I'm considered a malicious guy and I'm fine with that. My malice is well considered rejectionism. Why not? There are outrages everywhere. Does this mean I have a thin skin, or does it mean that most people have no moral compass? I say it's both. We live in a vile civilization that glamorizes power and yet, isolates us as individuals; thus encouraging people to objectify others. Isn't that fucked up? To seek power over those who appear to be little more than cartoons? Why shouldn't I hate that? And if I choose to be a hater, what's wrong with that? Those who label me thusly, what are you suggesting? That one shouldn't be outraged? That one should just stfu and tend one's garden? I oppose that on principle. Principle: the source and solution of and to my malice. Fucks are deaf and blind to good deeds and appeals for goodness—but by definition, fucks are very sensitive to the malice of others. So I'm proud of my malice. At least I declare it and it's not like I'm a Joan Rivers or Perez Hilton, using my malice against other, basically vapid enterprises. And the worst of course are the malicious who can actually argue with a straight face that they are not acting on hatred, but are rather acting on an impulse of love and compassion. These people should be murdered.
Free-for-all rules apply for this combat, which means if you don't like the main topic, go and riff off another combatant's composition.
Combat Expiration: 12am PST, 4/25/2011
Critique Expiration: 12am PST, 4/27/2011, with a rolling grace period of 24 hours to allow for critique rebuttals.
Bonuses/Penalties: +2 if posted by 6pm PST, 4/22/2011, +1 if posted by 2am PST 4/23/2011, -1 if posted by 6am PST 4/25/2011, -2 if posted by 12pm PST 4/25/2011.
The Rules: http://combatwords.blogspot.com/2010/07/official-rules-for-combatwords-updated.html
Subscribe in a reader
Hood
ReplyDeleteThe fact that I felt even a mere ounce of doubt
worming its way through my guts, the fact
that I wanted to protest but out of fear could not
meant that I was more worthless than the rest
who all hung, perfectly content
within their dense silence just like insects suspended
motionless in coagulated amber.
At least no one could call them inconsistent.
It mattered not that their stoic bravery,
however unwavering, was buttressed
not by some heroic act of strength but
by the beams of stubbornness and ignorance.
I must not be forgiven for my silence.
I looked on with the rest as that weight twisted
and felt my brittle spine reduced to splinters.
Top of Victory
ReplyDeleteOne of my first poems started:
"They found a boy by my house today/
With a note in his hand/with blood."
I don't remember the rest.
The long-haired boy in T-shirt and jeans
Had been killed by a shotgun blast to the chest
And his body was dumped
At the top of Victory Boulevard
Up the hill and down the other side
From where I lived
I wrote the poem so that maybe
I wouldn't have nightmares
Rumor spread quickly at my junior high
The killer was the older brother
Of two of our classmates
The rumors were true
I read it in the newspaper
The next day
He was on the losing end
Of a love triangle
He was arrested out of state
And waived extradition
Ricky, a little guy, found the body
I didn't find the body
Because I didn't take that shortcut
To Dan's house anymore
Last time I'd gone I almost
Stepped on a rattlesnake
Thank you snake.
I saw Joann in the hall at school
I looked at her, thinking
What everyone else thought that day
When they saw her
"Her brother killed a man
And dumped his body
At the top of Victory
Joann looked at me
She knew what I was thinking
I was glad I didn't find the body
Thank you, snake
Ricky, in his twenties, would go to bars
And flirt with girls who were with big strong men
When they told him to get lost or get beat up
He'd show them pictures of victims,
Pictures he'd stolen from the coroner's office
And say the murders were his work
And invite them to step aside
And let him chat with the lovely lady or die
He was arrested for making terrorist threats
I didn't find the body because
Of that rattlesnake that had terrified me
When I almost stepped on it
As I climbed up the concrete drain after school
Thank you, snake,
Thank you again
(n.b.: five minutes in the box. but i'd written it in short story form before, and may have written it in poetry form in the past, too)
Silk Knight Swoons [Combatwords Poem, April 23, 2011]
ReplyDeleteKnight of granite squares, night of business casual wear;
Fights by chessboard bets—I swear, Ruy Lopez has the night sweats
Underneath tobacco palms and gritty nails and Lasker psalms.
Even though I wore a suit, I paused and watched the two galoots
Murder pawns and trade a pair of dollar bills for several prawns
Fried and battered—basket case: they fed while chessmen scattered.
Low and you'll become the queen.
Slow and knives become serene.
Laugh alone to laugh like hell;
Crazies knew I shared their smell.
"Glasses ain't afraid of anything."
"Watch that tie; he wants to fight."
Silk cocoon and pace of concrete moon—
A silver goon, a briefcase croon;
A stroke, a grand mal swoon:
A check and mated loon.
This comment has been removed by the author.
ReplyDeleteMalice
ReplyDeleteHow her boss stared over her shoulder
when she worked. How he sauntered
cat-like into her office when she was at lunch
to check the caller ID on her phone.
How he called her at the exact time
she should have returned from lunch
to be sure she was there. How he asked
where she had gone to eat. How he
demanded to know where she had been
every time she went to the bathroom.
How he watched her from the window
of his office when she walked to her car
after a long day.
How every night she dreamed
she was an ant in a tiny, slim ant farm,
glass pressing on her segmented black body
as she squeezed herself over and under
grains of sharp gray sand, two huge eyes
glaring at her writhing progress, her
inelegant trails and tunnels, waiting
for the right moment to lift the box,
shake it like an Etch-a-Sketch,
silently admonish her to do it again
but better this time.
Give Pause:
ReplyDeleteOn our pale blue dot alone
There exist more than six billion centers of the universe
And every single one is off bucking fate
Re-determining their destination
Confusing free will with knee-jerk reactions
That zap telegraphed with all the consciousness, love and compassion
As an electron tumbling down a wire from one point to another
Perfectly happy to keep their heads straight and eyes glazed
As they barrel in and out of control to their next desire
Unable to be troubled, to look out for others
Causing traffic jams, world wars, and great depressions
Making rubber necks of us all
To be inconvenienced by other peoples mistakes
Jarred annoyingly from a sleep where we are free to dream
That this is ok, that the phrase 'never loved and left to die'
Is an acceptable combination of words
Because it exists in nature
Phooey
Toady:
ReplyDeleteOunce of doubt worming its way through my guts is a clever fusion of cliche, but it does nothing for me. Passive sentences I realize are there to mimic the muddy sense one has when feeling malice. Can't say it did anything for me. 0.
Onyxsupersonics
"I wrote the poem so that maybe
I wouldn't have nightmares...
Thank you snake. "
Liked it +1
Linebreaks seem arbitrary, ending went on too long + seemed grafted upon the 1st part. -1
+1 -1 = 0.
Valerie:
1st stanza was really interesting. I liked how off-balance it read. +1
2nd stanza started off promising, but really deflated the energy of the 1st. I almost feel it was a separate comp, grafted upon the 1st. -1
+1 -1 = 0
The Humanist:
The movement of thought was cool with this, but the language seemed a little rote for my tastes. I also feel there could have been better organization of the thoughts. 0
respectfully dissent on valerie's, i vote yes on both stanzas. nice symmetry: at work, at home. in the work and farm, in the dream ant farm. i give her two thumbs up, i thought that was a strong piece o' work.
ReplyDelete