Submissions by The_Silly_Sibyl
POEMS AND SHORT STORIES
Poet Introduction I appreciate all kinds of poetry. I think any form can have value if it's used well, though I hate the notion that poems are just outpourings of emotion. Even free verse needs a craftsman's eye.
ANGER POEM
Published
20th Feb 2020 11:40pm
20th Feb 2020 11:40pm
The Sissy
The simple wickedness you take
in comments meant as jokes, I’m sure,
is like the mutt’s teeth teasing forth
the marrow from its bone,
leaving it brittle, and hollow, alone.
If you were svelte and handsome or
at least not larded up,
a fat and sarcastic bastard
with acid butter in your heart,
you’d make a sweet icon.
An inspiration to the queer.
But you, you take those comments and,
processing them, come out not
as Disco Boy. Receiving all
your mother’s jibes about
gay guys in bogs, your...
in comments meant as jokes, I’m sure,
is like the mutt’s teeth teasing forth
the marrow from its bone,
leaving it brittle, and hollow, alone.
If you were svelte and handsome or
at least not larded up,
a fat and sarcastic bastard
with acid butter in your heart,
you’d make a sweet icon.
An inspiration to the queer.
But you, you take those comments and,
processing them, come out not
as Disco Boy. Receiving all
your mother’s jibes about
gay guys in bogs, your...
#LGBT
95 reads
4 Comments
DARK POEM
Published
29th Jan 2020 9:58pm
29th Jan 2020 9:58pm
Exorcism in the Middle Ages
To ladders lashed and raised
in smoky orange endlessness,
the licking of the flames
and cries from far below
your single sign of worldliness,
you pray to burn the Devil out.
-
From your pocket as you burn
dangle earbuds plugged into
a smartphone sweating in its case.
The sticks from which the stake
is raised are called faggots,
hence the slur, since that was how
they dealt with unrepentant queers
(or so your father said,
and o how he enjoyed the fact!)
-
Whatever...
in smoky orange endlessness,
the licking of the flames
and cries from far below
your single sign of worldliness,
you pray to burn the Devil out.
-
From your pocket as you burn
dangle earbuds plugged into
a smartphone sweating in its case.
The sticks from which the stake
is raised are called faggots,
hence the slur, since that was how
they dealt with unrepentant queers
(or so your father said,
and o how he enjoyed the fact!)
-
Whatever...
#devil
66 reads
3 Comments
SELF POEM
Published
22nd Dec 2019 3:16am
22nd Dec 2019 3:16am
Ezra Pound’s Cage
My back a knot of muscles pulling taut
at any sense of strain
and radiating agony
keeps me glued to bed and chair
and bath like an unloved old man
struggling to get along in an apartment.
It also makes me think
how useless I’d be under torture,
or any cruelty applied
to punish an ideal, a stand.
I don’t respect what many men stand for.
In his dishevelled arrogance
Pound was just another brat,
deaf to human wailing.
But in his cage I think of him,
sleeping on concrete,
denied humanity and books, ...
at any sense of strain
and radiating agony
keeps me glued to bed and chair
and bath like an unloved old man
struggling to get along in an apartment.
It also makes me think
how useless I’d be under torture,
or any cruelty applied
to punish an ideal, a stand.
I don’t respect what many men stand for.
In his dishevelled arrogance
Pound was just another brat,
deaf to human wailing.
But in his cage I think of him,
sleeping on concrete,
denied humanity and books, ...
#SelfReflection
113 reads
6 Comments
DARK POEM
Published
14th Dec 2019 5:15pm
14th Dec 2019 5:15pm
Yellow Moon
poem for Friday the 13th (December 2019)
Yellow moon caught in branches
above the town, on a night so cold
you hesitate to stop moving.
I know I'm not a good person.
Quick to anger, gluttonous,
riddled with misanthropy
like insects burrowing in meat.
Looking at that yellow moon,
imagining a horde of freaks
gathered in its jaundiced glare,
I see myself stood on the kerb,
all black in formal shirt, trousers,
a Protestant prude in the body of
a red-faced monk.
What vampires, were-beasts, ...
Yellow moon caught in branches
above the town, on a night so cold
you hesitate to stop moving.
