Subject Poetry Contest.

My red button down shirt
Is my now-shirt
For the now-place
That's fine for right now.

The bright yellow lights
Are the tomorrow-lights
That I can't see past.

The song let loose
The last troubadour stood down
Sidestepped the noose
And denied what he'd known

An epic life no longer his
He looked to the sky to lead him forth
After shedding ritual guise
And embraced again the Star of the North

He undid each red button of his dwindling breeches,
Slung on a new belt to fit his new tunic
Pulled on some larger pants, disappearing into the beeches
As the knave took off into the rustic

What had been of the buccaneers
Hung in the chorus of his song in the trees
To be tried by peers and seers
With a cryptic map of creaks and leas

The captain of yore, abandoned in part,
But left, in his words, to the judgment imparted
A random message and a new start
An extension of the course first charted

Is this one still open??

Quote:

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Originally Posted by balehead

Is this one still open??

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I haven't seen notice of "contest closed" so I would say, yeah, it's still open...

Sorry all, I've been living in hotels and airports for the last few weeks, so lets keep this going until the end of the month.

Thanks so much to all who have entered so far!

LMK

The Hope/Red Button subject contest is closed.

Thanks for all who participated, the winner will be announced shortly.

Thanks for all who participated...FABulous work all!

LMK

Thanks to Pendragon, Sapphire, PoemsEulogy, Alakungfu for your submissions.

The concept for a poem about hope that included the words “red button” came from some lines that popped into my head when considering various subjects and topics for this contest. I have yet to write the poem, but the lines are roughly the following:

“All I have left is hope.
To see the shiny red buttons on her favorite sweater
To feel her gentle touch stroking my hair
To hear her softly whisper that everything’s going to be ok
To hope….”

Pendragon I enjoyed the metaphoric imagery of slimy panic and feathery hope.

Sapphire what a fun structural form!

PoemsEulogy, you nicely captured the essence of a less-is-more moment for me.

Alakunfu, you were able to conjure some great emotional imagery.

Thank you all, it was fun reading and re-read the entries. While all complied with mentioning the the words "red button" and included an element of hope, the piece that included the words and seemed to be about hope (if I am reading it correctly) was Alakunfu’s, “By Order of a Buccaneer.”

Congratulations Alakungfu!

Thank you, LMK. I confess, that was a bit of a surprise.

The next subject is going to be "mixed feelings" and the poem has to include the phrase "tortured soul".

The contest deadline will be October 31

Skinned Alive

You say you want to know me? I suppose you can
try looking into my eyes and if they are not cloudy,
you may see the tortured soul you’re looking for.

You might even engage a mettle detector to count
the ticks but it often races and it sometimes skips.
At best you’ll be listening to a faulty metronome.

If you really want to know me, examine the skin.
This stretched, limed and living parchment with
a thousand nerve endings to the inch.

That’s where you’ll find the indelible fingerprint
of everyone who’s ever touched me. And, yes,
I’ve got a few scars but there is a hell of a story

behind each one. Bruising? Of course. I call that
my black and blue collection. More wrinkles than
I’d like - that’s life. Feel free to add up the laugh

lines I want to multiply by a hundred fold. Those
freckled places the sun seldom sees? I’ve been
told they’re kisses from God. Deviant perhaps -

but who can stop God? Then, after you’ve x-rayed
each subtle essential layer, goosebump, dimple,
dip and irregularity.... you’ll know.

Beautiful poem, Sophia -- introspective but not unnecessarily critical. This contest is off to a good start.

Between Sunrise & Sunset

Upon the crossroads
between shadow and light
a tortured soul
stands half in night
and half in day.

Before his eyes
swings the pendulum
of virtue and vice,
feeling trepidation
stir within his blood.

A road weary traveler
tempted to lie to rest
in the devil's embrace
but in his ear calls a voice
to walk into the rising sun.

Neither sinner nor saint
there comes the moment to choose,
dust upon the brow,
steeped in days long sweat,
the question hovers
to turn east or west.

One lone soul
stranded in the middle
his heart pulled
two different ways.

The path that offers ease
at the end of his labors,
but at what eternal cost,
while the other road
means more work to come
but for what reward?

