Tag: free verse

In the Air

I will not make you a slave, you
will live in my 200-story castle where unicorn
servants will feed
you doughnuts off their horns. I will
personally make you
a throne that is half platnum
and half solid gold and jewel encrested.

Thankyou again for teaching us
about meteroligy, you’re
more awesome than a monkey
wearing a tuxedo
made out of bacon
riding a cyborg unicorn
with a lightsaber for the horn
on the tip of a space shuttle
closing in on Mars,
while ingulfed in flames.

A thank you note from a 9-year-old to a weatherman who visited his school, via the Metro, 15 March 2012. By Marika Rose.

Saying true things

I’m in love with you
and I’m not in the business
of denying myself
the simple pleasure of
saying
true
things
I’m in love with you
and I know that
love is just a shout
into the void
and that
oblivion is inevitable
and that
we’re all doomed
and that
there will come a day when
all our labor has been
returned
to
dust
and I know the sun
will swallow the only earth
we’ll ever have
and
I’m in love with you.

From The Fault in Our Stars. By Megan.

The moderate Finnish sauna

You should not slap
your neighbours without asking
their permission first.

The sauna is dear to me, almost sacred.
My father was born in one,
and his dying wish was to bathe 
in a sauna one last time.

Summer is the best time to go.
Strike a match, hear
the crackling of dry birch wood
as it is engulfed by the greedy flames,
then sit down on the steps
to ponder the ways of the world
and wait for the sauna to warm up.

Your body sighs with relief when the first
ladleful of water hits the sizzling stove.
The experience is topped off with a dive
into a pure, clear lake.
What else does a human being need?

Both senryu and main poem are from a piece about saunas by Olli Rehn, European Commissioner in charge of the Eurozone crisis.

Simon and Ruth

At first, Ruth was a bit put off
by the fact that Simon turned up in a car
with every imaginable gadget:
I wasn’t used to flash cars, she says.

Then, on a day out to the beach,
Simon messed up Ruth’s kite.
He got all the lines tangled
so I didn’t use it again, says Ruth,

who had, however, noticed
that Simon was very polite.

From the Announcements, Marriages and Engagements section of The Times, 18 February 2012. By Thom.

I am not even faintly like a rose

I am not even faintly like a rose.
I wasn’t even vaguely engaged.
I have been drunk just twice in my life.
I was standing beside his bed.
I was lying half asleep in the cold lower level
of the Pennsylvania Station.
I had been actually invited.
Most of the time I worked.
I felt a haunting loneliness sometimes.
I wasn’t actually in love.
I felt a sort of tender curiosity.
I am one of the few honest people
that I have ever known.
I was more annoyed than interested.
I don’t believe they heard a sound.
I stayed late that night.
I was reminded of something.
I wanted to get up and slap him on the back.
I was tempted to laugh whenever he opened his mouth.
I just remembered that today’s my birthday.
I was feeling a little sick and
I wanted to be alone.
I walked away and left him standing there.
I couldn’t sleep all night.
I didn’t want to go to the city.
I thanked him for his hospitality.
I wanted to get somebody for him.
I’m five years too old to lie to myself
and call it honor.
I turned away.
I went over.
I erased it.
There was nothing I could say.
I sat there, brooding on the old unknown world.

Nick Carraway’s confessions, as they appear chronologically in The Great Gatsby. By Gary.

Liber Amoris

To have crossed the Alps with me
to sail on sunny seas
to bask in Italian skies
to have visited Vevai and the rocks of Meillerie
and to have repeated to her on the spot
the story of Julia and St. Preux

She’s a strange, almost an inscrutable girl
It is all over, and I know my fate
its giant-shadow, clad in air and sunshine
my courage failed me
its enormous but graceful bulk
You are struck with the point of a rock
The truth is, I never saw anything like her

From Liber Amoris or the New Pygmalion by William Hazlitt, 1823. The text comes from the very end of Part II, ‘Letter the Last’, and the beginning of the first letter of Part III. By Grace Andreacchi.

Here

There is still snow on the trees; it is that kind of snow.
One sees it out of the windows here
like some extraordinary garden.
It is the kind of snowfall about which girls write verse.

There is an uncommon silence
when I walk Federico to the school bus.
The light is eclipsed and lovely.
One wants to see it all so clearly.

From a journal entry by John Cheever in 1968. The Journals of John Cheever (Vintage Classics, 2010, first pub. 1991), p. 244. Submitted by Thom.

Swimming a Horse

During seasons of high water, men,
in traversing the plains,
often encounter rivers which rise above
the fording stage, and remain in that condition
for many days, and to await the falling of the water
might involve a great loss of time.

If the traveler be alone, his only way is
to swim his horse; but if he retains
the seat on his saddle,
his weight presses the animal
down into the water,
and cramps his movements very sensibly.

It is a much better plan
to attach a cord to the bridle bit,
and drive him into the stream; then,
seizing his tail, allow him to tow you across.
If he turns out of the course, or attempts to turn back,
he can be checked with the cord, or
by splashing water at his head.

If the rider remains in the saddle,
he should allow the horse to have a loose
rein, and never pull upon it
except when necessary to guide.
If he wishes to steady himself, he can
lay hold upon the mane.

From The Prairie Traveler by Randolph B. Marcy (Perigree Books, 1994, first pub. 1859), pp.62-63. Submitted by Alexa.