i thought it might be fun to have a thread where someone can post a poem, story, essay, etc, that they're proud of.

Guidelines:

1. Try not to post a random, pointless story with like.. two sentences.
2. Don't make it offensive, or extremely explicit.
3. Follow the rules of the forum, and the rules of this particular forum - Humour and Debate.

Once upon a time, there was a green apple who wanted to be a red apple, because being red meant being popular. So the little green apple went to the hardware store and bought a tub of red paint. His mommy helped him paint himself red, because she herself was a red apple and could hardly bear the shame of giving birth to a green apple. The green apple was painted.

Then it died from the toxic effects of having paint on you all the time.

The moral of the story: don't change yourself to be popular. You'll only die trying. ;)


There. i hope you guys have fun with this. :D

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A bit longer than expected perhaps... but hey ho.. I had it lying around. Nice idea for a thread Gracie! Disclaimer: The following rubbish from my mind is not Gracie's responsibility! lol


The dim clouds hung in the sodden sky like filthy cotton wool. The wind was biting, and chilled me to my hub. I had not long since been mewling and puking, and I was enveloped in my hand-me-down coat, which offered no respite from the ice-wind, I was in the back yard; me and my shining morning face. My mother kept the kitchen door ajar so my March play was accompanied by the customary calamitous kitchen percussion, and silent steam belches wafted by my shoulder and onto the crispy daffodils, which hung their pale trumpets and paid no heed. No frosty fanfare today. The tiny wooden kitchen which father had made me was blood-stained due to nails and rain. The door to the Lilliputian oven was swollen with moisture and would not close, but I adored it, it was mine. I’d cook dinner for my husband and ungrateful children, who were most tiresome at times and had to be disciplined. My husband was kind and thoughtful, ever warning them not to be naughty, or they would get the belt like Hilda next door. We’d hear her father take the belt to her she would cry first and then whimper, like a baby before and during feeding, but it wasn’t nourishment but punishment which caused the auditory disturbances. Through my shiver-sniffles and wind-nipped fingers my play would thrive, I lived in my mind. Strange how things come full circle, I live in my mind again. I don’t wish to speak to the devil’s humbugs. Blue and white macabre stripes hovering above me; they are portents of mortality. Where is my God? The sounds they create when they enter whisper, ‘you are going to die here, this is all for you’. Tempus fugit they say, but the ‘ticker ticker tick’ of the clock’s metal heart decelerates tardily.

They heave me and tug at me pulling me, bruising me, making me exposed. Sit me on a plastic ring and tell me to excrete and urinate. My second childishness has come and I am just flesh. I cannot focus now to read, couldn’t hold a book if I could I absorb you, but I remember, I recognise what you meant, I am already dead, no pity for me, and I am indeed ‘bleached like a doorstep’ and I’m sure my eyelashes are pale. I am already dead. The scouring cloth on my face, my hands, my genitals, barely warm, hurried, stinging of soap and vicious reminds me of my meaninglessness. They don’t look inside, never turn my leaves, I padlocked myself closed like a teenager’s diary. Occasionally a humbug will utter, ‘What are you thinking?’, then wedge padding between my legs, ‘The supper trolley is coming soon and then you can have some lovely tea.’ The condescending tone and raise of voice comes as standard; I am of course, a halfwit. Bereft of my senses because my body has gone, my pipes and whistles remain unvoiced. These buzzing striped children know nothing of Mae. They smother my motionless body with polyester and I wither like old food in sunshine. The bars of my shiny cage are raised and clothed with marshmallow and I recline in tranquillity once more, I pray to rest in peace, be oblivious. The heat steams, distorts the air like it did on the sun-showered pavements in summer. I had you then.

