Hey all you creative writers at Lincoln uni!

I've posted two versions of my Ted Hughes ending - the first is the one I read out in class (with rhythm but no rhyme) and the second is a re-write (with rhyme but no rhythm as a suggested exercise from Phil). I found the second really hard to write - rhyme comes naturally with rhythm for me! I actually think there might be some rhythm in there at times - oops! See what you think!

Reality Smirked (Original)

I have always been a gullible man,

a man built of trust and faith.

My eyes show me things

that my heart will believe

and my head rarely has any say.

So when I stumbled across hell

and a strange monkey man

with a grin and a limp and a gasp,

I let out a roar to shatter the still

and accepted the matter as fact.

Thus I gagged and I shuddered,

I moaned and I cried

through a sea of ruin and death,

and the monkey man laughed all the more as I did

as we stood in that mass, tangled grave.

So I fell to my knees

and begged to the Lord

to show me what it was I should do.

Then he opened my eyes

as a voice announced ‘cut!’

and reality smirked in my face.

The corpses arose

one by one till the last,

and my monkey man wriggled with glee,

while I was left standing perplexed and in shock,

ashamed that illusion had won.

Later I stood in the perfume of tea,

a cup clutched tight in my hand,

watching actors and frauds

mill about without masks

on a set built to trick and elude.

As I drained the last dregs

my monkey man spoke

and asked where it was I should be.

I was escorted from there

with a sigh of relief and one hell of a story to tell. 

Reality Smirked (Re-write)

I’m a gullible man

built of faith and trust.

My eyes show me things and my heart clings;

believe them I must.

So when I fell into hell

and a monkey man flailed

towards me with a grin and a gasp,

I threw back my head and wailed.

I gagged, shuddered, moaned and cried.

Ruin and death engulfed me like a wave.

The monkey man laughed

in that tangled grave.

I begged to the Lord

‘Show me what to do!’

Bodies cushioned my knees as I sent up my pleas.

Then He opened my eyes to see what was true.

Reality smirked.

I stood perplexed

as corpses began to rise and stagger.

Illusion the victor, I the vexed.

In the perfume of tea I watched the frauds,

their masks shed,

mill about in a set built to elude;

the sour tricks my mind misread.

I was escorted from there

with a vast sigh of relief

and a bitter smile at the story I’d gained;

a tale born of naive belief.  

Thought I'd share a link to Mikky Ekko's new song, Pull Me Down, and video that my sister, Hannah Temple, edited.
Have a look! I love it, and am a very proud big sister :-)

 http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TpVVuJnsUL8&feature=relmfu

To all MA Creative Writers at Lincoln Uni - 

I had a go at Michael's book idea for creating poetry! I used Wuthering Heights. Here are 3 poems I came up with:

*

Up the garden causeway

the pervading spirit of neglect

twisted round her head.

He rose,

a born and bred gentleman

eager to greet.

He refused her hand and

shook her head instead,

thinking it best.

*

Hide your face.

Be off!

A stranger’s interest,

an object of amusement.

Trip merrily on!

My expectations are satisfied.

*

Impelled to see through my rudeness,

a respectable character

perceived decay,

black gaps and

creeping moss

woven into the heath

beneath a benign sky. 

No idea if they make sense or are any good but it was fun!!!!

Check out this guy!

My sister edited his video! He's a new artist from America.

 http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3Wl4UnxMlJY

A little poem by me...

           Once a Whale

                    Now

               a colossal

            shell, a vessel

       emptied of the desire

         to claim the ocean

              as its realm.

                    The

                 greatest

             voyager, rest

           in your final port.

Mirror by Sylivia Plath

I am silver and exact. I have no preconceptions.
Whatever you see I swallow immediately
Just as it is, unmisted by love or dislike.
I am not cruel, only truthful---
The eye of a little god, four-cornered.
Most of the time I meditate on the opposite wall.
It is pink, with speckles. I have looked at it so long
I think it is a part of my heart. But it flickers.
Faces and darkness separate us over and over.
Now I am a lake. A woman bends over me,
Searching my reaches for what she really is.
Then she turns to those liars, the candles or the moon.
I see her back, and reflect it faithfully.
She rewards me with tears and an agitation of hands.
I am important to her. She comes and goes.
Each morning it is her face that replaces the darkness.
In me she has drowned a young girl, and in me an old woman
Rises toward her day after day, like a terrible fish.