Snapshot: Nov. 24, 2009 chat & forums.

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Thread: Snapshot: Nov. 24, 2009

alyosha

Joined: 10/29/2007

Msg: 1068 (view)

Snapshot: Nov. 24, 2009 Posted: 11/24/2009 8:41:31 AM
Little Esmé goes by in her pink woolen toque, not-quite-Coke-bottle glasses, which lend an extra air of vulnerability to her already trusting face. She is holding her mother’s, Ann’s, left hand,. her brother, Seymour, holding the other: Three companionable, happy adventurers against the cold morning wind.

alyosha

Joined: 10/29/2007

Msg: 1065 (view)

Darkness (R-rated) Posted: 11/23/2009 9:44:39 AM
Hey Ya...J.....this one is of course in fun, jest, humour, etc. Eh? Honestly, I don't know WHERE it came from other, perhaps, than from the very bottom of some puddle of self-pity....... I mean, to tell you the truth, what the H. does it mean to make suicide an Olympic event???????/

alyosha

Joined: 10/29/2007

Msg: 1063 (view)

Darkness (R-rated) Posted: 11/22/2009 11:58:55 AM
Darkness Why are there no precipices when you need one? Or they’re all occupied, people doing cartwheels in mid-descent. I hear they plan to make suicide an Olympic event

alyosha

Joined: 10/29/2007

Msg: 326 (view)

“The trouble with poetry” Posted: 11/22/2009 11:48:10 AM
Little girl leaves many cold She is not even three. "she does not do anything!" Let me politely disagree She looks up from beneath her lashes The gaze packed to the brim of her lashes. Blue light in her eyes...such a slow smile let her ride, I am not surprised at the depth she carefully releases. Had you not a child, this one teaches you profound respect for the love she elicits In the fortunate who know that the child who is loved. Is the child all wish they were. Oh, that last stanza, especially those last three lines, gave me goose-bumps!

alyosha

Joined: 10/29/2007

Msg: 1303 (view)

i will know it's you when.... Posted: 11/22/2009 10:09:56 AM
flanders poppies so red my heart forgot their meaning blood red the field of sacrifice young men thrown up against the gleaning of hatred, and social separation the better in their wickedness the lesser in their degradation so hinge the sorrow of a generation This is SO STRONG, my friend, most especially: young men thrown up against the gleaning of hatred

alyosha

Joined: 10/29/2007

Msg: 24 (view)

Confused by my hormones - having sex with boyfriend for first time Posted: 11/19/2009 1:51:51 PM
The problem to me might be hinted at in your words " I could just take him to my room and let him have me"... Of course the concept that the man gets to "have" the woman is or was the norm in our society. Ideally, of course, it's an equal exchange but maybe you associate the 'surrender' of your virginity with the loss of self?

alyosha

Joined: 10/29/2007

Msg: 1301 (view)

i will know it's you when.... Posted: 11/18/2009 4:40:44 AM
i will know it's you when our needs are naturally met not through discussion but with love i will know it's you when i laugh way more than i cry... and sometimes we laugh so hard it hurts! i will know it's you when i'm inspired to be purely me and you're inspired to be purely you i will know it's you when i listen to your words teach me something i simply did not know before i will know it's you when you offer me your hand and we go through the door together i will know it's you when i start thinking poetry as we share intimacy i will know it's you when i look into your eyes and see your soul and it feels so good forever Such all-embracing love and such whole-hearted tribute to it! I kind of held my breath after the first few "I will know it's you" s - eager to see what would come next but a wee bit fearful that it might turn sour!

alyosha

Joined: 10/29/2007

Msg: 1299 (view)