The sun would bleach the grass until it was a tatty yellow rug, but we had one place tucked away in the forest where there was emerald, fresh carpet. Secreted by the cool dark branches we were, and not the sun, nor could folks find us there. Our mouths on each others’, fumbles and mumbles and revelations in the musky warmth; there was laughter and pleasure and us; exquisite us. Your balmy hands playing me like your instrument, slippery heat, bodies connected and us; you satiated me like we filled the summer with memories, sighing like furnaces, and I never forgot, even when I washed your obsolete body down before the doctor came, I never forgot. The sun made stripes on the turquoise candlewick and I cursed it and shut the drapes. I opened the front door, held your cold dead hand and waited. You were gone even then, a recollection, no you in that white, dead face to be found. Where did you go my love? I heard once that Freud said on his death-bed if he could have his life over, he would study nothing but parapsychology. He had also said he believed in God, in Heaven, and it was better to believe and take the chance of not believing and end up in Hell. I heard it once, I don’t know if it is true. There must be something more than this, this cushioned torment. There has to be a place of happiness beyond, I believe that. I’m not sure if that is Christian or Plutonian. Philosophy and religion, so alike, both guessing what is there, beyond. Perhaps I am a religious philosopher. Perhaps my bliss was when I shared life with you and I died when you died, but my heart would beat in Plath’s ‘I am I am I am’ and my children called me mother. I was queen nurturer. I was always a lacking without you though, always a plant in a too-small pot, always the pot, the yoghurt pot and plastic spoon; more hullabaloo and a plastic spoon. Just because they flavour bacteria, it doesn’t hide the content. I know I need it, so I absorb it. The humbug smiles approvingly and nods and crinkles in its blue plastic protection. I swallow the plastic shovelling and wonder if Dante would understand the concept of Hell being here and now. I consider its face, the humbug’s face; it’s a she and dark in complexion. Her eyes are large and the colour of coffee. Unaccustomed to me observing she looks directly at me and we connect for a moment; she tilts her head like a curious pup. I disconnect, her youth makes me angry.

When I had to start dying my hair because it was peppered, you told me the colours were lovely every time. Looking back I must have looked like an aubergine with that plum colour, but you always approved. You said my eyes and smile were what you loved, and you made me smile. You were always making me smile. Our children took after you, and you never got to see them as adults. They would come to see me in autumn; they would stay for two weeks and help me clear the brown red and yellow foliage from our garden. The three of us would sit out there, in the cold-sun of the season, after our work was done and sip hot chocolate. We talked of you often, I must have grown tiresome to them, but they were patient and understanding. Our girl is a photographer, she has our arty touch. She studied photography and her pictures are wonderful, I had several of them on our walls at Elizabeth Street, I don’t know where they went when I came here. Locked in a dark box no doubt, mushroom-like, festering and fed on dirt; how alike we are. She could not make the money she deserved and now does portraits to make a living. One of her first was of the three of us, I remember it vividly. She’s wearing the blue blouse we got her for her seventeenth and the diamond earrings we saved so hard to get her. The aubergine is in the middle and our boy is to the left. He looks like you, with his dark visage and hazel eyes, the ruffled clothes and messy tresses; I had no idea unkempt appearance was genetic. He’s a manager in his office now. He married a wonderful girl, oh you should see her, and I wish you’d been there to see the weddings. Hers did not last, be she, his bride had skin like cream and hair like wiry copper. Wild ginger I called her. The ground was scattered with damp leaves and the sky had darkened when we left the church, but her smile was vivid, his wife’s, she knew she had the right one. We have three grandchildren now. I sometimes forget these details, intimate pieces of who I am. They seem sharper now as my breath rattles in my chest. Like finding something you had forgotten you had misplaced. Each thing I reminisce seems to encase another memory, a magnificently detailed Russian doll in my mind.

The humbugs roll me over and rip the saturated padding away, replace it with the desiccated-fresh. They exasperate me with their buzz-flapping. They look at me closely, haul me upwards and change my nightdress. Dragging the sleeve up my arm one of them comments, ‘She doesn’t seem to be in any pain’. She is accurate I am not in any pain, not physically, but the woman I was, is weeping. I long to be free of this ineffectual body, which even now is quaking because of the pneumatic drill in my chest, and the senseless hiss of a snake of scent is activated by a humbug I cannot distinguish. Lavender: not real lavender, synthetic, plastic, metal, factory-produced lavender pervades the sticky air and invades my shallow breath. One of the humbugs kisses my brow, closes the door. Silence and lamplight blanket me, soothe me. I’m sweating, but I’m not hot, nor do I move at all. Hot, cold, hot, cold, on and off like a soldier’s march, an indecisive tap. I try to focus, so arduous to focus. Unable to visualise the area I delve inside in the head I call home in this, one of many numbered boxes. My box is fourteen I saw it on the door. Repulsive brass numbers cruelly taunt me, they say ‘this is not a front door, this is a door behind a front door: it’s not your front door, this is not your home.’ Away malicious numbers, the numbers they mockingly placed a wreath by at Christmas. Oh, for another kind of wreath.

