Activities Faire + Meeting update!

The activities faire went great today-- we had over twenty-five students sign up!
Hopefully we will see all of them at the next meeting.

At the meeting after the faire, collective poems were written in a group writing exercise. We only have three, due to the small turn out, but they are melancholy and brilliant.

The Fall of Man

Tumbling over the rocks and grasping for life,
Elliott tried his hardest to remember that day.
The deepness of resonation as the avalanche
claimed Elliott for the Earth.
Borne back, like Persephone,
his sixty years of good health
never seemed to fail him, until now.
A sudden pain in his heart,
and then quickly followed the collapsing
of his ribcage, moving to kiss each other--
she first sensed his warmth
before she felt it, first saw
his dark eyes an unwilling face.
Opposites it seemed but
within, the farce that he played
showed him truth: he was the same.
Laying down the law, a set of rules
to say, once and for all,
this would be the end of it.
This would be his redemption.
He drew the sword from his hip
and under a cry of repent, he
brought it back to the stone,
hands ripped, splinters sparked.
The aimless fury of memory.


The Man with a Gold Tooth

Heorot holds little for those, drowned
without victory in their old age. The gold
flecked away by unsympathetic time,
and not hacked by savage swords.
His pristine face brought forth a shudder,
a man with his life behind him and
only the eyes of judgment ahead:
gold tasted bitter, youth a pained past
and tomorrow...
At the end, it was nothing gained.
The sun and moon switched positions,
the tide visited and left him,
the night had fallen to crest the sand,
until only a crescent on the water sparkled
for a moment on the water and was gone.
Like a child, he wondered why
this was his fate,
why must the world torture only him.
It seemed as if he was the last martyr
left to the beating fists of providence.
Locked in a cafe, a mental cave,
a whispering in his ringing ear,
It is time to let go
be free and give us your life--
you are free.

The Saddest Comic

Like a road in the desert,
swept over with sand,
the path disappeared
yet a light shone down:
here lay the death, illuminated by
the depth and rapidity of transience,
the half-caught breath, the morning mist.
He always knew what lay ahead. But still,
there was an unsettling feeling inside of him.
Encompassed by shadows, be rethought his next move,
the calculation of the few moments ahead of him
meant everything. He could not imagine life beyond
these walls, this familiar bed.
The sun hadn't set yet.
There was still a hint of hope.
Running, tripping, and screaming--
the roll of motions beat each other
through the rhythm, and they prayed on.
Prayed for the nights that would shake them like shingles,
prayed for a moment to wander in fear.
For once, it was a necessity.
It was time for
the crossing of the threshold:
entrance to the battle of
the champions.




--Stephanie

Change of Date - this week's meeting

In case it isn't getting through on the announcements...

I (once again) am tied up on Friday afternoon. This week, we will have our meeting in the teachers' lounge after we have wrapped up the Activity Faire. Then next week, we will be back to our normal schedule.

My apologies to any of the band members who cannot make it. But if you get me your poems, we can discuss them...

-Mr. Lally

Challenge #1

Here is our first literary challenge:

A few of us scoured some selected passages to find words or phrases that might make for an interesting inspiration for a new poem. Look at the list attached below, find a line, and use it as either the title of a new poem, or work it into the poem somewhere else. You cannot change the wording.

An aside, when we read aloud our "found lines," we discovered that they made strange little poems of their own, so the arrangement has been kept intact to reflect this. As people use the titles, I will remove them from the master lists.

DEADLINE: Rolling deadline until we start a new challenge...

THE STARTING POINTS:

The second stop is Jupiter
4:00 AM
The velvet smile of scorn
The only true reader
Ask Jacob or Jake
Unmapped
The year had lost its meaning
Mind-bound images
Two measures of tenderness
Smother
Bone and paper
Tramp and tread
It ended up a mess
Fluttering
This trembling
Merciless brightness
He signs at the gates of death
Indifference
Ego had another plan
Quicksand and sidewalk
Mistress of the hammocks


I travel through time
Till God called “No”
As swift as premonition
He’s seen the newspaper
Spray cans and needles
Brooding this hour
Flames of Discipline
I stare ten-thousand miles vacantly
Soft blue smoke
I forgot her
Benign Dementia
Admirer
The statistician
A rising coil of smoke
A coarse grace remained
Engulfing America
Flickering in sunlight
Nothing of harm to dread
Quaking like the dust
Though sad moons shadow every sun that sets.

-Mr. Lally

PS - As soon as someone "claims" one of our starting points, as is happening in our comments, I will put it in italics to show that it has already been taken. Try to avoid choosing a line that someone else has used. Good luck! Oh - and if you want, publish your responses here in the comments section. A living poetry blog. How delightful.