My Mixed Bag of Christmas Candies

RiverNotch

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I have this collection of poetry festering in the "Showcases" section, wanting pieces of constructive criticism from you peoples! But, *ahem*, anyway, do I have to actually post all of my feedback-wanting poems here too, or is this announcement enough?
 
You can either copy and past them into this thread, or you can just tell us that you want some criticism just like you've done in this thread. It would be good if you provided a link to your poetry though, so people can easily go from here to there ;)
 
Okay, here's a bunch of stuff I'm transferring from the showcase to here, for the sake of, well, hopefully more responses.

First, I need various opinions on my revision of my poem "Uterus". I tried making it more concise and less, well, refrainy, while further developing the speaker's bleak ideas on loneliness, primarily by adding an equally, er, fuzzy, 'companion' of sorts to the mix.

There lies in front of me
An egg of despair.
It has no air.
It cannot breathe.

There lies in front of me
An egg of despair.
It has no air.
It cannot breathe.

I must release it soon
Or it will suffocate.
I must go find a way
To help it respirate.
I have to see to it
That life is brought to it.
This egg, it can't just rot.
This egg is all I've got.

There lies in front of me
An egg of despair
It has no air
It cannot breathe

There lies in front of me
An egg of despair
It has no air
It cannot breathe

(There is nothing but emptiness in my mind
Towering spires of thoughts and people,
But voices I do not wish to hear or climb.
Their towers are too tall and scary:
They do not feel like they're alive,
Only there to fill my world with stone,
The prism to my wisdom's ray of light,
Making rainbows that make me close my eyes.

I would rather stay, for ever and ever,
In this little glass box, trapped like an office-worker.
There are no words for me to say
All of my being and the beings in me.
I would rather be in this universe of mine,
Each crevasse in the matter of my brain is like
A rolling field, easy to run through and play in
In them my eyes are open, but are blind)

There lies in front of me
An egg of despair.
It has no air.
It cannot breathe.

There lies in front of me
An egg of despair.
It has no air.
It cannot breathe.

Oh, these nukes and aeroplanes,
Shelters for imagination;
This dazzling darkness,
Love's reciprocation.
I have to see to it
That life is brought to it.
This egg, it can't just rot.
This egg is all I've got.

There lies in front of me
An egg of despair.
It has no air.
It cannot breathe.

There lies in front of me
An egg of despair.
It has no air.
It cannot breathe.

There lies in front of me
an egg of despair.
It has no air.
It cannot breathe.

I must release it soon, or it will suffocate.
I must go find a way to help it respirate.
But what roads I can tread all lead to black oblivion:
All of our exits blocked by love's reciprocation.

"There is nothing but emptiness in the mind
hollow spires of thoughts and people:
voices no one wishes to climb.
Their questions on mortality
fill this tenderness with clear quartz
weaving eye-stinging, heart-burning darts of color.

Let me stay, please let me stay
in my little glass box of pencils, pens, and paper!
I don't care if she's crying her life out:
I don't want to pick up the telephone.
I prefer the earth, where all the pretty things delight,
over your silly ocean."

She cries out in her sleep, she cries out as she wakes up,
though when she is awake, her gates are always shut up.
Her eyes are aeroplanes; her lashes, atom bombs.
Her skin is paper thin. Her shell is tempered glass.

There lies in front of me
an egg of despair.
It has no air.
It cannot breathe.

Second, I need various opinions on my minor revision of my first draft of "Portraits and Phantoms", as well as the actual first draft of the same.

Who is it, that knocks on my door?
That breaks a rhythm into my soul
and fills solitude with song?
A red light flashes, as I open the door,
and crawls inward, slowly, by the floor,
until, at last, like the creeping chill of the night,
the stone foundation is set in blood,
and the golden rays of the morning sun
is replaced with cheerless dusk.

Who is it, that enters my abode?
That enchants with the sweetest sight,
the subtlest smell, the softest sound?
A thread of needles flows out of her opened mouth,
and creeps slowly, crawling like a snake,
cutting with a silent bang through the air,
aiming for my hands, my feet, my head,
wrapping around my spirit, binding me
as Prometheus was bound to the rock.

Who is it, that locks me in an embrace?
That showers me with sweet and holy waters,
then consumes me from within?
A thunderstorm erupts, as she bares her chest,
and sweeps quickly through the sky
until, at last, like the hand of God,
it finds its heathen target,
and strikes her into ash,
leaving me with nothing but a dream.

