Poetry Contest

[Petrarch's Love]

I've been pre-occupied for a few days, so wanted to drop in now to congratulate ktd on her win. Looks like you've choosen a deceptively simple pic. for this round, an the competition's already heating up. I'll have to submit something myself if a good idea strikes.

[white camellia]

ill have one in soon. ktd i LOVE THIS PIC. THANK YOU.

holo, are you sure you've seen the picture? Why can't I see it?!

[Will Press]

holo, are you sure you've seen the picture? Why can't I see it?!

If you can't see it, it's pretty simple. It's just a cube drawn from black lines on a white background.

[ktd222]

Thank you Holo, Petrarch, I loved your poems as well.

I'll announce the winner sometime next week, so there is plenty of time for submissions into the contest, all.

[white camellia]

I appreciate your help, Will Press. That image sounds really appealing, a simple abstract touch.

[LauraAmanda]

Simple in shape, In shade
In light, A box
Where we all reside
A place to keep
forgotten memories
Something to stand on
To reach a little taller
We all feel small sometimes.
A place to hide
unwanted emotions.
A place to keep
the socially unwanted.
A box
Simple
In shape

[ktd222]

There's about a week left before I determine the winner, so entries are welcome.

[Petrarch's Love]

Linear Evolution

1Twelve lines of the first dimension variety
2Arranged themselves with contained sobriety
3On a typical plane of the second dimension
4(They did it without too much pretension),
5And when well arranged they admirably
6Produced an image from dimension three.
7The twelve straight lines were, with pride, reborn
8Into the dimension of higher forms
9Where the box they made could contain a treasure
10Or be dice or ice or a house at pleasure,
11And the space outside it metaphorically
12Could represent individuality.
But still, these lines, which ascended disciple-like
From their thin, singular, simplicity to complex, tangible, fullness
In pursuit of something greater,
Still they lack the fourth dimension
Of unseen animation
And still they lack that numberless dimension
With the infinitely faceted simplicity
Of a spiritual geometry.

[holograph]

Home has 2 dimensions.

Every rhythmic knock
sends a hollow static
through the walls,

and these walls are
my bed, and

I lay like
spoiled sandwich meat
between them.

They aren’t as thick as
you’d think, but heavy:

the shroud of night
on the eyelid--

a child’s carriage veil.

I live within

the box outside the box enclosed

between

two integrals in these four walls
of fog, and the fog casually thickens
like a sad housewife

that eats and eats, and

precipitates its smog
on my tender cheeks, an

acidic red. I am x, and

I’ve no derivative.

And I’ve been miming for years

get me out
get me out

let me back in

But all I hear are the brooding
winds of nothing.


[amazing poems you guys!]

[ktd222]

There is still a few days left for anyone else who would like to submit a poem.

[Virgil]

OK, here's my entry:

Cubic Haiku

The lines today stay
Upright for a framed pinfold.
Press out to find home.

Step back breathlessly
Find the cube’s open back side.
Lean over the edge.

Life within is sad.
Like a black bird in a cage,
Can you see the sun?

A corner vector
Gives dimensionality
To a world of lines.

Tomorrow’s boxes
Vanish unpredictably.
Will I be free then?

Dashed lines sum it up,
Sealed up in hexahedron.
A cube has six sides.

[ktd222]

The contest is closed today at 12 A.M. PDT. I will tell you who the winner is on Monday.

[ktd222]

I read some C.S. Lewis books recently, and when I came across this image of a cube it reminded me of an example he gave for knowing God’s identity. That each of us – even if we are unable to discern God’s identity in this world – is of Him. And that we are only able to see in components now. Just as the deconstruction of this cube results in only it’s component parts(or lines). And it is when we move beyond this world that we are revealed a clearer image of God. Just as the component parts begin to interconnect to form structure. Until we are totally enveloped into Him and the structure interconnect with structures to reveal the true image of God.

I preface this by saying these are only my opinions and may not actually be what you all are trying to achieve in your poems.

