The Workshop

Pastoral (1st major revision)


A countryside heavy with harvest, rugged fingers
Thrust out of fear and fire
Trembling about a scythe,
The cold a tick away: types from an arche

Dissolving, space-time contracting
To anxiety's exclusion, to memory's conclusion,
To reincarnation: all form and image
The barren stock of words,

Points blossomed into lines
Reaped and reworked and printed and praised
More simply and swiftly forgotten,

Your red hair and my rough chin,
Hypostases to outlast the ousia that is us,
Clawing at the walls of the golden city---
 
Not a finished work by any means, but I think this is an interesting enough response to merit not-spoilering, at least for now.


BMO


I miss you already

will be replaced with

I miss waiting for you

will be replaced with

I miss remembering you.


Margles


He smiles and all I feel
is envy that he should be
allowed his ending. Oh, it is
its own pleasure: what little
of me that remains remembers
what it is, to be alive ---
to not be outlaw even
in the eyes of the cosmos.


Simon


It is not the sky that separates us but
the field of stars that try to outshine
your fading image or your broadening image,

I cannot tell. I asked you once to return
and you said no --- or, in horror, I heard
your silence as a "no".


Finn


I told her not to build a monument
to my more than eventful youth
nor to my brother's ageless mirth
which even his bones exude,

but to shape us sober, as we are now,
each lesson a wrinkle, a scar,
a clump of white propelling its way
through the black earth of a wart ---


Minerva


Spare me nothing, I
want to feel

as you felt, see
what you saw

in that willow underneath
whose blooms you

lived, in that cliff
where you say

your love once dreamed,
in that deep

blue once feared
now your bringer of

joy.
 
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Loose Ends: Sketches on the Adventure Time Finale


Minerva's Ode

Spare me nothing, I
want to feel

as you felt, see
what you saw

in that willow underneath
whose blooms you

lived, in that cliff
where you say

your love once dreamed,
in that deep

blue once feared,
now your bringer of

joy.


Simon's Song

It is not the sky that separates us but
the field of stars that struggle to outshine
your fading image or your broadening image,

I cannot tell. I asked you once to return
and you said no --- or, in horror, I heard
your silence as a "no".


Margles' Lament

He smiles and all I feel
is envy that he should be
allowed his ending. Oh, it is
its own pleasure: what little
of me that remains remembers
what it is, to be alive ---
to not be outlaw even
in the eyes of the cosmos.


The Ballad of Finn and Billy

I asked milady not to build
a monument to my youth,
nor to my brother's ageless mirth
which even his bones prove,

but to shape us sober, as we are now,
each lesson a wrinkle, a scar,
a clump of white propelling its way
through the black earth of a wart ---

She answered me with silence.
And when on my dying days I saw
a sword strapped to my back,
I smiled:

she knew I had not grown at all.


Marcy's Song

Each moment feels like ages then
recollecting them fresh, each anecdote passes
eleven minutes long, a generation compressed
into nine, maybe ten, short seasons,
then the heart cools:

each moment becomes a note
in the grand melody of life
stuck to the staff,
lost friends and fathers and lovers
their voices, their colors, sucked out

so that when they return, as they always do,
each moment feels like ages again
while the weight grows
lighter, shorter, sweeter.


BMO's Lament

I miss you already

will be replaced with

I miss waiting for you

will be replaced with

I miss remembering you.
 
hunger 2: tragedy at the kennel

I don't want a woman with big breasts.
When our babes bite into her nips,
they might hurt so much
she eats them.

But whom am I to judge?
I like 'em young too.
 
Silence


To be righteous, one must take
Abraham's ritual knife and strip
away the gloves that mask one's trace,
the shirt that mocks at innocence,

the breasts that feed, the tongue that tastes
and, with its every word of praise
or soured satisfaction, breaks
the silence that is righteousness --

but all is forfeit should a drop
of Christian blood be spilled.
 
You've got nothing in particular.
You've got legs and a fair enough face.
You've got timing and good taste.
You've got brains,
or so everybody says.
You've got presence.

You cried like I cried.
Headboard, mattress, quilt,
I'm tired and miles away from home
and all I got to pay you for
is time. You take it,

you've got somewhere else to be.
Sunlight shoots through the western window
and you're Julie Christie smoking.
I'm Beatty in the snow.

