Classmate Response #5- David Mathis' "When Things Thrum in the Depth of Night"

Great job on this, really enjoyed reading it. Your visual cues and descriptors were spot on and really provided interesting ideas. For me, I would like to see more of those sharp ideas fleshed out and maybe cutting some of the rest. I have a contraction of your piece below, I hope it helps. Great work, looking forward to future renditions!

Heads sink beneath black waves

No light

Depths enfold, spiral

 A knife gores between the ribs.

Fast. Hard. Jagged

But you like it.

Cough and hiss; your flesh is flayed.

Coals heat your eyes, spreading shredded wings to fly.

 Plummet, the soaring will plummet.

 Frozen dread of a depth-less ocean will whisper.

“Inhale.”

Frozen, tumbling in black

Tear your mask off and struggle, paddle.

Light shines, burns the brine from your back, sears

Off the coral. The water boils, tremendous bubbles.

But from your perch, every sea is only just a lake.

Random Impulse- Speak Light

Another free write from class, just gibberish. A bit of T.S. Elliot in there.

He speaks light
He speaks salt in the light. Restless nights in one night mink hotels pulling all-nighters.
What is salt? Don't ask, just write.
Screaming color and hearing sight.
How do you hear light? With all your boar guts.
Feeling the smell of squid wash over your skin. What is that like?
Like being bathed in light. Actually, like submerging in black. The colors scream with insidious intent.
Don't ask, just write. He can only speak salt in the light.

Random Impulse- New

Haven't felt too motivated this week, so just coping down our in-class work from the past week.

Sedated in the barn, awaiting
sauced haze

Picturesque like the gleaming moon
Take a deep breath

I saw a rat today, and it saw me.
But neither of us uttered a sound.

I saw a rat today, and it saw me.
It feared me more then I

but a girlish scream pierced the night
I put a ring on it
I liked the way it felt- visceral like a moose
I am not myself but something lesser
like a pebble washed upstream.
Cold to the touch, invested
A lost dog with no road home.

Junkyard- Week 5

Women are like wolves. If you want a wolf, you have to trap it. Snare it. Then to keep it happy, you have to tame it. Feed it, care for it. Lovingly. The way an animal deserves to be loved. And my animal deserves a lot of loving.- Dwight from, "The Office"

So bad that it is hilarious. I would like to try my hand at some humorous poetry at some point.



The supreme paradox of all thought is the attempt to discover something that thought cannot think. This passion is at bottom present in all thinking, even in the thinking of the individual, in so far as in thinking he participates in something transcending himself. But habit dulls our sensibilities, and prevents us from perceiving it.- Soren Kierkegaard

Probably my favorite idea from Kierkegaard. Guess I'm irrational at heart, even though the idea uses reason to support it.

If you had an imagination, you'd be dangerous. -Some video game demo I played a couple of days ago.

Just enjoyed the way this line flowed.

Junkward- week 5

I saw Stasay's recent  tongue-in-cheek quote on coke and it sparked my interest in Coke's mystical recipe piece recently released on teh interwebs(misspelling intention for once). I have doubts it will prove useful, but who knows!

The recipe:
Fluid extract of Coca: 3 drams USP
Citric acid: 3 oz
Caffeine: 1 oz
Sugar: 30 (unclear quantity)
Water: 2.5 gal
Lime juice: 2 pints, 1 quart
Vanilla: 1 oz
Caramel: 1.5 oz or more for color

The secret 7X flavor (use 2 oz of flavor to 5 gals syrup):
Alcohol: 8 oz
Orange oil: 20 drops
Lemon oil: 30 drops
Nutmeg oil: 10 drops
Coriander: 5 drops
Neroli: 10 drops
Cinnamon: 10 drops

Junkyard- Week 5

Voilà! In view, a humble vaudevillian veteran, cast vicariously as both victim and villain by the vicissitudes of Fate. This visage, no mere veneer of vanity, is a vestige of the vox populi, now vacant, vanished. However, this valorous visitation of a by-gone vexation, stands vivified and has vowed to vanquish these venal and virulent vermin van-guarding vice and vouchsafing the violently vicious and voracious violation of volition.
[carves V into poster on wall]
The only verdict is vengeance; a vendetta, held as a votive, not in vain, for the value and veracity of such shall one day vindicate the vigilant and the virtuous.
[giggles]
Verily, this vichyssoise of verbiage veers most verbose, so let me simply add that it's my very good honor to meet you and you may call me V.- V from the movie(and comic) Vendetta

Well, this quote pretty much cemented my love for consonance. Consonance is probably my favorite device in writing(if you couldn't tell). Also, it doesn't hurt that this piece uses "v", especially in such a elongated form!

Reading Response #6

It is difficult for me to comment on on my change in aesthetics from a poem, but since we only had one reading this week I will give it my best. My favorite poem from our latest listings was "Antimatter" by Russell Edson. I really enjoyed his idea listed in his bio that, "the shorter the work the more it can depend on symbol, metaphor, and gesture". His title does an excellent job of setting the mood for the reader. The word antimatter brings to mind physics, space, stars and the like. I have always been intrigued with the ideas of alternate dimensions, time travel, space travel, etc. His minimalist descriptors really add to the strength of his idea of a paradoxical dimension. He stays consistent with his paradoxical idea, referring mostly to love. Reading Edson's works have inspired me to revisit my older works and see if I can find their essence in minimalist style.