Lit of the Week 134!

Poetess
nawkaman

PoetessNo quaint bottletop knick-knack wisdom
scratching at thick cotton candy scent
stuck to tongue and throat,
she burns words for fuel and breathes
through vessels she collected on the way
because it keeps her alive.

she burns words for fuel and breathes / through vessels she collected on the way



one
straygod

onei
there's a sickness in you, but it isn't the HIV.  the sick don't shake like you do.  i don't mean these vacant tremors.  i've watched you sling suicide at a boy scrabbling shy for your approval, saw it slice away layers of self esteem.  we guessed uncertain at the reality of your ambition, but nothing we imagined ever began to measure the breadth of your duplicity.  pain calcified a bile in you and you wear it like a medal; you wear it like all these vulnerable kids might keep crawling back to you, because you've Been There and know how it feels to be homeless and disowned and addicted to anything that blunts the suffocation of familial rejection and yet still naive enough to believe in modern day martyrdom.  
louse.  your sincerity is a fungus.  
ii
overdue road trips.  i write letters and delete them, ghost them snarling because i'll never be able to tell you how you ruined us forever.  that everything was narrow until you sat back

i write letters and delete them, ghost them snarling because i'll never be able to tell you how you ruined us forever.



Ode To A Scholar
Blacksand459

Ode To A ScholarCadieux was a scholar
In a small, Northeastern town
Groomed in an Adirondack holler
Far from city folk
Despite his narrow circle
Of relatives and friends
He grew to be a master
Of the civilized tongue
Strong hands cradled a text
Now bound for two hundred years
It's words and rhythms still as piquant
As though they were freshly penned
"The class will come to order;
Please be seated
I'll begin with
Keats' Hyperion...
Augustin, will you read?"
Cadieux loved the flow of words
Like the notes of a stirring toccata
Privately interpreted in the minds' eye
From his schoolroom he commanded the oceans
To crash on a hundred wild shores or,
Lead his intrepid band of warriors
Into the fray with Roosevelte's dashing
Rough Riders
"Lionel, tend the fire, will you?"
Harsh words were not required
To affect a loyal response
Strict discipline was garnered
With mutual respect
His peers found his style archaic at times
Notwithstanding they approved;
To be sure, his budding students
Score

From his schoolroom he commanded the oceans / To crash on a hundred wild shores

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