orpheus-wept

[orpheus-wept]

Steven Universe is interesting to me because it’s got the most extreme dichotomy between ideas that would be better fleshed out in a show for adults, and ideas that are interesting specifically because they’re native to an unironic children’s show.

[orpheus-wept]

writing mood™️

[orpheus-wept]

Saccharine Sunday slips by slowly,

Bringing with it

That sickly-sweet taste that

Lingers in the back of the throat and

Threatens to rip the heart out your chest.

The rotten corpse of autumn gives way

To spring, then- no,

Was it winter?

Seconds pass like hours,

Hours like years; weeks like centuries.

A faceless, nameless thing slips

Under the door and stands overtop your bed

Leaning over and watching intently with

Eyes that do not exist and

Fangs that need not bite and

A presence that haunts your days but

Waits patiently through your dreams

And it is a patient thing-

You have come to call it Dread.

It does not jump out at you,

Does not go bump in the night. No,

It is a patient thing indeed.

It does not have need of your pain;

Only your fear,

Which it knows oh so well.

You feel it before you see it,

Taste it before you hear it,

Smell it before you touch it,

This thing which cannot be;

Which must not be.

You tell it,

"I am not afraid of you,

You cannot harm me.

You are a figment,

Imaginary.

You hold no power,

You are not real."

All lies, of course.

It need not bite you to bleed you out;

Need not to see you to Know you;

Need not harm you to hurt you.

No, this thing called Dread,

It need only wait,

And you will do its job for it,

Scraping and

Pulling and

Plunging into the dark,

Averting your eyes and

Pretending you cannot tell it is there.

You go to the doctor,

Tell her,

"I must be going crazy:

This thing, it will not leave me be.

Surely, surely, there is

A pill to take or

A surgery to undergo.

Something, anything,

To make it go away,

This thing called Dread"

But the drugs don't work,

And she certainly won't cut you open

For an issue within only your own mind

She says

"Have you tried breathing exercises?"

Of course you have.

It would never hurt you, not really;

It cannot do such a thing.

You know this,

You have lived with it so long.

Rather, it Waits,

And Waits,

And Waits.

For it is patient,

This thing you call Dread

And at last, it comes to a head.

Your crumbling mind cannot bear to see it

Even one second longer.

You take your final recourse,

Enact your final petty resistance,

Then give in,

And it greedily accepts

Its final feast

Saccharine Sunday slipped by slowly,

Taking with it

That sickly-sweet taste that

Lingered in the back of the throat and

Ripped the heart out your chest

[orpheus-wept]

Writers when it's time to write the story no one forced them to come up with in the first place 🙄

[orpheus-wept]

writing? oh, i’m definitely writing. in my head. during the most inconvenient times. like in the shower or when i’m about to fall asleep. actual typing? no, no, we don’t do that here.

[orpheus-wept]

the suffering never ends

[orpheus-wept]

i love finding poetry in the mundane, and yesterday i stumbled upon something that just hits that spot

So, my partner has an old phone- It served them for many years now, but it has one issue: Charging it is hard. Their current charger is hanging on by a thread (literally), and can barely do its job. The phone and the charger came together: They've never used another charger for said phone.

Now, they've tried to replace the charging cord several times. But it doesn't matter how much they've searched what damned specific charger the phone uses, none of them work. They finally decided to bring it to a phone shop and ask what should they use.

The guy at the shop looked at the phone for a bit, and explained: "The port itself is broken. The charger you have works with this phone because they've mutually broken each other into the same shape, in a way that no other charger is shaped. The port itself has corroded in a way that only accepts the charger that shaped it like that in the first place."

And while this is of course a frustrating situation for my partner, I feel like there's a metaphor here. I could write a goddamn story about this. These two half-broken old things have been together for so long they've destroyed each other in a way that keeps them from working with anything else. They've hurt each other in a way that barely keeps them functioning together, and have been rendered useless with literally anything else.

This too is toxic yuri to me-

[orpheus-wept]

[orpheus-wept]

The most sure sign that someone doesn’t know much about poetry is when they insist that poetry has to rhyme.

And the most sure sign that someone is a little too pretentious about poetry is when they say that they hate rhyming poetry.

