An ember wakens,

Breathing in the air of dreams,

Hope sparking the mind,

Consuming the wick,

An inferno of daring,

To know everything,

Yet knowing nothing,

And being alight with it,

Brightened, enlightened,

Amassing of coal,

Humdrum days of searing aches,

A melting of cogs,

Observing the glows,

Young flickers spare a glance to

Ashes in a jar.

Your foot's in the door

Keeping it ajar

My pride's on the floor

Weeping from afar

Adjoining rooms are portals

For the feckless mortals

Who shouldn't be together

Conjoined in life by tether

It will hurt when I stomp

On the foot from the swamp

That keeps me in the slaughter

Come Hell or high water

It's a final blow

That crushes the toe

And causes withdrawal

From death laced in floral

For slam and shut and lock and seal

Are not pretty words to end our ordeal

Time's come to stop the shelling

I can no longer buy what you're selling

Dear Sexy Brains:

I wasn't going to post a video today, but reading this Challenge by Beatrice Gomes pulled me in. Some of our resident legends and some new blood entered the circle for this one, each creating dark and irresistible worlds. Here's the link.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OhYpK2wNVmE

And here's the Challenge.

https://www.theprose.com/challenge/14174

And.

As always.

Thank you for being here.

-The Prose. team

There once was a poet romantic

Who would drop names in meter pedantic

The likes of Jesus, Nietzsche, or Freud

Or deny even God to the void

To invoke gravitas semantic

Poetry taken as serious

Oozes exudate from something serous

From anatomy arcane

That hoodwinks the brain

Into thinking it's something mysterious

As long as it reads with tension

It will get elitist attention

From the literary sheep

Who thrive on the deep

And are suckered by brazen pretension

Roses red and the violets blue

In some hands implies more than what's true

And if you don't get it

You're not worthy of the poet

Who bestows empty gifts to the rest who claim to

I donned asbestos gloves

Picked up ball lightening

Hurled it down to Earth

People fell like pins

Preternaturally punctual

I was there, effervesced

And worked what's wrought

Then dutifully, likewise, evanesced

I ionized the Borealis

Shuffling my feet on carpet

Touched a fellow by-the-toe

Falling like a TASERee

I collected acid rain

To dilute the Great Salt Lake

Mormons were alkalinized

Decreeing the new pH to be

I ran counter to Earth's rotation

Until I was geostationary

I could pick up all the GPS

Telling me where I can go

I can see souls leaving bodies

And hear the beauty of a face

And sublimate your better points

Before I return to my senses

Hello, Writers and Dear Readers.

Two-for-one today on the channel, because the Challenges ended so closely together. New Challenges, weekly, and for next month, are loaded, as you may already know.

Here they are.

CotW. https://www.theprose.com/challenge/14181

CotM. https://www.theprose.com/challenge/14178

Now, regarding the writing, needless to say, the last CotM was ridiculously over-full with innovation and beauty. Sexy ass writing, but we never expect any less. And the CotW was another great Challenge.

Here's the link to the feature on The Prose. Channel.

https://youtu.be/Ea-YYmQy6dE

And.

As always.

Thank you for being here.

-The Prose. team

The day before my birthday

This challenge ended

To judge my wordplay

And cleverness defended

Tasked with a long poem written

To change the world or just one life

OK, you can say I've bitten

To meet criteria that suffice

So here it lies

A poem about nothing

And the space it occupies

Further exam says I'm bluffing

I've got nothing to say

And a meter to say it in

Be it take a night or a day

I just do what I've been bidden

I can drop names of import

Like Jesus, Nietzsche, or Freud

Or even God as a last resort

Or deny Him to the void

As long as it sounds deep

It will get some attention

From the literary sheep

Who thrive on pretension

I want to please the ones who like Shakespeare

And wax iambic—I amb what I amb

To make the statements that soon disappear

They're written temporarily in jam

For those who like Dickenson

I can choose a meter for

A singsong Caruso, like Robinson

Gilligan and more

For ee cummings fans

I ups so many floating words say

Punctuations all **%^%

And sensibility's defrayed

And once I wrote a limerick

That was--like this poem--a trick

It didn't mean a thing

And couldn't help from being

A poem written by a prick

And haikus lose me

In terseness and in nonsense

Too few words to see

And free form is just

An excuse

To vomit jabberwocky

And -ish from my jibber

As I pine about truth and justice and

The American weigh

Your options carefully

Writing pall-mall and willy nilly

Until I can throw in

Someone like Camus in the mix

It's just absurd!

If you read this backward

It can certainly serve

As a self-righteous op-ed

Of opinion that strikes a nerve

You just can't beat

Pithy and laconic

But this poem can neither meet

Metaphyzzy or ironic

Yesterday was the 4th of September

Labor Day for expectant mothers

The day before my birthday

Cooking dogs and burgers with others

One day we'll all be dead

And history won't remember

The cow we grilled or us we fed

On that 4th day in September

But words and rhymes are cheap

And come easily without fail

The bullshit in long poems is deep

When everything's on sale!

"Now, take off all of your clothes," he instructed his victim. He had led him at gunpoint to the hospital morgue. He extended to him some burlap, enough to wrap him.

There were the back-and-forth refusals, then gunpoint compliance. Now naked, the man wrapped himself in the burlap. The latch in the floor opened an underfloor chamber of wrapped cadavers floating in formaldehyde. He fired one bullet into his victim's chest, and he fell in. He slammed the door shut, flush with the floor.

The anatomy students would be surprised to find their cadaver had a bullet in his chest.

Each of my teeth

Is hanging by a thread

On top and underneath

Each is dangling from my head

When windy they tintinnabulate

Chiming with chagrin

People with noses abdicate

From the halitosis downwind

I dangle them in chlorine

To one day prepare

For oral hygiene

And regular professional care