Please don't remember this.

This body, this face, the clothes I used to wear. That's not how I want to be remembered.

Instead, remember our memories together. Dancing in the rain, Cuddling by the fire, or Singing as loud as possible on the car ride home from Church on Sunday morning. Remember my life, my adventures, my letters I wrote.

Please don't remember my death, the journeys I could've taken if only I hadn't gone away, the letter that tried to explain why I did what I did.

Remember my smile and not the lie behind it. Remember our song, but don't think about how you'll never hear the lyrics come from my lips again. Remember the times you picked me up when I had fallen, or wiped the tears from my sobbing eyes. Do not blame yourself for any of this.

Remember only the good in me, not the slamming doors, broken promises part of me. That's not how you'll want to look back and think of me. If you want to remember me, remember the three words I told you and were true: " I love You." Remember those. But please, don't remember this.

she danced the waltz with suicide

she twirled up the stairs  in her gown 

her lips blushed with flushed feelings that she prepared to douse in gasoline and a bullet 

her eyes blackened with sorrow and pain 

her skin warm from his touches 

her hair a mess from midnight decisions 

her hands pinky promised with words 

she cared not to keep 

her heart burst and aflame with love

her dress laced inwoven with the memories of the ball 

her breast pooling over a sweetheart neckline 

chiffon bottom 

ruffled waist 

dusted in the sparkles from the scent of him 

the clock struck twelve 

and the magic 

had faded 

and the story 

was wrapped 

in an aged book 

and 

she 

ascended 

gracefully 

into 

her 

room 

and 

looked 

back 

at 

the 

ghost 

of 

the one 

she loved 

and 

said 

tonight 

we 

meet 

in 

heaven 

she 

into 

the 

lost 

eyes 

of 

her soul 

and 

said 

please 

don't 

remember 

this 

and 

she 

slide 

the 

gun 

from 

under

her 

skirt 

and 

pushed 

the 

gun 

to 

her 

and 

pushed 

play to 

Tchaikovsky's

(once upon a dream )

I know you,

I walked with you once upon a dream

I know you,

The gleam in your eyes is so familiar a gleam

Yet I know its true

That visions are seldom all they seem

But if i know you

I know what you'll do

You'll love me at once, the way you did once upon a dream.

Once upon a night,

I dreamed we'd be together

In love forever.

Once upon a night,

I was wishing for a never,

A never ending.

 for this was just a dream, and tonight was just a dance, she  laid on on her bed and fired a shot through her brain

please  don't  remember this , rember how I made  you feel 

Love is never what it seems it is neither friend nor foe

With every day the infection begins to grow

The symptoms range from mild to severe

From deathly cruel to nauseatingly sincere

One day a fever followed by paranoid delusions

Driving you pushing you to make wild conclusions

Another day you feel safe and rested in its embrace

Drifting superbly in such a peaceful place

But do not be fooled do not forget its lingering bite

It can drag you down without a fight

It has several faces each one designed to draw you in

Leaving you dizzy and your head in a spin

It's both a blessing and a curse

So sugary sweet and addictively perverse

------------------------------------------------------------

© M.Withers/M.Strudwick . All rights reserved.

Both the name The EriduSerpent/EriduSerpent

and any written material is owned solely by the above named.

Permission granted for all written material to be shared but not for profit.

Printing or publishing is prohibited without seeking permission first from said owner.

I came here out of curiosity after finding Prose on Twitter.

I stayed for this reason...it is a place for every sort of writer from the emotionally disturbed, the eccentric, the silly, the serious, the romantic, the almost suicidal,

the highly educated, the barely understandable, the "plain and normal", the boring,

the fun, the clever, the not so clever, the experienced, the inexperienced writer,

the old school, the new school, the rhymer, the non rhymer.

No one holds any prejudice here, no one judges, no race, no religion, no creed matters, gay or straight, God fearing or Satanist...everyone is welcome as long as they abide by one unwritten rule and that rule is be friendly, be supportive, be part of the community that is Prose.

