View Full Version : Pic Prompt Poem Contest
Here are a few pics to get your creative juices flowing. I will put up a poll sometime in August.
http://i239.photobucket.com/albums/ff79/walterodim_photos/batteredmale-1.jpg
http://i239.photobucket.com/albums/ff79/walterodim_photos/atomicbomb.jpg
http://i239.photobucket.com/albums/ff79/walterodim_photos/arora.jpg
http://i239.photobucket.com/albums/ff79/walterodim_photos/truck-dogs.jpg
http://i239.photobucket.com/albums/ff79/walterodim_photos/truck1.jpg
http://i239.photobucket.com/albums/ff79/walterodim_photos/cougarwink.jpg
http://i239.photobucket.com/albums/ff79/walterodim_photos/Iknow.jpg
http://i239.photobucket.com/albums/ff79/walterodim_photos/IMG_0073-1.jpg
http://i239.photobucket.com/albums/ff79/walterodim_photos/inbread-1.jpg
http://i239.photobucket.com/albums/ff79/walterodim_photos/insomnia-eye1-1.jpg
http://i239.photobucket.com/albums/ff79/walterodim_photos/lichen-1.jpg
http://i239.photobucket.com/albums/ff79/walterodim_photos/LovePC06.jpg
http://i239.photobucket.com/albums/ff79/walterodim_photos/mathew.jpg
http://i239.photobucket.com/albums/ff79/walterodim_photos/mousetrap.jpg
http://i239.photobucket.com/albums/ff79/walterodim_photos/reverndjimav.jpg
http://i239.photobucket.com/albums/ff79/walterodim_photos/safetydance2-1.jpg
flaggwalkstheline
07-22-2010, 03:58 PM
I got something, I was looking at that nuclear explosion photo and trying come up with something for it then I remembered a particular unrelated incident in a public restroom that happened the other day that I connected with nuclear apocalypse somehow
ahem
A necessity of comas
Unpollinated stopsigns flutter on metal stalks in the lonely western night of great drums
Each moment has starts in another moment, each of equal absurdity
And this moment of ugly slack jawed clarity started unexpectedly
When I went into a public restroom at the same time as a police officer
He was big and muscular, dressed in black with a shiny badge and an oily gun on his hip
He had the swagger of someone who is in control, knows it
And is prepared to defend that control by whatever force necessary
He possessed the same smirk as the young men with tattoos and AK47s he’s sworn to arrest
We stood at the urinals and I tried to ignore the specter of authority
I can’t piss when I’m nervous and his squawking radio didn’t help
He could probably taste my fear oozing out of every sweatgland like some kind of criminal pheromone
I could taste the gulp of it so there’s no way a trained fearsniffer could miss it
I washed my hands slowly doing everything I could to ignore him
And as I walked out that thick wooden door into the hallway
I realized that it’s always been this way, there’s always an us and them or a me and you
A coyote and a roadrunner writhing in technicolor freudian torment
There are those of us who are blunt and polished reactive
Who have the fascist twostep goosestep twelve step swagger
And then there are those of us who sneak around them ratdancing and irrationally guilty
Though we urinate side by side in the same stained porcelain
Some boys have heavier feet to put down
And push their pornographically fickle accelerators
To the euthanasia breakdown blueprint vanishing point of original sin
They can take a stand on their grandpas’ burial mounds
For hot-rod lust and squealing justice witch burning ditch digging burden of victory
And for toe tapping bra snapping brutality mentality of the absolute
But that’s not me, my snarl is a lukewarm fictional sneeze
I’m one of those rare invisible undercooked idealists
Not the kind to wolfwhistle obscenities from rooftops at passing females
Though sometimes I scorch with a dandelion puffing wish to partake in the soft zap of their breath
And from my optimist wasteland-tinted glasses viewpoint in the dust
I know I have an itch of unfinished responsibility simmering
Scratching out an SOS code in hopefully desiccated crayon gashes
The iron palaces and phallic war-machines of the john waynes and stanley kowalskis
Will wash away in an antiseptic flood from one too many pissing contests
But just to be sure, I can’t look over both shoulders at the same time you know
I would like to declare in big neon mercury tainted letters a kilometer high as a kite
An anti-capitalist, anti-communist, anti-terrorist, anti-teaparty,
Anti-hippie, anti-yuppie, anti-democrat, anti republican,
Anti consumerist, anti-psychotic, anti-freeze
Scream at crackable deaf swaying imitative of trees wall of imperial tombstones