The Bridge Came Down Posted: 11/17/2009 8:55:53 AM
Sleep my imperfect, perfect, budding child dream that the sun is the moon, but the moon is other side of the sun at midnite, I will come to your side, I will gaze at your silence Then wrench anything that will dare to sully your path. Sleep, then awake, my growing child with care.. walk the length of your miles You need all the caring you can swallow On the horizon is your future. Dream that the earth is your friend, it is truly that final. How fortunate the child or grandchild who had someone to sing that for him! And do consider this link to an equally marvelous poem: http://www.online-literature.com/forums/showthread.php?p=805396#post805396

alyosha

Joined: 10/29/2007

Msg: 1297 (view)

The Bridge Came Down Posted: 11/14/2009 3:59:27 AM
The bridge came down, the house fell, and the soldiers marched in formation. Tourists came by to visit the war. The price of everything went up but the soldiers continued to march in formation. The enemy came, even more rapine than advertised, and the soldiers fell out of formation.

alyosha

Joined: 10/29/2007

Msg: 628 (view)

In another room Posted: 11/14/2009 3:33:19 AM
Would you consider taking out..."and realizes that" out of the third stanza? Horrors! I misposted that last verse. It should have been: On another street a child wakes up and realizes that the night has a scent all its own * followed by: On another continent...

alyosha

Joined: 10/29/2007

Msg: 626 (view)

In another room Posted: 11/12/2009 8:21:35 AM
And still further changes: In another room, a man stares out the window facing north, in another house, a woman puts down her book and reaches for a cigarette, her third in the last hour. On another street and realizes that the dark has a scent all its own. On another continent...

alyosha

Joined: 10/29/2007

Msg: 2093 (view)

Brizo's poems Posted: 11/9/2009 9:12:30 AM
In another room, in another house, on another street, on another continent a man stares out the window facing north, a woman puts down her book and reaches for a cigarette, her third in the last hour. A child wakes up and realizes that the dark has an odour all its own. In another room, in another house, on another street, on another continent... ______________ Pummeling

alyosha

Joined: 10/29/2007

Msg: 1061 (view)

in another room Posted: 11/9/2009 9:11:25 AM
In another room, in another house, on another street, on another continent a man stares out the window facing north, a woman puts down her book and reaches for a cigarette, her third in the last hour. A child wakes up and realizes that the dark has an odour all its own. In another room, in another house, on another street, on another continent

alyosha

Joined: 10/29/2007

Msg: 624 (view)

In another room Posted: 11/9/2009 4:49:00 AM
Thank you 60 & Pickles. In fact, though, I've made some structural changes: In another room, in another house, on another street, on another continent a man stares out the window facing north. A woman puts down her book and reaches for a cigarette, her third in the last hour. A child wakes up and realizes that the dark has a scent all its own In another room, in another house, on another street, on another continent.

alyosha

Joined: 10/29/2007

Msg: 1293 (view)

We Will Be Fed Posted: 11/8/2009 1:22:26 PM
neruda slowly dancing to the weight of his words sultry seduction moves my hips rhythm of his beat crapulously falling falling drifting again Another wonderful one, which calls to mind: http://judithpordon.tripod.com/poetry/pablo_neruda_lone_gentleman.html

alyosha

Joined: 10/29/2007

Msg: 621 (view)

In another room Posted: 11/8/2009 12:28:19 PM
In another room, in another house, on another street, on another continent a man stares out the window facing north. In another room, in another house, on another street, on another continent a woman puts down her book and reaches for a cigarette, her third in the last hour. In another room, in another house, on another street, on another continent a child wakes up and realizes that the dark has a scent all its own.

alyosha

Joined: 10/29/2007

Msg: 1291 (view)

We Will Be Fed Posted: 11/5/2009 7:15:10 AM
i think of cummings when i cum does my body fit with your body? bending twisting hard/ soft moist dry melting into one • it is whitman who sings the body electric as i lie in afterglow This is such incredibly good (naughty) fun that I wanted to hear variations on other poets' names, but really it's not naughty at all, and extending it might have taken away from the seriousness of your tribute to erotic joy and YES, of course the two, the sexual fulfillment and poetry belong together!

