55 Fiction

For those who don't know, 55 Fiction is a style of storywriting using only 55 words to tell a story. I've always been a fan of constrained styles of writing, so I thought I'd give it a go. It's always nice to blur the tenuous divide between poetry and prose. I thought I'd make it in a sci-fi style; I think it's pretty existentialist.

§

Riker left the Quasarbar, and took a drag on his photon cigarette. Polaris-beta was seething with off-worlders this time of the solar cycle. “Buy Zzkzzon's!” the billboard opposite screamed. Bio-flies hovered, scintillating in the Phosphos. Ash settling fast, he sighed, breath hanging in heavy atmosphere. Life was better when the humans were still alive.

Jazz

Zippydeepipdepippdepowwww
zoo--WOP--zoo---WOP-zoo-WOP-----

scibbydideebadoosriddyBAOdiBOW
doo--WOP--doo---WOP-doo-WOPdePOW
boom boom (boom) boom boom boomboom
!doobiedoobiedoobie!
boom boom boomboom boom boom

dee!

pow!

DEE!

POW!

(ba) DUM DUM DUM (ba) DUM DUM DUM DUM
sribbyscribbysribby -!-!-!-
p.p.p.p.p.p.ppppp.p.p.p..p.ppp.p.p.p.p.p.

RREEEEEEOOOOOOOEEEEEOOOOOUUUUWWWWW

scra!

Ode to an Aeroplane

East to West
Great grey skytube
Held aloft by nothing
But air
Filled with travellers
Some business class
Some economy
All travelling forwards

West to East
Returning home
Weary wanderers with eyes
Filled and hearts
Made lighter
But not their luggage

O, aeroplane
Glint in sunlight
Scudding through the clouds
You are the globe shrinker
The train of tomorrow
You are our saviour

Wisdom

Hi, Calvin here. I was listening to The Maccabees the other day, and I started to wonder about where they got their name from. It's a nice word, rolls off the tongue well.

Anyway, it turns out the Maccabees were a Jewish way back in the day who liberated their homeland from the Seleucid Empire, which is pretty cool. I'm always in awe of collective action against oppressive regimes.

The story inspired me, so I wrote short poem about it. I suppose it's a commentary on the parallels the story has to the modern day, what with the situation in Palestine and Gaza, and how The Media twists the image of these conflicts to its own ends.

===

Fight them hard, men
Fight them back
These cursed Fiends
Followers not of the true G-d,
But heathens, the lot of them

With simple swords
With bronze and stone
And the righteousness of our lord
We smite with your fury
Taking back our land

And so we won
And our marvelous legacy
The Hasmonean dynasty
Achieved through lusty battle
Will stand forever more

But what of our land now?
But what of our great home?
A thousand lies and rockets
Bring death and horror
To our glorious homeland

Fight them hard, men
Fight them back
These cursed Fiends
Followers not of the true G-d,
But heathens, the lot of them

Unto the Gates

"Follow me, and do not be led astray"
You said
With back arched and tongue
Lasciviously flicked
In my general direction.

"Lead, and I'll not be far behind"
I said
With fool's hope and heart
Open to all possibility
Of you and I.

Oh, that I were able to turn back time
(But not like Cher, even though that was
Our Song)

It took me many mournful months
To come to terms
With the way you the waylaid the wayward ways
Throughout
Our tender summer, now bitter hiver.

February came
That stunted month
Runt to Mighty August,
Proud March
Prosperous October.

"Once more into the jaws of hell"
I thought to myself
Like some modern-day Orpheus
Or another unlucky fool
Laid down in tales of times gone by.

You blinked once, twice
But not a third time
Scissors, dangling as did Delila's
My hair, not cropped
But still not long for this world.

Gripping his lyre,
Orpheus stepped
And forwards
And through
He rose
Ridding the past of its poison.

Lain, pieces cast
Like chicken bones after a feast
Your body
Lies
The final words to escape from
Her Lips:

"Do you believe in life
after love?"

