Thursday, October 01, 2009

when i refuse the lithium - #fridayflash

the angels whisper a cacophony -- unsullied by any elemental metal
i effervesce up up up to blinding sun -- swathed in immortalizing
armor i surge feet pumping a limitless engine immune to flames
licking from joy’s corona -- mad elixirs in my brain swirly
whirly bombard microcosmic synapses dopaminated nerves electrify
crimson corridors connecting muscle to mind

i hurl heavenwards

wings beat down the stalking shadow -- from here nurse is an ant
her entreaties flutter in my maelstrom -- i pause listen consider
the idiocies and the blazing beckoning white -- but bliss melts
blue hot hot hot -- my seraphim falter whistling screams on the
dive bomb their waxen pinons crackle-pop my legs and arms scrabble
in endless air -- nurse chortles at my spiral her teeth a jag
of evil normalcy -- minute orbs roll in her upturned palm

my shrunken incinerated hand hovers

The sun scuttles behind the moon, turning sky to asphalt, sulfurous and lovely.


***

Just playing, a very experimental piece for me.

AND CHECK OUT MY CONTEST - a free copy of BEG, BORROW, STEAL - A WRITER'S LIFE by Michael Greenberg can be yours!

Peace, Linda

30 comments:

  1. Wow, Linda. What happens when you actually accept your Lithium? =)

    "crimson corridors connecting muscle to mind" and "my seraphim falter whistling screams" are so visually stimulating.

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  2. Mania, what a blast! This was cool. I liked it! Nice experimentation.

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  3. Neato. Why is it that crazy people are so interesting to us normal people...I mean YOU normal people. :)

    Nice work!

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  4. Your words tickle my spirit in a good feathery way. This has such beauty in its flow.

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  5. You've got some snappy vocabulary here, all well chosen and beautifully constructed.

    You've manaaged to be precise without being clinical - no easy feat.

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  6. Your experimentation is a success!

    Vivid and poetic language.

    Well done!

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  7. Lovely choice of words, great inner rhyme - assonance - which is rather rare in fiction, more common in poetry. If it's available sub to me at Skive

    http://www.skivemagazine.com

    Matt

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  8. One sentence capitalized and punctuated among the whole -- the last one. Significant?

    So much to consider here. "my shrunken incinerated hand ..." and "nurse chortles at my spiral ..." and "unsullied by any elemental metal i effervesce up up up ..."

    Thank you for "sullying" us with your elemental poetry. My shrunken notion of #FridayFlash incinerated, hovers.

    Jeff Posey

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  9. I have wild horses in my head dragging these words behind, one at a time. This was simply magnificent.

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  10. When I take the Li++? No angels, Angel ;^) BTW, not real life, from POV of one of my characters (he writes poetry, ya know). Peace, Lidna

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  11. Thanks all for reading! Mania is so seductive; biggest problem in keeping bipolars adherent to their meds.

    Can you tell I'm reading Pynchon's GRAVITY'S RAINBOW? That prose style is sneaking into my own...
    Peace, Linda

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  12. Beautiful imagery here. The feeling of being armored is very well presented.

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  13. I'm not usually a huge fan of poetry, but this was excellent. Thanks so much for sharing it with us!

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  14. An excellent depiction of an off-med patient. "a jag of evil normalcy"
    What a unique point of view. I'm glad you decided to experiment. That's part of what #fridayflash is about.
    ~Chris

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  15. This reads like poetry: vivid, alive and free. Very nice.
    ~jon

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  16. Absolutely gorgeous. GORGEOUS, do you hear me.

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  17. Love it!! I especially like how things get increasingly disjointed (until the last two sentences). It's so hard to represent manic thinking and this is one of the closest I've seen. It captures the associative connections and their sense of making sense (one reads it and can imagine this making perfect sense to the narrator, while also getting an "outsider's" view of the elusiveness of this type of sense to others). You also capture the poetic rhythms and sound common to this type of thinking well.

    And you make it beautiful.

    Thank you.

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  18. "...crackle-pop my legs and arms scrabble in endless air."
    Love this line! Wonderful prose, I felt like I was flying with her and then falling. Mental illness at the speed of light :-) Absolutely gorgeous.

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  19. Thank you all for reading and your RTs. I'm going to sit with this for a few days, then play some more with the formatting and words. I guess this is a prose poem?

    Thank you Melissa. Means much from you - you're my poetry barometer ;^)

    Shannon, love your "mental illness at the speed of light". That's mania for you.

    Peace, Linda

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  20. MGW! I'm flattered - thank you. Somehow missed your comment - off to check out SKIVE... Peace, Linda

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  21. Wow. The manic was pulling my breath away. Great job, Linda!

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  22. Interesting piece.
    "evil normalcy" and "my seraphim falter" - loved those

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  23. You should experiment more often, Linda! There's something good about this I can't put my finger on, which makes it intriguing.

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  24. This brings to mind the phrase "trapped in the maelstrom". A very good experiment indeed. My favourite phrase - wings beat down the stalking shadow.

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  25. "i hurl heavenwards" - for that line/image alone, I wold read this.

    Melding bipolar with the Icarus legend - excellently, excellently done.

    A successful experiment - it seems to me.

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  26. Thanks Laura, mazzz, Laurita, barry, and K for reading and commenting. Kevin, so pleased you got the Icarus aspect, not sure it was clear enough. That's one of my favorite mythologies and my writing skirts it a lot, especially when it comes to mania and getting high.

    Peace, Linda

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  27. That was really cool. Very experimental indeed!

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  28. Thanks Eric!

    And here we are again, another almost Friday! Peace, Linda

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