Invictus by William Ernest Henley

Guided Adventures by Robert Earl Hoffman

Popcorn is Poppin' Out the Poetry

It takes a lot to get Brittney to say that poetry is cool...

but this kid earns the Brittney Seal of Approval!

Alfred Noyes: The Highwayman

Alfred Noyes stopped by Nervous Norvis' café last night to have a cup of tea and recite his famous poem, The Highwayman for the crowd.

Beavis and Butthead showed their support for Noyes' work. Butthead stated "and then, my friend, you die," followed by Beavis' enthusiastic assertion of "you die!"

Noyes invited the fellows to join him for tea, but Beavis said they'd prefer a Crappuccino. They enjoyed reciting poetry until the next morning when the caffeine finally wore off.

Tom Thumb

for

FOGNL/UNDEAD Arts and Culture Beat

A Tribute to Lou Reed

March 2, 1942 – October 27, 2013

I wish more people
Were vicious like Lou
We should all strive to be
As intolerant too

Lou was one of a kind
His tunes may be imitated
But his heart, soul, and mind
Can't be duplicated

Still, it would be nice
If we all could just be
So vicious like Lou
And just let others be

Love,
Tempest

No Quarter

Note: I am currently in quite a low place emotionally, and this poem is what was inspired by the 100 Word Song challenge. If the only thing you have to say is to tell me that I "shouldn't" feel how I'm feeling, then kindly fuck right off. I am feeling how I'm feeling, and I don't have the patience to argue with the sort who wants to sanctimoniously lecture me about it.

I've found in my long and often difficult life that the people who want to tell a sad or angry person to stop feeling that way have gleaned some sort of uncomfortable truth from said individual's work. I've got some bad news for you, Sunshine. Life is not always a happy place, and there are some for whom it's always a struggle. If you can acknowledge that with an open mind, read on. Otherwise, go here.

No Quarter

When you are

Middle aged

Mentally ill

And

Badly Broke

You realize

That there are no

Opportunities

For those like you

To triumph

Ever

You stop trying

Because you can never triumph

You stop sharing

Because the only thing that happens

To the words you share

Is that they are torn down

Love is meant for beauty queens

And opportunities

Are only given

To those who meet certain qualifications

Agreed upon by a shallow

Youth-oriented

Society

I learned the truth at seventeen

But fueled by denial

I hoped that the bleeding hearts and artists

Would embrace me

It never happened

~Tempest~

Wasted Moments

Wasted Moments

Warning: Post contains NSFW image (nonsexual nudity)

You told me you didn't care

About the size

Of my thighs

That you loved me fat or thin

But my dear, you couldn't win

Against hate so internalized

You said you wanted to see me

But I turned out the lights

We could only make love at night

I despised the body I had

Taught from day one that fat is bad

What I am just wasn't all right

I wasted so much time

Hating myself

Wanting to be someone else

I regret those wasted moments

Blinded by internal torment

Instead of celebrating ourselves

My body is what it is

~Yeris~

Dedicating this to my husband, who will be gone 11 years this February

An amazing photographer who sees the beauty in various body types

This is the body type that I have, and this woman actually looks quite a bit like a younger version of me. 

I never hated other fat people. 

I never used to be able to say the word "fat" without thinking of it as an insult.

I so feared being seen as fat that I did some very damaging things to myself in my younger years to stay thin, although I was never really thin.

With less time and more kids, I became heavier.

This happens to a lot of us, and it isn't something we should be ashamed of. It's just nature.

I only learned in the past few years just how much damage the diet industry does to people. They pull in billions of dollars every year selling shame and self-hate. I refuse to be part of it any more. I thank the friends who introduced me to Health at Every Size and Size Acceptance.

These days I like to look at photos of larger women, either nude or in beautiful clothes, to help remind myself that there's nothing wrong with the body I have.

This is one of my favorite blogs:

Fat Girl Posing

A Likely Epitaph

Fun tombstone found here

A Likely Epitaph

Here lies Wanda Bates

The lady who waits

She didn't get what she was wantin'

So she's comin' back a-hauntin'

~Wanda~

My Poetic Friends

 

Edgar, the Raven and I

Hang out in dark places

Sometimes with black cats

Sometimes with unquiet spirits

 

Visit the artist

 

Howard and I

Try to ignore the rats in the walls

As we search the eldritch lore

For inspiration for our work

 

 

Dylan and I

Feel the pain of our fellows

Sometimes too deeply

 

 

e.e. and i

try to remind the world

not to take itself

too terribly seriously

 

 

Christina and I

Escaped the goblin market

But cannot escape the pain

Of loves gone wrong

 

 

Though life may go wrong in so many ways

The words of my poetic friends

I'll have with me through all of my days

 

~Opal~

 

 

Daring By the Numbers

 

Daring By the Numbers

 

1

 

Some people think me daring

Though I never sailed the straits of Bering

Nor did I ever meet Mr. Behring

Or battle Mr. Goering

I might be prone to fits of swearing

If I slip on a ball bearing

I occasionally fish for lake herring

And spice up my writing with red herring

 

2

 

Do you believe yourself daring?

