OctPoWriMo 2015: Day 26: Every Bride Should Feel Beautiful

Image by Beverly Tan

Every Bride Should Feel Beautiful

Pretty as a picture

The bride on her wedding day

Picture what was in her mind on this most wonderful

Day of her entire life

Wonderful thoughts--you would think so

Life has not been that kind to every girl

So it started back in childhood, this insecurity

Girl is told time and time again that she doesn't measure up

Insecurity, at first a shadow tiptoeing

Up it rises in the silence of her mind

Tiptoeing round the corners of her soul

Mind needling at her more and more as she grows

Soul spirals in a cycle of doubt and shame

Grows within her soul like a seed

Shame as the world becomes more transparent with its message

Seed planted springs forth with full realization

Message that girls who look like her should feel shame

Realization may be subtle like the smell of petrichor

Shame may burst through her like a lightning strike

Petrichor, and the lingering smell of realization

Strike her down with the understanding

Realization that she is short and plump

Understanding that most people see her as ugly

Plump no longer a sweet, childlike quality

Ugly girls are all too common in this world

Quality girls are such a rarity

World where girls are taught to hate the way they look

Rarity for a girl to be able to be confident on her wedding day

Look at her, mired in self-doubt when she should be smiling

Day so full of promise, heart so full of trepidation

Smiling because she loves him so

Trepidation because she fears the spell will be broken

So why can't we make this a world where no girl feels

Broken and ugly on her wedding day

Feels instead like she deserves the best

Day after day, whether celebration or just a day like any other

~Sadie~

Note:

I was very happy on my wedding day. However, I was not an obvious beauty like the lady in the wonderful picture. I was a short, plump Filipina, and part of me kept expecting my husband-to-be to suddenly come to the realization that he was marrying someone that the majority of the world saw as quite homely.

Fortunately for me, my long, lean wizard has never come to see his princess as a toad. After 35 years together (married for 32 of those) we still love each other very much.

How to Loop 101: 

There are no restrictions on meter or syllables or rhyme schemes (YAY!)

BUT we have a few rules!

Take the last word of a line. Skip a line. Use that word as the first word of that line. 

I know, sounds harder than it is, so basically take the last word of the FIRST line and use it as the first word of the THIRD line. Take the last word of the SECOND line and use it as the first word of the FORTH line. Last word of the THIRD line is the first word of the FIFTH line. And it keeps going on and on like that. 

Some people do it by stanzas. 

There is also a variation where there's no skipping and the last word of the line simply becomes the first word of the next line. Simpler, but personally I think it's a LOT harder. 

NaPoWriMo 2015: Day 19: One If By Landay

Craving Version 11

Photoshop Phoolery by The Real Cie

You can hide the truth with lying lips

But your dreams tell the secret of whom you long to kiss

~Thalia~

The Prompt:

for today’s prompt (optional, as always!), I’d like to challenge you to write a landay. Landays are 22-syllable couplets, generally rhyming. The form comes from Afghanistan, where women often use it in verses that range from the sly and humorous to the deeply sardonic and melancholy. The first line has nine syllables, the second has 13. 

Here is an article on Landays.

Bitch Please

Bitch Please

 

Anonymous scum

You think your threats of chantage

Will cause me to fade into the brume

For fear that some privileged information will be exposed

 

You think to desecrate my temples

Wherein the discreet throb of my heart

Creates misshapen dreams of desire

 

Your threats to embarrass me

Only skim the surface

Of the endless depths of what I feel

 

The thoughts which I reveal

Are only an emblem

Of the greater truth embedded in my soul

 

One day my heart will open like an envelope

And I will spill all my disgraceful secrets

Until that time, the clock ticks on aloof

 

What reprehensible evidence are you offering up anyway

Which I haven't already revealed myself

If not outright

Then couched in simile and metaphor

 

Do your worst

 

~Cie~

 

Prompt Used:

Mindlovemisery's Menagerie

 

Forever Your Little Loser

Forever Your Little Loser

They say that I'm a lunatic

They say I'm nothing but a loser

Because I say I want to take a spacecraft

And go spinning past all the planets

Straight up to the Heavens

Where the angels sing in your dreams

My one and only endeavor

Is to be with you forever

I want to spread my heart before you

And pray that you tread lightly

I want to tangle my fingers in your soft, dark hair

I want my love to heal you

Has my longing driven me insane?

