perfect skies with raindrops

[amuse]

i inhale the
comforting
citrus scent of
your armpits
as you lay
next to me
i am safe here
while you
celebrate and
protect me
from myself.

i feel the
break in
your collarbone,
you caress my
hair. we
are whole
together,
nearly perfect.
nothing out of
place.

i love you,
your strength, your
voice. your bossiness
and warmth.
your eyes with
their otherwordly
treasures.
they give me hope
that one day
i might find
the courage

to ask

do you know
about my bullet?
i wonder have
you got one too.

the sort that
refuses excision
and stays deep
yet agonizes

even after our
final hours.

so one never
forgets
that moment when
time faded, and the
meaning of life was
suddenly
clear.

if it it were only! more
comforting than that...

i wish i knew
how soldiers of the
civil war
managed it.

[Helga]

Amuse, I always love your poems! it's beautiful... your poems are probably what I've missed the most these months I haven't been able to check in here.. BRAVO with tears in my eyes. (and some jealousy)

[amuse]

ah!!! thank you, Helga. i've missed you too! why haven't you been around lately either? i edited a few bits, btw.

take care and pm me if you get a chance.

[jon1jt]

I smell suicidal tendencies in this poem, yet it is possessed by a quiet exuberance. Very nice.

[amuse]

mm! ...i am happy to say that is not so, but i'm glad you like it, jon1jt.

[Virgil]

It is very nice, amuse. I liked it. It had warmth.

I wish my wife would tell me this: "i love,... your bossiness" :lol: Nice twist.

[blp]

Sorry, I'm not so into it. A friend of mine, in the wake of a good grade for it at college, used to say contemptuously that writing poetry was stupidly easy - you just had to write a sentence and then put in line breaks. It's nonsense, of course, but this poem operates on his principle. And then there's all this 'We are whole together, nearly perfect' stuff, which is nothing at all.

[amuse]

Virgil: yeah, i wouldn't love him if he weren't bossy, lol

blp: okay

[jon1jt]

Sorry, I'm not so into it. A friend of mine, in the wake of a good grade for it at college, used to say contemptuously that writing poetry was stupidly easy - you just had to write a sentence and then put in line breaks. It's nonsense, of course, but this poem operates on his principle. And then there's all this 'We are whole together, nearly perfect' stuff, which is nothing at all.

There are two basic ways to be critical of a poem, either constructively or sarcastically. I have encountered scores of poems in contemporary academic journals, the Oxford Book of English Poetry, and Robert Frost's Complete Works, that slide toward your definition of "nothing at all" but on the whole are brilliant.

"I'd like to get away from earth awhile
And then come back to it and begin over....
I'd like to go by climbing a birch tree..."

Simple, right? That's from Frost's "Birches". There are dozens of examples, but you've all ready implied that this poem and others like it are garbage.

According to your principle, every poem has to mimic Shelley's Prometheus or Blake's London or Wordsworth's Tintern Abbey or Herrick's To the Virgins or Whitman's Song of Myself, to be considered noteworthy. And that's not always possible. We're all out here trying to improve our writing, perhaps gather some thoughtful feedback and try to get it right next time.

If I don't like a poem, I normally don't respond and move on to the next one. That's not to say I get "nothing at all" out of them. The problem with you is your ego is getting in the way. You've inspired me to read your work now, if you have any here. I look forward to that.

[blp]

I didn't mean to be sarcastic, jon1jt. I apologised for not liking it and gave my reasons. You're reading much too much into what I said. I didn't say I disliked simple poetry.

Amuse knows, or should, from some of my other comments on her work that I like some of it a lot, simple or otherwise. By 'nothing at all' I meant - I know I didn't make it very clear - that those lines were just banal, verging on the clichéd, not sufficiently thought about.

I ignore a lot of poems too, but you're being contradictory. We're here to improve, yet you pass by the poems you don't like without comment.

My ego, little cutie that he is, has bugger all to do with this. He requests that you leave him out of this, as I try to.