Crushing Krisis

Comic Books, Drag Race, & Life in New Zealand

poetry

Bad Teenage Poetry Blogging Day

by

Yesterday Rabi pointed out that Superlagirl had declared today to be bad teenage poetry blogging day, and issued a challenge for other bloggers to join her in participating.

Alright then, Rabi. I’ll see your four pieces of (debatably) bad teenage poetry and – against my better judgment – raise you my (less-debateably) bad teenage poetry website preserved in all of its framed glory, directly imported from Geocities.

Behold: Synonyms for Damage. Even the name is bad teenage poetry!

Honestly, I only reinstated it for the novelty of having it there – I wouldn’t encourage you to surf through it, as I will share the chief passages of note below.

[Read more…] about Bad Teenage Poetry Blogging Day

Tangible

by

Over at SongFight they have two particular side skirmishes that have been piquing my interest.

One is the Album a Day movement, where you do your best to write and record a 20-Minute EP in a single 24 hour period. Lots of SongFighters have joined the fray; the results i’ve heard have been mixed, with a lot of silly songs, but a a few keepers. I am sorely tempted to try it.

The second, starting on Friday, is Marathon Songs – where all the participants will write one song per day for sixteen days. The thought of recording and posting a song for sixteen straight days makes my head quiver and long to explode – this is, afterall, my year off from Blogathon. Still, i am intriqued by the thought of forcing out a product consistently for two weeks, especially as lately i am alternately convinced my songwriter gland has atrophied and afraid that i will never be able to record all of the dozen dozen songs i’ve got floating around.

That’s the crux of it, really. I have so many songs floating, and i am torn between forging onward into the unknown and holding back to work what i have into perfection. Hopefully the decision will be made easier by the shiny new guitar winging its way to me from Kansas City as we speak, but in the meantime i am warming up for either or both of the SF challenges, with my final decision on whether i participate or not coming on Friday.

So, yeah, basically what i’m trying to say is: here’s some shitty poetry.

I am thinking where am i
Georgia O'Keefe flowers keeping watch
Over my drip drop on the museum floor

I am soaking wet in Washington
Sixth and Pennsylvania
With four dollars in my pocket

     Lost here in the city
     I recognize each building
     That i have seen on teevee
     Could i be as real as these streets?

I was walking in New York City
Skirting the hole
Where buildings used to be

I was circling Central Park
Where teevee stars walk
But i don't know where i am really

     And lost then in the city
     Rabi seated across from me
     Could i be as real as those streets?
     As real as the buildings i once looked down from upon
     Now gone?

I am wondering who am i
Walking to your house
Wondering if i know where i begin
So many ends i've got figured out, but
The means to acheive is what i'm always missing

Dry now in Washington i know i'm as real as the streets
And that white house where all the dignitaries meet
As real as Georgia O'Keefe's
Lewdest flowers, hung for all the world to see

by

Simple Refrain

(or, Upon Reading ‘Ella Mason and Her Eleven Cats’)
I have learned to keep my secrets like Ella and her eleven cats,
As if shuttered against hurricane season and a gossiping ear.
People make queries that disregard the gender of the spinster created.
Though only words, for no good reason my answer takes forever
Because nothing is secret that is already heard.

I wrote a letter to Miss Sylvia in the shape of a song
While i was locked out of my house. My front step was a podium,
My pen a Pandora box. How could she have known that
I had just spent another sleepless night, ready to explode
A razor’s edge away from my fears?
Because nothing is secret that is already heard.

When i set that one down on paper
I was pretending my thoughts were clouds that fade away.
But i have found that if i keep them bottled up they distill down
To a simple refrain.

I’ve never really owned 11 of anything — maybe more
Or less, though. I can surely count my secrets on less than
Ten fingers and just one toe, but i’d rather just send them
Back Home.

https://crushingkrisis.com/2001/11/7259939/

by

Atlas

(after Plath’s Edge)

The mind is sleeping.
A mighty

Giant stands in quiet surrender,
The air of spartan arrangement

Is crisp in the curves of her muscles,
Her bare

Shoulders are claiming:
We will not topple over, i know.

Two gaping spaces stretched strangley silent
Each one in

A state of crumble, emptied.
She still holds

Her torch to light the same sky
Of steely jagged mountain majesties

stiff and resisting the
winds of change, cold of winter seeping in.

Her set lips reveal nothing,
Visage fixed on endless clouds beyond.

She is weary of the weight.
Her brow furrows, green.

https://crushingkrisis.com/2001/11/7259676/