If loving you makes me a loser

If wishing I could make things better

Makes me a lunatic

Spinning ever closer to insanity

Then that's just what I am

Forever your little loser

Because I won't get you off my mind

~Cie~

Image Source

One Soul As Two Minds

Born in two bodies

Yet with a union so close

They were of one mind

A love of this kind

Survives death of the body

Or loss of reason

~Koni~

Koni's Notes:

Angus Young (L) was the first person to notice that something was amiss with Malcolm Young (R) when the bright and hyper-organized Malcolm began to become disorganized and forgetful. Angus covered for his brother, at first helping him remember things that needed to be done, and eventually covering for Malcolm during performances when he would miss chords from songs that he'd written himself.

Before Malcolm lost the ability to remember what he had done during his life or even the ability to recognize the people he was closest to including the brother who seemed to be the other half of his own soul, he told Angus to keep making music. Not long afterwards, it became necessary to place him in a long term care facility. 

It is my belief that a bond like this one survives even death, be it of mind or body. Not everyone is fortunate enough to know the reflection of their soul. Such a reflection is not always romantic; as in this case, the reflection is platonic and/or filial. In any case, such a union is to be treasured. It can never be destroyed.

~Koni~

Cross-Posted to:

Dream About Me, Sweet Brother
(Note: Blog overall is NSFW; certain posts contain explicit gay erotica)

Poetery of the Netherworld

The Flower of my Love

The Flower of my Love

Your halo sits crooked, my bijou

And although I have promised to keep my effable feelings to a minimum

If you listen you can hear the truth in the susurrus

Whispering from deep within the chasm of my heart

I fall in a helical pattern

I cared too much about the copper

In the two cents thrown at me by those

Who do not understand how deep the root of my devotion goes

For some the flower of their love is a rose

Pretty and smelling like summer

The flower of my love is a black orchid

I want you to etch your name upon my heart

I don't care how much it hurts

~Cie~

Prompt:

Mindlovemisery's Menagerie

Spirit of Love

May the loveless ones

Be kissed by the breath of wind

And know acceptance

~Thalia~

Love is the Ten of Swords

I love you.
Not just when it's tragically hip to do so.
Not just when your band is the "in thing."
Not just when you're young and unconventionally handsome.
Not just when things are going good.
Not because I'm a pretty girl (I'm not) who likes to prove she can get any man she sets her mind to.
Not only when it's a nice day or I'm hypomanic or at least the charnel smell isn't blowing down from the damn meat packing plant to the North of where I live.
Not even only when your beautiful, sharp mind is at its best and you're cooking up something new and wonderful.
I love you when it hurts like hell to do so.
I love you because you deserve to be loved.
I love you because you were, are, and always will be a cut above.
I love you because you're beautiful in the ways that really count.
I love you even though I know how it makes me look.
I love you even though it makes my heart feel like it's being ripped out by dull razor blades and sometimes stabbed through by burning swords.
It never ends--I always will love you.

Please visit this very talented artist. http://elric2012.deviantart.com/art/Ten-of-Swords-190084600

~Cie~

 

Cross-Posted to:

Dream about Me Sweet Brother

(NSFW blog. Contains slash/explicit gay erotica)

 

Poetry of the Netherworld

 

 

Even when he started showing signs of how frail and sick he was becoming, he still didn’t want to be a burden to anyone, and so he kept trying to be strong and do what he believed was right.

And so, this is why I can’t stop talking about him.

That and the fact that he saved my life more than once when I was a miserable, lonely, scapegoated, mentally ill teenager just by making music that was for people like me, not for the “cool” kids, but for the rejects, for the lonely, the angry, the pissed off. For people who everyone else thought was worthless. Malcolm Young did not give a rare rat fuck about being cool. I loved that about him—love that about him.

Always in the present tense, because that is a feeling that will never die.

Fictional Creations

Visit the Artist

This erasure challenge provided by Hannah from Imaginary Garden With Real Toads was...hard! But it made me happy to do it because I talked Team Netherworld's own Rose LeMort to allow me to take a page from her in-progress novel, Fetch, and play Erasure with it. The story is a paranormal romance. 