Momentary manifesto of flood memoirs
I would like to spit a spite loogey towards the atmosphere and watch it hang there, glistening
I’d like to make a long distance call to hold someone in my arms
I want to sprint up and tell anyone willing to listen for my occasionally gilgamesh heartbeat,
“You and I should lie on the grass with the fruitflies and discarded beer bottles
Watching the stars drift by like pulsing ships that don’t know they’re already sunk
Give it a try, your bank account can wait
And the tupperware leftovers won’t get any more rotten and unedible in your fridge than they are now
I want you to realize and maybe help me convince myself
That even the bent repentant shoeshiners
Can shake of the horseflies, when sharing the soft taste of a stargaze”
Sadly, that kind of talk is nearly a forbidden quantity in this time of illuminated alleyways
We who possess the reinvented double edged silver ego word
Are all too often fed swiftly, finally and drenched in beads of sniper sweat
To convenience stores open all night glowing gasoline high fructose false oasis
Or various snowballing vietnams and their squalling broods
To leaving green lands and parking lots behind for something not too different
Butchering the ideal into palatable chunks, easy to chew
Shoveled into thorazine anti depressant cleaning solution sizzles
To morning pie and black coffee serving diners with angry methmouth waitresses wanting orders
While outside trains and SUVs and greyhound buses obliviously speed through shimmery deserts
To twilight nightlight repetitious existence sustained on foodstamp stews boiled pink
To late night television laughtrack comfortable slip away heart attack bathrobes
To suburban mind sleeping comas, convinced of their necessity we march on giddy with self destruction
Tossed into the happymeal furnaces of a plasticized gaea
A lithe swimmer rising out of pondscum morning breath is your fantasy now
Consummate volcanic eroticism?
Scheming a tightrope to balance on as it suits my nausea
The american hallucination will gobble my innocence with many a fairy tale giant grunt
It stands confident, red white and blown glass boogeyman outside my bedroom
So I wait out these last few solstices with the blinds closed to keep out street lights, moonlight
Neighbors fighting, car doors slamming, backfiring gunshots sirens dog howl serenade
Under the covers with a flashlight and a comicbook
I don’t ever want to have what it takes to wear the big stomping boots
Or slip a silk tie noosey around my neck
For the eventual unknown inevitable whiplash jealous hangman
If I had a time machine I would go skipping forward into the future
And shoot myself dead right when I’ll expect it
At least then I’d know when he was coming
I would be my own blue angel countdown timer
But such fantasies are only all too typical as I shake with uncertain mumbled dreamhums
Soothing voice of reasonable conduct intones,
“When you finally stop running stomping pavement flat footed and wheezing the joy of escape
They will suck it out of you drop by drop with the most colorful twisty straws you have ever seen”
Popped stockmarket bubble of chocolate milk children with missing front teeth grim on a carton
Unable to sustain the illusion of rabid seafoam
I lift this clown painted tragedy on my sunburned epiphany for a nickel shoulders
Smiling sly and unwise, a failed cherub with red cheeks
I get down on a bended knee to poke with my tongue
The clear water running scared from well mannered wounds
Svelte impossibility cuts deeper than the blind shine sword of the hypnotist
So as the bluesmen mystics of another century predicted with such bruised wit
Started with something simple as pissing next to a cop in a public bathroom
There will be a reckoning, a beckoning and a crossroads
I can either snicker about my predicament, irreverent and irrelevant
Or I can let the terror-pill of posthumous growing-up dawn upon me bitterly
Honestly though, I’d rather the sound of my laughter mingles wet with the flushing of waste
Rituals of realization and purification on their way to vast oceans of chlorine
flaggwalkstheline
07-25-2010, 05:45 AM
cmon other people, there are lots of neato pics up there begging to have poems written about em, hop to it!
educatedlady
07-25-2010, 06:01 AM
Some of these have caught my eye. I'll try to write something later when I'm not at work.
Only Flagg can make a loogie so poetic. :lol:
flaggwalkstheline
08-13-2010, 02:36 PM
soooooo
howbout those other poems yet?
