Scanner is kaput, so I present you with a photo-free Cringesday. Today's contribution comes from my much loved and leafed through Aegis English anthology. Yes, Aurora 2000. If you are interested, and I suspect you are not, read about a brief history of Aegis here. So, our senior year, all of us had collected a portfolio of writing that we'd used to enter several contests (you're looking at a two time winner of a Rose State writing competition poetry medal - I know, right?), which were then compiled into our anthology to live in high school ignominy forever. At the time, this little book was quite something. Now it is a work of humor. Oh God. We were too much. Check out this poem I wrote for my brother. I feel it's appropriate as he is now supposedly attending college. I say supposedly because he has no books and does no homework. How do I know this? Because he still hasn't moved into his dorm room. Three cheers for National Merit Scholars. Turd.
Joshua (c. 1998/1999)
Barefeet pounding
against the mossgreen tundra,
muscles singing,
back arched like the neighbor's cat,
sunpowered
moving weightlessly
in the cathedral of the afternoon.
Not afraid of the truth (that will be like a blanket
that won't cover your feet), just
bumble bees, wasps, and the little girl next door.
And you're glowing, springsweet,
like a thousand white candles, your
splendid ignorance
seeping through the caked mud and grass stains,
illuminating flushed cheeks,
escaping (too
quickly)
through breath and perspiration,
and I want to be your catcher in the rye.
OMG. I want to die. First of all, I suspect "springsweet" is from a Dave Matthews' song, which is pretty much all I listened to back in those days. Second of all, I'd rather show a shitty picture of me than reveal the inner sanctum of my high school brain any day. This looks easier than it is. So why are you doing it then, Blythe? Cheaper than therapy. Cheaper than therapy.
So, come on. You know you want to add one to the pile. It feels good. Catharsis baby!
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33 comments:
Not that hideous until the last line, which isn't cringeworthy but laugh-out-loud awesome. Phrases that might also have worked: "My mice should meet your men"; "You would never kill my mockingbird"; "I want to wrinkle your time"; "Shall your handmaid reach my tail?"; "I yearn to see more glass"; etc and so forth.
HAHAHAHA
I suspect "springsweet" is from a Dave Matthews' song, which is pretty much all I listened to back in those days.
I knew we were soul mates.
I wrote a poem for you though:
Satellite in my eyes
Like a diamond in the sky
How I wonder.
Satellite strung from the moon
And the world your balloon
Peeping tom for the mother station
Winters cold spring erases
And the calm away by the storm is chasing
Everything good needs replacing
Look up, look down all around, hey satellite
CN - if i weren't lactose intolerant (and maybe i'm not) "i want to wrinkle your time" would've made me spew milk out my nose. it almost might enter my repertoire of dirty talk a la the last post. thanks, as usual.
jeannette - laugh it up lady. someday, it'll be your turn.
dmbmeg - i know. remember the theme song for felicity, "new version of you" - that's kind of lke us. except we're the same version of each other, but in different geographic locations and you have a better job and brown hair. love LOVE the poem. sadly, or awesomely, depending on how you look at it, you might be the first person to write me a poem, even if it is soley composed of DMB lyrics.
Given the age when it was written, it's not bad. It's very "drama club and yearbook staff", but still... I've seen worse.
But crimenotes is right. That final line is absolutely priceless. When I first read it, I thought it said "I want to be the catcher in your rye", which is somehow more goofy.
How about "the bridge to your terabithia"?
New wallpaper. New shoe leather
OK now that we are on the topic of Felicity...the real question: Ben or Noel?
I started out as a Noel fan solely because Ben seemed to be a bit of a meatstick. However, when Ben pulled through in organic chemistry, I switched my allegiance. I've always had a thing for blondes too...
I will write you many a poem then. Granted, they may be lyrics from overplayed DMB songs, but no one ever accused me of being original. Pagerrizm is my thing. Just ask JHC.
I kind of like, "I'll be your Ethan Frome." Not like it makes any sense in the context of this poem (and is actually a little creepy), I just like the name "Ethan Frome."
TK - if you must know, i was a debator, not a drama kid. and i was in year book ONLY in ninth grade. and bridge to terebithia was probably my favorite book besides maniac magee as a young adult.
dmb - ben? ugh. listening to ben and felicity whisper "hey" to each other 1400 times each episode left me hating ben. but he was hot. he had no passion, though. i've stll never seen the final episode. i can't bring myself to watch it. i wish i were keri russell.
The problem with the last episode was Elena was supposed to have died in a car crash, then apparently appeared in ghost form from beyond at Noel's wedding cause she was standing right there!