You're all gussied up. I'm red all over.
You've got somewhere else to be
and someone else to meet.

The king is not fit for meat
and so is left by the side of the road
until summer.

A bear digs his claws into the carcass.
Belly full, he lies in a cave.

Thieves pour bronze down a deacon's throat.
Left for dead, he unties his bonds, stands up,
and prophesies the return of the Lord.

Snow falls in the church
like feathers---or floating maggots.
 
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Honey


The king is not fit for meat
and so is left by the side of the road
until summer.

A bear digs his claws into the carcass.
He returns to the cave of his mother and father
and lies as his family feasts.

Thieves pour bronze down a deacon's throat.
Left for dead, he unties his bonds, stands up,
and prophesies the return of the Lord.

"Out of the eater, something for meat..."
Snow falls in a church
like feathers -- or floating worms.
 
The End of the World


Creeks become rivers,
Rivers become straits,
Straits become seas,
Seas become oceans,

This narrow strip of land
We once called love
Will be swallowed by the heat,
We'll be swallowed by the heat.
 
hunger 3: runneth over


Red jelly drops
float on the glaze
of the lightly flooded driveway.

Catsup, compote, cold
like melting vanilla---

Mom's in shock.
 
The water runs unleavened,
the holy wine unclean,
the body unfermented
will leave the sin unseen.
 
Plucked from a Stream


A pearl is round
and formed of spit
of clams. It's often black
or white
or rosy, and its heart
is made of sand.

Her hair is kinda bad
because of all the dyes she used
when she was younger. Dyes and heat
can ruin heads like gemstones
ruin heads,
sand ruins sight.
 
Glamor


Glamor kept the seven lamps alight
and birthed the Christ.
Glamor was the engine of the streams
that fed the Jordan when the Baptist cried,
'Repent, ye children, for the Lord is near!'
It was our ears.

Glamor is the raiment of the Queen
who sets herself before the holy throne,
two fingers raised, and casts a mocking glare
at all the pretty lies we proudly wear
upon our chests -- and then she rests
her head against the Cornerstone.

Glamor: what we can't avoid,
the priests soon found a store of oil
and for two hundred years they kept
the presence glowing, burning bright,
until a wolf in tiger stripes
the temple plowed, the lamps snuffed out,

and Faith the only witness spared
under a broadening night.
What knowledge can the mind recall
with neither Faith nor Glamor?
 
Sketch based on a chat rp


A cat floats
where a dog sits.
He relishes the wolf
shoved into darkness:
red is his privilege.
Uncollared, he had a vasectomy
where the stud was spayed.
He doesn't leave a trace
even when his teeth
dig deep into the sheath,
he floats, not sits,
on the bitch's lap.
 
NaPM is done, and I'm still just halfway there. I fully intend to finish last month's round of prompts, but until then, days 1-14 will be posted here (once I get my butt in front of a computer, that is).
 
Coils


You got me in your coils,
honey, you got me
in your drip. Constrict
or bite,
constrict or prick:
are you a python
or are you poison?

Your mind is like a donut,
honey, like a ring
my whole world's in.
Let me take a bite
or let me prick:
are you copper
or are you sweet?

It's not matter,
it's electric. I'm the axle
to your wires. Gel my blood
or steal my breath: if you let
our bodies come together, honey, we'll be sweet
release of death -- power hearts
to heaven.
 
Spaces


Daylight is cruel. The sun
is never hot enough
to burn deeper than the skin.
It roasts flesh, warms bones, helps with digestion
but the soul remains
cold. Frozen in place. And it illuminates
the spaces between atoms,
the spaces between things,
the spaces between bodies,
the spaces between homes,
the spaces between towns,
the spaces between cities,
the spaces between countries,
the spaces between worlds.
The spaces between words
are vast, too vast, theyshouldall
bejoinedtogetherandourvoices
shouldnotneedtostop
everysooften,ourthoughtsandfeelingsshouldnotneed
tobeputintowords,thespacesthatbreaklines
shouldnotbe,weshouldjustbe,feelwhatifeelandthinkwhatithink,knowwhatyouknowandswiftlysplitthedifference,evenforjustamomentbe
 
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I remember the precipice.
I remember God's eye, brilliant as the sun, reflected
on the polyethylene face of night.
I remember falling, crashing, grasping for air,
my mouth and throat and lungs burning
as they filled with water,
I remember being buried.