Prose is that place you come to let it all out from the deepest darkest parts of your mind and the dustiest part of your heart, it is the place you come to when you want to whisper or when you want to shout.

Prose is all about what writing should be, it is a space to create, a safe place to be yourself.

And there are some damned cool people here, who become your friends and mentors.

these crazy thoughts 

crawling out my brain

spilling out my mouth 

concrete plans 

with no sidewalk 

nightmares 

that lack no happy ending 

daintily little bodies 

laying dead 

hanged over 

the railing of my bed 

sharpen knives 

and 

guns 

gushing blood 

innocent little thoughts 

that started as a game 

drawings 

mapped 

and 

dark 

pencil 

jagged and curved 

pressing 

into the paper 

like knives 

pressing into 

innocent bodies 

hollowed 

screams 

that turn 

into 

echoes 

talon-like 

nails 

scratching the wall 

as I trap my victims 

in my spider web of thoughts 

saliva stained 

walls 

that lick off the lead 

peeling from 

the walls 

bones cracked 

and caved in 

into 

the wall 

lost souls feasting 

on my thoughts of emptiness 

ravenous beast 

getting drunk 

off of last night blood drive 

I had in my room 

velvet and crimson 

stains 

on the carpet of my floor 

my bed becomes my grave 

suicide in the bed 

a little  sleep never hurt anybody 

you hope this poem 

was just a nightmare

well see about that tomorrow 

some people wish

on stars,

some

on meteors,

and others

on time

maybe 

that's why 

we never aligned

because i wished

on stars,

you wished

on meteors

and forgot

it takes time

to create galaxies.

Writing is a closet hobby of mine, I suppose. Not many people who know me personally know I write.

(Actually, I don't think anyone who knows me personally knows that I that I write.)

So consider yourself a little secret-keeper of mine. 

I'm a high school junior of mixed East Asian descent. I'm an avid musician (I play the violin, viola, guitar, and piano) and I love science and mathematics. My favorite books are Flowers for Algernon, 1Q84, The Alchemist, and Dubliners. In fact, my pen name here is a reference to a character in 1Q84.

As for my writing, I like to capture seemingly mundane moments in life, whether they be my own or of my own creation. I enjoy writing short stories the most, as I can usually chug one out in one sitting before I go to bed. In many of my pieces, I explore themes of fate, estrangement, and realization. I don't like writing dark or especially moving pieces. Subtleness is something I work best with.

So far, I've only published one short on here, titled "A morning commute." I hope you all could check it out and maybe leave a comment. I look forward to reading some great work here as well.

From this anonymous screen to yours,

Fuka-eri

After completing the final draft of a manuscript for my fifth book, I wanted a reality check. I hired a professional editor and learned something important about self-publishing. No matter how capable you are as a writer and proofreader, you can’t accomplish your best writing entirely by yourself. Even professional editors hire professional editors.

Collaborative Editing

My initial editing process was hardly ineffective. My latest book is a memoir of my sailing adventures from the 1980s and 90s. I rounded up a capable crew that included people who were there, people who were college writing instructors and people who were simply avid readers. I sent them one chapter (1500-2500 words) per week for almost a year (so as not to burden anyone with a huge job to do gratis), and offered to edit their material in return. I got useful feedback about everything from seamanship to grammar along with their general reader reactions. The collaborative process also forced me to polish each chapter before I sent it out; I usually spent a few hours rewriting before posting the week’s installment on Google Docs and sharing it with my group. That unquestionably improved the book.

Editing with Software Tools

I also ran every chapter through AutoCrit.com. AutoCrit is a remarkable style checker. It highlights duplicate words and phrases, ferrets out clichés, identifies weak writing patterns and generally helps point out places in your writing where you should consider making changes. It’s a machine—it’s not perfect—but it scans your text with cold, digital objectivity. Give it your best shot and it will embarrass you over and over again. How could I have missed something so obvious? Learning to write prose that won’t upset AutoCrit is a fantastic growing and learning experience that’s available to any writer at nominal cost.