[orpheus-wept]

I once believed there was good in me,

That, for all the suffering I caused,

There was yet still a chance for me to

Ease the pain of others and to

Stand firm for my loved ones,

If no others.

Oh, how wrong i was.

What a sweet little thing that young girl was

Playing with dinosaur toys and

Truly, without doubt, thinking she was

Kind.

No, dear fairy girl;

There is no kindness within you.

No longer, anyway. It was-

Torn out,

Ripped to shreds and thrown away

If it ever existed to begin with.

No, sweet changeling;

Every debt ever incurred,

You will pay in full.

Your currency, demoninations of

wrath and rage and

An ever-expanding arsenal of

Knives shaped like "I'm sorry," and

Guns on stands labeled "I can change."

You know, deep down, that only one-

Only one thing in this storeroom of violence

Will ever truly change the world,

As you so desperately wish to.

A little plastic bottle,

Tucked away in a corner;

It reeks of entropy and second chances,

Of a thousand lives not lived and

Ten thousand more of us who found this room.

The label reads

"I'm so sorry. I did love you all. Goodbye"

And as the "child-proof" lid pops off

(You were always a clever girl)

We are greeted with applause,

Then,

At last,

silence.

[orpheus-wept]

“Oh my god you’re a writer? Can I read your stuff?”

[orpheus-wept]

You know the problem with reading a book? You get hooked and then it ends and you feel sad

[orpheus-wept]

[orpheus-wept]

I have been,

Am,

Will be,

Broken;

Shattered ages ago,

Sharp fragments lost in the dirt or

Thrown away

To keep them out of reach.

Bloodied fingers have,

From time to time,

Reached out, taken a shard and,

Inevitably, held on too tight.

Don't they know?

You should not touch broken glass.

Poor things, injuring themselves on me.

I am all fired clay and old porcelain,

All razor-sharp and merciless splinters

I was never whole,

Not so far as I can recall.

Perhaps, once upon a dream,

Many ages ago

Yet, what is this strange thing?

No, please, do not approach.

You are beautiful to behold.

Please, be careful

Those pieces of me are dangerous

They will slice through skin, muscle, sinew

They will bury themselves deep and

Be incapable of removal

Please, I beg of you,

I do not wish to cause more pain, but-

What is this?

Why do you not bleed?

What is this crown of light atop your head?

I am bathed in it's glamour and

For a moment believe

Perhaps I am more than what I have seen

Perhaps my broken pieces were once-

No, that cannot be.

But you,

Beautiful thing,

Touch them with such...

Tenderness

It almost causes me to forget

That i am all fired clay and old porcelain,

All razor-sharp and merciless splinters.

Every day, now, you approach;

Take one tiny fragment, and,

With grace and celerity,

Fit it like a puzzle piece into me.

Never does it cut you open.

Nor do you ever complain of my Shattering;

A flash of white feather and gold inlay and

Eyes that must see more than mine.

For why else would you bother

To try and fix this old, Broken thing?

I cannot understand you, yet

Find myself enraptured.

That such a beautiful thing,

Which seems as though it came from

Some better place than here,

Would care for its polar opposite

Calls forth a strange sensation in my chest.

Another day, another piece

Plucked from the ground and

Placed atop my head.

The cracks where they each connect,

Held together with gold.

"Kintsugi" I've heard it called,

Like repairing a broken plate.

I have grown accustomed to your visits,

And look forward to them now.

Your voice sooths the ache in my cracks

And with each passing day,

I am closer to a shape resembling yours.

No longer am I

All fired clay and old porcelain,

All razor-sharp and merciless splinters.

How long has it been?

Surely not so long as it feels.

Yet already you seem to know me

As I scarcely know myself.

There are but few pieces left,

Scattered across the grass.

I could, should I desire, grasp them,

Place them crudely, fill the cracks, but

I have come to fear the day when

The last piece fits into its hole.

Will you continue to visit me,

Despite our differences?

Your halo grows brighter still

Each time I see you,

Your wings yet still more beautiful.

And at last, the shape of me has taken root-

Jagged horn, claw, hoof; leathery wings-

All bestial, sharp, and dangerous.

Yet still you call me beautiful,

And I feel your words sinking into me.

