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Thank you, Dark Muse. The new line is the last one from a famous poem by Dorothy Parker:
"You might as well live."
Two weeks from today, which is Election Tuesday here in my area. Need to get dressed and hit the polls! Good luck.
PS Prendrelmick never be afraid of entering a contest. You have as much chance of a winner as any of us. Glad you enjoyed the poem.
God Bless
Pen
While you’re here what seems strange and unkind
May change shape. Who knows what you might find?
So, you might as well live
And let live, let life give
You a chance to enjoy what’s maligned.
:hurray:
Whiskey and dancing is what I like the mostest,
I'm no longer young, but pretend I haven't noticed,
The debt to my body grows greater and greater,
And the price to be paid I'm going to pay later,
But you might as well live like the life of old Riley,
With a hey and a LOL and a big yellow smiley.
Still time for more poets!
Dying is ugly and painful,
And it lasts a lifetime. Still,
Death comes to all in the end.
Meanwhile, you might as well
live - pretend that something
matters - and it does, in the end.
Time to announce a winner.
All of these are good. But I think that prendrelemick made the best use of the given line.
Congrats, P-Mick and you're up to bat!
Thanks Pen.
The next line comes from Maya Angelou's Million Man March Poem, which begins -
The night has been long,
The wound has been deep,
The pit has been dark,
And the walls have been steep.
So up next is, "The Night Has Been Long".
You Are My Love Song
I recite poetry
as your fingers
dance in slow
graceful movements
across the harp strings,
a twang within my heart,
making my soul vibrate,
each cord breathing life
into my words,
a ghostly melody
before a burning fire,
which adds its own voice
in whispered undertones,
the wind bleeds through
seeking entry
like death at the door
wanting shelter from
the storm,
the night has been long,
as the world rages on
but Hestia watches
from the shadows
of her firelight,
blushing at our
musical caresses
and lyrical kisses.
Dirge #25
I am a man who was born in the dark
I have kissed the lips of Mother Night
The Night Has Been Long a friend
Since I was birthed from the darkness
I know what men try to hide under the cover of darkness
Since Mother Night walks beside me
I know the secrets men try to hide beneath her starry skirt
Because I dwell among the shadows
I know the hidden secrets people would have the shadows conceal
The Night Has Been Long and weary
But the sun doesn't visit my land of shadow
You think that you have hidden secrets:
But I know...
Pendragon
11/17/2015
Of Life, Song and Wine
Let us embrace the night
With song and wine, bright
Lights keeping out the dark,
Wrapped in a nocturnal lark.
The night has been long,
Filled with wine and song.
Now, as the sun reappears
We stop denying our fears.
Finding hope in death is pithy,
Living now, before dark Lethe
Holds us in eternal slumber -
Live your days as they number.
The night has been long. No daybreak is near.
The demons are eating. Tim gives the “All clear.”
We move our positions. It’s safer out there,
But where is it safer? We no longer care.
We fight and we kill building mountains of dead.
We fight and we die and we hope we are led
By those better than demons who die as we do
Since the night has been long for our enemies, too.
I shall look at them this weekend. Any more?
She Never Lost a Passenger
The night has been long, the suffering great,
though darkness offered a welcome ally,
as she conducted her fight underground.
Moonlight reflects faces of a bartered people
burnished in the alloy of polished rails.
Put an ear to the ground and listen;
do you hear vibrations of twisted commerce,
the crack of a whip, the rumble of fear?
Or, is it the stampede of hope queuing,
to catch her next train?
Ok, here we go.
Dark Muse. Once again a sublime layering of metaphor upon metaphor building up a surreal atmosphere, using heightened poetical language. Nothing is simply what it is, it feels to float unanchored to reality.
Pendragon. Anyone perusing these pages will know that Pen is in a purple patch with his poetry at the moment. Here the story and the mystery grabs your attention from the first line, The atmosphere of lurking menace is just right. The voice of the narrating presence is consistant and well drawn.
North Star. This is the kind of thing I would've done, light and bouncy, with a pithy homily at the end. It was good, I liked it, I feel though the rhyme is contrived in a couple of places, which I know is always a problem - you have to compromise either the meaning or the natural syntax to hit the rhyme.
YesNo. Here is the left field entry. Good rhythm, good rhyme, plain language. It is the opposite of Dark Muse's entry, everything is just what it is. We are landed in the middle of a much larger story, what's going on? we ask ourselves - is it Dante or Buffy? .