I'm waaaaiting:pirate::P
I will offer one and extend the time.
(From the first pic)
Biochemical Beasts of Burden
The heat of passion cannot hope to melt the glacial truth
But as biochemical beasts of burden, we try endlessly
Our words; our actions carry silly, caloric, vein hope
Hope of thwarting the force that gouges fjords in our psyche
You question this? View the topography of the human brain.
Fjords and folds abound as if geologic forces were working overtime.
We feel the euphoric rush and eventually the searing pain.
We then turn to that glacier to sooth the cruel, stinging, heat
Only to find gouges deeper than ever before and a new burn
Love…forever? It is “until I find another” or ’Til death do us part.
For you see, even the strongest love is rent asunder by death.
http://i239.photobucket.com/albums/ff79/walterodim_photos/Fjords.jpg
http://i239.photobucket.com/albums/ff79/walterodim_photos/Brain1.jpg
alinda
08-14-2010, 01:04 PM
http://i239.photobucket.com/albums/ff79/walterodim_photos/atomicbomb.jpg
I am the monster that gandalf tried to kill
my whip in hand , can't get my fill.
If I don't scare you nothing will.
Kiss your ass goodbye.:scared:
LadyHitchhiker
08-14-2010, 02:27 PM
Beaten by the flame of beauty
I doggedly wait for the movement
of the winking wild cat
- who some think is the devil -
He creeps along the beach.
He waits among the freaks.
I wait in bed with one-eye open
dreaming of the colorful rocks
the way they change his coat,
next to that same beach.
can't wait to type on my pretty computer
as I question all
the futility and cruelty of a mouse trap
when there are such beautiful felines
to keep me woefully and joyfully awake.
In my life and in my dreams,
the wild cat dances
chasing prey
chasing dreams
living in my heart,
and as much with me as he can be.
candy
08-15-2010, 03:05 AM
http://i239.photobucket.com/albums/ff79/walterodim_photos/batteredmale-1.jpg
Hello
Will you listen while i tell you, while i try to explain?
I dont know why i do the things that i do,
i only know that it hurts you
and that is enough
there is a bitch inside of me, she's called candy too
somewhere deep inside she enjoys your pain
your look of hurt when i hit that mark
that glance that says 'enough baby enough'
Why do my punches not hurt you?
why do my scratches not break the skin
yet the words i use cause grievance wounds
these wounds that take so long to heal
i should know better, i've been hurt too.
sometimes i think stop, stop just stop.
but there are other times when it seems
You're 6 foot tall and made of wood
or so it seems to me.
know that after its all said, and i wish to take it back
i look at your back as we lie in bed and think why?
why do i do these things i do, that hurt so deeply
create these wounds that no one but i can see
and then she's back, old candy too and hates your back
that broad expanse of skin turned in anger.
how dare you turn your back on me
who are you to be so proud
turn round and face me
be a man
bastard
will you listen while i try to explain?
I am the monster that gandalf tried to kill
my whip in hand , can't get my fill.
If I don't scare you nothing will.
Kiss your ass goodbye.
My lady’s coming down that distant hill
Her graceful, lissome walk gives me a thrill
Whoever harms her will be drowned in swill:
Kiss your ass goodbye
alinda
08-15-2010, 01:30 PM
Jean, how funny! Look at the photo, do you not see thefire monster that pulled old Gandolf off the bridge? Whip around his ankle....do you see him? :couple:
ladysai
08-15-2010, 07:13 PM
I see it! It is the Balrog and his whip!
Good eyes, Linda! :clap:
Jean, how funny! Look at the photo, do you not see thefire monster that pulled old Gandolf off the bridge? Whip around his ankle....do you see him? :couple:
I can see that, but when I see you posting you eclipse everything else.
alinda
08-16-2010, 01:55 AM
:blush: thank you, I always feel the same way about you. :D
http://i239.photobucket.com/albums/ff79/walterodim_photos/batteredmale-1.jpg
Hello
Will you listen while i tell you, while i try to explain?
