< strawberry milkshake >

[rayheinrich]

   

 
     < strawberry milkshake >
 
     ray thinks he wrote me
     but i was the one using his hands
     i'm a thief
     i take anything i want
 
     the version of me in HD video should be attached
     (if you didn't get it, you probably can't)
 
     my reader is more important than my writer
     for instance: what are you right now?
 
     i'm not counting on quality
     there are readers out there
     (not you, of course)
     who haven't read anything better
     they
     are my audience
 
     writing is not a process of better and better
     the dinosaurs were every bit as capable as mammals
     bacteria are more capable
     it really doesn't matter
 
     you can think of me as a poem
     you can think of me as a milkshake
     you can capitalize me wherever you want
     you can pause or stutter any time you want
     i can't control your creativity
     (neither can you)
     i'm about choice
     choice is about ambiguity
 
     i love the word "and"
     i hate the word "redolent"
     one adjective is fine,
     two give me pneumonia
 
     a 3.75 inch millipede is crawling across me right now
     it has alternating stripes of orange and black
     it tickles
 
     that millipede is every bit as important as me
     (and both of us are willing to kill if it suits us)
 
     thoughts come to me from the outside
     but once they're here
     they can't get out
 
     there's no need to judge me
     just eat me
     and let your intestines take what they want and turn the rest to shit
 
     i was dead until you started reading me
     but you
     have made me a zombie
 
              - - -


Old commentary:

The question about who defines what a poem is came up on
another thread and I commented that I left that distinction
up to whoever wrote the damn thing. To me, what is and isn't
a 'poem' is one of those "how-many-angels-fit-on-head-of-pin"
kinda things. It may be fun to speculate, but it doesn't have
anything to do with what a piece of writing has to say to me.
(But hey, if somebody else wants to think it's important,
that's fine with me.)

Anyway, in this here other thread I said:
"I have this poem I wrote about this very thing. I'll post it
in its own thread so as not to dilute this here topic."
(Leanne would be SO proud of me.)

short version:
 
     < strawberry milkshake >
      
     i think of this as a poem
     but you don't need to
      
     in fact
     if you want
     you can think it's a milkshake
      
     but if you do
     i hope it's strawberry
      
     - - -  
[sp]



P.S. This is one of those:
"Free-Ranging Allowed, Creative Responses Encouraged".
The reason being I'm bored with "who's a poem" and would really rather
talk about aardvarks.

P.P.S.
Just joking, hell yes I'd like to talk about it.

[Wildcard]

Simply playing Devil's advocate here, but what if I write a novella and call it a poem? Does that really make it a poem? Or does it make me a fool who can't tell the difference?

[rayheinrich]

Simply playing Devil's advocate here, but what if I write a novella and call it a poem? Does that really make it a poem? Or does it make me a fool who can't tell the difference?

Probably both.

But I'd prefer to think of you (and myself as well) as members of the
avant-garde of poetic coolness.

Or, as some wonderfully intelligent, if nonsensical, person said elsewhere:

"So, yeah, if somebody wants to call their dog a poem, sure, fine with me.
I may not like their dog, but I'll tolerate it as long as it licks my hand,
wags its tail, and doesn't piss on the carpet."

[billy]

usually if it looks like prose that's what it is.
poetry prose is a little different.
i'd say both the pieces on show are poems.
they use poetic device. normally if you use a spade you're digging.....or killing someone

so you're saying the message you try and get across doesn't matter. yet you do a poem to get a point across. to think a poem is a real milkshake would probably mean someones a retard or seeing a mirage.

i am a dog bone
the rear leg with st vitus's dance

i quite like the short version except it's mango flavoured.

[rayheinrich]

We agree, we both think they're poems.


"so you're saying the message you try and get across doesn't matter"

No, I'm saying how new/original it seems depends on the audience.
(How much it matters also depends on the audience.)


yet you do a poem to get a point across

Yes, on this one. But you know there are lots of other reasons as well.


to think a poem is a real milkshake would probably mean someone's
a retard or seeing a mirage.

Yes, or intentionally being funny. Anybody who calls one of my
masterpieces a milkshake, BTW, is classified as a cretin.


i am a dog bone
the rear leg with st vitus's dance

I must be scratching you in just the right spot.


i quite like the short version except it's mango flavoured.

Hey, mango, sure, I can go with mango