Who is it, knocking on my door?
Breaking a rhythm into my dumbness,
filling my solitude with song?
A red light flashes, as I open the door,
and crawls inward, slowly, by the floor,
until, at last, like a painter's wall,
the stone foundation is set in blood,
and the golden rays of the waking sun
are replaced with cheerless night.

Who is it, entering my abode?
Enchanting with a simple sight,
a subtle smell, a softened sound?
A thread of needles slinks out her open mouth,
slithering like a serpent from the sea,
cutting through the air with silent bangs,
aiming for my hands, my feet, my head,
wrapping around my body, binding me
like Jupiter chaining Prometheus to the rock.

Who is it, locking me in an embrace?
Stewing me in honeyed Holy waters,
then sucking up the mess?
A thunderstorm erupts, as she bares her flesh,
and sweeps swiftly through the sky,
until, at last, the hand of God
reaches out, pulling forth from its cloud-quivers
lightning-darts, and strikes her into ash,
leaving me with nothing.

Third, I need analyses on my completed poems "Seasons and Spirits" and "Portraits and Phantoms". This is less to determine whether they need improvement or not, and more to determine how you perceive those piece, so that I'll know if my style is clear enough with whatever it is I'm trying to say there (I'm gonna be cryptic with the latter; the former, though, should be pretty obvious).

I can feel the heat of summer swinging
to your bosom's respiration.
Rapping on your ashen temples
are my greedy fingers, stained red by wine.

The azure atmosphere of fall
nips at your placid countenance.
Enthralling smells of freshly-pressed cider
and boiling maple sap bleed the dull air.

Blossoming flames and heady beer
blend passion into our imprisonment.
The fearless rhythm of our winter love
blushes the silver blind beyond.

You're wearing that shift of flowers again:
your vernal musk, the wax to your honey.
A glen of cherry cordial lies
unsullied in our dim cellar.

Who is it? Who's knocking on my door?
Heartbreaking rhythm going floor to floor,
spreading like my bleed, oh, that crimson tide:
another hard hello to bide.

Black and white, chamber seething musk:
its foundation, cheerless dusk.
See how it sleeps: the emperor beast,
lying in his sensual feast.

Who is it? Who's interrupting me?
But your rainbow fingers are electric glee:
oh, how they make me too clearly see
the subtlest signs of self-willed sin.

Needles, hundreds of metal pricks:
ooh, your mouth's my dirty fix!
Sting me, bind me, wrap around me -
Prometheus, give me your gin!

Who is it? Who's embracing my form?
Heaven's gift, a Holy water storm,
all these implosions, messing with my ride:
another sweet goodbye to bide?

Orbs of glass, shoot the smoking gun:
come on, my dear, we have to run!
But here it comes: an ungodly flash,
and we are swayed into ash.
 
Here's a bunch more stuff that I will definitely be editing (if they seem to require it). I'm also planning to edit "Your Hearth", "A Trip in Your Library", and "Her History" (the last of which I'll be fusing a bit with "Queen Green" and "Goldenrod"), but I'd rather get started on those individually, showing their second (well, in the earlier two's cases, third or fourth) editions here instead, since those poems don't really have enough meat on them for you to work with now, I think.

I am a bull in a chinese shop
The shop is a restaurant
They desire my testicles for a nice soup
So I run around and breath tables

Only the two round things in my head
Are blind and hollow with chaos and malice
How could one find paranoia delicious?
Why would one desire my point-of-view?

And yet, here is Plato studying Socrates
While also gently pleasuring him
Is this love you give to me?
Or Jimi's sweet confusion?

I am a gangly teenager in a government office
The office is filled with computers
There are many wires on the floor
Connecting the hemispheres of the machine

I walk around, looking for an answer
Yet instead of a Trip Through Your Wires
I trip over your cables
And kiss the bony, empty floor

The student thus becomes the master
The answers to you I question and question
Is this love I give to you?
Or Jimi's sweet confusion?

We seem to have lost each other in each other
My emptiness is yours to fill
Your enigma, my own puzzle box
We have switched sides, minds, genders

You are the ugly thing drooling on the floor
I am the red-haired girl masturbating
I am a phantom in the dark
You are the ever-blinding light

And yet, you do not find me gross
And I feel you are all the more real
Are we in love, in true romance?
Or Jimi's sweet confusion?