alyosha

Joined: 10/29/2007

Msg: 324 (view)

“The trouble with poetry” Posted: 11/5/2009 7:07:39 AM
It’s true, as Billy Collins wrote, that “the trouble with poetry is that it encourages the writing of more poetry” as, no doubt, it will continue to do, like Chinese food, fulfilling us at the time, but half an hour later we are hungry again, hungry for the next poem and the next one but, really, searching for the lost, original one.

alyosha

Joined: 10/29/2007

Msg: 1060 (view)

Table d’hote Posted: 11/4/2009 4:29:27 AM
Alone sitting flickering images colour the night and from eyes shut tight tears remembering and wishing time could turn back life she was a good wife once loved and loving now a shell the memories she knows so well replay, replay just enough to get through another day As is usual with your poems, I admire both the passion that is in it and the discipline - perhaps hardly a discipline with you by now, more an ingrained aspect of your character - the discipline with which you set the emotions down, never exaggerating, never using one word or one line-break to call attention to your skill, never anything boastful or done just for effect.

alyosha

Joined: 10/29/2007

Msg: 1057 (view)

Table d’hote Posted: 11/2/2009 4:53:41 AM
I stare at the perfect symmetry of the pink Shasta daisies they arrived by Interflora delivered just as I arrived home a week ago last Tuesday I have not heard from you since our last rendevous so I have spent the interval playing... He loves me, He loves me not.... could you call please because you see I am now down to a very few petals. God, how I love this! I love the way it appears to meander calmly through quiet, objective narrative - only to arrive, at the end, at this crucial "very few petals." Even there, the statement appears to be quiet, matter-of-fact but the urgency of it explodes in one's face after a moment of reflection.

alyosha

Joined: 10/29/2007

Msg: 1053 (view)

Table d’hote Posted: 11/1/2009 1:03:56 PM
Deeply appreciated, Brizo. Frankly, I hesitated to post it because I thought: That 3rd stanza is so bleak, so bitter, who needs it?

alyosha

Joined: 10/29/2007

Msg: 1051 (view)

Table d'hote Posted: 11/1/2009 9:47:58 AM
Thanks, WeAre1. Talk about endings that throw one for a loop!

alyosha

Joined: 10/29/2007

Msg: 1049 (view)

Table d’hote Posted: 11/1/2009 7:35:32 AM
Death is not a marrowbone from which you can suck the essence and set the rest aside nor is it a smorgasbord where you sample the dishes that appeal to you, and go back for seconds and thirds. No, it’s the Full Meal Deal after swallowing which you dab your lips delicately and lay your napkin down

alyosha

Joined: 10/29/2007

Msg: 620 (view)

The Kabbalist Posted: 10/30/2009 6:43:24 AM
He fiddles with words as if they were sweetmeats offered by or pilferred from the Kabbalah: milk, dates, loneliness. In each word there is the husky after-breath of God, a whisper containing a world.

alyosha

Joined: 10/29/2007

Msg: 2089 (view)

Brizo's poems Posted: 10/28/2009 8:56:06 AM
We WILL be fed There is a hunger in us for which the veal has yet to be calved, fattened and slaughtered, the grain to be planted, cultivated, harvested, milled and baked into some as yet unimagined bread. We are hungry and we will be fed. ___________ Alyosha's Poems

alyosha

Joined: 10/29/2007

Msg: 1288 (view)

We Will Be Fed Posted: 10/28/2009 8:54:50 AM
There is a hunger in us for which the veal has yet to be calved, fattened and slaughtered, the grain to be planted, cultivated, harvested, milled and baked into some as yet unimagined bread. We are hungry and we will be fed.

alyosha

Joined: 10/29/2007

Msg: 323 (view)