I dont know why i do the things that i do,
i only know that it hurts you
and that is enough
there is a bitch inside of me, she's called candy too
somewhere deep inside she enjoys your pain
your look of hurt when i hit that mark
that glance that says 'enough baby enough'
Why do my punches not hurt you?
why do my scratches not break the skin
yet the words i use cause grievance wounds
these wounds that take so long to heal
i should know better, i've been hurt too.
sometimes i think stop, stop just stop.
but there are other times when it seems
You're 6 foot tall and made of wood
or so it seems to me.
know that after its all said, and i wish to take it back
i look at your back as we lie in bed and think why?
why do i do these things i do, that hurt so deeply
create these wounds that no one but i can see
and then she's back, old candy too and hates your back
that broad expanse of skin turned in anger.
how dare you turn your back on me
who are you to be so proud
turn round and face me
be a man
bastard
will you listen while i try to explain?
Candy...this poem touches me so deeply. Words mean things and can do damage. After all; the pen is mightier than the sword. I lived 22 years with a gradual break down of self esteem. A break down to the point that I lashed out at innocent people with my words.
This is odd to say but...thank you for the tears this poem brought.
candy
08-20-2010, 10:37 AM
:couple: me too jon, my poems my not be elequent but they are always straight from the heart
ICry4Oy
08-22-2010, 12:27 PM
http://i239.photobucket.com/albums/ff79/walterodim_photos/batteredmale-1.jpg
Roses are red,:rose:
Violets are blue.:cry:
Suck my dick.:dance:
Brice
08-22-2010, 02:28 PM
http://i239.photobucket.com/albums/ff79/walterodim_photos/batteredmale-1.jpg
Roses are red,:rose:
Violets are blue.:cry:
Suck my dick.:dance:
Such a subtly elegant poem. :rofl:
BROWNINGS CHILDE
08-24-2010, 12:38 AM
http://i239.photobucket.com/albums/ff79/walterodim_photos/insomnia-eye1-1.jpg
The Vigil
This old house,
Is full of creaks,
Of groaning boards,
That squeal and squeak.
Is that a haunt,
That roams the halls,
Or something else,
That creeps and crawls?
I mustn't sleep,
Or even blink.
They'll come for sure,
If I should wink.
Outside my window,
Lurks the beast.
Upon my flesh,
It yearns to feast.
Another waits,
Beneath my bed.
If I should look,
I'd lose my head.
So I lie still,
Eyes open wide.
Until the morn,
I must abide.
I cannot move,
Or make a peep,
But above all,
I mustn't sleep.
candy
08-24-2010, 10:55 AM
:clap: oh i like that!!
ICry4Oy
08-25-2010, 11:54 AM
http://i239.photobucket.com/albums/ff79/walterodim_photos/batteredmale-1.jpg
Roses are red,:rose:
Violets are blue.:cry:
Suck my dick.:dance:
What???
It's funnier if you read it with Ben Stein's voice!
...
I'll try again:
http://i239.photobucket.com/albums/ff79/walterodim_photos/arora.jpg
A GOOD DAY AFTERALL
I woke up in a fog
with nothing to say;
had my coffee and shower,
dressed and was on my way.
I was in a bad mood
expecting a bad day
when I looked up and realized
the sky is gay!
~
BROWNINGS CHILDE
02-21-2011, 12:38 AM
Did we collectively forget about this or what?
we criminally neglected
I hope to see some activity here
BROWNINGS CHILDE
07-03-2011, 04:45 PM
We need a new contest.
The Road Virus
07-03-2011, 05:00 PM
Try to lick your elbows :D
:lol: I'm just kidding (and agree with you about a new contest reviving this thread )
ladysai
07-23-2013, 12:14 PM
I hope its ok to post an image here to prompt possible poems...
(Apologies to Jean and Odetta if Ive erred!)
This one was in Huffpost recently and it touched something in me, and Im dying to read others' poetic perspetive on it.....
http://i.huffpost.com/gen/1249107/thumbs/o-JOSEPH-CRACHIOLA-PHOTOGRAPHY-570.jpg?8
what grace of innocence
unites the young
in Joy
such a simple magic
is Love
Other perspectives on the image?
sweetheart, it's not "ok" - it's awesome!!! we sure need some activity here, and this picture is wonderful, as is your little poem
:rose: :rose: :rose:
ladysai
07-24-2013, 05:47 AM
bearhugs!
