Messages

76

Poetry and Artistic Writing / Re: Andalus' poetry

« on: January 26, 2012, 04:01:12 PM »

Twisted

There is a beauty still in ugliness,
The eyes must open twice to see.
In the absence of perfectedness,
In all the lack of symmetry.
In the suffering and twistedness,
In phobic visions dark and cold,
There is a beauty still in ugliness,
That shines through from the soul.

77

General Chatter - The Boozer / Re: Workshop Booze Up IV - This one's got a V in the number!

« on: January 26, 2012, 03:08:40 PM »

Are you kidding? If we lost Jubal this site wouldn't last through the end of the week.

Neither would Portugal.

78

Poetry and Artistic Writing / Re: Andalus' poetry

« on: January 19, 2012, 04:21:03 PM »

Yellow Lines

I snatched two yellow wax crayons,
Strapped them around a two pence coin,
I slashed them across the tarmac,
From roundabout to three-way junction,
I striped two violent yellow wounds,
Strewed ribbons down a one-way street,
I laughed and lit the yellow wick
And beat my quick retreat.

79

General Chatter - The Boozer / Re: Workshop Booze Up VI - This one's got a V in the number!

« on: January 16, 2012, 08:02:38 PM »

Maybe the WBUs are to be organised by triangle numbers from now on?

80

General Chatter - The Boozer / Re: Playlist

« on: January 14, 2012, 03:28:22 PM »

Soundtrack to Red Cliff. One of my favourite films, with such beautiful and stirring music.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LBUet65RMvM

81

Announcements! The Town Crier! / Re: A Triumph for Andalus!

« on: January 14, 2012, 03:24:42 PM »

I'm not entirely sure what just happened, but hurrah, much thankings!

So do I get the freedom of Exilian for the day or something?

82

Poetry and Artistic Writing / Re: Andalus' poetry

« on: January 12, 2012, 04:57:26 PM »

I love poems about bridges. I don't know why, but they always seem to be the very best of topics. 

Ha, that does seem to be true.

Fingerless Gloves

To turn the page of a book
I can read in the dark.
To cover the holes of the flute
And awaken the mute metal.
To feel the bark of the twig,
Read the stumps of gone leaves
Where new life will spring,
And sing, come spring.

Fingers of life, like light,
Like claws reaching out wide,
Ripping out fabric eyelids,
Tearing out my blind eyes,
And wiping away disgrace
From the eyeless face.

83

Poetry and Artistic Writing / Re: Andalus' poetry

« on: January 05, 2012, 04:05:06 PM »

Something Like Ice

A parade of white flecks swills
And among the current swirls,
And flies, escaping downstream,
Rising from beneath to breath its steam,
Against the stones of the pillars
That carry the Usk bridge aloft,
In triumph across the conquered span.

The river rushes too rapid
To falter and freeze to ice,
Even for a hesitant moment,
To be broken and fragmented,
To meet defeat and demise
Before the gathering swell,
To barely rise before it fell.

The river rushes strong and wide,
On its road the dancing column, white,
In undisciplined formation, ragged,
On the surge of the water, carried
From the stones of the pillars
That carry the Rhine bridge aloft,
In triumph across the conquered span.

These stones of the pillars,
Tied together with mortar,
They whisper to each other,
And the daughter they bear
"Remember, mighty Caesar,
"Thou art mortal, beware!"

84

Poetry and Artistic Writing / Re: Jubal's poems

« on: January 05, 2012, 04:01:00 PM »

Nice one! Very old-timey feel to it.

Though - "All with pistol with and powder," - should that be 'and with'?

85

Poetry and Artistic Writing / Re: Andalus' poetry

« on: December 29, 2011, 03:40:54 PM »

This one still has much room for improvement, but I want to post it while it is still topical.

Sirens on Christmas Day

The first one came during dinnertime,
A police car screaming by.
It's all we can hear in here
Of the world that hides out there.
The blue siren jeered
And faded away to arrest the criminal,
The serial cat burglar
Stuck in someone's chimney.

Once gone, Sunday silence screamed louder
As I emptied the peelings of parsnips,
Sprouts, carrots, potatoes, onions,
Into the black vats of garden rot
And quick retreated back inside,
To unwrap my cracker in silence,
The snapping fuse untouched,
As I prised out the plastic tweezers.

Later, as we slumped
Among shimmering, unfolded paper
And the peelings of tape,
A second racer came,
An ambulance, this time.
The slower, dirging wail,
For someone's lonely granny,
Choking on a wishbone.

I'm still waiting for the fire engine
To extinguish the inferno
That wreaths the house next door
With strings and wire antlers,
And to douse the firestorm
Started in a carpenter's workshop,
A blameless candle upset
By a juddering, misplaced nail.

86

Poetry and Artistic Writing / Re: Jubal's poems

« on: December 29, 2011, 03:32:44 PM »

Probably the best I've read from you, Jubal! Amusing and beautiful.

87

General Chatter - The Boozer / Re: Workshop Booze Up III - GO GO GO!

« on: December 22, 2011, 06:17:48 PM »

It's almost heart-warming to think that there might be a little flaming chair of eternal torment down there that already has my name on it. 

I think it might be warming a bit more than your heart.

88

Poetry and Artistic Writing / Re: Andalus' poetry

« on: December 22, 2011, 04:04:18 PM »

Clockwork

Earlier today, I bought a wooden clockwork clock,
Prized away from the dusty shelf in a cluttered charity shop.
Now I see it still says two and the crooked hands still stay
Where I left them, when I set them, earlier today.
So it seems this clock doesn't work and refuses to sing
With a tick or a tock - but it's still a pretty thing.

89

Poetry and Artistic Writing / Re: Andalus' poetry

« on: December 15, 2011, 05:51:06 PM »

Leaves

Sleeping on water, just as on dry ground,
The leaves do not care for where they are found.
They fly only because they've been set free,
To roam, find any home away from the tree.

90

Poetry and Artistic Writing / Re: Andalus' poetry

« on: December 08, 2011, 10:32:15 PM »

Evening's Flight

The evening falters away, backstepping
Nervously into the night,
Tearfully, unwillingly,
As the nightingale weeps goodbye.
The dusk is afraid of the dark,
Flickering like a hummingbird,
Like Ingrid Bergman stuck in pause,
Trying to turn away.

An echo etched into a woodcut,
Rolled out in black and white
And smudged, that farewell across the pale,
Trembling horizon,
Running down in sobbing sunset,
As the evening flees away.
The last fingers of light linger
And clouds slip over the glass moon
That's left behind.