The light you gladly call your home,
young one,
does not come from heaven's hosts.
This light, the canvas of my world,
young one,
flows out of my mouth
like a song.
Now, wake up, and be blinded!
The blind see more than they who see.
Pull yourself out of your heaven,
young one,
for your work is not yet done.

I fall down from my bed.
A spirit lifts me up
and cheers me on and on and on
with one more cup.
A dizzy shot
that breaks my head in two
and makes me want to not believe
that living in sleep is still living.

I am the darkness,
and my bosom is your world:
it rises when I breathe in,
it falls when I breathe out.

I fall down from a ledge.
A devil lifts me up
and beats and rapes and swallows me
like a wife.
An evil act
that cracks my ever-aching heart
and makes me want to discover
what the inside of a woman feels like.

The world you gladly call your own,
young one,
was not made by God for you.
The cosmos is His canvas,
young one,
flowing out of His mouth
like a song.
Now wake up, and be fooled!
Fools know more than they who know.
Flee your silly house,
young one,
for your home was never here.

I fall down from the sky.
An angel catches me
and draws his sacrificial blade
in one fell swoop.
The gorgeous blade,
he plunges into my enflamed spirit,
filling me with ecstacy,
making my penis erupt with pain.

I am the darkness,
and my bosom is where fairies play:
they rise when I breathe in,
they rise when I breathe out.
And I will never stop breathing
for I can never die
so the world will forever spin
in a ring.

Calling, calling:
My voice is loud and raspy;
It's like my arms,
which ache and ache
as they stretch out for the sun--

Like a jazz trumpet
with notes flowing out
up and down, high and low,
the rolling stones of a crashing hill
is this concerto
for the voice.

"I love you
"I loved you, I'll love you"
I'll love you until I don't
remember what love is--
as the inconstant sea
swallows up the golden gate.

And you laugh with the gravy train,
your groovy way of swaying,
rocking, dancing your skull around:
you laugh and laugh and laugh
as I love and love and love
not for your sake, but for mine.

The sun burns:
And my branches tear off,
my voice fades away;
I melt like a candle,
and the green pasture swallows my remains.

Boiling milk on the skin of the waters,
dissolving into a cool mist
as their masters break upon the shore,
blanket his crooked feet.

Chalky stone walls made by the hands of giants
guard the lonely man on the beach
that entombs himself in the salty sea air,
as he rests upon the fallow sands.

High above the young man's opened eyes
lies a boat of sea glass, stretched by the thick fog
through the light of the morning sun.

He wonders how many youths like him,
disimpassioned, joyless, have fallen
from the white cliffs through that particolored arc.

I swim through tempests made of books,
I shout in hallways built by crooks.
My life is filled with knowledge new
but has no wisdom timeless, true.

The solace of my haughty wit,
these times that turn all tat for tit -
because of only these, I go
and live a life so vain and low.

Where is my God? Where is His hand?
Why are my nights devoid of sand?
And all the stars, why are they dark?
Has all our joy turned empty, stark?

And in the end, I graduate,
but still, I own an empty plate.
The cycle, it goes on again,
until death's song ends all my pain.

Of course, at times, I met the sun,
and felt her warmth, like honey, run.
And though her shine, it did not last,
they still hold true, the sparks that passed.

But what has passed cannot be held,
and mem'ries are too eas'ly felled.
The cycle, it goes on again
until death's song ends all my pain.

And then the reaper swings his blade,
and all our debts are duly paid.
I come, I go: I've never been.
What of the things I've learned and seen?

Touch her
as slowly as curdled milk flowing from the bottle
She is delicate
her skin is as crisp as a fallen autumn leaf
Your breaths
must waltz perfectly with the wisps of her lungs

Cotton candy
flies from her lips into your blushing cheek
It sticks
with the salted caramel of your curled brow
Move closer
the treasure seeks an audience with her captive

Two vein-lyres
play like the trickling of a soft spring shower
Two half-apples
are pressed for their juice by two pale sieves
Two black stones
collect morning dew upon their glassy peaks

Your hands
are burned by her tender head of flame
She licks them
but they fall off your arms anyway
Into the deep
they land upon the decaying remains of air

You want to
peel her childhood off and suck her sweetness up
You want to
learn about each other and talk the night away
You want to
find oblivion with her even for just one second

Silence
broken by little bursts of thunder from above
She watches you
a single word of hers speaks a thousand volumes
Return to her
as swiftly as mother's milk flowing from the nipple