[ktd222]

rabid:
This theme, even though a bit cliché, will never grow tiring for me. It is what keeps me growing and maturing into a capable adult. This is a poem about goals and dreams and keeping your focus and aim in order to achieve them. I like your symbolic use of the box/container as the barrier that ‘limits your sight and mind.’ The container is the thing with the fake ‘form.’ Even if in reality the container is what’s in front of you - the blank space outside the box is the ‘true form’ – the place where ‘thinking and living’ exists. I had particular trouble with phrases like ‘slight container,’ which I assume means flimsy or fragile container; and ‘seems empty in the eyes of those in side in coils,’ which gives the impression of huge amounts of potential energy, so I don’t understand how a ‘slight box’ could hold back such potential energy. The title correlates being outside the box to where ‘thinking and living’ is; and the whole of your poem is about living and seems so positive that the word ‘crime’ seems out of place. This is just me though. I do like the movement of point of views from outside the box, to inside the box, back outside the box, as you read on down the poem. It gives me a sort of first hand experience of these two ‘realms.’ I also think the use of the word can (third line from the bottom) is wonderfully placed in your poem. The only thing that we can see is not necessarily the thing we should ponder, because that will sideline our dreams; which will waste away our ‘thinking’; which is the actual type of ‘living’ we can have if we live for our dreams.

Will Press:
The box itself is the treasure, not what’s inside. ‘A crystal cube, a diamond box’: these are descriptions of value attached to the box; while the walls of this cube is described as wrapped with ‘unseen locks’ and ‘glassy chains,’ like the ‘faces clear as shallow streams.’ These are some wonderful descriptions lending clarity and palpability to what’s inside the box, – nothing. The ‘I can only dream of some secret,’ whatever this secret was. But this is where value, just like the kind attached to the cube, attaches itself to questions asked. You have movement from abstract value towards palpable value. The important question to ask is not ‘what or where’ this ‘secret’ is, because it’s long gone. The important question is to deal with what you do have and ask why this kind of box was used to store such a secret in plain view. I don’t see a use for end rhymes; or care much for cliché phrases like ‘a puzzle and a paradox,’ or ‘not asking what or where, but why,’ or ‘therein lies the mystery,’ but you’ve got plenty of positives things going on in your poem as I’ve mentioned above.

mir:
I have a sense you’re reconstructing the image of the box in your poem. You have this movement from primary lines, to secondary lines that form simple structures, to tertiary lines that interconnect to from complex structures. But it is beyond these primary lines the idea of what a line is defined as fails. I think the words ‘perspective’ and ‘elective’ are crucial to your poem. And I guess that’s why you’ve highlighted them by rhyme, right? The other rhymes I can’t figure out though. Anyway, those two words make me believe the definition of a line is dependent on perspective; but more than that, dependent on the held belief in that perspective. In this case, the perspective is the Math class’s – not even a perspective because of one’s choosing. The poem is restrictive in this sense. The word ‘but’ in ‘but in Math class’ is perfectly placed towards the bottom of the poem because it contradicts what you’ve set up throughout the poem: which is defining to me what a line is NOT. Which is coincidently what a line is in the perspective of an artist? So the words ‘but’ and ‘not’ create a mathematical equations where two negatives(or contradictory words) equals a positive:

Perhaps a true line is that which
does not bend, wriggle, or twitch,
but in Math class, is allowed to pass

For me the poem still succeeds without the last line, mir. I like how you deal with how different people defined what a line is in comparison with the image.

psycheinaboat:
I do like your poem Psycheinaboat. A simple reduction of the image 1 minute from now; 2 minutes from now; 5 minutes from now. The ice cube becoming less and less recognizable – just like the words of the poem becoming less and less like a word. But I guess I’m left with the question of why this reduction is happening? What is the reason for you seeing this ice cube dissolving?

[ktd222]

lauraamanda:
I do like the functional element you’ve introduced into the image; turning the box into an actual place where ‘forgotten memories’ and the ‘unwanted’ things go to dwell or live. Hence the word ‘reside.’ And where ‘we’ go if ‘we’ want to use the box ‘to reach a little taller’. But there is also a lot of ambiguity that I can’t quite wrap my brain around. What is it that ‘makes us feel small’? This is a box that keeps both positive and negative things, right? Or is this a place for just negative things to dwell? I would like to know what is it about the things that reside in this box that makes it ‘something to stand on to reach a little taller’. Or are you just talking literally? Is ‘simple in shape, in shade in light,’ a reflection of what is in the box or just a description of the box itself? If it was the first, then that would match nicely with the positive and negative things that dwell in this box. I think with a little clarification your poem will be quite amazing.

holo:
Holograph, you have a lot happening in such a short poem. In any case, your poem almost succeeded on so many different levels.

The first is this ‘rhythmic knock.’ Is this knock coming from outside the eyelids? Is the structure of your poem, containing short stanzas, trying to mimic this opening and closing of eyelids? That would be a cool effect! But I’m not positive on this.

