NaPM April 25 2015

[milo]

Rules: Write a poem for national poetry month on the topic or form described. Each poem should appear as a separate reply to this thread. The goal is to, at the end of the month have written 30 poems for National Poetry Month. 







Topic 25: Write a poem inspired by a story.
Form : any
Line requirements: 8 lines or more

Questions?

[just mercedes]

Ariadne updated


Know something, Theseus?
You really suck.

You’re not the sweet hippy
mystic Zen poet
you pretended to be -

you’re a fake.

I betrayed my father
my brother (well, half-brother)
my native city
for nothing.

You promised
you’d take me to Athens.

Lying piece of shit; you dumped me
on Naxos at the mercy
of this biker gang of winos
instead.

Talk about betrayal.

Thanks a lot.

[rayheinrich]

                < a short poem about ducks > (Inspired by the story: "A short story about ducks")
               
               
                i was standing at my kitchen counter
                preparing breakfast for the cats
                when my favorite cat Shiva
                backed up
                pressed her ass against my side
                and pissed out about a pint of hot pee which
                thoroughly wet
                my shirt
                my pants
                and assorted other things below
               
                (females have a large diameter urethra
                that can do this with amazing speed)
               
                while this had never happened to me before
                it did remind me of a past girlfriend whose
                chief method of sexual arousal was being peed on
               
                since peeing while fully erect is almost impossible
                it was lucky for her
                that this act
                had no such effect on me
               
                it wasn't that I couldn't appreciate
                the quirk of her fetish
                no
                it was the thought of having sex with someone while
                writhing about in my own piss.
               
                (now this
                you could be thinking
                is not what might be expected
                in a short poem
                about ducks
                but
                considering that my former favorite cat had
                backed up to my side
                pressed up against it
                and peed a pint of piss down my side
                i should be allowed some leeway)
               
               
                but love
                and sex
                are what
                they are

               
                so I pretended to like
                sloshing about
                in my own pee
               
                as my mother was fond of saying
                 "A couple
                willing to make sacrifices
                within their relationship
                is significantly more likely
                to have a long and happy one"
               

[Todd]

The Algorithm of the Unattractive

We’re looking for the athletic
lines of a circle, a thoroughbred
in a donkey suit. Everyone wants
a greyhound instead of a St. Bernard.
It’s like a school dance. That scrawny
kid might show you that math
earns more than stealing
bases. We’re looking for tech stock
billionaires, for Babe Ruth
in a land of fitness models.

[RiverNotch]

A Russian Song

Into the quiet taiga I go,
into a Moscow of pines and birches
and firs and spruces,
where mosquitoes the size of my hand
ride taxis and trains
through tunnels and roads
of twigs and tree-trunks and roots
to work on my skin,
where hedgehogs and bear cubs
and eagle-owls and horses
dart through the ferns, the flowers, the fog,
to have some tea,
where the sunlight always falls
through the cracks in the canvas of green
above my unwashed hair
like yesterday's medovukha
falling from your bottle's mouth,
swirling around in your glass,
tasting your two sweet lips,
washing away your thirst,
where I am free to sing
of my quiet schedule,
of my empty samovar,
of my desperate soul.

ALSO:

Ariadne updated

Look on the bright side: at least you get to marry a FRIGGIN GOD.

[Erthona]

Tragicomedy

He was the newspaper chopper:
pulling the stacks of paper through
to line them up and chop them.
Full proof safety.
A button on his side needed to be pushed
by hand before the blades would come down.
The safety people did not count on his
"All Around Cowboy" belt buckle:
the achievement of his life.
Buckle on button,
blades flash down,
him on one side,
his arms on the other.
When we heard the story
from Tim's older brother
we were on the floor laughing:
too young to know that there were
some things that just weren't funny.

Erthona

©2015

[Tiger the Lion]

Isaac

 
In his youth he rode with the hurricanes,
serving as a soldier, when they stormed
the pagan beaches of Louisiana.
 
His favourite trick was the Cadillac flick;
he could send a pimped ride through a bordello window
with barely a sneeze.
 
He was high and puffed jazz up the noses of saints.
 
It took all middle-age to come down from that adrenaline.
 
He waned into infamy,
never able to blow into one ear and escape through the other,
without leaving a gibberish debris.
 
His last breath,
at best was a breeze;
he hurled himself into her wraparound skirt,
hoping to still move men.

[Grace]

Uncle Ernest

My mother, stroking
the dog's silky ears
as she told me.

That's all I remember
about Uncle Ernest,

apart from his ghost,
sitting cloth-capped,
and grim-faced
on his front step;

the way he smiled,
when he carved birds
out of bits of wood
in his garden shed,

and a newspaper clipping
about how they'd found him,
wandering on the Yorkshire Moors.

He'd drunk weed killer,
after posting letters
saying sorry.

"Tangled web", the paper said.
Something about gambling
and money for the holiday.

[Keith]

Baba Yaga

Phallic mother
I am the forrest,
a death that rots beneath
my leaves
can swallow whole
each mind of man
or gently blow on bone.

Come sit inside to grind our paste,
a cloud across the moon,
see which sister shows her face,
on chicken legs the room will turn,
your path will twist if we conspire,
now ask of me a dream a quest,
shadows run if I desire.
You failed your test I take your flesh
and breathe your Russian smell.

The willow whisps so soft
The wizard blows his horn
All creatures call out loud.

A thousand swarm
are by my side
a Firebird burns behind my eyes,
grasping feathers, hands in flame
through the woods
I rise again.