Our front door had a pretty wreath once. Jack Frost had nipped the children’s cheeks crimson; they looked like they were wearing your grandmother’s rouge. Frozen-nosed and footed we roll the ragged balls of snow for hours, crunching in circles on the open field in the whitewash. Tiny black jet eyes twinkled mischievously on his face, his twisted carrot nose made him look like Pinocchio, but he was a monument, a deity to be worshipped: the mighty Mr Thaw! We photographed him, black and white with his plant pot hat, his branch arms and penguin belly. Every Christmas we would try again, but we never got one to match his majesty. His name was an omen and of course he couldn’t survive, but we adored him then, our family effigy. I perceive the children’s happy faces, the furious excited unwrapping, the trembling hands, and the presents. I smell the turkey, always colossal. Their faces change though now, and they converge. They are not smiling bona fide beams anymore. They are smiling the smile of a travelling salesman. It disturbs me. They sit like bookends for my bed, trying anxiously to sell me what I don’t want. I know why they do this, they think I’m not ready, but I have been prepared since you left me. I love them and without them I would not have carried on. I’m dead already. I heard it once, about Freud. I am an incomplete aubergine, a mushroom. I bow and prepare to exit stage left.

‘I love you mum’, and a sniffle, a squeezing of my hand. The rattle-chest refrains. I hear such weeping, ‘Oh don’t cry, it’ll be wonderful to see your dad again’, my first and last words in scores of months, my final. I don’t breathe, I hear secluded weeping. I was Ena James in room 14, and now I’m coming home to you my love, my oblivion, to us.

lol gracie.. I was priviledged enough to hear that one on the spot as you made it up. I still love it. Poor apple.

Buffs, that was a wonderful piece of writing, truly. I absolutely loved it! You're very talented, hun. :)

As you can see from gracie's sig, I'm not good at writing or being creative: story time: okay, once upon a time, a girl was playing in the playground at school. she was running fast, and went head straight into a tree. she had a blackout then woke up and realised she was dreaming. the end. by MsNerdinator

lol So I'll just read your pieces instead, XD

I did it for a uni module... all handed in and completed now.

You're only after my body lol. Plenty of it to go round. Seriously though.. I'm glad you guys liked it. xx

no, the story doesn't have to be funny if you don't want it to be. i was just thinking.. no racial/religious discrimination in any of the stories, etc etc. and i put it in here just in case anyone was going to post a sexual fantasy or something... :P

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You're right.. I want your body over here in the 'House' thread. ;) Oh deary me. Spam!

gracie, can that be classed as writing that I'm proud of?

i'm a perfectionist when it comes to writing... so after i'm done a poem and am fairly satisfied with it, when i come back to it, i end up hating it.. bah. anyways, this poem was the only one i haven't started hating yet. it was an assignment for English class... we were supposed to take a common object, and through using a metaphor, we were supposed to make people think twice about it, or make it seem strange.



flits of dancing green
floating joyously on the breeze

a fresh, green leaf
flutters
its way down to the darkness.

A doomed butterfly.




a bit dramatic, i suppose, but it's one of my favorites. xD

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Like Gracie, I'm a bit too self-critical, maybe. Maybe I'm supposed to be. Well, I wrote this to describe a feeling. Not a pleasant one, obviously.


Narrow,
Narrow slits
My reflection fades
Desaturation

Contrast paces through the corridor
as the echoes fade.
The thumping of the excitement
hammering on my eardrums

But my skin becomes of paper; Fragile,
Spouting claws of cold sweat
that haul me through the crowd

Pushing free... Gazes
Fixed upon my bloodless complexion.
They won't see and they'll forget

Start chanting without me
The tones fill my ears but they don't enter.
My reflection has left me
My ears left buzzing.


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And then a bit more positive one...


We're just paper boats
in a wild sea,
Chasing the horizon...

And if we unfold
as the wind blows
We'll be taken away

And you will see that
if you believe,
we will fly over the city lights

Crying for freedom

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"Hate is Nothing Without Love"

You are sitting there.
Wanting,
Waiting,
Alone.
They’re gone.
They ripped out your heart and massacred it moments before floating off into the abyss.
You want to join them.
It would be so easy,
How could it hurt?
He tore your heart out.
You have no feeling.
You are empty.
It would be so easy,
Just one little slit.
The blood cascades down in radiant rivers along your wrist.
You instantly feel relieved.
You can almost taste it,
You want it so painfully,
It feels so satisfying.
The blood is pouring a brilliant crimson color quick and heavy now.
All your stress,
All you worry,
Vanish.
Knowing you will be with him again.
It is not out of love that you desire so badly to leave this world,
It is pure hatred.
You want to shove his heart into a disposal,
And have him feel the pain you felt.
You are almost there.
The last thought to breach your conscious mind is,
“But where is the hate and pain, without the love?”
Then your body,
Your soul,
Is engulfed into the emptiness of your ever bleeding heart.



Heh, one on the brighter side?

