Young Writers Society

{^____^ Thanks~~}

April 11th, 2009;

I'm cold. Make me a blanket.

You kind of make me shiver and shake and quake and my liver
feels funny when I get around to reading your words.
Because only writers like us could possibly understand
just how deep the veins and arteries dive and thrive,
and exactly which nerves they pluck, made to sing in
prose and fancy adjectives (never adverbs, no!).

Because every simile is like another gilded rose-bud,
wrapped in silver tissue paper so I won't prick the thorns:
how sweet and thoughtful of you, how very eloquent.
And every grammatical error is just as sickly-sweet
because it reminds me that you are still human, too,
behind the beautiful red and gold quilt you weave with poetry.

I kind of fall another footstep in love with you at every word,
and every line, and at every end of every paragraph, I sigh
a little more, a little happier. If this is not love,
then I'll be loveless and cold my whole life, and be content.
And as the shreds of pages fall around me like snow,
I know this is our writer's paradise, and I hope
you will notice me someday, and weave me into your cloth,
and I won't even mind -- a willing victim to your web.



April 11th, 2009;

Covered and Coated in China

When fine, familiar brown coated everything,
muted the harsh, grating voices into soft whispers
of new opportunities, just as the sun rose
over a barren field of stark, bare sticks and trees,
she woke in a cold, wide world of pollution
and love she'd never known before in her life.

On the road, a stranger road his bike into the dawn,
and it was as if she'd never seen a bike before,
because this was muted, hazed, fuzzy, weird,
as if it were all filtered through a colander
that had decomposed in the cupboard for years.
Her fingers swept eagerly over the windowsill --
she wanted to be dirty, dusty, faded, too.

As the day grew lighter and colder, she breathed
and inhaled all that she could, until her lungs
were lined with alien-sweet poison and salve.



April 11th, 2009;

사랑해

Ye. Ne. Saranghe.*
Speak to me in buoyant tones of my future.
Nae i reum eun Hannah im ni da.**
This is who I am and this is who I'll be.
Na nin seunsaingnim im ni da.***
This is what I'll do and this is what I'll love.
Na nae chingu bogossipta.****
This is where my heart is, where I lost it.
And it's all wrapped up in a little thing:
just a little thing: a necklace.
And some pictures and some letters,
and a picture and a fan, and some rocks,
and. I miss you. I love you.

* Yes. Yes. I love you.
** My name is Hannah.
*** I am a teacher.
**** I miss my friends.

I love them all, Hannah! I adore last one! Nothing else to say here, except that they're beautiful.

Absolutely beautiful. Particularly that first one - strikes a chord, for obvious reasons

Cheers,
~bubbles

bubblewrapped wrote:Absolutely beautiful. Particularly that first one - strikes a chord, for obvious reasons

Mmhmm. I love your poetry, Hannah. It's so beautiful and fragile and real.

April 12th, 2009;

green?

i thought the leaves were green
(of course, not just green, but
olive green and emerald green,
with hints of spring green too),
but then i saw the white.
it was there because of the light:
and it shattered all the green.
and all the images i'd had
fell like the green-white leaves
because i didn't love them anymore.
i wanted to touch them once,
to see if they were waxy and smooth
or if the shine was a facade,
but now i don't really care, because
they aren't actually all green.

and i'm not sure if it's your fault:
you told me to look at the white,
and because i thought you were smart,
i listened and looked and cried.
you always told me that knowing
would be better than being green,
but now whenever i look at you,
i can only see the white splotches,
and the green fades away.

I absolutely love it. Again. Can I just write ditto from now on? XD Kidding. But seriously. The first stanza seems almost frivolous, but then the second one adds so many more layers it transforms the whole poem. Beautiful.

You know how sometimes when you read something lovely and it sends shivers up your spine?

Yeah.

<3

Marry me twice.

April 13th, 2009;

the world on a teaspoon

We'll paint a teaspoon black and brown
and sink it in cinnamon.
Once it dries, you will add some scallions
and we'll have the world at our lips,
at our stained fingertips.

And when we grow tired of artificial worlds in
laminated, tiled, bleached and scrubbed kitchens,
we'll float on rusted-bicycle clouds
to the cold spring-beach,
and huddle in our hoodies until the wind stops.

We'll think the world is frozen in the air,
but take Polaroids instead
and try to catch the moment between friendship
and romance and before we touch the sand again:
sand between our toes in the same way.

And when the doubt rolls out from shore,
we'll find ourselves swaying
to the same, gentle, natural rhythm.
Because with teaspoons and beaches and bikes
we don't have to force it: just be.

{Hey! I wrote one yesterday at like 11:40pm, on my phone, so I didn't have time to post it. And these are both crap, but yeah.}

April 14th, 2009;

Disappeared

Flag after flag after flag,
but none mean anything to me.
Give me instead a pair of smiling eyes
and lips that crinkle and sparkle
with happiness. Keep caution
never to dim those laughing expressions,
and capture them only in dreams.
I loved you once, in a dream,
but sold the dream for a bit more reality,
then saw just how priceless you were.

