Looking Down *** Comp Entry ***

[pseud]

Looking Down (Not my comp entry)

There is another world beneath us, slate-brown,
only seen in the rain. It is much duller than this one,
tilting and rippling in grainy puddles. Marble frowns
with drowning shadows, its sky will never have a sun.

[camus]

MMMMMMMmmmmm,

I take this a vision of Hell, somehow encouraged by the grim reflections of the rain?

OH! Hell is a reflection of oursleves! I'm winging this you understand.

That makes sense though, if that is indeed the case, and if it is, nicely done.

Still "Hell is other people" is the truth!

[pseud]

haha yes, London is hell. No, I guess that wasn't the intent. Maybe I should leave the title "look down."

I guess the closest parallel is C.S. Lewis' The Great Divorce, in which Hell is depicted as a mediocre, gray place with lots of shadows. Yeah, that was the attempt, but I don't know if it matches the picture so well.

It was the first poem I've crapped out in months though...

Thanks for the comment Kris.

- Caleb

[juliadebeauvoir]

London in 1997

Up from the Thames a rising bleak
smudges the tops of sooty crowns,
shaken with the smell of hot concrete,
and petrol cook up with rain.
In a rushed hand, gargoyle quills
splash onto passer-byes,
drool into city grates,
where trickled libations
barely feed a half starved Minerva.

Forgotten under tire and foot,
she lets out a long rumble
from the wind pipes,
darkened and swishing at steps
lit florescent on wide platforms
thin legged emissaries,
collide upon corners,
grasp trouser hems for a pound.

Up in oblivion, hurried paces
slap in staccato, in scored margins,
sentinels at pop-up stands
wave damp dailies,
white teeth and brown collared.
I stand quite alone, vellum hooded,
on the loneliest street,
bereft as a empty wash tub,
holding onto a weepy scone
for the heat in my pocket.