Thanks! It's pleasure to be analyzed by you. I would say also that the "original" wording at the end of the stanza could be called a bit pretentious ("diluvian laughter"). But I'm not sure which version I like better.
DWill

I owe the writing of this to booktalk. It expresses the anxiety I have felt about some of my postings. But a feeling of talking and really exchanging ideas with people in this format has lured me beyond myself. So this is for all of you.

Note to Self: Stay Safe

You have to flicker
like a flame
shifting sharp shapes,
never fully formed
--not solid; not fulfilled --
uncaught, unkilled,
unarmed and unalarmed,
Unconquered Empress of Escapes,
oh, but burn The Name.
Go lighter, quicker.

Be sight unseen, too hot to touch
a mind awake inside a dream
obscure as steam in steam.
No eye can catch,
retain your glance enslaved,
no, nor mind make fixed
by lovely lines engraved
the fire of you beyond the match,
the dance beyond the dancer flexed,
mass matrixed out of all firm muscle,
struck to the basic boneless strength beyond.
When you feel flesh becoming fond
of you, relax right through,
without a tussle or a wrestle
flash you free, no never nestle; stay strong,
go limp, go leaden -- go -- you can't go wrong
unless you fail to go
a second split before you know.

Nice ending GentleReader!

you can't go wrong
unless you fail to go

Here's a piece I've been playing around with.


with her name
you built a white picket fence
between us
through which we sometimes
hold hands

Hi, Saffron!

Here is the poem I promised from the end of the thread on "the poem of the moment." It could be read to bear a coincidental relationship to the last (very interesting, but I didn't know what to say) poem you posted in this thread, too, as it turns out. Hmm. I "say more than I know," like those ancient pagans as read by Augustine!

(A love poem to Saffron, whom I suspect of having been a little blond Quaker girl once upon a time)


Tag-You're-It

I spy with my inner eye
The flowing, shining, scattering
Of little blond Quaker girls, barely
Putting weight on gazelle-delicate
Legs across an open meadow.
And I (a wavering shadow
Stretched late and long to swell the elegant
Ranks with chiaroscuro shades) I rarely
Grazed their lacy edges. Cheerily chattering,
We are..........clattering
Higher,..........higher,
To the..........First Day
School...........(I sing:)
If I could touch the hem of her garment
I know I could be made whole then.
'Twas the simple gift of little golden Friends
To let me play at all, odd bird in every flock.
Saffron, did you run among the Heathen with a pack
Like that, or are you quietly inclusive by convincement?

I've been browsing the poetry forum for a couple days, thanks all.
I'm not a poet, nor a writer of any kind. This is just a moment in time, a feeling, fleeting, gone, and I know the ending is poor, but I put it there in frustation and it stuck, I couldn't change it.


The demon within my soul
Wanders around from room to room
Trailing fingers of lust and longing
Lingering, forgotten hallways
One by one I shut the doors
Firmly, resolutely
Trapping him down deep in the bowels
Miles of twists and turns
Blind and lost, searching
He sends out calls
Cell to cell, vessel to vessel
Ignore the SOS, false, misleading
Avoid, a void, void
Shit, I can't

Realiz: So glad you posted. I think it takes a lot of courage to put up an original piece. And you say you are an accountant? I guess you do more than numbers.

Yeah, Realiz, I concur with Saffron. I enjoyed reading that. Thanks.
DWill

GentleReader9 wrote: Saffron, did you run among the Heathen with a pack
Like that, or are you quietly inclusive by convincement?

Hey GR9,
Thank you most sincerely. What an honor to have a poem composed for me. I can not tell a lie -- I was blond and did run wild in a pack, but a Catholic school girl in a plaid uniform with a matching beanie (that is before I lost it). I began attending Quaker meeting about 11 or 12 years ago. My three girls, blonds all, ran and sang in First Day School. They still like to sing a funny little song about George Fox and his shaggy, shaggy locks (Walk In The Light).

I like this game of tag we are playing!

Saffron

Yay, realiz ! Another person contributing the to the poetry strings! Welcome, realiz, and a warm welcome to your demon, too. He may feel very lost inside your poem's virtual body, but he has the good company of those who wish him only the very best home here. Thanks for introducing him to us. I haven't forgotten that you agreed to recognize me as a Heathen, so you contributed to my poem to Saffron, too, with your encouragement.

Saffron, I've heard the George Fox song, too, although I'm kind of rusty on the words; is it, "Walk in the Light wherever you may be. Walk in the Light wherever you may be. 'With my old leather britches and my shaggy, shaggy locks, I am walking in the glory of the Light,' said Fox." Or is it some other kind of old "whiskers," not "britches"? It cannot possibly be "old leather whiskers." He was a free spirit, but not that strange. I sometimes hallucinate alternative lyrics to songs I haven't sung in a while. There are verses about his not swearing on the Bible because, "the Word's more important than the book to me," and not fighting with a sword. Not one of my most favorite sacred songs, apparently. I like "That Cause Can Neither Be Lost Nor Stayed." I will post its lyrics under the song in your heart string in case you don't know it. Some older Quaker will know it and be able to sing you the tune.