Where is my dream now?
Those eyes, the burning they left,
the contagious smile,
more desired than disease:
all have faded in my betrayal.
What I would give to hold you
in my mind once more.



April 15th, 2009;

i can't stand it

they tickle at the edges of my eyes
and i will them to come and i will them to fall
and they will refuse me and burn where they balance:
teetering on the edge between torture and relief.

all around me, they pour poison
down their gaping, grasping throats.
one brightly colored bottle after another,
they condemn themselves willingly to an ignoble death.

tied around my ankle is a golden thread;
they tell me to believe it was always there,
that where it leads me (in an ever descending line)
is a perfect, noble paradise. they go too.

any thread can be dissolved with patience
or flaming, writhing drops that originated
from emotions that cannot be discovered alone.
soon, soon, i hope, i will be free.

{I'm really not dead, I swear! I'm determined to catch up, as well. I wrote portions of poems on all these past days, but haven't had the energy or presence of mind to finish them. School has been so busy, and breakdowns are not conducive to good poetry, so, yeah. ^_^}



April 16th, 2009;

i'll get you, yet

Let me help you make your double-kite.
The diagram is useless: the picture is dumb,
so we can put it together any way we like.
Even if the strings are uneven, if the plastic is torn,
if the poles aren't quite long enough to reach safe
port in the ends of the pre-cut form,
it will still cling to the wind.
What wouldn't want to fly? I want to.

Let me help you help it fly and hold it up.
You can run away, but eventually, we'll wind it up,
and you'll have to come back, because kites have strings.



April 17th, 2009;

Terrible Sameness

There is a terrible sameness in the acid smell of sweat
and the sour breath that creeps past yellowing, congealing teeth,
carrying the cloying greeting from cheap, base wines:
perhaps it is a beacon of the rot that lies beneath.

Where does the fermented poison go, once swallowed and absorbed?
Why, back to the company it knows full well -- acid again,
this time in a sac lined with awards from high school: trophies, ribbons,
lined with a family to come home to dinner at five ten.

As oily fingers' product from the water where they're submerged,
what bliss might have been procured instead separates, awkwardly.
Aftermath as dirty as the cork bits underneath fingernails,
so much the same. Disintegration is all the same.



April 18th, 2009;

Leigh Almond

Leigh Almond would like to rip it out and spread it on horsetail
(scouring reed, it's called) until all the little granules fall
out and away to where they were meant to be -- pollinating life.
He rubs his cracked fingers and ugly, torn cuticles on this nose
repeatedly, hoping the next cycle might jog something loose to relief.

He wonders if he can't just scrap out the lining and leave the shell,
if he can just cut his fatty belly off and paste the skin back on,
if the skin will cling to skin like it does in cheap motels, so
there will be no need of a thief (medical doctors are all alike).

And the girls that stare aren't worth half of his time, much less
half of his life, half of his brain, half of his love or lust.
They may sneer all they like, but he'll still have one hand on
the ballooning checkered cotton above his belt and one hand still
rubbing at his nose in slow, deliberate, useless circles of desperation.



April 19th, 2009;

shamefaced

Forget those anchors, weights, and chains!
You need only shame, driven, to hold down a spirit.
Bend not beneath petty, bitchy brains --
grasp firm to your dignity, take care not to smear it.
There's a ruined bell a-tolling: can't you hear it?

You lost yourself along the way,
but there are no bright markers along this track,
so only clinging can make you stay,
and only outside caring might bring you back,
so bend to the warmth -- it's not an attack.



April 20th, 2009;

Make It Stop

The hummingbird hovers outside in the allergy-air,
while I reach for the pot handle floating along over there:
it was red hot and pretty, burned each single leaf that it touched.
But for the danger, I wanted that handle so much.

It has eyes quite as heavily big as a Jupiter's moon,
though I know I'll see same-yellow orbs flashing brightly too soon:
caution, caution, they'll shout and give way to a brilliant red
on my fingertips. The heat works its way to my head.

Alligators with spines decked in roses and lilies of white
try to scratch their soft pallets with pink tongues at night,
but as soon as they scrape off the pestilent, pink-feather-buds,
the cats creep on their pads and bring back itching suds.

I try wading to them, pot-handle brandished in rage,
and succeeded in coaxing a few to a polished, gold cage,
but the lavender cats and their toxic blue whiskers still crept,
and in air too stuffy to smile or struggle, I wept.


April 21st, 2009;

cold feet

never put your cold feet into the sink under hot water,
because even thought it gets them warmer, you're going to
start shivering, teeth chattering, toenails getting softer,
and even if you dry them off, the shock of cold still
hibernates in the cold, tile floor and will pounce as soon
as you can press your calloused skin to the smoothness.

and as you walk back to bed, you'll start shaking so badly
that the only possible relief is your blanket or quilt --
no guilt at the fact that people don't matter right now.
all you need is a little warmth: a cocoon to shut up in
and gather your own power, your own heat, your own sun.

