Tuesday, June 8, 2010

- Blanks -


Sorry for the sudden disappearance.. Blame it on the writer's block!!
It seems Insipiration with a capital "I" will only hit me when it wants to...
But it did the other day, and so here you are with my latest (and no so much polished) creation.. about lack of Inspiration.
(The English lit lovers will recognize some references to Keats and his Ode to a Nightingale here)


Tributes to Inspiration

Listen Listen.
To the Negative Immortal,
Casting soliloquies
Upon the world.
Dreamer hidden behind
A metaphysical mystery,
A stifled cry of romance.
And so I ask you: what of the promised vintage,
Cooled in the cold catacombs of dirt?
The sweet taste of Flora
Has been drunk by the worms,
So it seems…
And the voyage that brushed my lips
Has fled to kiss another.
Soft wings of Poesy,
You have left without me,
So it seems…

A mixture of thoughts,
Mingled with blushes
And blooms
Of imagination.
Is this a crack in the back of my head?
The mixture dances, flutters,
Flows. Flows out
On to the dark and cold
Concrete ground of life.

Precious thoughts,
You have been stained with the dust,
Sombre plague of City.
One could feel the moss under a dreamer’s feet
As he swoons to the song
Of a Nightingale.
Hear now, the panting presence
Of humanity, sucking on emerald
The last bits and pieces
Of a dying Nature.

I stretch tired fingers and
Touch, feeling the youth
Of soft cold grass.
There, the footprints
of heartbroken phantoms,
Who have bowed one last time
to the bellowing crowd,
Thrown out a kiss to one
And many lovers,
And disappeared..
Gone into the unknown, the Belle Dame’s lair
Trading a tear for Merci
So it seems…

Tracing out the wet contours
of broken pasts,
Let the sharpness strike me,
Nurse my thoughts back to health.
Will it seem,
I find Inspiration?

Wednesday, April 14, 2010

Inspiration in the laundry room




Sorry for the late post, I'm quite busy with exams right now, and I have to say the whole blog thing is quite new to me... so all my apologies. I swear there will be more writing on the way once these hell-like weeks have come and gone :)


I was actually revising for American Literature two days ago (still am...), reading Allen Ginsberg's Howl. Really loved his style and imagery: it's all so explicit, tension-filled and harsh that it makes it inebriating... I almost came into this kind of trance reading it haha... ok maybe not to that extent, but it really is powerful stuff.

So, while doing my laundry at 11 pm and reading Ginsberg's endless strings of verse, I was suddenly struck with an idea for a poem, and (having no paper or pen), typed it up on my phone (it took up 5 notes haha).
So here you go ladies and gents:


Hibernation of Broken Hearts


I.
Your majesty always wins.
And I dig with dirty nails the wet ground of our field,
Letting the jazz drip through my pores,
And sip my soul…
A velvet wine indeed.
I am now one with the world –
Music and dirt will choke me to comfort.

You cannot reach me here, too high up with disdain;
Pinned to your cloudless ceiling of perfect.
So let it be this way:
Your majesty strapped, securely in himself,
And I, the underground worm,
Who yet again could not reach for the stars.
C’est comme cela, “Verre de terre amoureux d’une étoile”

But your stellar ego was cold anyways,
It had frozen my heart.
When, ice skating on the lake,
You did not come…
No, busy dancing, pulsing to a narcotic tune of novocaine,
And rave…
Oh, rêve! Rêve d’être avec vous, mais vous n’êtes pas venu.
No, the French are condemned to scribble away crystal tears,
Tears of muddy dirt and A-minors.

But the laundry is done now, and everything else has yet to start.
So earthworm looks up: Day, at the Sun.
Night: at your cold and distant victory.
I can’t help desiring,
For a sudden Supernova…

II.
As I crawl this way,
Hear the cat-like purrs of this and that.
Your eyes twist in an invisible stare,
Forcing me back, underground:
Non, je ne veux pas te voir.
But didn’t you see the beating red sign in my chest?
The one that cried: “Beware! Repressing emotion can lead to explosion!”

But, too late… too late.
The Supernova has wiped out my world;
Nest of earth and jazz now all turned to putrefaction,
Decay.
And warning sign,
Blown away.
Mais pas vous, votre majesté,
Your pulsing heart keeps beating,
Yet… beating for another.

As you turn on the news,
Hear the buzz of grey channels:
“After investigation, a broken heart was found to have caused the explosion…”
And mute. The grey turns black.
It’s the same refrain for everyone anyways,
A myriad of moans in A-minor.

III.
But this they did not know:
What is broken can mend,
A scarred soul growing from the dirt,
In spring; with fingers and eyes,
And stems and leaves.
And dirt-coloured petals,
Pointing up at your cold distant star
In an uncanny grin…
Fingers now strum away on strings
Of different hearts;
And I sing in A-major.



Just a little note: I kind of used personal material for this poem, so some might understand what I'm talking about (with the similarities to real life and all).. And I'm sorry if it sounds accusatory, bitter or resentful; it's not really. I just needed something to help me get rid of these emotions. And it all came down to words.

