Submissions by Casted_Runes (Mr Karswell)
POEMS AND SHORT STORIES
Poet Introduction
I write poetry on a range of subjects and in a range of styles. My privacy is extremely important to me, though I hope that you enjoy my work and that I enjoy yours.
DARK POEM
Published
25th Nov 2021 8:45pm
25th Nov 2021 8:45pm
It was a dark and stormy night
The hotel was more populated than the proprietor, a tall and thin man, had ever seen it.
He said as much to Abigail as he led her to her room. 'The usual ghosthunters?' she asked. The proprietor paused on the landing. Beside him was a small Gothic window looking out on the forest that ran parallel to the hotel.
Opposite the hotel was a bluff that plummeted a hundred feet down to wind and seaswept rocks. 'I don't like to talk about them' he said, referring to the ghosthunters. Abigail left the matter there and followed him to her room.
It was old-fashioned,...
He said as much to Abigail as he led her to her room. 'The usual ghosthunters?' she asked. The proprietor paused on the landing. Beside him was a small Gothic window looking out on the forest that ran parallel to the hotel.
Opposite the hotel was a bluff that plummeted a hundred feet down to wind and seaswept rocks. 'I don't like to talk about them' he said, referring to the ghosthunters. Abigail left the matter there and followed him to her room.
It was old-fashioned,...
#scary
355 reads
4 Comments
LOVE POEM
Published
21st Nov 2021 2:18am
21st Nov 2021 2:18am
Making Love to a Witch
She walked up to me as I collected
firewood. She giggled and kissed
me on the lips, this grown woman,
and I felt bashful but not cross,
nor any sort of mad. I felt Woman
was only of the shaming dross,
once she had left and I was left alone.
What else to call my spitting on the throne
but sin? I’ll say it clear: I wanted her again.
Somehow I knew. I’d see her in the woods that night.
Her hips were wide, and freckled fine as dew.
Her shoulders too. In among the fallen
locks of thick red hair I found the Sapphic
witch anew;...
firewood. She giggled and kissed
me on the lips, this grown woman,
and I felt bashful but not cross,
nor any sort of mad. I felt Woman
was only of the shaming dross,
once she had left and I was left alone.
What else to call my spitting on the throne
but sin? I’ll say it clear: I wanted her again.
Somehow I knew. I’d see her in the woods that night.
Her hips were wide, and freckled fine as dew.
Her shoulders too. In among the fallen
locks of thick red hair I found the Sapphic
witch anew;...
#lesbian
559 reads
3 Comments
OBSERVATIONAL POEM
Published
14th Nov 2021 2:00pm
14th Nov 2021 2:00pm
The Old Days
1
you wonder how we did it in the old days
as if sex really was invented back
in nineteen sixty-three
and gay sex in sixty-seven
but sex is sex
just as eating is eating
it's all the same innate wanting
whether you like Red Leicester with beef
or casserole
or whatever
I can't sum it up
except with an anecdote
2
there were guys who were better at it than others
who could pick up sailors
morning noon and night
and never get beaten up
I wasn't...
you wonder how we did it in the old days
as if sex really was invented back
in nineteen sixty-three
and gay sex in sixty-seven
but sex is sex
just as eating is eating
it's all the same innate wanting
whether you like Red Leicester with beef
or casserole
or whatever
I can't sum it up
except with an anecdote
2
there were guys who were better at it than others
who could pick up sailors
morning noon and night
and never get beaten up
I wasn't...
#gay
695 reads
7 Comments
OBSERVATIONAL POEM
Published
13th Nov 2021 10:23am
13th Nov 2021 10:23am
Son of the Fascist
After all, you don’t dress all in black, skulk in the shadows ..., weigh eight stone and hide in your college room doing equations, then get into heroin and do it until you die at the age of 39, alone in your west London flat, to be found the next day by the cleaner, because you feel loved and nurtured by a family of whom you are intensely proud, do you?" - Giles Coren, "This is one Mosley whose name should live on", The Times
on reading that Oxford University is planning to end the Alexander Mosley Charitable Trust, due to the namesake's father's and grandparents' ties to Fascism...
on reading that Oxford University is planning to end the Alexander Mosley Charitable Trust, due to the namesake's father's and grandparents' ties to Fascism...