I know I'm not a good person.
Quick to anger, gluttonous,
riddled with misanthropy
like insects burrowing in meat.
Looking at that yellow moon,
imagining a horde of freaks
gathered in its jaundiced glare,
I see myself stood on the kerb,
all black in formal shirt, trousers,
a Protestant prude in the body of
a red-faced monk.
What vampires, were-beasts, ...
#scary
115 reads
3 Comments
OBSERVATIONAL POEM
Published
9th Dec 2019 7:56pm
9th Dec 2019 7:56pm
Work Programme
I once worked in a hospital
as part of a programme
to get job-seekers off their bums,
to learn how adults live,
and give a certain something back
that isn't heroin or crack.
It was the sort of hospital
that breathes on you a cleanliness,
a latticework of blue
in paint and atmosphere.
Being a proletariat
of NHS peerage,
I'd never seen such wholesome glare
from elegant strip-lights, let
alone a cushioned chair
with uncut holstery.
Around a central courtyard wrapped,
the rooms were...
as part of a programme
to get job-seekers off their bums,
to learn how adults live,
and give a certain something back
that isn't heroin or crack.
It was the sort of hospital
that breathes on you a cleanliness,
a latticework of blue
in paint and atmosphere.
Being a proletariat
of NHS peerage,
I'd never seen such wholesome glare
from elegant strip-lights, let
alone a cushioned chair
with uncut holstery.
Around a central courtyard wrapped,
the rooms were...
#LifeCycle
100 reads
4 Comments
SELF POEM
Published
6th Dec 2019 6:44pm
6th Dec 2019 6:44pm
Unfinished poem
What becomes of me becomes of you.
Floating in the same eternal estuary,
one of a countless horde of lives
advanced enough to hold a pen,
yet still oppressively mundane.
I never liked myself. The vain
so often don't, and though
repulsion dawned on me
when witnessing my form,
I felt I was at least urbane.
Floating in the same eternal estuary,
one of a countless horde of lives
advanced enough to hold a pen,
yet still oppressively mundane.
I never liked myself. The vain
so often don't, and though
repulsion dawned on me
when witnessing my form,
I felt I was at least urbane.
#humankind
97 reads
2 Comments
OBSERVATIONAL POEM
Published
24th Nov 2019 10:39pm
24th Nov 2019 10:39pm
Suggested Inscription on a Commemorative Plate
Prince Andrew's up the shitter, then,
or so they'd have us think.
And Princess Maggie was a cunt
who liked to smoke and drink.
I wonder, really, what it's worth,
God's representatives on earth,
when they can't even stand aloof
and lead the peasants hoof by hoof.
Once, at least, they'd ride to war
Or have the sense to hide away.
Now they're splashed on TV screens,
old, perverted, fat, and grey.
The rotting teeth are on display,
and no-one cares about croquet.
or so they'd have us think.
And Princess Maggie was a cunt
who liked to smoke and drink.
I wonder, really, what it's worth,
God's representatives on earth,
when they can't even stand aloof
and lead the peasants hoof by hoof.
Once, at least, they'd ride to war
Or have the sense to hide away.
Now they're splashed on TV screens,
old, perverted, fat, and grey.
The rotting teeth are on display,
and no-one cares about croquet.
#culture
74 reads
2 Comments
OBSERVATIONAL POEM
Published
19th Nov 2019 8:33pm
19th Nov 2019 8:33pm
She Walks in, Ugly
When sex was weaponised, and not
as in the caveman sense
of girls on shoulders hot
with hair and sweat, a recompense
was that old lie that anyone
can get some fun.
Destined souls, and all that crap.
The pictures brim with leggy sorts,
who have the day won for them by a chap
whose belly never sags, nor waist consorts
with any welcoming fleshpots.
She’s looks enough to make a vegan drive
a semi through a petting zoo,
and he’ll sweat like an English duke
on being questioned live
about his taste in prostitutes....
as in the caveman sense
of girls on shoulders hot
with hair and sweat, a recompense
was that old lie that anyone
can get some fun.
Destined souls, and all that crap.