Life wields a shoddy scale Posted: 10/26/2009 5:23:39 AM
Why do sidewalks pause something in my being? Why do I see beyond into the past. Why do sidewalks never cause me to stop caring this foot, that foot, my foot, the seasons why do I care for those before me why do I care for those coming? Why do I see the day they laid down against a hot summer day, this concrete pathway Peter had tanned, sinewy, delicious arms. This is December, this is way past the time this sidewalk appeared intact. Why do I care. That opening line was already a poem in itself, but of course also that which made it compulsory to read on, and as the questions mounted and I felt drawn closer and closer into the mind (and heart) of the questioner, I waited as eagerly as any child on the eve of December 25th, for the answer to the question Will tomorrow be Christmas? Will tomorrow, at long last, finally be Christmas? But there is no hurrying Christmas, there is only the waiting, patiently, for what the morning may bring... Even though one has heard, again and again, that "Joy cometh in the morning..." What a glorious poem! What can I add to the richness of being you must have felt as you were writing it? I will save this one to my file of favourite poems, preferably with your name to add to it if you would send me that.

alyosha

Joined: 10/29/2007

Msg: 6 (view)

How to build chemistry with the nice guy after always going for the bad boy? Posted: 10/25/2009 12:45:21 PM
Beautifully expressed but you pretty well make it clear that the problem is within yourself. I've never really understood the syndrome of women who are attracted to the bad boys, and being one of the other kind myself (though not a saint) I've been hurt by being attracted to types like the sort you seem to be. The whole of the issue may be stated in your question, because one doesn't build chemistry; one builds relationships, but what dictates the chemical reaction is likely to be something in your past or your self-image.

alyosha

Joined: 10/29/2007

Msg: 41 (view)

midst Posted: 10/25/2009 10:34:56 AM
the shorter the poem sometimes the harder to extricate and the deeper the love

alyosha

Joined: 10/29/2007

Msg: 321 (view)

Life wields a shoddy scale Posted: 10/21/2009 3:59:15 AM
In grade two I chased Daniel he had red hair. I swear his eyes danced every time he smiled. So, too, his freckles. I did not understand that Daniel was also a free message appreciate those who point you towards free, then wide. Love needs wild, tantalizing, scintillating ground. "Daniel was also a free message..." is both a great line and a bit and a wonderful insight...

alyosha

Joined: 10/29/2007

Msg: 319 (view)

Life wields a shoddy scale Posted: 10/19/2009 7:22:47 AM
Alyosha drove his car . Stopped the car, got out, he has done this numerous times but today his mind was filled with the finite. With the temptations to downgrade his existence. Now that is very easy to do. Within the realm of what he imagines the infinite. But we are finite and sometimes a real treat. I think Alyosha has forgotten that he is indeed a treat. The infinite always proceeds. And if he can't concur...well... let it be, let it be. What are little girls made of, went the old nursery rhyme, and What are little boys made of, but it never told us what real friends are made of because it preferred to let us discover that, one act of of love and friendship at a time!!!!

alyosha

Joined: 10/29/2007

Msg: 5 (view)

Seinfeld Reference I don't understand.... Posted: 10/18/2009 2:36:12 PM
If the guy asks you repeatedly (or even just more than once) if you're in love with him, he's probably hoping you'll say yes because he doesn't want to risk saying it first. I don't know how he defines the Jerry/Elaine relationship: best I remember it, they really were good Platonic friends, nothing more,

alyosha

Joined: 10/29/2007

Msg: 2085 (view)

Brizo's poems Posted: 10/18/2009 7:18:27 AM
My powers grow weak as my needs remain strong. Life wields a shoddy scale. Money can’t buy happiness but the poor get their misery wholesale. ________ "Me...and my Shadow"

alyosha

Joined: 10/29/2007

Msg: 317 (view)

Life wields a shoddy scale Posted: 10/18/2009 7:17:35 AM
My powers grow weak as my needs remain strong. Life wields a shoddy scale. Money can’t buy happiness but the poor get their misery wholesale.

alyosha

Joined: 10/29/2007

Msg: 2083 (view)