Gilliat Gurgle. I usually catch your drift about a month after reading one of your poems, and then go, "Ahh yes of course. Clever!" So I'm probably missing something here - a whole network of allusions and references and the like. Anyway let's say it's about the evening Metro commute with underworld connotations. I like the phrases you have used - bartered people, twisted commerce, stampede of hope, and best of all, burnished in the alloy of polished rails. adjectives/abverbs can be the ruination of a piece but you know what you're doing.
And the winner is....
Pendragon,...again - somebody break his keyboard or something.
Hehe, yeah, I wondered if the locals might have had a better chance at catching my drift.Quote:
Originally Posted by prendrelemick
I'll spare you the agony of waiting a month...Harriett Tubman
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Harriet_Tubman
Congratulations Pendragon, another fine entry.
edit - and thanks for the comments btw.
My blushes, Mick! And please don't break my keyboard! I surrender!
This is the first line of "The Cremation of Sam McGee" a longtime favorite of mine for the way that the rhyme rolls so smoothly.
"There are strange things done, in the Midnight Sun, by the men who moil for gold."
To accommodate Christmas, this is to be decided December 21st.
Ahh, yes, Clever!Quote:
Originally Posted by Gilliatt Gurgle
There are strange things done in the midnight Sun by the men who moil for gold
And the gold grips tight to their minds’ dim light being heavy, bright and cold.
It is all they see and they work for free trusting fate to guard their dreams
When they have enough they’ll forget how tough all their loneliness now seems.
There are thieves they fear who are ever near who would take all that they’ve got
And they might confess they’d deserve no less than to die without a lot.
But for those who win and forget their sin a fine future could be had.
They would share their gold, give a thousandfold, so that all the Earth is glad.
But for Thomas Redd on the ground and dead all his dreams have reached an end
And the midnight Sun takes the hand of one who had failed to find a friend.
Under the Midnight Sun
The gunman walked
dressed in black
across the burning sands,
the vulture followed
as his shadow,
black wings fluttered in
an arid wind,
ghosts walked at his side
his only true companions,
it was a barren land
devoid of all forgiveness
with strange things done
in the Midnight Sun
by the men who moil for gold
and the women
who toiled had hearts
blacker than
a miners pit
or the gunman's eyes,
they came, with hopes
and dreams
crushed to dust
beneath the heel,
and the scavengers
thrived upon the bones
the only thing
left behind.
the Sun, in Midnight/Dada & Anagram
the Sun, in Midnight,
strange gold done
who for the moil, things by
There are
men.
~~~~~~~~~
God ere morning within
the lasting holm -
The dear refined hymn
thus to be
song.
12/1/2015
Ta ! (short for tarradiddle),
tailor STATELY
Northern song.
There are strange things done,
And strange songs sung,
When the wolf howls at the moon.
Tales without reason,
In time and in season,
The hare dances with the loon.
In the midnight sun,
When the salmon run,
And the banks are lined with bear.
Then fox and crow,
Scavenge below,
And bigfoot leaves his lair.
By those who moil for gold,
These stories have been told,
Passed down from fellow to fellow.
For the swish of a pan,
Breeds songs in a man,
As he searches for the yellow.
And with this comment, I leave the contests again. I don't think myself the best poet on here. But this comment really stung. It is like saying that if I put a poem in a contest, then everyone else might as well not waste their time. I dunno. I will finish judging the contests that I have left on Dec. 21 After that I'm goneQuote:
Originally Posted by prendrelemick
Pendragon
i typically don't come to the poetry sections of the forum, but I saw your comment pen on the "whats new" page and thought it warranted a reply from someone outside the thread. please don't mind my kibitzing.
no---it isn't like saying "that if you put a poem in the contest, then every else might as well not waste their time." it isn't saying that at all. its not a criticism of your winning, or your entering or a disincentive for anyone else to enter a poem.
all it is---is a comical tribute to how good you are at it/how much people are liking your poems.
stay encouraged, and stay here.
It was a compliment.
Is this still going? If so, then where are we? What's the line?
An Abstract Northern Tale
in the Manner of Johnny Horton
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JSt0NEESrUA
Put a log on the fire, prop up your bipedal tire, I have a golden tale to tell.
Abstract fragments of lore, chipped from Alaskan ore, the year was 1913.