At the end of the group editing process, I had a tight draft manuscript approved by a tough piece of software and some people I’m convinced are bona fide geniuses. Still, I had this lingering doubt; I wanted my book to be great—better than anything else I’d ever produced. But all my previous writing was created in a personal vacuum, edited by people who knew me. I wondered, “What will an industry professional say about my work? Am I camping in my own back yard?”

Finding a Professional Editor

I decided to hire a professional editor. I began my search at the Editorial Freelancer’s Association website, threw a few darts at the map and took a trip to Steven Bauer’s Hollow Tree Literary Services. The general tone of his site and the testimonials from previous clients sold me. Of course, the right editor for you is one who works with your writing genre and understands your subject matter; a law book or a technology book will have different editing requirements than a novel. You may speak with several people before deciding on an editor whose style and background are complementary to your purposes.

I called Steven, got on his (not unreasonably long) waiting list, finished polishing my final chapters and sent him my manuscript. When we spoke, I made it clear that my goal was to produce a well-written book, independent of any business aspirations or target reader groups.

Your aspirations are important information to give your editor. Polishing a manuscript to a high standard of literary excellence and preparing a manuscript for acceptance by a particular market segment are not necessarily the same task. Know your goals, or at least have an experienced editor help you choose them. I told Steven that his job was to “protect my manuscript from me.”

After a few weeks, I received the manuscript file (with annotations) and one of Steven’s famous “reports.” We should all aspire to write as well as Bauer does in what I expected to be a simple business document. A few brief excerpts reveal how well he understood my intentions as a writer.

You’ve eschewed a traditional plot in favor of an episodic plot, one that is willing to trade suspense for a different kind of relationship between writer and reader—a slow accretion of respect and admiration not only for the knowledge and skills on exhibit here but also for the measured, mature equanimity with which the tale is told. Nevertheless, as you must be aware, just as a sea voyage has its longeurs—when the wind stops and the sea becomes glassy and the boat either sits in place or motors on—there are some (small) stretches here when the book feels a bit repetitive, when a little suspense wouldn’t have hurt, when a reader could be forgiven for a desire for a more traditional plot. But you’re true to your story, to what happened, and you’re not about to ratchet up the tension when there wasn’t any.

And the manuscript:

It is also remarkably clean as a manuscript. As you scroll through the pages you’ll see that the editing I’ve done is sparse indeed—an occasional small suggested cut, an occasional relocation of a sentence. It’s clear how carefully you’ve worked on this book; there is nothing slapdash about it in any way at all.

That’s important validation for my initial editing process. It suggests that with some innovative technology and the cooperation of a few smart (and dedicated) people, the costs of editing can be greatly reduced. Save money by cleaning up your manuscript before engaging a professional. Why pay someone to put your periods on the correct side of the quotation marks?

Steve offered useful comments about style—consistency in use of italics, my use of footnotes, and an interesting and well supported suggestion about serial commas, before offering critique of the content:

If there’s work that needs to be done on the manuscript—in a roll-up-the-sleeves sort of way—it’s in the first 80 pages, the section before “voyage the first.” Once you get underway, across the Gulf Steam and into the Abacos, the book picks up a momentum and a mystery that’s irresistible and charmed. But while it’s clear that you need the opening—both as a springboard for what is to come and as one of the bookends that contain the book—I feel that there may both be too much of it and that its tone is a bit wrong.

Bauer’s comments continue for eight pages as a list of well-considered questions to answer, passages to cut and paragraphs to polish. His humble conclusion offers a picture of the kind of relationship he cultivates with his clients:

You should know, of course, that, despite my long history of working with writers, I have not achieved omniscience and perfect knowledge, and that I’m as cranky and idiosyncratic as the next reader. Some of my suggestions may strike you as lunatic (or at least not very useful), and if that’s the case, just heave them overboard. But others will nag at you, if not right away, then in a day or two—and those are the ones that you’ll want to pay attention to.