Your scrutiny is unsparing

You enjoy making people sad

Tearing down what makes them glad

Your attitude is very bad

I think you to be a cad

Who always follows the latest fad

Your meanness makes me mad

I'd like to set up nets of snaring

And feed you to the king herring

 

3

 

I

am not

sexy hot

or daring cool

I'm not a pepper pot

But I just might take you to school

Maybe you should go jump into the pool

You think you're a truly irresistible guy

I think you make yourself look like a fool

You get off on being cruel

Trapping hearts in your knot

Lord of misrule

caring not

soul rot

lie

 

~Tempest~

 



To My Father

 

To My Father

 

His name was Richard

He was a high school English teacher

He loved to work on cars

And motorcycles

He loved his wife and son and daughters

 

Its name is prostate cancer

It slowly stole away his life

Turning him into a shadow of his former self

But it never was able to take away

The love he had for his family

 

Or the love we have for him

 

~Wanda~

 

Richard Bates

September 10 1932 - August 28 2004

Holiday

 

Holiday

 

A holiday is

Relaxing at last with those

Whom I love the most

 

~Aurora~

 

 

I'm sorry, I wasn't feeling tremendously creative. So I wanted to get right to the point and say it all in as few words as possible!



Unlock the Penitentiary

Unlock the Penitentiary

Will there ever come a day when we can really be free

From the penitentiary of hate

If you say “I’m gay”

People should say “that’s okay”

Or if you happen to be fat

Fat’s where it’s at

We judge each other too much

On things that really don’t matter

I’d like for the day to come

When no one

Hates who they are

I want to see the day

When bullying someone for the way they look

Or who they love

Is what gets a person ostracized

I never again want to see

Anyone’s brains splattered on the wall

~Adam~

A response to the Citizen Cope song "Penitentiary"

Well I'm waiting on the day

When the people walk free to see

When the penitentiary is on fire

When there's no need

To bleed

For your mother or your brother

Or the one that bomes before you whoa

Well I'm waiting on a time when people walk free to see

From the penitentiary in our mind

When there's no need to bleed

For your father

Or your son

Or the one that you've become

When the penitentiary is on fire

When the penitentiary is on fire

I'm waiting on the day

When the people walk free to see

When the penitentiary is on fire

there's no need

To bleed

For your father or your son

Or the one that you've become and a

I'm waiting on a time when people walk

free to see

when the penitentiary in our mind

there's no need to bleed

For your mother

Or your brother

or the one that come before ya yea

When the penitentiary is on fire

When the penitentiary is on fire

When the penitentiary is on fire

When the penitentiary is on fire

My Wish

My Wish

Things are going well for me

I'm happy in my career

I've found the love of my life

I like the place where I live

I miss my dad, my uncle, and my little grand-nephew, who was only with us for a short time

The rest of my family is doing okay for the most part

But some of them are struggling

I wish I could do more to help my loved ones whose lives aren't going as well

Who are mired in depression and dissatisfaction

Who have been faced with overwhelming change

I wish I had the means to take your pain away

I sometimes feel so helpless

But my sympathetic tears

Have no magic powers

I can offer you a shoulder to cry on

I don't have the monetary means to do more

Than buy you a sandwich now and then

I wish I did

I can give you advice, for what it's worth

But I can't take away your depression

I can't heal the illnesses that you can't afford to see the doctor for

These days, a dollar doesn't go very far

We're all struggling

I just wish you didn't have to struggle so hard

I wish it were easier to change jobs

So those of you who have come to hate yours

Could find a different line of work

I wish that education didn't cost so much

So you could train for something new

I wish I could wish on every star

And bring each of you what you needed most

I wish we could all speak to our loved ones in Heaven

And know that they're okay

I wish we could all mend fences

Heal wounds

Have second and third and fourth chances at happiness

Know that we're worthwhile

No matter where we live or what we drive

I wish I could give all of you happiness

For that is the most important thing of all

~Adam~

Overwhelmed

Overwhelmed

(the prompt is numbers)

I

just want 

everything

to stop, just stop

life is killing me

its simply too much for 

me to endure it any

one thing leads to another

and yet another and then there's more

please can't somebody make it stop for

just a little while please can't somebody hit

the switch there's got to be a switch oh Gods why is

there no switch I think this must be hell I know it is

a hell of my own making I wish I'd been more

careful with my choices and listened to my

heart instead of the voices of those who

claimed they knew what I should do because

now I'm stuck and there doesn't seem

to be any escape for

this rat trapped in the race

which can only end

when her life is

spent and she

at last

dies

~Helena~

Can you guess where the numbers are?

It's ascending and descending syllable counts!

Sir Microscope

This isn't my best effort, but it's what came to mind. The word prompt is "micro," and I remembered a certain incident. It came to me, like a flash, like a vision. I just wrote it down.

Sir Microscope

A guy at school

Flashed me

I then dubbed him Sir Microscope

Guess why.

