< accidental hellbox >

[rayheinrich]

               


                                                                < accidental hellbox >
                                       
                                                        and here it is...
                                                        without effort
                                                        without explanation
                                                        a gradual growth of leakings from some tired soup
                                                        a mess laid up like jellied bricks
                                                        and growing with each spill
                                                        each splash
                                                        each desperate attempt
                                                        at fun
                                                        at efforts to divert
                                                        avoid
                                                        convince imaginary listeners
                                                        ourselves
                                                        or anyone
                                                       
                                                        of the significance of ants
                                                       
                                                        to hide as best we can
                                                        the reason for each spill
                                                        each splash
                                                        to cover up the struggle of our drowning
                                       
                                                                            - - -




Would be delighted to find out what thoughts you had while reading this... not interpretations of my words, but what the words got you to think about.
(Though off or on-topic remarks, clever abuse, response poems, and criticism are welcome as well.)

[ellajam]

hoowhee, ray, gut punch.

[thegaslights]

a gradual growth of leakings from some tired soup
a mess laid up like jellied bricks

Damn. The entire poem is great and will bring me back for re-reads, but these lines are fantastic. I would, but the last stanza makes me ponder artificial intelligence in the years to come. Good stuff.

[nibbed]

mercy me, this is a poem

the last stanza especially pulls together the touching human quality about it
& your images rock!

janine

[shemthepenman]

it makes me think of that Jake and Dinos sculpture 'Little Death Machine (Castrated, Ossified)'.

[ellajam]

it makes me think of that Jake and Dinos sculpture 'Little Death Machine (Castrated, Ossified)'.

I can see why. I like the piece and a fun google, thanks.

[rayheinrich]

comments:

... the last stanza makes me ponder artificial intelligence in the years to come.

    Wow, great! I'm going to steal this into my head and begin believing I intended this all along.

it makes me think of that Jake and Dinos sculpture 'Little Death Machine (Castrated, Ossified)'.

I can see why. I like the piece and a fun google, thanks.

Jeez, yes... more googling than I'm willing to admit. Those Jake and Dinos miniatures are amazing in their details.
Always love vulgar art/political anti-commentary.

[shemthepenman]

Jeez, yes... more googling than I'm willing to admit. Those Jake and Dinos miniatures are amazing in their details.
Always love vulgar art/political anti-commentary.

yeah, they're probably the only YBAs i ever really liked in the 90s (i was militantly Stuckist and anti-conceptual art, back in the day). my post-graduate philosophy professor actually taught them a few years prior, and i asked him what they got (their degree grade), and he said "a third or they dropped out" and i said "that's surprising" (on account of how successful they had become by that point--naively thinking, at the time, that academic achievement was an accurate measure of a person) and he told me that he found most of his students that ever amounted to anything either got a 3rd or a 1st, and that the 2:2 and 2:1's ended up working as bank managers or lawyers.

“If you want to be a grocer, or a general, or a politician, or a judge, you will invariably become it; that is your punishment. If you never know what you want to be, if you live what some might call the dynamic life but what I will call the artistic life, if each day you are unsure of who you are and what you know you will never become anything, and that is your reward.”

~Oscar Wilde

[Bits]

               


                                                                < accidental hellbox >
                                       
                                                        and here it is...
                                                        without effort
                                                        without explanation
                                                        a gradual growth of leakings from some tired soup
                                                        a mess laid up like jellied bricks
                                                        and growing with each spill
                                                        each splash
                                                        each desperate attempt
                                                        at fun
                                                        at efforts to divert
                                                        avoid
                                                        convince imaginary listeners
                                                        ourselves
                                                        or anyone
                                                       
                                                        of the significance of ants
                                                       
                                                        to hide as best we can
                                                        the reason for each spill
                                                        each splash
                                                        to cover up the struggle of our drowning
                                       
                                                                            - - -




Would be delighted to find out what thoughts you had while reading this... not interpretations of my words, but what the words got you to think about.
(Though off or on-topic remarks, clever abuse, response poems, and criticism are welcome as well.)

First thing that came to my mind after reading this was how everyone holds a mask of their own. Many people don't express what they're going through and keep it to an internal battle and this poem made me think of that and how this poem relates to the internal battle that people face on a day to day basis.