Weekend Assignment # 105

Weekend Assignment #105: Share a favorite poem.

Extra Credit: Ever write poetry yourself?

I will share one of my long time favorites - Song of Myself, a piece from Leaves of Grass, as penned by Walt Whitman. For his time, Whitman was a genius - he broke all laws of poetry and spoke to men and women of every class and race. I will give you just a snippet of Song of Myself:

"I CELEBRATE myself, and sing myself,
  And what I assume you shall assume,
  For every atom belonging to me as good belongs to you.

  I loafe and invite my soul,
  I lean and loafe at my ease observing a spear of summer grass.

  My tongue, every atom of my blood, form'd from this soil, this air,
  Born here of parents born here from parents the same, and their
     parents the same,
  I, now thirty-seven years old in perfect health begin,
  Hoping to cease not till death.

  Creeds and schools in abeyance,
  Retiring back a while sufficed at what they are, but never forgotten,
  I harbor for good or bad, I permit to speak at every hazard,
  Nature without check with original energy."

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If you want to read a fabulous book by a poet, read The Prophet, by Kahlil Gibran.

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Extra Credit: A poem I wrote, entitled, "Anger"

In hazy days I lean upon my staff,
rancid breath heavy with sweat and tensioned fury,

Red feelings behind my eyes, and I see her bloodied before me.
I see her sweet white neck, ready to break, bitten, mauled from her head.

Feel the warmness bathing me.
I slather myself in her life.
Its pulse lights up my heart.

My hands, hands grasping for her head. I will destroy it, rip it, push it, sqeeze it, eat it, feel it - her skull, break.

She is mine; eaten, she is nothing.
She lays dead even before I began.

I see the future. I know her taste. She is sweet,
like warm honey. She is my feasting blood. She heals me and setsme free.

She is anger. She is power. She is defined, precise, unleashed. She is uncontrollable rage. She beats fists of hated arms and salavates over your dread corpse.

There is no end to anger. I love it. I need it. Her breath is mine and I give her life.