I'm so worried, stretched and drawn,
really worried, my skin is torn
To think, that ghastly gleaming grimace comes for me,
Too soon! I've yet to save each moment's words,
To build a mountain, a mountain range of all life's
savage, leering, laughing joys and scattered turds.
I fall back, glaring rapaciously into the roiling night
terror sucks me from the ground into a wormhole.
That I might miss the chance to write it all
from bang to entropy, I fall in thrall of loss
into the void behind her pinpoint pupils
this abyss stares back with little of import,
for just this hour must replace the years I'd hoped
for something real, more real than this, cheap chapped kiss
and tying off the tourney, work the fist and pat the vein
seeing the bloom of blood into the fit, I know
that nothing's worth me coming back again...
.
.
Video-
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9Ue9pLa5GUU
Comments
thankx jess.. newer words for my 100 words still in progress
gleaming grimace
leering,
turds.
rapaciously
roiling
ah
entropy,
I'm glad to add
to your vocabulary,
had hoped you might get more,
if only dysentery.
re
moved
Thanks mate,
Your workshop was really liberating. It gave me the freedom to express myself in ways I would normally, don't laugh, I mean it, be a bit shy to do.
I found this very moving
Not only moving, but also there is a directness and rawness which adds a vulnerability too.
Technically, some great alliteration, fantastic imagery - all accomplished, which I'd expect from you.
I am left wondering. The final references could be someone dear to you that took an overdose - or is this your fate?
Jx
Truth.
I was a junkie until 1994.
Never gone back, never will.
However the bloom, the rush, the closeness to death every time, never quite leaves you.
I think I might have scared the shit out of a newcomer
when I did a reading of her poetry she offered to do one of mine and I offered this.
Bad Jess! [smacks himself on wrist]
Naughty, naughty Jess
She says grinning.
The poem is good though, so if she's up for the challenge it would be interesting to hear her version.
Jx
Jess
Human desperation at life's end, not so much for life itself , but unaccomplished hopes and legacy
may be universal enough to make this poem more than a unique and personal story only...I hope that is the point , and intention. I felt it, relate to it, and shuddered at my own diminishing future.
I often misinterpret, but don't care, as long as I get something churning my psyche. I did.
Line (verse) 12 "this time (she?, or it? ) stares back with little of import. Something here confused me.
your strength of talent prevails,
Thanks and well spotted, Al
those lines need work.
I was trying to simultaneously reference Nietzche's "And if you gaze long into an abyss, the abyss also gazes into you." with a junkies vacant stare.
Too much with too little, eh?
Perhaps the full quote would help
"He who fights with monsters should look to it that he himself does not become a monster. And if you gaze long into an abyss, the abyss also gazes into you."
I've done an edit, Al,
is it clearer now?
Yes
Yes
"abyss" need not be repeated though. "it" would work fine here as the pronoun
although , now thinking about it, I like the sound of "this abyss"
appreciate the heads up on the edit. We are almost "LIVE CHATTING"
.
Jess
The spoken word brought the message of your work, and it was great to hear.
Made a lot of difference reading as the reading had a soul, feelings and a reality that came over clear.
Excellent.
Yours, Ian.
as I just said to you on Barbara's Renga,
and it was a bit blunt but I hope you didn't take offence, yes, the poetry is in the hearing of it,
thanks mate.
Dear Jess
Sometimes being blunt makes a bigger line, as with a pencil, the words stand out not etched in finery, but laying word after word in blurred frankness.
Your frankness, if controlled, makes this site a place to remember lessons.
You have taught me many things young man, in the years we have been on Neopoet, I guess I should have been more active, well that's just me as always.
There are many new poets of quality here now, the only thing wrong is, they are once again streaming their own words, and not streaming comments, it takes a few moments to comment, yet they persist in taking such a long time on their own appearance.
There must be a way of balance here, I will leave this problem up to the board.
Take care young Jess and know that we walk with you always, Yours Ian..
Like the edit
Agree with Al, no need to mention abyss twice.
It does make it clearer though.
I had wondered if it was a specific female's trip/ death. Obvs don't now.
Jxx
um yes
looked in lots of void eyes at that time, once woke up next to someone who didn't.
Eeeek
A tad unnerving to say the least.
Jxx
coming to the poem
just now, and trying to treat it fresh, as intended, i think it's just fine as is. it moves us very passionately and physically from a panic attack of running out of time to reach that BIG reach, when the words just pour out of you from the high hill of blessings in living, and fall back to the scream of the memory of that high. That is a tough, and it is laid out raw here.
I think you saw in my recent poem BURST OF RAPTURE the same urge- you seek out that big moment when everything is in a frozen burst of just feeling alive To build a mountain, a mountain range of all life's/ savage, leering, laughing joys..
I think it's part of what poets do; the poem becomes the magic moment.
I can see that in "BURST OF RAPTURE"
I thought it was what we all strive for.
Hi
Grim but One of your best poems.
It has a lot of feeling.
Connecting past reality as it relates to present reality connects well. A deep message is present.. One of courage and grace for who you was and is.
Jess
As (almost) always, an excellent write. But you left me wondering if there wasn't more to say. The title implies that you are currently worried. The ending states that there's nothing worth going back for. So why the worry? In the first stanza, you lament not having the time to write the words, yet here you are. What words are missing?
That's just my humble ignorance. As (almost) always, I am probably wrong
It's the bit in the middle, Scott,
that is missing.
Can we hope to write everything from the Big Bang to the collapse of entropy?
Complex poem.
Complex poem.
I relate to the feeling of fear not so much of death but of the fact that there will be not enough time to embrace everything what is in life.
The tempting shortcut you mentioned in the second part is almost as scary as death itself.
It is a real pleasure to read your poem.
I see the pinpoint pupils stare indifferent and ubiquitous like the law of physics.
Thank you, IRiz
You seem to have understood all the themes with sensitivity and insight.
It's nice to be appreciated, especially, in a way, for something that wilfully carries such ugliness.
I'll check out your work when I can.
Jess,
Never imagined I'd read a poem by an adult that used the word "turds" unironically. Or was it?
But if someone was going to do it, and make the poem lavish with images and literary devices, and serious, personal content, and do it all well, it would be you.
Tourney = tourniquet? (Google tells me it's tournament, but that doesn't make sense)
Kels
Jess,
Never imagined I'd read a poem by an adult that used the word "turds" unironically. Or was it?
But if someone was going to do it, and make the poem lavish with images and literary devices, and serious, personal content, and do it all well, it would be you.
Tourney = tourniquet? (Google tells me it's tournament, but that doesn't make sense)
Kels
Tourney = slang for tourniquet
ta, Kelsey