Brizo's poems Posted: 10/17/2009 9:05:56 AM
Wrapped in a shroud of tears little comfort in a barren life... Extraordinary poem! You write better than some of us breathe.

alyosha

Joined: 10/29/2007

Msg: 618 (view)

Spend money, my child Posted: 10/15/2009 1:38:14 PM
Thanks 60. I haven't been writing much & I might have posted this before but it seems to fit the theme of the preceding: Spend money, my child, and grow strong, eat moderately but well, exercise and think, as much as you can, with clarity. Spend money, my child, and grow wise studying the words and work of those whose light held back the ever-encroaching dark. Spend money, my child, and love, for love is the only coin that returns even as it leaves the hand that offers it. Spend money, my child, and age, for spending and loving and aging and death is the duty of all of us and the privilege of some

alyosha

Joined: 10/29/2007

Msg: 1287 (view)

Practice & Theory Posted: 10/13/2009 8:45:49 AM
“What you suggest may be all very well in practice, but it will never work in theory.” Apocryphal French philosopher. And indeed, in practice, the world works very well: the hungry suffer quietly, out of sight, the brutes all live in East- or South-Medialand, the dogmatics rage at each other and none of this, really, affects us, while the theory that --the meek shall inherit the earth; --the lion will lie down with the lamb; --we will beat our swords into ploughshares; --we will love our neighbours as ourselves; --we will honour the stranger who is within our gates; --we will not do unto others as we would not have them do unto us... will never, apparently, work.

alyosha

Joined: 10/29/2007

Msg: 616 (view)

On Bacon Street Posted: 10/12/2009 4:56:01 AM
Hey Alyosha...no more two dollar bills but the peace and order and security of this poem is so wonderful. There is more to this poem than simple simplicity. Yes. I said that. I love this poem. A great deal. I love the basic decency and implied democracy of what is said in the poem. good stuff A. I'm not at all sure that I read it (or meant it to be read) the way you do, but don't we all make our own poems anyway out of the drafts the authors leave us? I was thinking more along the lines of (Wordsworth's?) "Getting and spending we lay waste our lives..." In my poem, that spending money had become for us a self-affirming activity in itself. We got what we wanted simply by spending money (or, alas, love I suppose).

alyosha

Joined: 10/29/2007

Msg: 316 (view)

Sanctuary Posted: 10/12/2009 4:48:48 AM
I run, from sanctuary to sanctuary - the cafe, my home. It is the in-between places, life, that threatens. Even in my dinged-up old car I'm not safe. The 8 or 10 blocks between each sanctuary contain a myriad of opportunities to go wrong. Once, racing an amber light, on a rain-washed street, I braked, hard, to avoid a young man crossing, but hit him anyway. He slid halfway up the hood, limbs every which way, then fell back on to the street... but I could, instead, have been seized by the apparition of some alien God.

alyosha

Joined: 10/29/2007

Msg: 1030 (view)

Snapshot: Oct. 10, 2009 Posted: 10/10/2009 1:15:13 PM
A guy comes into the café with hair so unruly it would take a troupe of barbers as disciplined as Lipizzaner stallions to tame it

alyosha

Joined: 10/29/2007

Msg: 1029 (view)

Snapshot: Oct. 8, 2009 Posted: 10/10/2009 11:19:18 AM
n my mind a vision comes through I see you buy not one paper but two A lovely enigma here: Is the person buying the second paper because he/she wishes to get a broader view of things than can be got from any one paper, or is he/she congenitally insecure and unable to rely on any one point of view?

alyosha

Joined: 10/29/2007

Msg: 1027 (view)

Snapshot: Oct. 8, 2009 Posted: 10/10/2009 4:57:42 AM
elderly one who often enters this cafe on one leg supported with a crutch only one searching for a current news paper I feel pressed but in the end he retrieves one without fault I was happy to note that this snapshot ended on an upbeat. Thanks

alyosha

Joined: 10/29/2007

Msg: 1025 (view)

