Poetry Prompt 1: 10 Words From Philip Larkin

[Todd]

So, of course my own prompt was a pain in the a..well you know. I will probably do a hard edit on this and move it to serious critique later.

Here it is in it's rough unedited glory.

~~~

The Amazing Sexual Exploits of Harry Houdini

He liked to be handcuffed—
and not with those
fuzzy pink novelties
sold near tattoo parlors.

He liked the ones that bite
against the wrists,
the exquisite challenge
of something like helplessness.

Some preferred the foreplay
of card tricks. They wanted
written instructions,
the predictable patterns
of other men.

Old pleasure is a faded stage
bouquet of plastic flowers,
a dehydrated dove.
Without risk, it is unsatisfying
Without misdirection, it will die

Any amateur could perform
in private.
The thrill was in being
before an audience exposed

showing off a new spectacle,
suspended upside down
lowered into the dark

water. Each second
a year, an eon,
like the pulse of a metronome,
the ripple of eternity.
Excitement is the little death
Must slow like the mountain
peaks jutting up like castle turrets
crumbling.
Slow like the tree in a deep forest
Slow like the rolling veldt
breath a green mist, relax
as the forest burns.

Escape is always possible,
though not desirable,
not the same as release.