Oh my love, in my long ignorance of you
I rotted, I grew cold,
but I also learned
to love the night. Under a quilt of stardust
I can adore, without shame, the wet cleft
that separates your legs, your breasts,
your left brain from your right brain.

We are wrapped, we are preserved,
we are vacuum-packed and stuffed
in a freezer
until it's time for the Man upstairs
to cook his lunch.
I wonder: does he know? Does he care
that I am riddled with worms, and you're all bone?

Oh my love, let us take our place in the heavens
like Ophiuchus and his snake.
Let's poke holes in our skin,
scrape away the crust, and unplug
our Maker's fridge. Let us lose
all usefulness, let's fuck each other senseless, let us rise
like smoke

or like mountains
high above the earth
then turn air into earth.

I remember towers.
I remember God's eye, brilliant as the sun, reflected
off the polyethylene face of night.
I remember falling, crashing, reaching for air,
my mouth and throat and lungs burning
as they filled with water --
I remember burial.

O my love, in my long ignorance of you
I rotted -- I froze over -- and I learned
to hate the light.
Within these clouds of dust, I can adore,
shamelessly, the wet cleft
that separates your left leg from your right leg,
your left brain from your right brain.

O my love, let us squat
somewhere in the darkness
like Ophiuchus and his snake.
Let's poke holes in our skin,
scrape away the crust, and unplug
our Maker's fridge. Let's lose all usefulness,
let's fuck each other senseless, let us rise

like smoke
or like mountains
high above the earth
then turn air into earth.
 
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Mega August update incoming!

I still haven't finished every prompt for NaPM, but instead of posting all that I've finished so far I'll just post some highlights, as well as some miscellaneous scribblings.
 
Not from NaPM:

Modern Love


Death is only a step
away from love.
What an absurd course to take,
to do anything for love,
that dull and fickle emotion
tethered to bottomless reference
or that stream of thought
passing in miserable montage
through the stricken mind
or something more objective --
nature's course, a fact of life --
even something sacred.

An ambivalent gaze,
a rare yet irresistible smile,
and adornments of the sort
that breathe as you breathe,
that curl up as you curl up:
in the night, on the screen, there is glamor
where you are dressed to sleep,
where your eyes are half-shut
and your whispered words run
like tender touches, buttons pressed.
In the night, there is more truth
to our imagined anecdotes
and half-drunk intimations
on thoughtless, pointless things
than to the walls and shelves and desk
the sun illuminates
as it rises,
as it warms the bitter air.

Death is only a step
away from the screen,
and a life lived
all in words
is still a life,
a love felt
just as vital.
 
Highlights from NaPM now.

Shroud


They wrapped his body with a pale linen shroud.
He was carried on a wooden stretcher across the field
to a pit dug open at the break of dawn. He was lowered
gently for the first four feet, but dropped when one
of the pallbearers slipped. The dirt was less demanding.

No one cared when the mound was tamped down
by the groundskeeper that afternoon,
nor when the worms began their hungry work
tunneling from the open through the earth
and the pale linen shroud and his skin.

His body bloated like from an excess of meat.
The whites of his eyes turned blue then black.
The pores of his skin widened into wounds,
only the blood that oozed out was green.
His nails, now purple, popped out of his digits.

What mercy it is, that when we die,
our bodies do not float high into heaven
like our souls -- that the sun is not fueled
by spilled yellow bile, that rainbows are mere light,
and that snow is feathers, not falling worms.


Cressida


In Diomed's arms, I am safe
and my father is safe
and Troy, whose most fortunate daughter
here cowers in the enemy tent,
sleeps in this bosom
and this womb,
safe. Better I take his arms
and draw them to between my legs
across my cunt up my gut
around my breasts to wrap around
my shoulders like a wall
than be seized
by his passions
like he seized
the Palladium. Better my father
see a smile
than bruises
on his beloved daughter's face.
Better I choose to love
and, in choosing, live
than keep my faith in a war
whose end is all determined.
 
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