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NeoGAF's Poetry Corner - #64: "Vanishing"

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Theme: "Vanishing"

Vanishing, fading, disappearing. It could be something once thought eternal, could be the most ephemeral of snowflakes. It might vanish for the space of an eyeblink, or take a tiptoe walk toward gone forever. Or interpret it however you like. It's all up to you.

Optional Secondary Objective: "A surprising metaphor"

Use a metaphor that surprises us; that we've never seen before.


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Submission Deadline:

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Voting Deadline:

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* FAQ
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(image source: http://aluccia71.deviantart.com/)
 
Here's something quick... will try to submit something with more thought put in but I don't want to forget (again):

Light

I rode alongside Einstein on his light beam
in 1955+55,
on mescaline.
He was wearing a moomoo for some reason,
and yoga pants,
and he didn't look bad in them
straddling the beam the way he did.
He talked and talked and didn't stop and I said,
"man,
feels like we're going nowhere
and we're getting there fast."
But he wasn't listening to me,
and I wasn't listening to him.

I remember him flying off when I was coming down.
He disappeared into a pinprick in the ceiling
talking something about The Man.
My cat was licking my ear.
Something was burning in the kitchen,
or somewhere else.
The TV buzzed pleasantly:
War in Egypt
Dead in Iraq
Boy kills mother and father

I thought, that's the way it goes.
I thought, I used to think there was more to all of this.

Then I heard Einstein call back,
"Don't stop!
If you stop, time catches up with you."
And he laughed and laughed
echoes into the dim CFL haze
of my empty apartment.
 
Second entry:

Chrysalis

Opening night.

He paces in a pasty-neon room,
(fluorescent lights
flicker),
nervous reflection in a window,
reciting lines.

After hours, safety:
alone.

Above the electric buzz, he hears
footsteps

(tap
tap)​

ring in hollow halls.

A beat.

He listens,
queues his excuses
(“Talking? Wasn’t me;
must’ve been someone outside”),
waiting,
watching the high school mascot tear at a banner
with a growl.

They come
quickly,
swinging fists and roaring,
the colors of their jackets turning brown against
his pride.

A boy,
under a shower of hands
(spiderlike, he thinks:
more afraid of you than you of them),
knowing the arrival of a thing long feared,
long threatened.

He swells.
In the neon light his body builds a shell around itself.
He hugs his knees within it,
imagining:
the open curtain and the lights
and his hands in the air,
mighty celebrated silhouette
for all to see.​
 
Ok, let's try something. This has some meaning for me, when I read this I feel the "vanishing" feeling, but I don't know if I wrote this in a way that anyone will be able to understand this meaning. But, at least I tried. And english is my second language, so I believe there are some errors here and there.

Days of Salvation

Christmas' miracle
Angel of God
Came to my life
To untie some old knots

The angel came to life
So I had to change my days
Make them all about the angel
Who couldn't make me feel afraid

The music says to us
"Trust I seek and I found in you"
The angel had this role
To make this music become true

And the time was passing by
The angel was still here
I felt like there was no choice
I should tell what I've dreamed

The dream was not the same
Not the same I thought it would be
I was afraid of losing the angel
To someone I couldn't even see

After waking from the dream
I realized what I should do
Tell the angel to come from the skies
To live the life like I, human, do

But before I could find my words
The angel had something to tell
I wish I was the one blessed
But the angel was blessing someone else

The words I was trying to find were all gone
The bridges I was trying to build were all burned
The angel wanted to stay
But I knew I should let it go

The angel asked me to stay
Saying it could bless me in some other way
But I knew that my angel was gone
That my path should be traveled alone

But as I tried to take the angel out of my mind
I found an empty space in my soul
A space that was gone when the angel came
A space that came back when the angel was gone

So long, my little angel
My mind don't want to let you go
But once you bless another one
I will understand that you're gone

Gone was the empty space
Gone when you found me
Gone is you, my angel
Gone is how I'll need to be
But I'll remember, my little angel
Of the days you blessed me
 
This thread deserves more attention. There are so many people here, I bet a lot of them can write good things.
 
As I bleed in this glass prison,
I have settled down to berime
The wait for exsanguination:
Through my wounds flees the sand of time.

I try to catch it in my hand,
To retain it - to no avail.
Through this hole under me, the sand
Trickles gently out of my jail.

Does it pile up at the bottom
Of this hourglass? I can't check:
No ray of light ever shines from
The dark chamber behind the neck.

Perhaps this odd chronometer,
Missing its half, is a worthless
Bottle feeding a catheter
Lodged in the arm of nothingness.
 
Remember dates
Remember concepts
Remember words
One day your whole perception of the world
will become a dinosaur without a fossil

Remember tradition
Remember your forefathers
Remember your debt to them
Remember also that your grandchildren
will forget them and you

Remember a poet
Remember Forgetfulness by Billy Collins
Remember a revolution
Looking down the hospital you were born in
you might as well have never existed

Remember the pool you played in with your brother
Remember the brand name of flavoured water
Remember what team you would have killed for
Even now, when your feet fail you
you see glimpses of a beer ad you saw as a child

Remember to walk
Remember to feel anything but pain
Remember to breathe
All those hoarded memories on rectangles
just forget it all

Forgetfulness - Billy Collins
 
Not too happy with this one but screw it here we go.