The second is the position of the ‘I’ during this poem. You say the ‘I lays…/between them,’ and I’m assuming ‘them’ is the eyelids. What makes me also believe this is that you say ‘I live/within the box/outside the box/enclosed between/two integrals.’ Which points to the shape that an eyelid is: an integral. But then in stanza 5 and 6 you say the ‘I’ lives within and outside this box. Now I’m confused. Maybe you meant the different Parts of the ‘I’? One Part lives in one place, and the other Part(the living Part?) lives in another place; and you’re trying to unify those two Parts into the true ‘I’? I don’t know.

The third is the comparison of the box to eyelids. I’m not sure that is what you’re trying to do but it’s what seems to me. Such an abrupt alteration of this box, I can’t get to imagining eyelid from box.

One aspect of your poem I do see achieved is the vivid description of deterioration of the ‘I.’ A deterioration, that like fog, comes on slow, but gets thicker, or more severe as in the case of human deterioration, as time passes. A representation of fog as being acid adds that vivid element for me, to imagine the type of deterioration that’s happening. Nice use of word, describing the fog as ‘casual.’ Fog doesn’t seem harmful at first, but over time it can be blinding. Just like life doesn’t seem wasteful when your young; but towards the end of your life, the amount of time you have left becomes more important.

Petrarch:
I saw your poem more as ‘mental evolution’. Not evolution in the sense where organisms change in order to adapt, in order to reproduce more successfully than competing organisms. Because your poem involves interaction of component parts(or lines) in order to achieve something more than it is alone: a line. But the first step is to instill your lines with intellect. I don’t know how you did this, but you did. Referring to the lines as having ‘contained sobriety’: giving them a sense of awareness. And as having ‘pride’: giving them a virtue. These lines need certain ability in ‘processing’ to understand such things, as virtue and awareness! I wish I were able to see how the lines developed intellect. That would have been pretty awesome.
The voice in line 4 is interesting. It seems to be saying these lines that interact to form structures had no motive or end purpose. And that’s why I don’t think evolution in this first sense works. There is always an end purpose to evolution. But who is this that is saying, ‘in pursuit of something greater’? I’ll leave it at loving that you’ve instilled mere lines to contain something more.
The word ‘contain’- you’ve used a couple times – seems important in your poem, because it points to what is containable, or capable, for these lines to achieve. It seems to go well with the numbering of the first twelve lines, because maybe the content in these lines are all that such lines are capable of: forming more complex structures.
Lines 11 and 12 caught me off guard because your poem seems to be moving towards a building and forming of things, that suddenly jumping out into the void of this image just confused me.
So maybe it is within these twelve lines that nothing spiritual can be conceived. A space to create two paragraphs would have also been pretty neat: to show disconnect in evolving the intellect in order to understand the ‘spiritual geometry.’
I also like the rhyming you’ve set up in the poem. An end rhyming that stops passed line 12. You may also be using this to show the fracture between the two types of geometry.

Overall I loved your concept.

Virgil:
Your representation that this cubical structure, formed from lines, – forms the world(the place we need call home) – is amazing! Because what is discovered when ‘stepping back’ outside the box is that this world is just a world made from lines. Made because whomever it was before needed a place to call home; and as a result, turned the dimensionless into a world of dimensions.

The way the world is being looked over made me gasp, because in two stanzas you were able to encompass and represent the world in this box; as well, take the reader to a perspective where the world can be inspected.

I’m not sure who this ‘you’ inside the box is referring to. Is this ‘you’ referring to the reader or the ‘I,’ himself – that part of the ‘I’ that remains bound in this world? Obviously the ‘I’ shows up towards the bottom of this poem, but who is doing the ‘stepping back?’ Is the ‘I’ asking this of the reader? Even though I’m not sure yet, it is still a very imaginative way to try connecting these entities described in your poem.

And as I said above, this world is now a world made of dimensions. And the answer to the question whether we’ll ‘be free then’ will be, no. Because just like the cube’s perimeters being erased, we no longer recognize that we are actually inside the box. We are in a world of dimensions without knowing so.

A very unique way of interpreting this image, Virgil. I love it!



Petrarch, this contest was yours. And then I read Virgil’s poem; with its playful way in approaching such a serious topic, and in-depth inspection of the image, both literally and figuratively, that I have to declare him the winner. Congratulations Virgil!

Cubic Haiku

The lines today stay
Upright for a framed pinfold.
Press out to find home.

Step back breathlessly
Find the cube’s open back side.
Lean over the edge.

Life within is sad.
Like a black bird in a cage,
Can you see the sun?

A corner vector
Gives dimensionality
To a world of lines.

Tomorrow’s boxes
Vanish unpredictably.
Will I be free then?

Dashed lines sum it up,
Sealed up in hexahedron.
A cube has six sides.