I like Ben more because Noel was always whining about how Felicity didn't love him. True, he was the smarter one, but I like my men with a little bit of a swagger.
ditto crimenotes. that last line was like a hammer.
more possible last lines that might also be relevant to the last topic:
and I want to be your old man, and the sea.
and I want to be your crime and punishment.
and I want to be Alice's adventures in wonderland.
and I want to be your mysterious key and what it opened.
and I want to be fanny's first play.
this could go on forever.
I must say... I've never:
1. Wrote a poem from my brother.
2. Listened to TDMD.
Oh my god, that is SO SWEET! You wrote a poem for your LITTLE BROTHER. Awesome. My big sister sucks.
Also, you kind of rocked, for a ninth-grade poet. Sorry, but I just don't think you should cringe about this one.
Off-topic: I've put the Harry Potter books up for reading-list judgement, and no one has stepped forth to defend their honor....
first off you were able to use the word ignominy in your blog. you get major points for that. there should probably be some award or something.
the poem is totally cringeworthy don't let anyone say differently. you should be embarrassed.* although it is pretty spectacularly awesome.
*i've totally written even worse things than this. i'm just trying to project some of my embarrassment. sorry.
Oh, I so wish all of my humiliating items were not stuffed in my closet in OK, and I even more wish I could figure out how to upload (from VHS) the most Magical Birthday Present Ever, in which you and friends did a lovely music video to the Spice Girls. 'Member?
OMG.
"Cathedral of the afternoon" is awesome. Almost as good as the last line.
Also, Niner totally listens to Dave Matthews.
I won a poetry contest in high school. But it was citywide, not statewide.
Also, I want to be your things that fall apart. I want to be your lord of the flies. I want to be the origin of your species. I want to portray your artist as a young man.
I want to be the god your collective eyes were watching.
d - fantastic! i need all the points i can get. and yeah, it's totes cringeworthy. who did i fucking think i was? splendid ignorance? i mean, really. i dare you to have written something worse. as in, send it, i'll post it.
christal - if i could figure out a way to get our VHS tapes to youtube, this blog would be 18million times better. and that was a very special b-day gift. for a very special b-day girl. for those wanting to know, i was, of course, baby spice.
cherry - i'm glad you liked the line. shain hated it. that's why we're friends now instead, though. and yeah, 9er's STILL listening to dmb.
flopslaw - i want you to, too. i want you to be codify my davinci.
I want to be an animal on your farm.
I want to go ask Alice with you.
I want to put flowers in your attic.
I want to be gallant and you can be goofus.
I want to Norton your anthology of poetry.
I want to encyclopedia your Brittanica.
I want to Strunk your White.
you all do realize that all of these are totally playing into my last post. i will never respond to "hey, you wanna?" again. now it's going to have to be "i want to strunk your white." thanks.
Not literary, but I like ' I want to Shania her Twain'.
On a personal note, I went back and read some of the stuff I wrote for newspaper....and if no one knew I was gay, they would by reading my work.
Holy man!
I was like freakin' flamin' Queen Mary of Scots in my writing.
Far worse than your poem.
And you're glowing, springsweet,
like a thousand white candles, your
splendid ignorance
seeping through the caked mud and grass stains,
illuminating flushed cheeks,
escaping (too
quickly)
through breath and perspiration,
and I want to lay strips of bacon across your boobies.
big daddy - send it!
dan - swoon.
Mmmm...we'll see.
I don't know if I am that brave.
please see my blog for an update on the James Taylor and Tanglewood situation, a post I like to think of as "Why I Lamented Silently To A Faraway Blythe From a Stoplight in Pittsfield Friday Night."
that comment, the fact that I grew up in Pittsfield, and the fact that I can't view your blog anymore is obviously killing me. thanks!
crash into me
with your ants marching and tripping billies
sometimes it's a jimi thing
when you hike up that skirt
a little more
and show your world to
me
call me zooey, franny
big daddy - you can do it. i know it.
stew/dan - yeah, i can't remember the link, hence my nonreading. sorry!
CN - you make me want to clean my room so i can find my copies of under the table and dreaming and nine stories.
http://pushingnoenvelopes.blogspot.com/
Awesome! I am not even going to share my award-winning high-school poem, The Homeless: A Sonnet.
stew - thx
colleen - come on, post it. feels soooo good.
OMG I FUCKING HOPE "THE HOMELESS" IS A SPELL-DOWN SONNET.
H ere they are, on their blankets of bags
O h how they cough, dressed in rags
M ighty the winds that bring the pee smell
well, wait, it's YOUR poem. Sorry.
not gonna lie, folks. was kinda hoping that someone would step up to the plate and send me a little snippet of high school hell. no? come on...
I'm not in high school yet.
I'll see if I can find them over the weekend.
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