Odetta
07-24-2013, 08:09 AM
Ladysai! *smooch*
Yay! OK, people... Start posting poems!!!
Steve
07-30-2013, 09:48 AM
http://i239.photobucket.com/albums/ff79/walterodim_photos/atomicbomb.jpg
I asked my daughter the other day
"Honey, do you know about Hiroshima?
About Nagasaki, Bikini Atoll, or
the Manhattan Project?
Ever hear of Enola Gay?
Does the name Oppenheimer ring a bell?
Do you know when they split the atom
It was unleashing the hounds of hell?
Honey, do you have any idea
What a nuclear bomb does?"
She looked up at me
Eyes shining
And she said,
"It goes boom, Daddy."
ladysai
07-30-2013, 08:33 PM
Cool post!
I especially like:
"Do you know when they split the atom
It was unleashing the hounds of hell?"
Have any thoughts on this image?
http://i.huffpost.com/gen/1249107/thumbs/o-JOSEPH-CRACHIOLA-PHOTOGRAPHY-570.jpg?8
I am pondering a response to your image, Steve....
~smooch~ to Odetta!
Steve
07-31-2013, 09:33 AM
http://i.huffpost.com/gen/1249107/thumbs/o-JOSEPH-CRACHIOLA-PHOTOGRAPHY-570.jpg?8
We wore crooked smiles and belled-out jeans
and pushed a shopping cart down the street.
Hand in hand in hand in hand,
black on white on white on black.
Sometimes we got looks, we never got words
except when this old man stopped us
and said, "You give this old heart hope
for the future of man."
It didn't occur to me then, but now I realize
That old guy was blind.
sgc1999
08-06-2013, 06:52 AM
http://i.huffpost.com/gen/1249107/thumbs/o-JOSEPH-CRACHIOLA-PHOTOGRAPHY-570.jpg?8
We wore crooked smiles and belled-out jeans
and pushed a shopping cart down the street.
Hand in hand in hand in hand,
black on white on white on black.
Sometimes we got looks, we never got words
except when this old man stopped us
and said, "You give this old heart hope
for the future of man."
It didn't occur to me then, but now I realize
That old guy was blind.
I'm sorry to bring the glass half empty, but it would kill me to find out this picture was "put together" and these kids don't even know each other"
I'm sorry, this world has made me a part time skeptic. so the other part will hope that it is a random shot, and that all the media, interracial, intersexual, "we are all friends" , tv shows, presidency's,ect..is a real try, and not another magic trick.
Just sayin
well, since we are not in a discussion thread here, we'll assume, for this thread purposes, that it is a genuine random snapshot
on the other hand, one can as well assume that it is staged for propaganda, and write a satirical poem about that
or about something completely different, provided the photo serves the source of inspiration
anything, in short, except a political/social discussion here (we have Starkblast for these)
ladysai
08-08-2013, 07:03 AM
I'm sorry to bring the glass half empty, but it would kill me to find out this picture was "put together" and these kids don't even know each other"
I'm sorry, this world has made me a part time skeptic. so the other part will hope that it is a random shot, and that all the media, interracial, intersexual, "we are all friends" , tv shows, presidency's,ect..is a real try, and not another magic trick.
Just sayin
Half-empty or not, thanks for your observation. :)
Odetta
08-08-2013, 08:00 AM
well, since we are not in a discussion thread here, we'll assume, for this thread purposes, that it is a genuine random snapshot
on the other hand, one can as well assume that it is staged for propaganda, and write a satirical poem about that
or about something completely different, provided the photo serves the source of inspiration
anything, in short, except a political/social discussion here (we have Starkblast for these)
I agree with Jean, and would like to add that I would actually love to see a poem based on the concept that it is a staged picture!
yes, bears wouldn't mind it either
We split ebony
We split ivory...
These photos for posterity
Our film only captures two
Black an white
Me an you
Crack and crank
Poor man's stew
Jon!!!!!!!! fuck, you're alive!!! you haven't been answering my PMs on FB, I have been so worried!
ladysai
08-16-2013, 08:09 PM
Nice poem, Jon, thanks for posting it!
:D
Odetta
08-18-2013, 08:37 PM
Love it!
Nice to hear from you again, Jon!
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