Mixed Feelings

Do I keep moving along the rugged pathway
Hoping to meet new beginnings at its end—
Do I search for light and brighter days,
Or just contemplate whatever life sends…
I’m just a tortured soul in need of solace
I wonder: do I give up or just give in…
Heartaches unnumbered, so out of place—
Do I continue walking or return to where I began—
Would starting over really be that bad
Even though my race is approaching the line—
Is it worth my while, or will it just make me sad,
To trade the night’s comfort for blessed sunshine…
I have had a close call, near as I can figure:
But sometimes my tortured soul wishes I had pulled that trigger…

Pendragon
© Friday, October 09, 2009

Thank you, Dark Muse, I loved how you paced your poem. And Pendragon, you painted an impressive picture with your poem. Thank you for your submissions. I hope this contest gets a good draw. It will by the look of things.

Mixed Emotions

Long ago one could find
a cut called “Mixed Emotions”
on an album by McKenna.
Which was better – the class
of jazzy notes Dave transcribed,-- or
his own piano style
rich with stride and sass?
Though years later my mind
can still hum it well,
I can't tell.

Filling a page may lighten
life’s ever-plodding load,
as a free spirit shedding care
while strolling up an off-beat road.
Sometimes unsolicited stigmata
from a deep psychic vein may swell.
Which is better,-- or
is neither worth the time and fare?
I can't tell.

On rare occasions the arty scam
pipes up and starts to sing:
“This could be it, maybe the real thing.”
Then again, it might all be a mere sham.
I'm the proverbial tortured soul, –- or
just a comedian, quirky as hell.
I can't tell.

Wow, Aunt Shecky, you really marry the poem to the chosen topic, well done. And nice choice of form, as well.

The doe came stealthily,
from the great lonely,
to the salt lick,
white all around
and she graceful in it.
Morning stirred around her
and she raised her eyes
to peer into mankind,
seeking,
ame torturee pauvre,
something.
Then,
without another glance
at abandoned civilization,
she leaped once more
into the
dragon’s teeth.

Qimissung

Lovely metaphor, qimissung, just like they used to write in days of olde. Dante and Chaucer couldn't have done better. Thank you for your poem.

Beautiful poems so far. And only four days left.

First of all, I must commend you all on your superb poetry. I especially like a poem that thinks itself through and out, answers its own questions so to speak. So, I have selected "Between Sunrise and Sunset" by Dark Muse.

Congratulations, Dark Muse. I kind of like yours because it leaves me with more questions than I started out with!

As you said, alakungfu, everyone did a superb job. Well, it was an interesting subject!

Oh wow! I had no idea I won.

Thank You!

This came as a complete surprise to me

Ok, the next subject is Alter Ego and poem should include the phrase "hidden truth"

Deadline December 3rd

Nice going, Muse!

Masks and Dreams

Searching the mirror where hidden truths lie,
The Alter Ego that prays to escape—
Which one with I become when the Night presses on,
For all are just fragments of me...
Faces float in the depths of my mind
A kaleidoscope of personalities, each just a part of the whole—
Masks to be put on or taken off as the mood takes me...
They call it “mental illness” but what it really is
Is the Alter Egos just struggling for air time
On the TV station that I call life,
The babbling voices that beckon and entice,
Blank visages awaiting the paint to give them uniqueness:
Jonathan Blade, Raven Darkendale, David Pendragon and more—
Who will I be in the end—
What name do I inscribe on my stone—
When my life has been one of charades?

Pendragon
© 11/9/2009

http://image.orientaltrading.com/otcimg/25_1185.jpg

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Pendragon

Nice going, Muse!

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Thank you, and great poem, it has kind of an eerie quality to it.

Shards of bevelled mirror
Shades of crooked canvas
Shreds of iced fabric
Diced to innovative imperfection
Enticed to leading inhibitions
An extemporaneous
Colloquial collage
Merging twill with teetering type
Trite with smoldering smut
Wrecked with onerous billowing
Tacit with blessedly believable
And what do you have?
Nostalgia
That is, someone's hidden truth
Or, better yet,
Just a trick of isolation
Put together for aesthetic sake
With Alice's sense
In a brief world
All too certain.