#unicorns
281 reads
1 Comment
SPIRITUAL POEM
Published
12th Nov 2021 12:41pm
12th Nov 2021 12:41pm
The Path Out
Sometimes I think about God,
or any force personified
as a robe-and-sandals man,
hacking away at my flesh.
Tearing away all the flab,
the veins, fat, and muscle,
until just bones remain.
And inside that the mortal strain
allowed at last to step beyond
the bars of its profane prison.
All flesh is profane.
That's why the Mohawk Saint
tried to burn a path out of hers.
With hot coals on the wild shore,
Heaven looming as a cross
out on the dark water. The core
of time degrades all flesh.
or any force personified
as a robe-and-sandals man,
hacking away at my flesh.
Tearing away all the flab,
the veins, fat, and muscle,
until just bones remain.
And inside that the mortal strain
allowed at last to step beyond
the bars of its profane prison.
All flesh is profane.
That's why the Mohawk Saint
tried to burn a path out of hers.
With hot coals on the wild shore,
Heaven looming as a cross
out on the dark water. The core
of time degrades all flesh.
#unicorns
304 reads
5 Comments
DARK POEM
Published
8th Nov 2021 7:47pm
8th Nov 2021 7:47pm
Frenzy
Camera dollying backward across the hall
and then down the stairs, around cornices and past
spindles, bollards, the British boarding house
sublime. The creep has just walked in with
her, his new victim, a woman we've seen
and got to know as an East End girl of
sharp manners but kind and loyal heart, a local,
friend, barmaid, lover. We also know who
he is. Heartless rapist, murderer. Frenzied ripper.
The camera leaves and crosses the street.
We see the woman's window, square and blank,
and though we don’t see what’s...
and then down the stairs, around cornices and past
spindles, bollards, the British boarding house
sublime. The creep has just walked in with
her, his new victim, a woman we've seen
and got to know as an East End girl of
sharp manners but kind and loyal heart, a local,
friend, barmaid, lover. We also know who
he is. Heartless rapist, murderer. Frenzied ripper.
The camera leaves and crosses the street.
We see the woman's window, square and blank,
and though we don’t see what’s...
#unicorns
301 reads
2 Comments
DARK POEM
Published
1st Nov 2021 11:08pm
1st Nov 2021 11:08pm
The Soul is a Kitchen Knife
My soul is a kitchen knife
and I am a mad slasher
waving it at all who pass.
To touch my soul
is to wrap your hands around the blade
until blood warms the webs
between your fingers.
and I am a mad slasher
waving it at all who pass.
To touch my soul
is to wrap your hands around the blade
until blood warms the webs
between your fingers.
#spiritual
423 reads
2 Comments
OBSERVATIONAL POEM
Published
29th Oct 2021 6:04pm
29th Oct 2021 6:04pm
Men at Funerals
Men are not good at funerals.
They're not sure what to say.
Untrained in all arts of keening
and life's broad emotions,
instead they lapse into cliche.
'Of course it did', perhaps,
when told by the grieving
that it came as a shock.
'There, there', or that old trope,
the mediocre blues:
'Come far today, have you?',
used in conversation
with someone new to you,
and whom you'll soon forget.
At all of the funerals I've been to
my brothers and I have been asked
'you're David's boys, aren't you?'
One...
They're not sure what to say.
Untrained in all arts of keening
and life's broad emotions,
instead they lapse into cliche.
'Of course it did', perhaps,
when told by the grieving
that it came as a shock.
'There, there', or that old trope,
the mediocre blues:
'Come far today, have you?',
used in conversation
with someone new to you,
and whom you'll soon forget.
At all of the funerals I've been to
my brothers and I have been asked
'you're David's boys, aren't you?'
One...