~Faycin A Croud~

Dangerous Folly

There are those who would like

To keep others locked away

Or worse

Because the color of their skin

Does not match that 

Of the fool who thinks they know better

Than the creator

The way another person should appear

There are fools who would dictate

That anyone who does not think the way they do

Who does not believe the way they do

Who does not love the way they do

Is not entitled to certain rights

Perhaps including the right to life

Some fools think that a woman

Who refuses to be demure and obedient

Is a threat

That she should be ostracized

Or worse

That she should be corrected

Threatened, beaten, or raped into silence

Sometimes I wonder

If there is any place in the world

Which the fools have not corrupted

With their poisonous prejudices

~Faycin A Croud~

The Yogurt and the Spoon

The Yogurt and the Spoon

Oh Yogurt! sighed the spoon

Your probiotics make me swoon!

You bathe me in cool creaminess

You make me feel so fine and fresh

Ah Spoon! the yogurt sighed

I can't wait for the moment when you reach inside

I hunger to feel you scoop me up

I'm waiting for you in my loving cup!

A very silly poem by

Petra Steele

The challenge was to write a poem about love between two objects. I was about to eat yogurt, so I was inspired to create this.

This one may rival the piece submitted by our Vogon guest a couple of days ago!

Folks, for everyone's sake, I am not about to try to meet the other part of the challenge. My ugly mug would break the camera, and I am very self-conscious about my hick accent. So--nope! Not gonna do it! Believe me, you should thank me.

~Petra~

MS in 33

 

MS in 33

 

To feel my abilities slip away

To have more to do and say

Yet be unable to do even the smallest of things

I know this is what my future brings

All stolen away

~Yeris~

 

I am working off two prompts. The OctPoWriMo prompt asks for a rhyming poem, and the Trifecta prompt asks for something that scares us (or a character of ours) in 33.

The loss of my abilities to MS does not scare me so much as it depresses me. I was diagnosed 12 years ago. I have periods of remission, which are like coming into the light from a dark cell. I know that these will become fewer and farther between as the disease progresses.

 

 



An Ode to Death Cheese

VILE Awards Judge Gangrine Nadds has penned a poem expressing his respluvicant admiration for Vogon fan favorite band Death Cheese

An Ode to Death Cheese

A Poem of Juquotic Xefrax

by

Gangrine Nadds, Esq.

Ah, Death Cheese!

None but thou causes me to breef so eloquent!

Only you may abscond eltword

To the vast reaches of space condensed

Like milk of earth bovines in a can

If I might be so bold as to inquire

For inquring minds want to know

From whence cometh the plostrus plague of thine inspiration?

Could it be the tabrous lock of your frontal lobe

Or is it in fact your nuafuk which so hydrates your rafwab?

We gastrotidly await the bombrous day of your return

When you shall grace us once again with your splunge-filled latitudes

And bring to the VILE awards a most noprous sfwilm

Bestow upon us your mighty gamut of brukk

Crush us beneath your boots of tyrannical doba

And bedeck our halls with bows of gakpuv and cuktod

Gangrine Nadds, Esq.

Board of Musical luydoj

Judge, 2013 Vogon Intergalactic Lyrical Endowment Awards

A Political Haiku

 

A Political Haiku

 

U.S. Government:

Just cut it out already

Love, Your Citizens

 

~Wanda~

 

The prompt from yesterday is to write a poem based on a news item. Since I already wrote a long poem, I was running out of gas and decided to keep this one short!

Infamous Last Words

Okay, they said "worst" rather than "worse." But you get the idea.

 

The prompt is to say some "famous last words" to someone deserving. This one goes out to a frenemy that I last communicated with in 2010, but every so often she tries to re-open the lines of communication. Um...no. Fool me once, shame on you. Fool me twice, shame on me.

 

Dear Frenemy

 

Your lying, backstabbing and pretending to care really hurt me

But now you're long gone from my life

Do you really think I'd let you return

And expose my back to your knife?

 

For a long time I felt so betrayed

By your wicked, devious ways

My hurt inspired vengeful desires

But now I just want to keep you away

 

Do you really think I'm that stupid?

Or are you just that much lacking in clues

I don't believe for one minute that you can be trusted

I'm not going to fall for your ruse

 

You like to think you're omniscient

But I'm not as ignorant as you want to believe

If you came to my door with your clothes on fire

I'd tell you to turn 'round and leave

 

I really and truly am done with you

Most days I don't think about you at all

I can't understand why you don't understand

I won't answer your letters or calls

 

Dear Frenemy, please leave me alone

There is really nothing more I can say

Either take the high road or take the low road

But take the road that leads you away

 

~Wanda~

The Quiet Scream of Chronic Pain

 Today's prompt is silence. We're supposed to sit quietly and listen. This is what I hear.

The Quiet Scream of Chronic Pain

It's never quiet

In a body where pain is

always chattering

~Cie~

Just a Drag

Axe Man admires the Ladies at the Just a Drag Peep Show

 

Image from Ministry of Burlesque

 

Just a Drag

 

Axe Man was sneaking a peek

At some ladies so sexy and chic

Axe is a bit dumb and can't understand

How ladies so gorgeously glam

Could have such a broad-shouldered physique

 

~Adam Everhard~

 

Note: Axe Man is one of our longest-running characters from the Netherworld blogs. He's the Norwegian Nympho of the intergalactically popular death metal sensation, Death Cheese.