I hope Rose enjoys what I've done with her page.

Click to enlarge

I got the idea for the graphic from our own Seth. One simply turns the font on the words they don't want to white, then pastes the results into Paint and saves it as a jpeg.

I'm going to provide the poem in a slightly more cohesive form below, then, for a real treat, I will share Rose's original page. She has given m her permission to do so. Personally, I can't wait to see more of this story. Rose has invited the team to brainstorm with her, and you can see the results at the special blog dedicated to this end.

Here it is in a more directly readable format

invited

fictional creations. 

They must be based on something factual. 

I need to find out what that something is

wires crossed

like drivin’ through a thick fog on an unfamiliar road

it wasn’t a stupid move, it was a desperate one

Makes me feel like I’m alive again

I’m tryin’ to make the best of it

I could use a quick little thrill

a little kiss for you

This was hard--really hard! I like the end result, although it's a bit of an odd piece.

Now, here is the real thrill for me, to present you with the original page from Rose's manuscript. Write, Rose, write! We need to see more of these characters--now!

Pepper sat down on the couch and invited Gerry to sit beside her. He nestled against her like a frightened child.

“Put me in your pocket then, Love,” he begged. “Let me stay safe here with you.”

“Gerry, I’d like nothing more. But at this stage, your body is going to keep pulling you back. I need to try to find out just what this entity is. I found the one commonality, but I need something more to act on. Both the Lights of Zetar and the demonic sphere from the Vampirella comic are fictional creations. They must be based on something factual. I need to find out what that something is. Until then, I very much do want you to stay with me as much as you can, my fetching fetch.”

“How’s that then?” Gerry asked, a smile brightening his face as if he were basking in Pepper’s affection for him.

“A fetch is the spirit of a person whose body is either close to death or very compromised, like yours.”

“Huh. Me body could go on kickin’ for quite a while. It’s only got minor sixty-some year old bloke crap wrong with it. It’s me brain that’s a fried mess with all the bleedin’ wires crossed.”

“Same difference. Your spirit can’t operate properly through your body.”

“Hate it when the fuckin’ thing draws me back in, like it did this morning. I was fightin’ me hardest to make that warped gray matter of mine function for me. It was like drivin’ through a thick fog on an unfamiliar road. I so desperately wanted to tell the staff what I’d seen. Feckin’ stupid, really. Should have known they wouldn’t listen to some poor addled blighter.”

“Gerry, it wasn’t a stupid move, it was a desperate one. I wish I knew better what was going on. We’re going to need to work on this together, okay?”

“My pleasure. I love bein’ here with you, Pepper. Makes me feel like I’m alive again. I hate this fucked transitional state, I really do. But I’m tryin’ to make the best of it. I tell meself I’m gonna see me angel, and I’ll be damned if that don’t just make everything all worthwhile. ‘Ey, would you do me a favor?”

“What’s that?”

“I could use a quick little thrill. How about a smooch?”

“I think I could muster one pretty easily.”

“Quickly maybe?”

“Impatient much? All right, my fetching fetch, a little kiss for you.”

A rosy blush spread over Pepper’s cheeks. She could feel the warmth of Gerry’s kiss, could even feel a bit of moisture. The kiss became more passionate. Pepper found herself trembling in Gerry’s arms. When he broke the kiss, he looked directly into her eyes. 

~Morella La Muerte~

With big thanks to 

Rose LeMort

Cross-Posted to:

Fetch

Poetry of the Netherworld

Hungry For More

Writing Prompt and Image Source

Hungry For More

I know this is the proper portion

Of tasty, healthy food

Which should be enough

To satisfy my body’s need

But I’m hungry for more

I need sweetness

Not just icing

But the whole cake

A little lovely substance

But not too much propriety

I’m sick of obedience

To rules I didn’t choose

Meat is good and vegetables fine

But what about a little wine

I crave a morsel of decadence

My need lies sweet on the tip of my tongue

My mouth waters for what I truly crave

The unspoken

Forbidden

Excruciating desire

For something I can never taste

~Cie~

The Prompt:

Light and Shade Challenge

Love in the Time of Pain

Love in the Time of Pain

 

The love we feel

When things are going well

Comes easy enough

 

The test of our mettle

Is the love that we feel

When the road has gone rough

 

