I think the whole notion is ludicrous. When I'm accused of splitting hairs, I just take it to mean that my accuser can't keep up and fails to see the significance of the proffered posit. But maybe s/he's not an idiot and maybe I'm wrong and maybe—just maybe—I attach too much meaning to subtlety.
Combat Expiration: 12am PST, 1/10/2011
Critique Expiration: 12pm PST, 1/11/2011
Bonuses/Penalties: +2 if posted by 6pm PST 1/7/2011, +1 if posted by 2am PST 1/8/2011, -1 if posted by 6am 1/10/2011, -2 if posted by 12pm 1/10/2011.
The Rules: http://combatwords.blogspot.com/2010/07/official-rules-for-combatwords-updated.html
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Fee-Fi-Fo-Fum
ReplyDeleteI smell the blood
of a Wessington
He keeps wasting his rage posting intelligent posits on Craigslist. Shooting belly up fish in a barrel only to arrive at the riot dangerously low on ammo. Now his opponents know they far outnumber the chance in his chamber to end them swiftly, safely, and from a distance.
He has got to come down and put his fists up. I'll warn you all now that he'll still look tough, but I've got a surprise for him. I've been gaining momentum over the course of the week. I'm fueled by first quarter kick off meetings, audits, and a veritable cornucopia of things that piss right me off. I'm flying in like Chitty Chitty Bang Bang on the internet hate machine. It's a tidal wave of cloudy-stinking piss, swarming with great white sharks that shit spiders and nightmares (and a series of tubes).
I won't stop at Wessington either. After I leave him a piss soaked, spider bite riddled and nightmare haunted heap on the ground, I'm taking my show on the road to all of you.
You all have no idea the darkness we unearthed in that board room. How were we to know our bar graphs and slide shows were ancient incantations to summon eternal madness from the aeon-dead abyss? It reached out and touched me. I shivered like I just finished a tinkle, and blasphemous thoughts swelled in my mind.
I had hoped my over the top threats to Wessington would have scared you all off, but I fear it has only incited your interest. Such is the evil I have been invaded by, even good intentioned deeds serve the ultimate end of destruction.
A Hair on My Tongue
ReplyDeleteI know I should be grateful –and I am-
that you ever even deigned to place your shapely form,
however briefly, in my presence.
That I was permitted to stand in the same room
as this exquisite figurine, with porcelain wrists
and eyes as clear as ether, dense with absence.
You instructed me on how to lick you, how to treat
your pearly cleft like the precious delicacy it was.
It was worth the price I paid in bickering,
like when you stayed out all evening
and, crumbling beneath my questioning,
confessed that you had spent the night kissing
some student miscreant who you were tutoring.
Was it open mouth? I hissed, unused to this position,
of being forced to instigate an inquisition.
It’s no big deal, you said, sounding equally convinced
of your essential innocence- if not in action,
then in intent. Did he stick his tongue
in you? I kept insisting.
He doesn’t mean a thing to me, you said.
It’s you I love. That made it worse
and so we fought, then fucked, the sex
the best we’d ever had by far. But whether it was fueled
by love or hate I could not tell you,
I cannot differentiate between the two. These passions seem
so entwined, to separate them would be like
unraveling a braid, or splitting hairs.
And like you said, Who cares?
And still after all these years, though I try to rid my lips
of this stray strand of longing that still clings,
though I spit and spit, still something stubbornly sticks there
Insist An If [Combatwords Poem, January 7, 2011]
ReplyDeleteShe doesn't know, she said she doesn't know
And so an extra pint, a shot of gin—
And pinball through the jukebox techno pop.
Pick a fight—what makes that eightball special?
Grab it, throw it where the music (music?)
Emanates and break the sound of fuckers.
She says she doesn't know, so disagree
And jump the curb—she's fists of hair and keys.
At last she's driving somewhere definite.
"God does not exist you crazy bitch,
Why withhold your judgment, nothing's there.
Say it might be so, I dare you, say it,"
Might be so. She married mighty soul,
A frantic drunk she shouldn't love—
Mostly doesn't anymore—
But drives him back to sheets;
Rolls the extra bed
And lays her head
Under moon
And asks
'If.'
Response to the Alchemist:
ReplyDeleteThe substrate of your poem is tightly packed
Carefully selected words reflecting craft
When the enzyme of emotion is added
There is a visible chemical reaction
The whole piece begins to coalesce
Reaching for the same sharp apex
A glimmering knife of anthracite
Obviously out for blood tonight
Hungering in the hands of dangerous
Looking to carve up a canvas
It's drawn slow across my remaining heart string
Like a bow rubbed with rosin
Playing a cutting note of ache
Reminding me that sometimes it's just that way
When the pin point of if passes through your lips
Becoming the first puncture in a wound being stitched