Poetics by Praxis

The glass is weathered yet untouched
by hands; eyes feel all the coldness.
Words become harsher as I clutch
all the pane and try to regress.

The glass is weathered yet untouched
by hands, eyes try to grasp kindness
outside; the wind carries in its clutch
a leaf letting it fly aimless.

Original post by sfinn2id

View from a Window: Murrels’ Inlet, S.C.

Square, white clapboard planter holds heads
of puff-pink crowned geraniums;
her hands dead-headed the rest, frail
brown casings mingled with plums

in the barrel’s heap. Among grass
warm bricks lay like honeycombs, held
hexagons, each by six neighbors.
Giving way to planks lain, felled

trees aligned like rows, a fallow
field, old with new, bleached with sap-sweet.
The planks are lead on by white rails,
cornices, the grey roof to meet.

The dock stands on stilted legs, pocked
by black, boorish barnacles, marred
by lines left by the tide. Creaking
soft sway, stubborn nails scarred

with rusty streaks that nothing can
escape. The inlet lays, flat, like
plate glass of unreal blue. The reeds
bristle like hairs on a clean face.

Original post by Whitney

“Dusting”
- Gjertrud Schnackenberg

1 A circle widens beneath my cloth, the years
Of dust rubbed from the wavy windowpanes.
Bits of planets, burst stars have sifted down,
Dust from remote globes of the universe
5 Drops in our closets, piles in corners softly,
Swirls in sunrays toward boxes we’ll unpack,
Around the clocks and mirrors under sheets;
The clouds I shake from carpets give it back,

The children paste paper stars upon the door.
10 With wet footprints disappearing in the hall,
Old wallpaper designs disclosing faces,
The faucet’s voice, the floorboard’s startled cry
Under my heel, what ghost is it accounts
For breath in the rooms, pale tears coursing
15 The windowpanes, what ghosts? I count even
the doorknob in my hand among the living.

Items for Discussion:
- nonce eight-line stanzas/ roughly iambic pentameter with some reversed first feet, and spondaic substitution
- rhyming pairs: “unpack/back”(li.6,8) “coursing/living”(li.14,16)
- all of the lines, with the exception of thirteen and fourteen, have more stressed than unstressed syllables. Lines 1,5,9,10,11,and 16 have one extra syllable (for a count of eleven), which comes as a weak, unstressed head or tail of the line.
- lines end on a stress generally, until the bottom of the second stanza, where they start to end on unstressed syllables: “faces, accounts, coursing, even, living…”
- Schnackenberg works roughly in the ghost of an “Ottava Rima” without the customary rhymes. Instead, she frustrates our expectation of couplets concluding each stanza, with the paired sounds in “even/living” (15-16)
- line 14 lends an interesting half-meaning; the ambiguity of “pale tears coursing” leads us to believe the speaker herself may be crying, before we find it is rain. This line is also the ONLY one in the whole poem that falls short of ten syllables. It has only nine, and ends on a weak unstressed syllable, so that the line itself “runs out of breath” in a way.
- assonance and consonance: the first stanza is brimming with repeated “w’s,” long “o” sounds, slippery “r’s” and “s’s” In other words, the sounds of the first stanza are very breathy, which mimics the act of dust particles floating.
- personification: by stanza two, we feel that the stresses pounding toward a crescendo (most of the lines have six or seven stresses), which culminate at the moment that the faucet is given a “voice” (12), and the floorboard a “cry” (12), evolving toward the supernatural possibilities of the presumably old house.
- The entire poem wrestles with the themes of ghosts, haunting, uncovering what is old, or disturbing what is old. These are echoed well by Schnackenberg’s use of a nonce form extremely close to traditional forms. In the poem, she presents us with two stanzas, as though they were imperfect mirrors of one another. It is unclear whether the speaker’s “Dusting” is a restoration or a disturbance. It is equally unclear whether Schnackenberg’s use of form is a restoration or a disturbance of earlier usage.

Original post by Whitney

Silk In the Forest 

Through the woods, I caught a glimpse of scarletsilk weaving, and dancing a piroet. 

The grumble grinds deep from within myself.Silk like apples laced with sweetness and health. 

I caught a glimpse of juvenile face,approached the young cautiously just in case. 

Her hair was enclosed in a burgundyhood her youthful voice sang sweet melody 

She would taste so luscious to me I thought so innocent, pure and what I sought 

Pleasantly spoke about her ailing kinvisit was vital not to be forgotten. 

The house was set simply over the hill,I would race her there and beat her still. 

my witty self played well, hoax the oldwoman, her body felt filling yet uncontrolled. 

Dressed in her gown, I waited for the girl,my hunger still struck hard, beneath my fur 

the moment had come my dinner grew nearshe opened the door, I told her to adhere 

she came closer the moment was presentI had what I wanted and finally went. 

Original post by sfinn2id

(painting by Herbert James Draper)

Death-scene of Icarus

Hand spun, now crippled, they hang like gentle
sails, harnessed with leather to his genteel

back. Hair, deep as night, lies in folds, laced through
with weeds, on the sky-runner’s quiet brow.

