Weekly Short Stories Contest and Company! discussion

After the thousand launches
eerie silence
a deathly sucking noise

Helen got dressed
in the golden haze
of shimmering memories

“[A] deathly sucking noise” can’t possibly be a good thing, especially in the context of ships being launched. My only excuse for what I have followed with is that it’s past my bedtime.

To frantically work
the bailer was what it meant
to be a sailor,

though their cries could but
regale her as she tried on
skirts from Ann Taylor.

I just read that to my wife and got the dreaded not-a-ghost-of-a-smile response.

Good night, pirates!

Yes, well, does she have trouble keeping a straight face?

Creations to be read
As I write my pen bleeds words
And my pencil shrinks

XD

Wow, that's some potent combination of haiku and popcorn! One which we'd missed for a long time. Very nicely done, Alex! Btw, your haiku from message 50 (page 1) is one of my favorites!

Hello Ajay!

Wow, Al, your post was so funny! And did you deliberately make your popcorn conform to Haiku?! It was brilliant!

Welcome, Numey, to the haiku thread. Excellent effort.

M, so funny, as usual. A sailor running a bailer?

Guy: What's a Haiku?
Neve: It's a verbal face slap.
Guy: Can I slap you?

Neve: You're too flaccid!
Guy: How is that relevant?
Neve: By how it feels.

Hello, Alex and Guy!

Lol! That's too funny, Guy! Loved it!

Alex, the stalker tree haiku is not just funny. Its much more than that! From now on, I'l always remember that haiku when I look at trees (which happens to be 'all the time')!

Hello Ajay. My ISP crashed for a few minutes, just when I was trying to post stanza 2:

Check the edit of #3181.

Thank you Al, but it pales to yours. Hey! You are supposed to be asleep, dreaming of floured madmen, scones and mummies!

Loved it, Guy! Makes me realize how much I've missed the popcorn thread!

Thanks, Ajay. Me too. It's time to get back to it. So many words, so little time! I still have two more detailed book reviews to write, and the story and, and and! Yikes.

Red ink slides across
the page as he watches me
write lines predicting

of his death and fall.
Cruel though it seems, it's the one
thing that comforts me.

I'l be looking forward to reading some popcorn, Guy!

Very grim and graphic, Stephanie!

Haha. Thanks. ;)

Grim and graphic, indeed! Wonderful writing, Stephanie!

Thank you, M.

LoL, Stephanie! That was so graphic and grim that it was funny! And such a subtly expressed connection to popcorn! Loved it!

And Ajay, I was thinking the same thing! LoL!

It's her character,
the one that has been alive
far too long in ink,

that needed to die
as an undetectable
pencil smudge, unsought.

Haha, thanks, Guy. And nice haiku, I love the image of the smudge.

So died he did but
heaven closed its doors to him.
Then she left the world.

But their faits weren't
the same and to the mermaids
she sunk in the deep.

And while the sea
claimed her, he boiled in the
deepest pits of hell.

Cold water rippled
her silk gown as five mermaids
pulled her to their lair.

She thought, each moment,
she must drown, yet she never
seemed to want for air.

Beautiful, M!

Poseidon waited
for the beautiful woman,
eagerly swimming.

Back and forth he went
until he laid eyes on her,
siren of the sea.

Her beauty beyond
measure, he bowed and gave her
the throne of the sea.

He stayed there though,
begging for a chance to hear
her quietly sing.

Thank you, Stephanie! I’m amazed at how natural it seems to be for you to write these. You make it look effortless.

The sounds that issued
from her throat when she called forth
that ancient refrain

were heard on every
fishing boat, on floes, on the
dark abyssal plain.

These are great, guys :D




Her lips opened, and
her song burst forth, a haunting
melody of love

Aw, thanks, M! "Ancient refrain" I like it. And nice haiku, Kat!

Telling of the death
and betrayal performed by
the man she had loved.

Her music changed the
sweet mermaids into devils
sent to drag innocents

down to the dark holes
in the oceans, where they are
tortured forever.

Thanks, Stephanie.

And WOW, Stephanie, M, Kat! These are so good!

Lulling lullabies
lured the lads, left the lasses
listless and alone.

In a sea of songs
sung sadly by sea sirens
baritones were barred.

He wanted to sing,
but the merman's family
would have none of it.

Thank you, Guy. I like the line "In a sea of songs" it's just beautiful.

Once beautiful, the
mermaids are disfigured and
wait for a savior.

Legends say he came
from the sky, sent by Lady
Krista, the moonlight.

Long has he toiled
in the earth's forgotten woods,
hunting demons of

the long lost lands where
beauty used to lie but where
horror now abides.

Thank you Stephanie. Yours are gorgeous! They strike me as the kind of writing that, with illustrations, would make a beautiful children's book.

Thanks Steph and Guy :D Stephanie, those are so gorgeous. Your writing always astounds me with its beauty.

Oh! Thank you, Kat!

You're welcome.

Guy: [RotFL.] Hi Al! I'm actually finishing a story for this week! Final edits, now. How's the flu?

Lol. I love the last one there, Alex.

Beauty marks her skin.
Inside lies a dangerous
being who crawled from

lands faraway who killed
and drained her former land and
people of all life.

Now a desert void
of all life, not even the
cruelest wolves want it.

In a ruined land
the wolves forgot, brick streets crack
and the signposts rot;

wind flutters the cash
in the open till of what
was once Scurlock’s Grill.

But emerging from
some unknown place, comes a parched,
almost-dead being.

As he nears the streets,
one could tell it was a man,
unlike the other.

Oh and congratulations to M on winning in the Poetry Group! 51 votes! Amazing!

Thank you, Stephanie and Alex! Stephanie, your profile photo is bewitching, and the haiku you followed up with is excellent.

Thanks, Alex and M! And, yes, my profile picture is of me so thank you for the compliments!

(Promptly falls onto floor laughing)

Alex, I really enjoyed this Star Trek series. I'm a huge fan myself and your haiku was perfect with my afternoon tea! Thank you :)

LoL! Al, so funny!

Now, I don't know if it counts as a fushigi or not, but one of the blogs I follow posted, this afternoon, Star Trek Economics.

And like the others, Stephanie, it is lovely to see the lovely real you. How old are you? Sorry, that came out rude. I'll rephrase: your writing feels like it is written by an intelligent woman in her mid-twenties. But you look like you are about 13. Okay, okay, I admit that my having gotten old has changed my eyes: anyone under 25 looks like they are 12.

Lol, wonderful haikus, Alex! I loved how you ended them!

Well thank you about the writing! But I'm 18. :)

Yeah, I catch ya. How old is your sister?

My sister is 19 too but not for long....

Lol. You're not old, Alex.

Hahaha. Fair enough.

A stroke of brilliance! I’m sitting here laughing. “We should have / stuck with Verizon.” That was completely unexpected.

Al, this is great! Can't wait for the bang :D