"Let Us"

Let's slow down time,
And see what's in store.

Let's hold hands forever,
And never let go.

Let's gaze into each other's eyes,
And never blink.

Let's never leave each other,
And be here for eternity.

Let's join our hearts together
And see where we go.

Nay, I love the second one. And the second one for Allison, too. xD

This was written at the beginning of the year for an English assignment:

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SHAMELESS BUMP

No one's posted for a while, thought I'd share this next poem with you... it was written by a friend named Rebecca.
You might say it's from a Canadian perspective - some people in other countries can't seem to get enough of winter!

Season’s Ball

As the Host of
a never-ending party
you must greet
each of your guests
in turn.

Summer is first,
radiating excitement
and energy, but
must depart shortly
upon arrival, leaving you
with sunkissed cheeks
and unfinished memories.

Reluctant Autumn is
introduced by a
Pumpkin Moon accompanied by
the familiar scent
of apples, cinnamon
and October Rain.

Next is Winter
entertaining at first;
but soon overstays its
visit, overwhelming you
with pine and dreary
uniform days.

You hope to be
refreshed by Spring’s green
embrace and lively spirits,
but know that Winter’s
Grey Clouds will
always keep it
fashionably late.

Rebecca G.

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Heres one from the dark side...


A Vicious Cycle of Despair
By Atreyu

Demons tearing at my flesh.
The devil whispering in my ear.

And although I scream for help,
No one seems to hear.

Alone in this darkness, alone in this life.
Constant lunacy, constant strife.

People look, but cannot see.
The terror I hold inside of me.
I did not ask for it to be.

The madness, wanting to release.
An ugly monster, a vicious beast.

I was created one day in innocence.
Tore apart my heart, my mind, my soul.

Now resides a thirst, that cannot be quenched.
A secret I may eternally hold.

But although a victim I may have been.
The seeds of evil were already sown.

These things unheard, these things unseen.
I created some victims of my own.

Now I sit and wallow, in guilt and pity.
Man, life sure can be $hitty.

Waiting for the day I crumble into dust.
Why oh why are things so unjust.

The day... the day..... it is so black.
But there is no turning back.

I, am all I fear.
No longer able to shed a tear.

Pretending to be something im not.
Put me in the ground, let me rot.

Drowning in the wretched smell
of my own sins, as I burn in hell.

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This is a little something I wrote for my creative nonfiction class. If you find it confusing; I switch back and forth from my present self to my 8 year old self. Hope you enjoy it. :)

"I’m Still Thankful"

I went to church today for the first time in three years. Maybe I stopped going because I don’t believe in going to hell anymore, or maybe I’m just too lazy to get out of bed on Sunday mornings. But as I arrived in the crowded and dangerous parking lot of St. Margaret‘s Catholic church, everything felt exactly the same as when I had last left it, right down to the horrendously parked cars that somehow managed to take up three parking spaces without killing anyone in the process. After all, to voluntarily drive into a parking lot filled with mostly elderly drivers who have heavenly salvation on their minds is an accident waiting to happen. Specifically one involving your car.

Once the situation was underhand and my mother chose a spot in the far corner, we made our way though the parking extravaganza and entered the church. I was immediately hit by that churchly smell, the one you really can’t describe unless you’ve sat through an entire service, swallowing great gulps of that stuffy air. Like mothballs in a worn-out coat pocket in an old, mildewed basement with some stale incense thrown in. It’s not exactly a bad smell, (I confess that I do like the smell of basements for some weird reason) but it is indeed a unique one. As the morning sun beat down, the stained glass windows flashed quick sneers at me, and I blinked my eyes quickly before I began to see those annoying yellow spots that float in front of your eyes after seeing a bright light. The wooden pews still stood stiff and orderly as we made our way to a spot in the middle. My grandmother, my mother, and I awkwardly moved into a spot beside an elderly woman and what appeared to be her husband, a balding man with an oxygen tank, clicking noisily as it sent out small puffs of air. I counted five seconds between each puff. All sorts of inappropriate questions regarding the oxygen tank (How do you sleep at night with that clicking? Is it heavy to carry? Has it ever malfunctioned?) jolted through my head at lightning speed. The wooden pew was as uncomfortable as ever, and I felt like my spine was jabbing into it somehow. The priest began to speak in a monotonous voice, and this final trigger elicited an overwhelming response from my subconscious mind, dragging me deeper into a past memory that I had chosen to overlook many times before.