Red shadows, like winter trees, stretch across
in congealing, rusted rivers. Limbs, traced

in blood, chased into red seas, gather
beside him. I inherit Gaea’s¹ wrath

as mother to him, still and quieted.
Time pardons none, not even the dead,
(more…)

Original post by intertextuality

Childish Fable

We built a two houses out of glass, steeled
Against the world to fight for class and style.
They stood tall amongst the skyline, a pair
To stand the test of time. But they fell prey
When a big bad man huffed and puffed, blowing
Them down; we wouldn’t stand for bullying.
But he went to hide away in his hole
A mocking retreat that echoed his howls
Of laughter as he dug in deep. Taunting
Videos have led to years of pitched tents
In uniform hills, chasing a tricky
Evil. Meanwhile we calculated a risky
Move to attack another wily beast
With heinous weapons yet to be released.
Like the woodsman, we caught him unawares,
Began huffing about, putting on airs
Conveniently forgetting all about
The first until a video comes out…
A disturbing nightmare one wishes gone
Something that we want to leave with the dawn.

Original post by klyphe

Marine’s Corps

The sand invaded my underwear weeks
Ago. Sweat is now a second skin; water’s
Become an odd rarity having slipped
And slid through most of my summers. A beach
Is exactly what this place needs with girls
In bikinis. Or at least calendars.
Grass would be nice, too. Trees and some god damn
Shade. Nothing could beat heat better than leaves.
Burnt yellow was the only color this place
Could make; flowers were only potted on
rooftops. Hidden away from a guy on
Riding up in a turret on a Humvee,
Watching for glints and flashes signaling
Danger. A bird flew overhead, landed
Front and center, rolling towards the truck.
It stopped, pulled-pin, a shadow on the ground.
I went down to greet it, give it a hug,
A long lost friend coming to take me home,
To leafy oaks next to enduring creeks
Away from sulfurous deserts and suns.

-Started writing this for an exercise in the Poetics Seminar, but it had other ideas… It’s not where I wanted to go with it necessarily, but it’s close.

Original post by klyphe

My sister sat there on the water’s edge, her toes stroking it over the dock. It was almost dusk and the sun was making its way down. The crickets create the percussion of the music outdoors, the sounds of rocking, chirping back and forth.  The fireflies add illuminate the scene. She sits there as thick air wraps around her. She stares towards the falling sun with its beautifully aligned colors of red, yellow, and orange. Like a painting on a fresh canvas it caresses the sky. She falls into a trance, into another place. A campfire in front of her with its screeching sounds. She envisions him, every aspect, his smell, his touch, his perfectly tanned body. He was hers, for a short time, but at least she had him at all. They were perfect for each other, inseparable. The memories she has are playing silently through her mind. He left just a few days ago, so stereotypically and cliché. The usual college transition summer. It wasn’t fair to her, the memories of the boats gliding on the water, and sitting on Uncle John’s rusty dock holding each other.  It was as if she was caught in his hazel, and comforting eyes. She was stuck in a moment of euphoria and didn’t want to let go; nothing went wrong when he was around.  A gust of cold wind crawled along her back; her feet hit the water as she flinched.  She stood up and bit by bit pried herself away from the dock. As she was walking she glanced back towards the water. She watched as each little ripple, each line faded into nothing. She realized now it was time to let it all go.

Original post by sfinn2id

I like to sell lies to kids in DUMBO,

but most of us call it paradise though.

Children believe they can find truth in grass.

They know Good/Evil with a vein of smack

that still holds the syringe that makes God

into a girl named Eve with hair so blond.

Instrumental was I in corruption

of Eve which led to exile from Brooklyn.

Her mate, Adam, too, met peril with Him,

Father of Eve is whom I’m referring.

The couple tried for so long to be chaste,

an infinite dowry from Him was this based.

Until a sultry Sunday they sauntered

up to my corner all hot and bothered,

sick of having all their knowledge cornered

by a man who paid rent and would warn them

“Take all in this borough that you can see

But leave the drugs to the sick-minded please.

If ever I catch you couple using,

Instantly you will find yourself moving.”

Now aside from Eve’s dabbles at Vassar

any prohibition will make passion,

which will lead to excess, unexpected

caress, of new dangers I elected

for quite a good price and some free advice,

“You peoples live different, you think you’re vice

free, but your apartment is dirty cash

bought and you didn’t even know.  So fresh.

You can learn all with a spoon and smile.”

Sad, they were too easy to beguile.

The father, omnipotent as he was,

Confronted the pair before morning buzz

of the city started to show and that

left time for Adam and Eve to catch a bus to Baltimore at 9.    

Original post by adamreadwrite

My laptop says that it will rain real hard.

The forecast is wrong.  This season of rain

Begs to earn its name in front of my eyes.

Jetlag ensnared my sleep and woke me up.

Thailand helps me meditate in the morn

While my children, and their children, sleep hard.

Seasons mean nothing; I’ve known that very long.

When I was 8 I rode on an airplane

That protected me from the storm outside.

The almanac said it would rain real hard.

My body leaked with sweat and I felt one

With the tempest that tortured the skyline.

I was in a dance perfectly synced with

The drops on the cool thick window near me.

My fever broke real hard and they used ice

From ladies drinks to cool me down real fast.

My lady and my son came to the porch.

I looked old and haggard because the rain

Would not come out and replenish the land.

The rain saw me and saw that I also

Laid in want, and my want to be known, came.

Original post by adamreadwrite