Love in the time of joy

Is a happy dance

Of a springtime song

 

Love in the time of pain

Is the sky crying tears

In a world gone wrong

 

Love in the time of joy

Carries you through the day

On angel wings

 

Love in the time of pain

Makes the soul want to run away

From what the new day brings

 

A sword through the heart

Reveals the true depth

Of the love within

 

~Cie~

Healing the Wounds Afflicted by Reason

Healing the Wounds Afflicted by Reason

Image Source

I

Let the unknowable touch the buckle of my spine

Having to know the essence of everything

Takes away its beauty

Let it be what it is

Let yourself feel what you feel

Don’t overanalyze everything

It is what is

You are what you are

We are the product of our yesterdays

We are becoming our tomorrows

Don’t be so quick to discount what can’t be put into words

Let it be enough to let it be

Copyright: tuvi / 123RF Stock Photo

II

In the end, everything dies

Stars become stardust

The most beautiful blooms fade

Their petals drop away

In the end what matters most

Is the sustenance they gave to their fellow beings

Counting the bread and wine by autumn’s gain

Is the best of measures

Image Source

III

“O, know, sweet love, I always write of you”

These words were already written in your heart, my friend

Digging in with golden talons

As you tried to deny that which was tattooed upon your soul

An offer of kindness

Became a desire for kisses

What you deem wicked

What you decry as x-rated

Is only the expression

Of your heart’s zeal

To heal

The beautiful, broken being

Left crushed against the rocks of time

~Wanda~

199 Words

Prompts:

Let the unknowable touch the buckle of my spine 

–

 Little Summer Poem Touching the Subject of Faith by Mary Oliver

*************

Counting the bread and wine by autumn’s gain 

– 

Poppies on the Wheat by Helen Hunt Jackson

**************

O, know, sweet love, I always write of you 

– 

Sonnet 76 by William Shakespeare

Heart Fragile Like A Flower

Image Source (and poem inspiration): Cee's Photography

This is a blog worth watching

Heart Fragile Like a Flower

Some things are so beautiful

That even if you realize

They have the potential to hurt you

Not through any conscious volition

But just by being what they are

You can't help but love them anyway

Your heart is fragile like a flower

You loved the beautiful iris

Even though you once believed it could make you sick

You loved someone who gave you the gift

Of saving your life when you were young and troubled

Someone who seemed strong

But broke your heart by being made of glass instead of stone

You are fragile like a flower

And that makes you beautiful

And better than the many harsh things in this world

Even though it also makes you terribly vulnerable

Even though it makes it all too easy

For you to be crushed

I love you Cie

~Wanda~

Wanda's notes:

Cie told me that when she was a little girl, perhaps three years old, she contracted the flu. When her mother said that Cie had caught a virus, she thought of the irises growing in the yard by the house where they lived. Cie believed that smelling the irises made her sick, but she didn't blame them. She still loved them. She believed that just because their pollen made her sick didn't make them bad. It wasn't their fault.

Cie's bipolar disorder seems to have onset when she reached puberty, although she may have had it all her life. She was bullied very badly in school. As a troubled teenager, she started self-harming. On the radio, she discovered music by the band AC/DC. The music made her happy and the fact that the band members seemed to be somewhat outcast types themselves made her feel that she wasn't alone.

Cie developed quite a crush on AC/DC's frontman, Bon Scott. But she always felt that the band's founder, Malcolm Young, was a kind, comforting personality. She felt that he would welcome rather than reject an outcast like her. He had a friendly face and an accepting attitude. She liked those things about him.

When Bon died, Cie was crestfallen. But she continued following the band. The more she learned about Malcolm, the more she liked him. She found it admirable that he took it on himself to call Bon's mother after Bon's death so she would hear the truth from a friend rather than from the news. Malcolm always said this was the hardest thing he ever had to do, but he did it anyway. This is only one example of the kind of fundamentally decent person that he always was.

Cie related to Malcolm's struggles with depression and alcohol addiction. She admired the fact that in spite of these issues, he always kept his obligations to his family and his band mates. She also admired him for being monogamous in an industry that encourages Bacchanalian attitudes. 

Cie has said over the years that she wished she could have found her Malcolm Young; meaning someone who would be decent and faithful, warm, intelligent and interesting, sensitive, gentle, and with a bit of a wacky sense of humor. 