It was a party of three; Horton, Thornton and Kandinsky (a canine companion).
A shimmering team of salmon, pulled them up the Yukon, Kandinsky at the prow.
They pulled into Nome, their feet began to roam, to join the rush for nuggets.
Picks and shovels flew, and the ale did too, bladders began to stretch.
Kandinsky went to Ketchikan, to pick up some flour and spam, and a treat of colorful candy.
Zappa, the clerk, gave him a note, a burlap bag to tote, the staples back to camp.
Horton read the quote, as their bladders continued to bloat and here is what it said:
“There are strange things done, in the Midnight Sun, by the men who moil for gold."
Distended by excessive thirst, the party did burst, outside to etch pictures in the snow.
The two men stepped back to show, their yellow lithographs in the snow; two fine pieces of work.
Kandinsky however, left a colorful abstract shower, a result of the candy I assume.
All the moilers gathered round, to see Kandinsky’s masterpiece on the ground, he called it Composition VII.
https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikiped...position_7.jpg
Anyone else? There are still eleven days to go!
It's the 21st and time for the judging:
YesNo: Stayed true to the rhyme. Not bad at all.
Dark Muse: Very deep and mystical
Tailor STATELY: A unique interpretation
prendrelemick: Loved it totally
GG: Nice I loved Johnny Horton’s “North to Alaska.”
But in the end there can be only one:
Mick: The splitting of the given line into three pieces was I thought the cleverest use of the given line!
Congrats!
God Bless
Pen
Thanks pen. I'll try to find something as inspirational for the next one.
How about some more Neruda. From Love Sonnet XI
I want to eat the sunbeam flaring in your lovely body,
the sovereign nose of your arrogant face,
I want to eat the fleeting shade of your lashes,
And the line is:
the sovereign nose of your arrogant face,
Donald
There you stand you stuffed shirt blooming fool!
Looking down the sovereign nose of your arrogant face
You really are not the sharpest or brightest tool
But you bluster and bully you hopeless disgrace!
Your arrogant face looks down on the people
Your mouth doesn't open unless a lie escapes
You think yourself an angel under the church's steeple
You rant every time someone else wins and you lose. Sour grapes!
Where did you get that hairdo jackass?
What makes you not smell yourself with that sovereign nose?
You think being loud and obnoxious is going to pass?
You couldn't lead a honeybee to a rose!
Do you think that your arrogance will help you get elected?
Better keep that sovereign nose well protected.
Pendragon
12/20/2015
“The sovereign nose of your arrogant face”
Is something my mind would like to replace
With prettier images--you as a child,
Inquisitive, sensitive, innocent, wild.
But that cannot be since my mind is so full
Of the arrogant face and the mouth dripping bull,
And that sovereign nose, upended in sight
And those nostrils, small caves, and that brain without light.
Anagram: 3-lines from Neruda: Love Sonnet XI/English translation
"I want to eat the sunbeam flaring in your lovely body,
the sovereign nose of your arrogant face,
I want to eat the fleeting shade of your lashes"
May our vanity, aglow, obey a thrill best not fed ennui
A fey frost graces age unto honor, I, ever on
O lies ! Thus thy altar hedges a fate none to wife
1/30/2016
Ta ! (short for tarradiddle),
tailor STATELY
Household Demon
A voice that haunts my deepest slumbers,
Two spear-like arms that ever race,
And at the center, ringed by numbers,
The sov'reign nose of your arrogant face.
O trickster devil, household sprite,
That daily will appall and shock.
O thing of evil, dressed in white,
And going by the name of "Clock".
Like that one, Joe!
Thanks, Pendragon :)Quote:
Originally Posted by Pendragon
Right, another week and I'll pass judgement.
You wield it around like a twelve pound Gribeauval;
the sovereign nose of your arrogant face.
Each spring you take in the royal gardens,
then shower us with your grace.
Ok then.
Pen. Politics, ever a fertile ground for poetical comment, and in Donald an inspirational subject.
Yesno. Smooth and flowing, interesting sentiments.
Tailor. What! All that's an anagram - amazing.
Joe. Good stuff. Clever idea well realised. reflects my own relationship with clocks.
GG. A fine entry into the poetical canon of the forum.
And the winner is... Joe
Congrats Joe !
Ta ! (short for tarradiddle),
tailor STATELY