Oh wow! That was fantastic

It is near the middle of the month and only 2 entires so far, before you know it the deadline will be upon you.

Since the deadline is almost upon us and only two entries so far, to try and make more of a contast of this, I am going to extend the deadline as I know for many this is a busy time of year.

So the new deadline is January 15

*bump*

I want to be the girl
who loves her life best,
like my friend who has
a hundred friends
like a parcel of random gems
she is never without one

there was the guy she first slept with
after breaking up with a boyfriend
and who, after hanging out and
having sex with each other
for three months, bought her
a purple teddy bear with hearts
on its paws, but that wasn't who
she was
so she apologized and moved on

and the one she spent three years with
who she thought might be the one,
but two years later he wasn't

or the one she lived with for five years
she thought for awhile that she might like to
live in Paris
she never said whether he would join her
or not

in the end they can hang
around
if they want to
that's ok with her

but i am not a nomad
in matters of the heart
i live
i love my family
i write, i paint, i think
some days i save the world

but the hidden truth is that
i'm lillian gish
floating downstream on an ice floe

and all i really want is for
someone to care enough
to stay with me til i die

Qimissung

Thank you to those who have entered, though it makes it even harder to judge, with so few to choose from, as all three entires were quite good, but alas there can be only one winner.

Pendragon: I loved your use of the masks, I have a fasncation with masks myself and so I quite enjoyed that asepct of your poem. A great concept, with some wonderful lines and paints a rather vivid scene with your imagery.

oqimissung: I really enjoyed your poem, I just loved the apporach you took. I thought the concept behind the poem was really great, and I loved the fact that it did have such a personal feeling to it.

But the winner goes to

alakunfu: Your poem was so richly and wonderfully original and the langauge you used was fabulous, it was a very expertly and brillinatly crafted poem and I most particuarly enjoyed your use of the resquted phrase "hidden truth"

Congratulations, alakungfu. The language you use is always rich.

Congratulations, alakungfu. Very nice poem there!

Yours, too, Pendragon. :)

BUMP! Next subject?:alien::alien::alien::alien::alien:

Paging alakungfu! Next subject, please! Hello, anybody out there?

As of today, I am reopening the subject poetry contest. I trust alafungfu is doing well, but she hasn't been here of late. My prayers go out to her.

The next subject is "Werewolves", and should contain the line "by the lemon twilight of the pale full moon"

Best of luck to everybody, deadline on March 5th.

pendragon

Reckoning

By the lemon yellow twilight of the pale moon
rises the eerie song of a sorrowful serenade
shattering the stillness of the night, offered like
prayers to the shining stars with their ever watchful eyes,
but no wishes will be granted tonight.

Warmth evaporates quickly into deathly cold
of the sanguine stained earth, for the bitter offering
of life stolen on the head of the hunter's silver bolt,
while she dies within the arms of her alpha mate
his own heart torn from within his breast with her
last precious breath bestowed upon his face.

Upon this night a new vow is forged with
his eyes turning red from the growing rage
which eases away the pain, while his call tares
open the sky, from this point forever more he
pledges that the man within him may be
buried within her own grave.

And awaken the wolf to claim free reign
and shed the last remaining shackles of humanity
to spread the plague of death and terror
until vengeance at last be held within the jaws
that he may close his eyes for eternal sleep
by her side once the hunter's blood is bitter
sweet upon his tongue.

A ROSE PETAL FALLS TO THE FLOOR


A rose petal falls to the floor.
Tiny lips pout, then giggle once more.

A rose petal drifts through the door.
“Can I grab the keys, Dad, and drive to the store?”

A rose petal’s tossed to the crowd.
Both parents cry, but still they are proud.

A rose petal blows far away.
Joy comes with visits, but never can stay.

A rose petal falls in the grass.
Unnoticed, a lifetime flies past.

A rose petal’s placed on a stand
While time strokes a shriveled old hand.

A rose petal's dropped in a grave.
Another pressed flat in a good book to save.

A rose petal flutters and glides.
Baby tosses the old book aside.

A rose petal's stuffed in the mouth,
Mommy fishes the nasty thing out.

A rose petal falls to the floor.
That’s what the dustpan is for.