How can a broken thing possibly compare

To your ethereal grace,

And to that kindness in you

Which led you to find my fractured pieces?

At long last, the final piece of me

Falls into place with your touch.

I am whole again,

Or perhaps for the first time.

We speak of days long gone,

Of the slow and arduous process

By which i was put together

And laugh uproarously.

You stand, making to leave for

Wherever it is you must go next.

I stand, too.

Shaking legs threatening to buckle. But-

No longer am I

All fired clay and old porcelain,

All razor-sharp and merciless splinters.

No longer am I

All bestial, sharp, and dangerous

No longer am I

Broken, staining careless fingers with blood

No; I am yours,

So long as you shall have me

[orpheus-wept]

Poet writing asks

I haven't seen a lot in the writeblr space for people who do creative writing other than prose, and so I thought I'd make a game about it! Send an ask to the person you reblog it from.

✍️ What's your favorite rhyme scheme and meter?

🔧 Is there a certain form of poetry that you use or prefer over others? (Sonnets, limericks, couplets, free verse, etc.)

📜 Share your favorite poem (by another poet)

✒️ Share your favorite poem (that you wrote)

📖 Would you make a collection of your poetry? What would be the theme?

🌱 Share a line that features nature?

✨ Share a line that features the sky/space/the heavens?

🌊 Share a line that features water/bodies of water?

💔 What's the saddest poem you know/wrote?

🌹Would you write a love poem?

👥 Who's your favorite poet?

🕸️ Make a web weaving with your favorite poems, songs, and art

🎉 Do you write poetry to celebrate big events?

🎹 Do you pay attention to lyrics or take inspiration from songs?

🎙️Would you put your poems to music as lyrics?

🎨 Would you draw a piece to accompany a poem or write a poem about a piece of artwork?

💡Where do you find your inspiration?

💬 What are some of your favorite words and why?

🎭 Would you ever perform your own poetry at a live reading event?

🖥️ How do you write poetry: journal, desktop, notes on your phone, voice memos?

🏠 Do you have a particular place you go to write poetry or feel inspired?

💭 Do you have any poetry memorized?

[orpheus-wept]

Sometimes I think

Pulling the oxygen from

Water would be easier breathing

Than what I go through with you.

Wheezing air from strained laughter

Nervous shaky breaths taken in moments

Where eyes are connected but

The words refuse to come out.

I’m stuck, see, drowning

In feelings and air is bubbling

Rising in my throat and I can feel

The tide is rising but

Even so soon with the

Water over my head

I can barely maintain a semblance

Of calm— of a full breath.

My chest is being squeezed

And constricting the organs like

A serpent, twining itself around

And around it will go.

It may just be asthma

It may be the humid air

It may be the heat pouring down

Or maybe, it’s you.

Maybe it could continue

Maybe you want to take

My breath away until I

Can barely hold up my body

Strength— weakened,

Knees— knocking

Secrets stay kept and

you pull oxygen from my lungs.

Let me give you my air

Fill you with grandeur and

Breathe into your lungs

Give you a piece of me

The piece of me I

Could never fully give

Leave myself barren from

Devout whispered prayers

Leaving my lungs empty like an altar

Consecrated ground formed with

Only the goal of peace and unity

To where it all began

I yearn more than to share the breath

To feel your words against mine

I crave to devour the world you

Give and rebuild from scratch

Even if that leaves us a little more breathless.

[orpheus-wept]

One day I will feel better.

It will be a cool autumn day,

Soon after the last of

Summer's bitter heat has passed.

One day it will make sense

And all that we did will coalesce

Into something approximating happiness

One day I will forget,

Despite my deepest wishes,

That devil's deal,

Sealed with a kiss,

And all the misery stemming from it.

One day I will forgive;

Not for the sake of the one who

Seared upon my flesh the mark

Of the one bound by fate to suffer,

But for the self that longs

To be free of hatred's prison.

One day there will be hope

Washing over like waves upon the shore;

With it will be seen-

Life, light, a new way forward

One day I will be heard,

And those who know me will see

That for all my oafish wailing,

I always meant well

But I am not better;

It does not make sense.

I cannot forget,

Nor forgive.

I have no hope,

And my screams cannot be heard.

I'll try again next fall