It also didn't hurt that he had killer eyes, a cute face, and a shy, humble demeanor, although he could be something of a pit bull when challenged or if he saw a threat to someone he cared about. Guys like him certainly are few and far between, and any woman lucky enough to have one should hold on tooth and nail.

When Cie found out that Malcolm was not only terminally ill but the essence of his personality had been wiped out, it devastated her. She found herself wishing that she could (her words) "Put him in my pocket and keep him safe." 

Perhaps stemming from her desire to heal and protect Malcolm, Cie found herself feeling a physical desire for him as well. I'm not a psychologist, but this makes sense to me. She was horrified at herself, because she has always been the type to respect a person's marriage and would never consider being a home-wrecker. She expressed her (very raw) feelings in this wonderful poem. It's a painful read; you can hear her heart break. But it's also excruciatingly beautiful.

Dear Cie, I am truly saddened to hear of this horrible thing happening to such a good person. Please don't beat yourself up any more. You are feeling pain because you feel love. That's the hell of it. However, there isn't enough love in this world. We must take it where we can find it. You found it for this person, and even though he doesn't know you in the flesh, I think that he can feel your love on some level and it may bring him comfort, which he desperately needs. I truly believe that.
I hope that maybe my humble poem will show you that someone is on your side; you are not alone, my friend, although I know you feel that you are.

Love,

Wanda

He wasn't very big, and he was genuinely a nice guy. 

But fucking with him was a bad idea, because he would bite back if attacked.

As they say, it isn't the size of the dog, it's the size of the fight in the dog.

In the end, it was no human assailant or even the demon from the bottle that took him out.

It was something that looks like this:

This is fucking scary, because nobody understands how to stop it from going awry and destroying a mind and a life.

This disease (Lewy body dementia) is particularly scary because there doesn't tend to be any way to predict it. Malcolm Young's family seems to have a history of cancer and heart disease, not dementia. It tends to strike younger people (average 50's and 60's) than Alzheimer's. Malcolm is 61.

Cie says that this diagnosis was a bigger punch in the gut than hearing that Malcolm had cancer or even that he'd committed suicide, because it destroys the personality, not just the body.

So, to recap for the rude person asking if this is now the Malcolm Young blog, maybe it is, at least temporarily. What's it to ya? He deserves at least that much respect, and our teammate deserves to express herself, including bleeding out her soul if that's what she needs to do.

Wanda

for

Team Netherworld

OctPoWriMo 2014: Day 28

Love is Love

Copyright: lentolo / 123RF Stock Photo

Hunger 

With you gone, my sadness began to consume me

My yearning for you was like an all-consuming hunger

It wasn't some sort of perverse lust

Which always seems to be postulated by those suffering from such boredom

That their only ambition is to cause pain

To those already struggling with self-doubt about their feelings

I tried to satiate my hunger by pursuing those I was told I was supposed to

But in the end, it only left me hollow

My soul scooped out like the belly of a man starving in an endless desert

Only you ever brought me joy

Only you ever filled my cold heart with warmth

Only you can dry my tears

With you by my side

With you in my arms

With you safe in my heart

My hunger is satiated at last

How can this be wrong

When it is my salvation?

~Thalia~

Word Prompts:

sadness

joy

ambition

lust

yearning

self doubt

boredom

Thalia's Notes:

I wrote this from the perspective of two male characters that the team works with on our story blogs. They have struggled with forbidden feelings for each other for many years, having one disastrous relationship after another with women, until they finally had to admit that the only relationship that ever really worked was the bond they have with each other.

I'm a lesbian. I've known I was different from "normal" girls since I was nine years old in the third grade and developed a very strong crush on my beautiful and kind-hearted teacher. I would daydream of being the avenging heroine, rescuing her from all sorts of danger. I was extremely ashamed of what I now realize were very harmless fantasies. 

I fought my attraction to other girls for a long time. When I was seventeen, I got involved in a behind closed doors relationship with a girl from another school. It didn't end well. Our fear of being found out caused us to treat each other poorly. Plus, I was very jealous and she wasn't particularly monogamous.

Unfortunately, I never found the right one. I'm not actively seeking right now, but I'm still open to the possibility that one day my princess will come.