I was being suffocated by bows and ruffles, drowning in a puffy white dress with a flap that even hung right over my face. My parents said this was called a “veil”. I was sitting on what felt like stone; cold and hard, and I squirmed along with the children beside me in their white dresses and black suits. I wrinkled my nose; it smelled like my grandmother’s stone basement when she let me throw the tomato sauce cans in the recycling bin at the bottom of the stairs. I knew we were supposed to be quiet and sit still, but it was really, really hard. All the cameras and people in the church scared me. But my parents had said they were so proud of me that I was going to make my first communion today, and that’s what I wanted most.

I glanced surreptitiously to my right to see my mother with her dark brown hair, specked with gray, her head bowed and her eyes closed. She looked peaceful, and I felt a pang of sadness reverberate against my chest that I couldn’t create that sincere expression on my face. To my left, my grandmother was watching me with hopeful eyes. Perhaps she thought today I would have a miraculous epiphany about the God that she was so sure about. In my imagination, I burst out and say that maybe when I’m eighty-five I’ll believe in a God too, then I mentally throw myself off a cliff over the guilt of the statement. After all, I don’t want to die either, but I’m not so quick to believe that putting dollars in a basket, belting out a few holy songs, and eating little cardboard wafers are going to save my soul. I bowed my head so that I wouldn’t have to meet her piercing eyes. I took a mint out of my pocket and stealthily popped it into my mouth.

I wondered how in the world a dress could be SO itchy. As I craned my neck to see the priest with his kind, blue eyes, I spotted the blonde-haired girl beside me blowing a big bubble with her gum. She was definitely going to hell. Chewing gum in a church was disrespectful according to the priest. I felt sorry for her, but also a tiny bit jealous because I really wanted that pink bubblegum. The priest began to talk to us, and he outstretched his arms as if he wanted to hug us all. He spoke to us softly, and I watched the others to make sure that I wasn’t going to yell “Amen” all by myself.

The church stood up around us, a chorus of benches scraping against the floor. I was one of the last people to stand. I used to be so good at the timing, but I was rusty now. The parishioners started to recite the creed, and I scrambled to flip my book to the right page. “We believe in one God…” they began, completely in sync with each other. I had forgotten most of the words, and a sharp glance from my mother reminded me that she had noticed. Had she expected me to be studying The Apostles’ Creed during those years when I refused to go anywhere near a church? The whirlwind of voices around me reminded me of a frightening chorus of robots. A cold shudder made its way up my spine that had nothing to do with the temperature, and when it had ended, I was eager to sit back down.

The blue-eyed priest stopped his speech about what good children we were, looked at us a moment and asked
“Before you receive the special gift of Holy Communion today, what are we thankful for children?”
“Our families.”
“Our health.”
“God”.
This wasn’t so hard. I could easily raise my hand and give a better answer than that and certainly earn a good “Awww” from the rest of the church behind us. I outstretched my hand, and the priest looked at me with blue eyes.
“Yes?” he asked me kindly.
“Be thankful that you’re not a bug” I said proudly, as my parents visibly shrunk down in their seats. The church behind me was silent. Had I done something wrong? I could not understand why someone would not be thankful that they weren’t a little ant, doomed to carry a breadcrumb for its short life, or a little yellow bee who would die after stinging someone once. It was like one of those movies where someone tells a bad joke and a tumbleweed rolls by and then the camera zooms in on a tiny cricket chirping somewhere a mile away. The priest stared at me like I had spoken in a different language.

I slapped a hand over my mouth to stifle a giggle as my mother nudged me forward. Sure, my answer is funny now in an innocent kind of way, but I still don’t think it was a bad answer, the most creative at least! But then again, I guess we’re technically “all God’s creatures” and I must have been demeaning ants or something ridiculous like that. People began to leave their seats and file down the aisle to receive communion. I debated whether I should stay in my seat or follow my mother and grandmother, but in the end I was a coward and got in line quietly. There was no way I could openly and quietly refuse communion; there would be a definite ♥♥♥♥ storm the second I exited the building. Perhaps this was the very aisle that I first walked down over ten years ago, when I was sure of a God, in my itchy white dress. Maybe I was insulting God now, if there is one, by taking part in a procession that no longer holds meaning for me. Maybe I should have tried harder to believe that I was doing the right thing, or maybe I’m still a rebellious, immature teenager, who will all of a sudden be awakened by the belief in God when I hit seventy. But as I neared the priest holding out that little tasteless wafer, no spiritually redeeming thoughts were present in my head, and all I was wondering about was how he would react if I told him that I was thankful that I wasn’t a bug.

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"We make patterns. Share moments. Sometimes I think I'm the only one to see it."

Remember what should be remembered, and forget what should be forgotten.Alter what is changeable, and accept what is mutable.