The comments and corrections in the manuscript were as useful and insightful as those in the report document. Given the speed with which the reading was accomplished and the previous scrutiny given the document by my editing group, I was impressed with the number of punctuation and grammar errors found.

I went to work on the manuscript, took about 95% of Steven’s suggestions, cut out a few sections (reluctantly, but Steven was right; they didn’t need to be there) and then followed up with a phone session to clarify a few matters I had questions about. Then we exchanged a series of emails in which we wrestled over a few fine points, whittling them down until we were both satisfied the problems had been addressed.

Why a Professional Editor Rocks

Publishing is not an art rendered in a free medium. As with hiring a professional graphic designer, hiring an editor may turn your do-it-yourself book project into an expensive undertaking, but if your goal is to sell books, editing costs are part of your business risk. If your goal is to produce a great work of literary art, at some point, you’ll need to buy the bronze from which you’ll cast your sculpture. Even if you’re an experienced writer, a professional touch will make the difference between a good book and a great book.

•An editor offers an impartial, third-party perspective. Friends and colleagues have likely accepted your quirks, idiosyncrasies and character flaws; they are not objective readers and they may already have heard parts of your story.

•An experienced editor has worked with a wide selection of authors and manuscripts. Your editor has already worked through problems on several books similar to yours. Even if your story is unique, your tone, format and general direction probably are not. An editor who has worked on eight memoirs before yours is well-equipped to help you avoid clichés and keep your story flowing.

•A professional editor has an unsurpassed trained eye. If you’ve already written several books and have gotten to be a “good writer,” you’ll still be impressed by the perspectives of someone who has worked on possibly hundreds of books. Want training, inspiration and critique on the highest level? Ask a professional editor.

•If you choose to go the traditional publishing route, agents and publishers don’t want to deal with your rough draft. If you want to demonstrate to the industry that you’re worthy of being published, don’t hand over a stack of typos, bloated prose and grammatical oversights. Publishers are swamped with “good stories.” What they’re looking for is good stories that are well-crafted and highly polished, not “diamonds in the rough.”

•After spending all that time writing and researching, you’re too close to your story. We all have annoying patterns of speech and character flaws that creep into our work. We often take weak or missing parts of our narrative for granted because we’re too familiar with them. An outside editor will advocate for your future readers by insisting on clear explanations and authentic personal reactions to the events in your book.

Many self-publishing advocates promote the myth that bookmaking is something that can be done entirely by one’s self. Certainly, some writers have no choice, but producing an exceptional book requires skills that lie beyond the capabilities of even the best writers. Skimping on cover design, typesetting and of course, editing—even for the most experienced writer—are surefire ways to diminish the quality of your final product. If you don’t believe me, ask your favorite major publisher; they keep artists and editors on their payrolls for a good reason.

Writing is a solitary pursuit, often undertaken during hours stolen from the moon. But the process of transforming a manuscript into a book requires fine editors, artists, typesetters and pressmen. When the sun is ready to rise on your final manuscript, choose your team members as carefully as you do your words.

You miss the old me, 

the little girl you could hold in your arms

the one that didn't protest when you made her wear a dress

the one who swore she would never, ever be attracted to a boy

the girl who played in the mud and studied insects

was a bit of a crybaby

wasn't picky or moody and went along with everything

loved everyone. 

I see it sometimes in your eyes. 

You see her in me. 

the grumpy teenager who never does anything right

and has a C in math 

and curses sometimes in front of you, accidentally

sometimes talks nonstop, sometimes not at all

can't put her feelings into words

talks about politics as if she has a place in them

acts like a guy sometimes. dresses like one.

will probably get a boyfriend in 50 years

writes depressing poems

and is so

goddamn

sad.