You are by far my favorite poet on this site.

{I kind of love you, Clo-twin! <3

Anyways, here's the crap I wrote yesterday and some I've been working on today.}

April 22nd, 2009;

I'll Pass, Thanks

"Come away from the glazing, harsh screen.
Come see the finch, darling!
It has a turquoise necklace, set in silver
dangling daintily to its downy breast,
and such apple-red heels it teeters upon --
certainly birds were never meant to
stuff their feet into harsh plastic."

You are so ridiculously transparent.
It is as easy to transform
"Oh, que t'a me manqué" to
"How I've missed you" as it is
to tear off your silk-worm spun veil:
"Why do you ignore me?
Is a silicon life more valuable
than the wonders of a finch outside?"

Mother, why would I waste my time
watching the same old birds with you,
when I can be falling in love with
people I don't know, people
from timezones I can't comprehend?
I'd gladly give up all the dolled-up finches
(the ones you make up to entice me)
for the luxury of a virtual life.



April 23rd, 2009;

She's a Fixer-Upper For Sure

He'll paint everything white for her, on again, off again,
wetting the yellow wallpaper and tearing it in strips,
clean slate, clean walls -- white washed if he could.
The soggy, defeated decorations slip and slime onto
the high-pile, lush illusion of a carpet (it's a rug)
where moody blues and angry, dusky oranges
are content to bend under the workman under the lady.

Pockmarked plaster revealed, his job is to level:
fill the holes with sweet words and promises
he wishes he could believe and keep and mean.
On the putty knife he wields comfort sex, cliche compliments,
stuffy, old, common words she claims to desire,
same as the touch, same as the skin, same as the kisses.

He'll paint everything white for her, on again, off again,
now that she's level as she's going to get -- filled in.
As his paint-dripped black boots crinkle the tarp, though,
he realizes how deep the roller pan is, filled with latex,
straining at the edges as if it wants to paint the floor.
Maybe once he's done his zig-zag lines, crosswise, up-stroke,
(very, very careful on the corners, very careful)
he'll have just enough left over to paint the floor.

April 24th, 2009;

pride goeth

facing each other one at a time
with staples where our mouths were,
stitches in our ears,
lead plates over our eyes,
painted-red teacups overflowing,
we step step step with care in
a futile three-step train.

with cedar raised high,
waspish branches buzzing, stinging
our skin until it bleeds thin,
in pin-breadth scratches with
hair-breath gasps.



April 25th, 2009;

trillium spring

it had been a trillium spring with Felix, the plaster cat.
when i moved him, as my mother said, he glared across the room
as if i'd wronged him with my snotty finger-tips.
no matter where i moved my red, plastic, sweaty flats,
he never focused on my shuffle-dance; he stared straight ahead.
FELIX FELIX FELIX please see me. please know me. please!
but he cost fourteen dollars, so i was not worth it.



April 26th, 2009;

Little

Channeled a five-year-old today -- I swear I did.
She swept in through my finger tips, chubby, sensitive,
smooth to each other. I pretended they were hers
against my (acne-ruined, say it ain't so) cheek.
When I cradled the moon in my palm, she curled them in
like her delicate, blonde eyelashes sans curler.
She needs no metal when she has the sun and the
tall trees in the pasture.

_______________________ It was she who found it:
the kestral under the black, white, gray, dark lines
in the bark. Peel it off and put it in and carry it.
When my eyes (the only part she left to me,
for she had seen everything she'd needed to see: honeysuckle
and bluebirds and streams of minnows) said
that it wouldn't last the night -- no chance!,
she pushed it in a shoe box with white and black lines,
droppered in her trust and soaked seeds, innocence.

Luckily, she lived until morning, but flew next fall.

Hannah,

This poetry is awesome. Too many good things to quote.

I especially love: trillium spring, Little, She's a Fixer-Upper For Sure, I'll Pass, Thanks, i'll get you, yet, and the world on a teaspoon.

Yummy stuff.



Ta,
Cal.

These poems have the breath of a million souls. You are one of the best poets on this site. Everything is so yummy and scrumptious and beautiful and wonderful and they really make me smile. Publish a poetry book? Please, pretty please. So then I can be able to sit in a dim light and read until my heart is filled with so many sweet words that I have cavities.

My favorite one will have to be....all of them.

But I do have to quote you though:

Mother, why would I waste my time
watching the same old birds with you,
when I can be falling in love with
people I don't know, people
from timezones I can't comprehend?
I'd gladly give up all the dolled-up finches
(the ones you make up to entice me)
for the luxury of a virtual life.

Beeee-aaaaaa-uuuuu-ti-fulllll!!!!

Keep writing,

~Angel