Thread: Desperate for a Dinner Date (Mild Language)

Mayhem methodically mauls me.
Malignant talons shred flesh
afresh, day after day.
Streamers of mangled meat
tangle and
dangle
from a lame frame.
Unhinged gutted game
ready for roasting.

Injury insufficient,
saline insult
sporadically spurts
marinating
stinging strings of sinew
to render them tender.
Brine before tine
babies the jawline.

A choir of exposed endings
shriek their version
of hymnal hell
hoping to be embraced
by heavy metal...

cast iron, that is.

Search and rescue
(gotta love Google)
dug up
a community of cannibals
who shy away from sushi
and tartare.
(raw me results in ruin)
Best to let the mess that's left
sustain others, after all,
there's no shame in a breakdown,
but only by bile.

There's one bitch of a hitch, though:
regulations forbid
festering passengers to fly.
But I can sail solo
if I build me a boat
and remember to forget
how not to cry.

Hi Lisa,

Your mastery of moods has always drawn me to your poetry, since you can effortlessly have me laughing or thinking deeply and respectfully. This poem is no exception. The consonance really highlights the comedy in her (or your?) constant fumbling and stressful preparation, and the melodrama makes it somewhat slapstick. What I don't expect is a sudden change at the end, and here's where the mastery really kicks because within three lines, all the comedy you have built up deflates and makes me re-read the poem in a completely different way, trying to spot the real stress and frustration through the slapstick.

I couldn't find any improvements to mention, so all I can add is thank you for sharing this, Lisa. It really does justice to the quality I've come to expect from you.

Lisa, I cannot crest Nick’s superior synopsis of this piece which so well depicts how one goes about to write the rubble in ones life, mind. You slice a life on a butcher’s slab.

Strings of words, startling, heart rendering and then outright amusing. Such a mixture, creating a very cohesive whole.

Still, I don’t know how you manage this.

The rebel Catholic girl loves this! Ingenious.

of hymnal hell

You know that I know this so well.

“and remember to forget now not to cry”

A large touching piece.

You're always in my heart. Laurie

I really appreciate how you can use and abuse sounds yet the abuse doesn't come off as heavy handed. It runs smooth. That's a difficult thing to do.

Another keeper Lisa. If I didn't already know what inspired this, I would have felt just as Nick did when I reached the end, he summed it up perfectly.

I'm so sorry guys, I'm so far behind with everything. I have too much stuff out all over the place, and it would be rude of me to bring it all back to page one, so thank you to anyone I haven't thanked in any of my threads. I do believe I've had my fair share of downed computers, kids with broken body parts, and weather bent on ripping me to shreds, so hopefully I'll be able to stay better on top of things. Again, my apologies.

Dear Nick, Wow, I can't begin to find the words to thank you sufficiently, love. I will say that I've instructed my daughter to contact you in the event of my passing so you may write my eulogy, you do me far more justice than I deserve. The comedy is my shield, the ending is what lies beneath, and although I'd rather just do comedy, my inner demons never allow it. Buggers always have to burrow to the surface and sneak at least one line in. That the mix actually works on occasion, elates me. In any case, you describe what I do far more eloquently than I ever could, and for that I am eternally indebted to you. Many thanks, my dear friend.


Dear Laurie, It's hubby I slice on the slab, love, (shhh) life, I just punch in the face. lol. I love you for "cohesive whole", I often fear that I'm so out there, I'll lose people. Getting the pieces to fit so that they're comprehensible is the hardest part of this, especially since my mind is a quirky battlefield. I almost didn't use hymnal hell, so I'm really glad it works for you. Exposed endings that had voices would actually sound like a bunch of beginner violinists. I knew you'd be able to embrace the last two lines, we fight the same war, methinks. And Law, best kick me out of that heart, or you'll see it rot before your eyes, I'm positively stagnant of late, lol. Thanks so much, love.


Dear SG, I could kiss you. I'm a sound junkie, the worst kind of addict, and addicts being addicts, will always abuse. That I've learned to "get high" without making an awful mess gives me hope that I'm making progress. Used to be my pieces got lost in my alliterations, consonance and assonance, perhaps I've finally found a decent balance. Big hugs for sharing your thoughts, love.


Dear Cin, Nick did do a wonderful job explaining my motives, saved me heaps of heartache because I can never really say what I mean unless it's in a piece, and even then I often loop-de-loop before I get to the point. Darn wordiness, empty wordiness at that, lol. Yes, my love, you know where this comes from, and for that I am sorry, but your eyes are a safe haven and your fingers consistently provide me with succor. God bless you, Cin. And it's great to know that you would have read again had you not been privy, those twists mean the world to me.

Thank you all so much for sharing your precious time with me, you are all appreciated beyond measure.

Warmest,
Lisa

Brine before tine
babies the jawline

These lines alone make me feel like laughing. What a brilliant facility with words you are showing off, while still venting, dancing and making salient (or salty) points.
Turning your own sufferring into delight for others is high art indeed.

one suggestion: I know you'll be loathe to desert those b-b-b's but

"But only by bile"
reads better imo as

"only in bile" It turns to the more 'serious' stanzas more smoothly and you've still got the breakdown/bile alliteration.

cheers
J.R.

Dear Lisa - Your words are amazing and your imagery bloody graphic! I followed 78% of the the metaphor - but what is the cast iron reference?

Your may have inspired me to paste a poem my late mother wrote about my late father in the 1970s containing the lovely line "'tis my wife I saw" - am I allowed within the rules to do such a thing?

Glad you survived . . . . family breakages and (I assume) hurricanes

Yours . . .David

Dear Lisa---I am sorry, but I did not pick up on the humor in this poem...What I did get, was a mental image of a rat running in a maze--trying frantically to find it's way out of a hopeless situation that it does not understand and has no idea how or why it got there...this for me--is a dark , twisted, hellish poem... Well written? Of course it is. Intriguing? with out a doubt! Disturbing ? Oh you bet it is... Peace...Jul