut, the letter
opened by the eyes, pink with watery
hues, blushes on a fancy store bought note
he thinks made with him in thought,
ever since she, they, came to him
and wipes a tear thinking in a mobius loop
again
and
again
about every wrinkled memory fading in his heart,
whispers “what was love”

is lost, like the dancers in the desert pausing,
watching from the bell-towers, the children
sailing to Neverland, all dreams of an old man
reflected in a mirror on the wall telling him
“you're just another day from death” he smiles
and tries to write a letter to an old friend, fingers
twitch and spin, a virtuoso composing the dust
in air to live again

and the letter is left blank, the old man is blank,
he's written every note, and lost every feeling
between the fore-brain and the spine, and then
he writes “what was lost can never live again”

his days of summer, the memories radiating
with feeling and emotion, lost, lost the words
down the rabbit hole, lost and not heard,
he's an old man who knows he's a gimmick, says
“I have nothing important left to live”

I've decided I'm going to comment on Alias, despite every gut instinct telling me to run in the other direction.

I just can't stress the importance of first lines enough. First impressions. I honestly couldn't care less how brilliant the rest of the work is if you haven't paid enough attention to what you say first -- we can't help it; we do judge things by first impression, and you'd better make sure its a damn good first impression to keep me reading. It's a matter of notes, yes -- I want a fresh image there, a surprising revelation (or, conversely, something that is deceptively simple -- an inside joke between the reader and writer that we know will continue -- but this is harder, so forget it for now; we'll discuss it later) -- and a matter of timing; time it right.

Here:

acting out the part in names "Agamemnon" and
immortal "Achilles"; we sold boxed chocolate

and handed out advice in Hallmark cards, and
wrote our names as "Erick" and "Elizabeth" on
epitaphs to place our loyal sheep, but these were
still more fables we labeled as lord's gospel, and
we laughed the dawn into dusk letting the moon

reassure our secret lair was protected, just for us,
where titles and nicknames were strictly verboten
and you laughed when I said "call me Sarah", she
was my sister, your aunt by marriage, and a convenient
covenant for marriage; but those were days we held

over the heads of others, and these are the days
left scratching from a calender, wondering where our hubris
came between Odysseus and Oedipus, but we
remember those are just the newest names

This is good. Flow is lilting from line to line -- smooth.I especially liked the first two lines I quoted -- I think it's that transition I love most, the way you surprised me, turned me -- suddenly, it's not myths and legends anymore, it's 'boxed chocolate' -- such a modern commodity, and then, of course, the Hallmark cards follow. I want more of that, actually. I want more modern things interspersed with the old; adds a really fantastic feel to the poem.

[Not going to bother talking to you about the old/new duality or the way your continuation with mythology can become too predictable that it makes the reader lax, lose interest -- we're well past that by now.]

Unfortunately, your opening and closing lines didn't cut it. Look at your words: whisper, sweet, caresses, ears, honey, suckle, song, chiding, secret, tree house. It's so sweet that it's...not sweet any more; it's disgusting. This is where timing comes in: tell me, how intelligent is your reader? Forget the conscious level; I'm talking subconscious. How intelligent is their subconscious? How emotionally attuned is the subsconscious? How much time do you honestly need to spend on a concept in succession to invoke a feeling? Not long -- if you'd said, 'we whispered' and dropped the rest of the sugarcoating, we would get it. Sure, you can come back to the sweetness later on in the poem -- you talk about chocolate, obviously -- but don't overdo it in one go. Repetition of an idea is one thing. Repetition in quick succession is yet another -- and mostly, it fails to have any impact, because it loses any element of surprise. If you don't surprise me, you don't interest me, and if you don't interest me, I can't care enough to carry on reading.

Last line -- let me guess -- you couldn't think of anything better to put there, so put whatever first came to mind. It's -- actually, no, it's not boring. It's a really obvious placeholder (/copout). I can't read it; I just slur over it.

In short, give the beginning and ending some pizzazz and this poem will be fairly decent.

Day 30 ext.

acid
sun drips in. the lips
of a newborn. hands grasp air,
to cup cherries in psalm,
prints on a page to say
“time, time passing
by
each day, each day
I'll probably die”-amen
burns like son
on skin