Photo by Phinou

Tuesday, April 6, 2010

Paradise Lost


Fudge... I'm supposed to be writing an essay on irony in Dickens and Browning, yet here I am... But hey, re-reading my old stuff whilst listening to distant thunder and tip tap of the rain on my window is way more appealing ;)
This, ladies and gentlemen, is my masterpiece haha. Wrote it for a 11th grade assignment, an English oral exam actually. Little description of the context: in Book II of Paradise Lost, by John Milton, the demons and followers of Satan sit down in Pandemonium, debating on how to take revenge on God. I invented my own demon god, and created his very own speech on how to defeat Heaven. Boo yeah.
Ok so it ain't iambic pentameter, but I still got kick-ass rhymes.

Paraphrasing of what my dear Callidio is saying:
The fallen angels should wait a very long time for the inhabitants of Heaven to forget their existence. During these years, they will create a new army, preparing for a surprise attack against Heaven.
When the attack date approaches, the bravest rebel angel will carry a flask containing water from the river of Hell, Lethe. He will penetrate Heaven secretly, tiping the contents of this flask into any one of God’s drinks, and make sure it has been drunk completely. If the plan works, than God will lose all memories of his past, forgetting his identity and his strength, as these are the effects of Lethe’s waters.
The rebel angels, who have been waiting for the signal (crystal flask falling), will attack Heaven: it will be an easy victory since Heaven's angels are left with a confused and powerless leader.


Callidio’s Speech: (l. 298 of Book 2)
Callidio, after Mammon’s sage speech, was next to rise
And as he stood, silence was the fruit of all’s surprise.
Small as he was, this angel was never noticed,
In the shadows of his superiors, he practiced,
As Heaven’s angels knew his head was an endless storm,
Where incredible ideas and plans were bound to form.
And as he started to share his scheme, complex and grim
Gleaming eyes and open ears were all turned to him:
“My brothers, I partly agree with Mammon’s thought,
Nevertheless, much more action needs to be brought.
We cannot live eternally in this pain and gloom,
We will become the lifeless creatures of this doom!
I propose that we overcome our fear of Him,
The terror and fright in which we endlessly swim.
In this place of darkness runs a stream called Lethe,
Its black water flowing to surface from underneath,
One draught of its water can erase one’s memories,
He cannot be awaken by any dreams or stories.
A small flask containing this water shall be kept,
And you will later on understand this concept.
We will wait, my brothers, together in this place,
And many years or centuries we are to face,
In this dark and indefinable place called Hell.
We are to wait until they are unable to tell,
With whom they led a battle many years ago,
And where their enemies were thrown, deep down below,
Beneath Chaos, beneath all light and living beings,
In a boundless prison forbidding all feelings.
They will fully forget our names and faces,
Our existence will be erased from all places,
And we will be free to attack them by surprise,
Make these unbearable feelings, in their chest, rise.
This battle is to be, once and for all, the last,
We have to be victorious in more than one blast,
We have to create an invincible army,
One that will make these angels forever sorry,
Sorry to have thrown us in this black endless pit!
For this to work, in two equal teams we shall split:
One will find a way out of our current prison,
That will lead to His own kingdom, Him in person,
While the other creates new weapons and tactics,
Preparing strong new soldiers, learning the basics,
As we are to win this battle in just one stroke,
So your greatest courage and strength I now invoke.
When the time has finally come for us to attack,
When, in their minds, our faces are nothing but black,
The bravest of angels will be sent to Heaven,
He will penetrate the place on the time given.
He has to be unnoticed by any angel,
Frequently hiding, till he reaches His temple,
And, taking the flask, into His drink it shall pour.
Now this, my brothers, will be the start of our war.
As the wicked fluid will slowly touch His lips,
Our enemy will forget after a few sips,
Every person that ever entered his mind,
Every great power he has, leaving him blind.
If victorious, the angel will cast the signal,
Letting the flask drop until shatters the crystal,
For all the revengeful rebel soldiers of Hell,
To come out of the prison in which they had fell.
They will all rise at once, like one cloud of sharp spears,
They will leave no time for Heaven to shed any tears.
And, destroying all angel who lies in our path,
We shall take our revenge by pouring this blood bath!
With a clueless leader, fully confused and weak,
The angels of Heaven will have no words to speak,
And no fight to lead, without orders or training,
Defeat, in their mouths, is the last word remaining.
This is, my brothers, the plan I suggest to you,
May my leaders honor me by thinking it through.

Well if you made it to the end, Bravo ;)
Kick-ass speech then? Well.. you tell me!

The Dream


This is the most recent one... Sadly it dates back from December, before leaving for Christmas break, so yes it's been a while since I haven't written anything hehe.
But now that I've got this going on, I'm pretty sure I will...


For my little sister

- Dream -

Tonight, she will close her eyes,

And let the oblivion take her.

Simple embrace, yet lifted up to the edges -

She touches the sharp borders of the universe.


Oh, but a cut – murky substance oozing out,

Brings her down to the depths of Ocean.


The drowning pressure of the universe,

Black and black… She opens her eyes -

And there she sits on top of the world.


Vast white lakes of cotton clouds,

And the bitter touch of Wind…

Sober from those crushing shadows, you now

Shout to him you’re inebriated.


Drunk with cold caressing kisses,

All she can do is beg for more.

Frosty lips will lock her eyes,

And make this one night the last.


But she calls for the sun,

And consumes all of Wind.

Now drunken with sky,

Warm rays melt her icy prison.


Suddenly, it is all just a blank mind;

The silence makes her shudder…

Yet it takes a simple bat of eyelash,

To make it start all over again.


Photo: Phinou completement photoshopée ;) t'es belle quand meme..