I lost myself again.
My way.
My head.
My heart.
My hopes.
My life.
Someone find me.
Can I find myself?
I thought I had put those days far behind me.
In my head the voice of my father echoes.
"Your troubles have just begun my son.
It's how you deal with them that defines you."
And I'm gone again.
This time I'm not coming back.
 
Help

I can't stand it
What have I done?
Thrown up like a rock
Back down on my skull
I'm losing myself
To things thought I wanted
Becoming enslaved
To things that have no endgame
Why did I go down this road?
Why can't I go back?
I'm losing myself
I can't tell what I've done
Please send help
I'm lost
And the road is losing form
 
To whom it may concern

a good poet
yammer in sleights and whispers
other poems
except this one
because I choked
and proceeded to
nearly drown
a litter of kittens
when I was young
 
Sitting on the fresh cut grass
Under a two-hundred year old tree
Protecting us from the dazzling show going on
up above

If anytime I should rise
it's to touch you for the last time
I want to tell you it's been all worth it
But I can't

We hold each other tight and spin
dance a rapid dance
accelerating exponentially
the force ripping skin from flesh
flesh from bone
bone to marrow
and marrow to dust
greater logarithmically
less than nothing compared to that a moment before

We fly away in a million, billion pieces
separated, together, combined
the stars hunger for us now
 
I see her disappear
through broken glass
quiet thoughts
of suicide writ large

the slow and silent fading out
that echoes in us all

the bleeding out of time
as measure ticks to rest
and meter slows and thins

another second percolates
another second gone
and
she
falls
 
You disappeared twice yesterday
The first time was the usual
Death
The second time
The second time was unusual
You leave not even memories
Yesterday, I let you go
Because you need you more than I do
 
I sit here
While the bottle empties
Listening to music pleasing to my ear
Another drink tempts me.

Once more
I go through another tour
Open another bottle
Weary of the upcoming battle

Oh well, what do I care
If this piece of paper
Full of dreams and goals
Can tear
Then so can I
Tear into pieces
Until I am swallowed up by my demons.

[my first attempt. had a couple drinks and figured why not. hope I made the deadline].
 
Birdsong,
bells,
thistle,
grey.

Plane's engine,
trains-on-tracks,
fluttering wings,
Woodpecker,
pecking away..

Winds-a-howling,
Crows-a-cawing,
and the pitter-patter
of a Squirrel,
running atop
dew melted grass,
her ears perk up,
nut in hand,
she stands to attention,
as on come the sirens,
before even that comes
to a stop.

And when all falls silent,
and the falling leaf
comes to rest still,
the littlest of birds,
he then starts chirping;
for he swells his breast,
when the air is lightest,
and the park's sea calmest,
when the pension walkers walk,
and the tense joggers jog,
and the last of the bottle's contents
drop; warm & sweet,
as it drip, drips, beside
a couple of wine glasses' tingle,
as the breeze intermingles,
and she
and he,
go, hic. Hic.
 
It's difficult to fathom;

Trillions and Trillions,
Floating around in pockets,
Under beds, in safes and more begrudgingly,
In the hands of others.

We rely on it, for survival;
The very thing that we grunt,
For what can seem like an endless cycle,
Is what keeps us existing.

As more is created,
Our trillions become more conceivable,
We can gain more,
but at what cost?

It begins to erode,
In our vicious, endless, cycle;
Into the dirt and gravel,
That we have been founded upon;

A step back, so we can start again.
 
 
There was also Riposte - Sliding on my knees.


Well, I'll go first then:

1. Crunched - Light
2. Ashes1396 - Opus #37
3. EdmondD - Gone again.
HMs: Crunched - Chrysalis; FelixOrion - Help; videtonator - Days of Salvation

videtonator said:
Ok, let's try something. This has some meaning for me, when I read this I feel the "vanishing" feeling, but I don't know if I wrote this in a way that anyone will be able to understand this meaning.
Click to expand...
I think I do. I can see you put your heart in this, so... nothing else matters. ;)
Oh, and I hope another angel will bless you one day.

videtonator said:
But, at least I tried. And english is my second language, so I believe there are some errors here and there.
Click to expand...
Same for me!
 
I like honest poems. Even if you bury it beneath a couple of folds. ;)

I like the burst of creativity this week. I wish we had more people drift in and vote, even if they haven't entered... Sometimes the poetry on offer is quite nice.
 
1. Crunched - "Chrysalis"
2. Ashes1396 - "Opus #37"
3. Stat Flow - "Gone"
HM: ZeroRay, AnkitT

Good stuff, and great turnout!
 
Hard to vote. A lot of really good poems.

1. Crunched- Chrysalis
2. Ashes1396- Opus #37
3. Lufiaddict- Chronorrhagia

HMs: Stat Flow, videtonator, ZeroRay
 
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