#death
551 reads
4 Comments
LOVE POEM
Published
25th Oct 2021 6:09pm
25th Oct 2021 6:09pm
Mr Right
I used to think that Mister Right
was a well-built buck
with perfect skin,
hands blushed as they grip
a riding crop,
lip sneered in disdain.
but as I've grown I've learned
that cruelty breeds wanting cruelty...
and there were lots of us.
boys who wanted to be hurt by men
just like they'd been by fathers,
brothers, even friends, interpreting their hate
as love, and thinking that's
what's needed to be loved.
sometimes I don't allow myself to think
how many gay boys have been lost
in...
was a well-built buck
with perfect skin,
hands blushed as they grip
a riding crop,
lip sneered in disdain.
but as I've grown I've learned
that cruelty breeds wanting cruelty...
and there were lots of us.
boys who wanted to be hurt by men
just like they'd been by fathers,
brothers, even friends, interpreting their hate
as love, and thinking that's
what's needed to be loved.
sometimes I don't allow myself to think
how many gay boys have been lost
in...
#love
#depression
#gay #sex
#gay #sex
471 reads
3 Comments
DARK POEM
Published
24th Oct 2021 10:56pm
24th Oct 2021 10:56pm
Sad Fact
I spit upon this dreadful banker's grave
who shot his heart out in a Florida dawn - John Berryman, writing about his father’s suicide
I don’t visit stepmother’s grave.
Never been obliged.
My family brings a practicality
to its emotions.
Illusion of control
though none’s in evidence,
from all the needless rage I’ve seen.
She was cremated. Urn buried.
And when we came home
I picked up the phone
and was greeted by a woman’s voice
asking if my father’s wife was there.
We’ve just come from her funeral, I said.
...
who shot his heart out in a Florida dawn - John Berryman, writing about his father’s suicide
I don’t visit stepmother’s grave.
Never been obliged.
My family brings a practicality
to its emotions.
Illusion of control
though none’s in evidence,
from all the needless rage I’ve seen.
She was cremated. Urn buried.
And when we came home
I picked up the phone
and was greeted by a woman’s voice
asking if my father’s wife was there.
We’ve just come from her funeral, I said.
...
#suicide
361 reads
1 Comment
SELF POEM
Published
23rd Oct 2021 10:52am
23rd Oct 2021 10:52am
How I Write Poems
I Clarity
We start with the subject meeting object, via verb.
The man walked down the street.
So long as he walks down that street,
we have a place from which to start.
Let's set his toes alight.
II Imagery
Now that we've got clarity,
let's carry on with imagery.
How does the man walk down the street?
Like a clown on its way to a crisis centre?
Sharp-suited, with painted grin,
but haunted, hollow eyes?
What does the street look like?
I'm picturing a British one,
with concrete kerb
and...
We start with the subject meeting object, via verb.
The man walked down the street.
So long as he walks down that street,
we have a place from which to start.
Let's set his toes alight.
II Imagery
Now that we've got clarity,
let's carry on with imagery.
How does the man walk down the street?
Like a clown on its way to a crisis centre?
Sharp-suited, with painted grin,
but haunted, hollow eyes?
What does the street look like?
I'm picturing a British one,
with concrete kerb
and...
#WritersBlock
#LifeAsAWriter
#WritingPoetry #art
#WritingPoetry #art
350 reads
3 Comments
DARK POEM
Published
19th Oct 2021 7:28pm
19th Oct 2021 7:28pm
Autopsy of a Slasher Film
We always begin
with original sin. What made him
pick up a knife and walk the streets
like a death-dealing door to door salesman?
(‘Would you like to try one of our knives?
You’ll never leave meat on the bone again.’)
Often it’s humiliation, something
to prick the male ego like a pig’s bladder
and watch it expel air, an old Halloween trick
for “haunted” suburban houses.
Sometimes it’s just grief, or even
mere insanity, alone. Throw in
some Freud, for Good Measure.
...
with original sin. What made him
pick up a knife and walk the streets
like a death-dealing door to door salesman?
(‘Would you like to try one of our knives?
You’ll never leave meat on the bone again.’)
Often it’s humiliation, something
to prick the male ego like a pig’s bladder
and watch it expel air, an old Halloween trick
for “haunted” suburban houses.
Sometimes it’s just grief, or even
mere insanity, alone. Throw in
some Freud, for Good Measure.
...
#dark
#narrative
#PopCulture #art
#PopCulture #art
419 reads
5 Comments
DU Poetry : Submissions by Casted_Runes (Mr Karswell)