Snapshot: Oct. 8, 2009 Posted: 10/8/2009 1:14:20 PM
Elderly nun on spindle legs corner Bernard and Esplanade, face like one of those sock dolls, puckered and seamed

alyosha

Joined: 10/29/2007

Msg: 1286 (view)

Perfect Strangers Posted: 10/8/2009 6:45:21 AM
“Do you realize,” I said to the attractive woman who was about to pass by my table, “that you and I might have five minutes of conversation neither of us could have with anyone else?” “Yes,” she paused: “It’s possible, but it might take us a lifetime to get to exactly those five minutes. And then what?"

alyosha

Joined: 10/29/2007

Msg: 1024 (view)

Mirror, mirror on the wall Posted: 10/7/2009 11:06:52 AM
heres to significant fornication. I had this lover about whom I often felt that our conversation was like making love and our love-making was like very good conversation.

alyosha

Joined: 10/29/2007

Msg: 314 (view)

Vicarious Love Posted: 10/7/2009 11:04:26 AM
So it could be the smell of the man the turn of her lip, the way her eyes avoid you when she finally smiles and the way he carried himself the first time he drove you anywhere was a long time ago, so long that things have gone into the eternal trash can and yet when he walks with the years directing his way, you smile you remember how slinkily he sauntered in the youth that was his temporary kingdom she seems to given up on you, but if you are fortunate she will look without her educated, abused eyes remembering the smell of the man, he was what she chose. You omitted "have" in "she seems to given up" but otherwise what irresistible, spontaneous-seeming flow there is to this, as if "So" already contained the rest of that line which contained the whole of this magnificently fluent poem!!!!!!!!

alyosha

Joined: 10/29/2007

Msg: 614 (view)

On Bacon Street Posted: 10/7/2009 5:07:10 AM
On Bacon Street corner of Main there’s a store that doesn’t sell anything new or used, but you’re welcome to drop in any time and spend a dollar or ten. The money doesn’t go to charity, to combat climate change or anything like that and you won’t get a lottery ticket. They’re open late on Fridays and people come in, drop a two or a five or a ten dollar bill and go out, satisfied.

alyosha

Joined: 10/29/2007

Msg: 1284 (view)

I believe Posted: 10/6/2009 10:07:42 AM
I believe in our need for “God” or a god or a godlike something but need, on a somewhat lower level, has never exactly worked for me. I’ve needed a woman. I knew approximately her dimensions, the cast of her mind, her unpredictable but wholly spontaneous sense of humour. I believed in–I needed–her as deeply as an acolyte teetering on the edge of his faith, trying to hold on to it as if it were the last patch of solid earth, but did that produce her (or God)? No, she came, if at all, from some other direction, in some other form and she, apparently, wanted to love me or she did and I wanted to love her, but wanting to love and loving are as different as chalk and cheese. * Thanks Trulio & Brizo for your contributions. As you may know, only the smallest portion of your donations goes to administrative costs, the rest to those who really need it.

alyosha

Joined: 10/29/2007

Msg: 1022 (view)

Mirror, mirror on the wall Posted: 10/6/2009 4:47:22 AM
Isn't Cunnilingus the Irish National Air line?? And what does it mean when one says: "My computer went down on me"?

alyosha

Joined: 10/29/2007

Msg: 311 (view)

Vicarious Love Posted: 10/5/2009 2:03:49 PM
The October rains search for shadows like water on a street making its way through fall And as for the "Harlequin," the book in question is "The Book Against God" by James Wood, mentioned in an interview by Marylinne Robinson. Hey, my daughter-in-law's work will be on display Oct 15-Nov 15 at the David Kate Gallery, 1092 Queen Street West. She'll be there IN PERSON Sat. Oct 17 2 - 5 pm. Say Hi to her from me and maybe meet my son, Adam, & their children at the same time!

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