The pictures brim with leggy sorts,
who have the day won for them by a chap
whose belly never sags, nor waist consorts
with any welcoming fleshpots.
She’s looks enough to make a vegan drive
a semi through a petting zoo,
and he’ll sweat like an English duke
on being questioned live
about his taste in prostitutes....
#beauty
102 reads
1 Comment
SELF POEM
Published
4th Oct 2019 11:16pm
4th Oct 2019 11:16pm
A Cold Bastard
The poison lingers on my lips
like salivation, uncontrolled,
and waiting to ruin everyone’s day.
I get it from my dad, I say,
which certainly isn’t a lie.
But really, ugliness is me,
as near the Divine as I get.
Some people reach it perfectly,
projecting only thoughts and deeds
to make an angel blush
redder than a teenager,
on watching with his parents that
scene in the movie where
the leads take off their clothes.
That isn’t me.
Sarcasm, and bitterness,
the lowest form of wit: ...
like salivation, uncontrolled,
and waiting to ruin everyone’s day.
I get it from my dad, I say,
which certainly isn’t a lie.
But really, ugliness is me,
as near the Divine as I get.
Some people reach it perfectly,
projecting only thoughts and deeds
to make an angel blush
redder than a teenager,
on watching with his parents that
scene in the movie where
the leads take off their clothes.
That isn’t me.
Sarcasm, and bitterness,
the lowest form of wit: ...
#dark
185 reads
1 Comment
LOVE POEM
Published
18th Sep 2019 11:46pm
18th Sep 2019 11:46pm
A Prayer to Mother Radcliffe
[Sir Walter] Scott himself said that [Ann Radcliffe’s] prose was poetry and her poetry was prose. She was, indeed, a prose poet, in both the best and the worst senses of the phrase. The romantic landscape, the background, is the best thing in all her books; the characters are two dimensional, the plots far fetched and improbable, with 'elaboration of means and futility of result'." - British Authors Before 1800: A Biographical Dictionary
Mother Radcliffe, seated in
a great armchair of deep
and churning red velvet,
the dowager alive
with castles and ...
Mother Radcliffe, seated in
a great armchair of deep
and churning red velvet,
the dowager alive
with castles and ...
#gothic
83 reads
1 Comment
STORY POEM
Published
16th Sep 2019 7:25pm
16th Sep 2019 7:25pm
Heather of the Dean
Heather [West, murdered daughter of serial killers Fred and Rose West] ... expressed to [siblings] Mae and Stephen her desire to run away from home and live a nomadic lifestyle in the Forest of Dean, and to never again see any human beings." - Wikipedia (entry for Fred West), quoting Rose West: The Making of a Monster by Jane Woodrow, p. 236, 2011
Such cruelty cannot be countenanced.
A simple truth.
Yet countenanced it was, and is,
and will in circles of despair
decreasing, hopefully.
I cannot broach your tenderness,
the rawness of your flesh ...
Such cruelty cannot be countenanced.
A simple truth.
Yet countenanced it was, and is,
and will in circles of despair
decreasing, hopefully.
I cannot broach your tenderness,
the rawness of your flesh ...
#tragedy
123 reads
3 Comments
SPIRITUAL POEM
Published
12th Sep 2019 6:29pm
12th Sep 2019 6:29pm
simple furnishings
we languished
underneath
a tree
talking of things
that couldn't be
and then died singly
in rooms
with simple furnishings
-
I remember church:
with deep carpets
and white pulpits,
flowers and coffee
in the tiled lobby,
colourful Bibles
on shelves.
The generations tidied up
and plastered stony walls,
installed stoves,
de-splintered pews,
upholstered God
from beard to robe,
and scented Him
with fresh lemons.
...
underneath
a tree
talking of things
that couldn't be
and then died singly
in rooms
with simple furnishings
-
I remember church:
with deep carpets
and white pulpits,
flowers and coffee
in the tiled lobby,
colourful Bibles
on shelves.
The generations tidied up
and plastered stony walls,
installed stoves,
de-splintered pews,
upholstered God
from beard to robe,
and scented Him
with fresh lemons.
...
#religion
123 reads
4 Comments
DU Poetry : Submissions by The_Silly_Sibyl