Threnody

At Paddington, two oh oh eight
Lay an artist, not feeling too great
No longer so sparky
Requiescat in pace
Our dearest beloved, Mark Speight

Late in the Knight

the FUZZFUZZFUZZ of white noise
whispers through my head
a train of thought
taught
taut
tort

the TICKTICKTICK of time
rushes me by
a clock of pain
rain
rein
reign

the BAMBAMBAM of my head
in the evening
a hit once more
sore
soar
saw

awe
oar
ore

or

Tracing Paper

I stroll a street of grey disdain.

Translucent like tracing paper.

Crumpled and soggy from the rain.

I see not what passers by trace.

They trace their own facades.

Representing their worldview.

They do not know or care for/of mine.

Through me, they can practically see through.

I stroll unnoticed a desert of grey disdain.

Translucent like tracing paper. Catching some rays.

Somebody tries to draw on me with magic marker.

What is this magic? I ask.

"This magic", (s)he* answered, "Is the magic of subject-oriented perception."

Resentfully, I look confused.

I do not understand this person's sentiment.

Him/her*, I can not see through.

Maybe you too are like tracing paper,

Or, should I say, tracing paper like you.

*I am a firm believer in gender blindness. If we were all blind, the world would be a safer place.

Daydream

Destiny rolls over and lights a cigarette
Lips purse, inhale
Hold
and Breathe

the slow, soft buzzing of a thursday afternoon
echoes gently through the chamber of this moment

A thin sheen of sweat
As if bathed in celluloid
Gold
and Keeps me safe.

where once i was tumbling through the currents of emotion
now i feel and know and touch each second as it passes

Sheets crumpled, the remnants
Of a night's embraces
Cold
and Now know no shadow

turning back to me and gazing deep with those glassy blues
i need no further invitation and exhale twice, deeply

His fingers, tenatively seeking mine
Almost touching tip to tip
Old
and Yet I die again

November 2nd, in a Haiku

Unwelcome light sears

you, untangible yearning.

Chainsaw massacre.

"It's Just Time"

Hi, Gary here. Well, not a lot to say about me really. I'm just a simple boy with a wonder at the word. I wrote this poem. Just let my essence bleed on the page (NotePad) in an intense frenzy of language. The piece is entitled, ""It's Just Time"".

The future is a mist in which I cannot see.

Hazy grey days, play away and eat hay: like a ghost

horse eats hay (ghost hay), every day. Somehow.

Remorse for (most of) the dead and unborn

will run its course.

The future, when you think you about it, is nothing more than me

or you, or any of us, and what we can do is reguarly take a

bus to the past. The journey will last through the present

and tear through the fabric of any tense left untorn.

Wait, I missed the bus. Shit.*

The future I missed (i.e. did not see)

weighs a great deal of pounds (and pence) on shoulders.

Shoulders you and me could not even concieve of

if we tried, and try we do. Hence;

One day a horse will be run over by a bus,**

and time will at last reach an end that is just.

A bit of hay will fall from the horse's mouth,

in a slow, solemn breeze of atmospheric grace.

Fin.

*I was actually at the stop on time, but didn't have the right change, and they wouldn't take a note.

** The bus will be going well fast.

You Are

You Are
an utterance

voices speak volumes
silence made absolute

a twig cracks

in the forest of solitude

Manchester to Leeds, 3.15pm, October 19th

as rust coloured houses
squat as urns
blend into autumn's ochre foliage,
I Pass Through

this cleft of steel and stone
running fast twixt fold and ridge

less the clank and scream of years gone by,

carries me (The Visitor)
from red rose to white

Old Mills, Now Houses

the chill grey clouds settle high above the bricks.
Green Fields, supporting Grey Pylons, supporting Black Cables

Over canal and under bridge, we pass
(faces long seen but not remembered)
Out Of a Tunnel
We Stumble
Suddenly Amid these modern temples
of glass and grey

New Mills, Now Home