The Wordsmith's Forge

Thanks to an audience poll for the general fund and ng_moonmoth chipping in the remainder, "A Hope and a Promise" is now complete.  Aidan and Saraphina explore the roof garden.

The poll has concluded. These are the upcoming themes:

August 1
Rites / rights of passage

September 5
Families of Choice

October 3
Otherkin and Other-nesses

November 7
Outlandish Occupations

December 5
Hearth and Home

January 2, 2018
Do you believe in magic?

This poem is spillover from the July 4, 2017 Poetry Fishbowl. It was inspired by a prompt from siliconshaman. It also fills the "gay" square in my 5-29-17 card for the Pride Bingo fest. This poem has been sponsored by Anthony & Shirley Barrette. It belongs to the Polychrome Heroics series.

WARNING: This poem contains historical atrocities which many readers may find disturbing. Highlight to read the warnings, some of which are spoilers. It features the Holocaust, acts of genocide, the Schutzstaffel, mass murder, loss of families, yellow stars, ghettos, a gay man and a straight woman getting married and raising a family together, some awkward family dynamics, gay-related bashing, unplanned (but welcome) lesbian pregnancy, and other challenges. But the good guys mostly win. If these are sensitive issues for you, please consider your tastes and headspace before deciding whether this is something you want to read. It is not a plot-relevant part of extant storylines, just an interesting piece of Terramagne history.

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 Thanks to a donation from bairnsidhe, there is one new verse in "The Order of Their Stars."  V thinks about sexuality.

The call for themes is now CLOSED.  Thank you for your enthusiasm.

I've reached the end of scheduled themes for the Poetry Fishbowl project.  It's time to brainstorm some new themes!  These are a few that I've jotted down earlier, ones that I've thought up or people have suggested, to give you an idea what kind of stuff might be suitable:

* Help and Helpiness
* Otherkin
* Pirates and Brigands

What other themes would you like to see me write about?  Suggest them in a comment below this post. 

Later on I'll collect the suggestions and do some polling.  The most popular topics will be added to the schedule for future fishbowls.  Previously, I have just dumped all the proposed themes into a big poll.  The more themes people suggest, the less well this works.  I have an idea for fixing that problem.  This time, I'm going to run the first large poll with checkboxes so you can express interest in as many themes as you like.  I will then either pick from the most popular ones, or use that information to pull out the favorite themes for a smaller poll to select the ones which will appear in upcoming fishbowls.

You can also help by linking to this post so that more people will see it.  Everyone is welcome to suggest themes.  Everyone will also be able to vote for them later; prompters and donors will get extra votes.  If you link to the call for themes, you can reveal a verse in any open perk poem:
"Testing the Metal" 
"Dangerous Refuges" 
"The Marble and the Sculptor" 
"The Golden Peaches of Peace" 
"Leaves Upon the Water"
"The Quick Brown Fox"
"Lead Us in Peace"
"We Will Fade into You"

Thanks to generous donations from ng_moonmoth, across_space_and_time, technoshaman, and alatefeline, you can now read the opening of "The Order of Their Stars."  Astin helps V with a shopping trip.

This poem is spillover from the July 4, 2017 Poetry Fishbowl. It was inspired by prompts from kengr, antisocialite_forum, curiosity, redsixwing, alatefeline, sweet_sparrow, technoshaman, mdlbear, chanter_greenie, and callibr8. It also fills the "blood" square in my 1-1-17 card for the Dark Fantasy Bingo fest.  This poem has been sponsored by ng_moonmoth, across_space_and_time, technoshaman, and alatefeline. This poem belongs to the series Polychrome Heroics. It directly follows "We Are All Related," so read that first or this will make no sense.

WARNING: This poem contains some intense and controversial topics. Highlight to read the more detailed warnings, some of which are spoilers. You-all wanted to see the gaybashers who attacked Kenzie curbstomped by the Iron Horses, so here it is. Watch out for conspiracy to commit assault, religious issues, conflicting obligations, bloody souvenirs, desire for vengeance, magical/spiritual stalking of culpable parties, Thunderbird is fucking scary and so is his follower, rude language, using superpowers against ordinary opponents, gaybashers stalking around a gay bar, oblique references to pony play, references to poaching and hazardous equipment, graphic violence, vigilante justice, use of barbed wire as a rumble weapon, probable permanent injury, brutal application of inconvenient truth, temporary hearing impairment, explanation of internalized oppression and repression of identity, complicated transgender issues, and other mayhem. This is a major plot development, so skipping it would leave a big gap, but the main thing you need to know is simply that the Iron Horses hunt down the gaybashers and beat the shit out of them. If these are sensitive issues for you, please consider your tastes and headspace before reading onward.

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This poem came out of the July 4, 2017 Poetry Fishbowl. It was inspired and sponsored by Shirley Barrette. It also fills the "asexual" square in my 5-29-17 card for the Pride Bingo fest. This poem belongs to the Schrodinger's Heroes project.


"Missing"


There are a few things
missing from Schrodinger's life:

two fuzzy lumps under his tail,

the special deliciousness
in the scent of a queen in heat,

yowling romance in the moonlight
and getting his black ears bitten
to shreds by his rivals,

litter after litter of kittens
that he brought into being.


There are a few things
missing from Schrodinger's life,
but his identity is not one of them.

It is something he found,
instead of something he lost,
as when a sculptor removes
everything that is not the statue.

He is asexual but still affectionate;
his humans are the center of his world,
and even without a common language
they know this as well as he does,
because they call themselves

Schrodinger's Heroes.


There are a few things
missing from Schrodinger's life,

but he doesn't miss them a bit.

I have completed the first batch of poems for this fishbowl. \o/  I am still working through other prompts I want to cover.

Today is the last day to put in donations that count on this ticker and will get you prompting rights for the mid-month session. If you send money, or pledge a specific amount, it counts; if it's just an expression of interest, it doesn't.  For all the folks who contributed prompts toward Kenzie's storyline, ng_moonmoth is running a pool to fund "And Thunder Calls in the Distance" with further options for "The Order of Their Stars" and "Mosaic Identities." 

Poems sent to my parents: "Missing," "Beneath the Willow Tree," and the remainder of "Essential for Human Survival."  But I'm not going to bust my hump trying to get those all posted ahead of the busyweek.  I just want folks to know what sold.

This poem came out of the September 2013 crowdfunding Creative Jam. It was inspired by a sculpture from Choi Xoo Ang. It has been sponsored by kengr. This poem belongs to the series Diminished Expectations.

Warning: This poem contains some intense material. Highlight to read the warnings. It features artistic nudity and extreme sadness. Also the series in general is dystopic. If these are sensitive issues for you, please consider your tastes and headspace before reading onward.


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