"Read Me," Ophelia Dimalanta

[lonelybusiness.livejournal.com]

Read Me
--Ophelia Dimalanta


whenever my voice flings arrows
your way at a fiery pace,
read, discover there is that
something in me that dies to go gentle.
for when i viciously tangle
with you trying to throw
you off course, inside, i am raring
to cover you, take you, become
all of me fire and fluid.
when i try to lord it over, empowered,
it is because inside i am already
slave groveling ready to heed your bidding,
crawling waves lapping you up
sea shore hillocks sky
all the way up, all drool and drivel.
and when i insolently seek out
pulpits to mount my gospel truths,
i am really one humped question mark
thrashing about for your steadying light.
and when i try to light you up whole,
there is really a part of your flame
i would want extinguished
to die rekindled in me alone,
and when i am wind taking roots
in your solid ground, i am roots as well
ready to take flight upon your wings.
when i prance around proud in times square.
i am child carousing in the greener
fringes of the heart's final roosting.

read this idiolect,
read well, decode, detect,
and love me when i seem to hate.



Rest In Peace, Ma'am Ophelia.

Friends' Photos by Ruth Fainlight

[thefairyreel.livejournal.com]

We all looked like goddesses
and gods, glowing and smooth, sheathed
from head to foot by a golden essence
that glistens and refracted its aura
of power- the wonderful ichor called youth.

We moved as easily as dolphins
surging out of the ocean,
cleaving massed tons of transparent water
streaming away in swathes of bubbling
Silver like the plasm of life.

Still potent from those black and white
photos, the palpable electric
charge between us, like the negative
and positive poles of a battery,
or the fingers of Adam and God.

We were beautiful, without exception.
I could hardly bear to look at those
old albums, to see the lost glamour
we never noticed when we were
first together- when we were young.


and a request - could anybody recommend poems on advertising, status, consumerism or youth culture? am writing a paper for a module on interpreting consumerism and am trying to cast a wide net to find something I'm interested in to work with. Thank you in advance!

request

[stitchesandlace.livejournal.com]

Hi :)

I'm looking for poems that deal with falling for someone when you know it can't work out, or poems about long distance relationships.

Not really looking for unrequited love, but poems that are kind of like a relationship that has everything stacked against it from the get go, especially distance.

Thanks so much!

A Quoi Bon Dire by Charlotte Mew and a request

[honorat.livejournal.com]

A Quoi Bon Dire
by Charlotte Mew

Seventeen years ago you said
Something that sounded like Good-bye;
And everybody thinks that you are dead,
But I.

So I, as I grow stiff and cold
To this and that say Good-bye too;
And everybody sees that I am old
But you.

And one fine morning in a sunny lane
Some boy and girl will meet and kiss and swear
That nobody can love their way again
While over there
You will have smiled, I shall have tossed your hair.

Unrelated Request: I'm looking for poems that are critical of or satirical about cultural or societal expectations or stereotypes for female beauty. I've got Shakespeare's Sonnet 130 and "Slip of the Tongue" by Adriel Luis, but I'd like a few more examples.

A request!

[delete-the-star.livejournal.com]

Hi wonderful poetry friends, I have a request! I'm hosting an event tomorrow called All Souls, No Pants (you can learn about it here: www.turnthepageonpants.com) which has an All Souls/Dia de los Muertos theme. I'm looking for poetry about death or dying, the afterlife, etc, etc. Can you help me out? Thank you!