The Writer's Den

Who's your favorite author? Fave Poet? Fave anybody that writes?
This is a place to talk about authors or to show off your own writing - stories, poems, lyrics - what have you!

I have a few... but my fave author is by far Herman Hesse. I'm not sure how many here know of him, but he wrote Steppenwolf, Siddhartha, Journey to the East, The Bead Game & many other fine works that all have to do with the quest to balance the mind and the heart. Passion vs logic. He was a German author who was highly influenced by the modern philosophy of the era like Carl Jung. In his novels, the protagonists were usually dreamer artists who felt confined by society. He'd use dream sequences a lot too, all before the 60's even happened!

My fave poet, as many of you may have guessed is Arthur Rimbaud. I'm honestly not even sure what I would have become like as a person or a writer had I not read his poetry. Some say that he was a genius.. some say he was crazy... some say he was a confused bisexual. I think he was all of that and much more. He was one of those before his time type people - writing poetry that broke with the structure of most poets of the time (1800's) and began an influence of modern poets to practically bleed upon the page, no matter how dramatic or passionate. He was on a quest to find the places unseen and the glorious, hideous colors of our human nature. Like most great artists, he wrote of the sacred and profane.

Many of you know my poetry... but here ya go anyway:

Quote :

Endless Sighs


I listen to you breathe, barely dreaming
You are just a sunshine away from the storm
And I wonder if you know of the lighthouse
Just beyond your ocean...

Take my life for example, I could be dead or lost or fucked up from the pain... drugged up
on some coccaine or slashed inside from a knife that bears a pillow's threat of all that I yearned for,
resolved to suffocate on my own regret... But that wouldn't be me, would it?

That would be some coward that you knew in another life, with another name and face. Fatherless and free,
I am walking down toward the sea, making my last stand with "god" and whatever else is inside me,
waiting to be revealed to my unborn children. So this is what they call heroism?

I never thought that my endless sighs were enough to be considered life changing, but then again, what did I ever know about changing life?
Not a damn thing, until you made me swallow your medicine, poisonous and sweet... and I see double now, triple in the moonlight!

Your ways have integrated with my stubborn soul and given me insight into gravity's tender underbelly... I never before knew about the smiling mother with her virgin and crone, altogether beautiful.

Look what kind of man you've made me! Look! A man you have made me be... And I see now, all the stars have imperfections, just like I do... just like anyone does... Just like our babies in their deep-sleep, suddenly caught within our magic lusts, weaving dreams over each others bodies, like the invisible layers must do when they mingle!
And there is no right or wrong in their creation!

But failures can make monsters when the cards are dealt poorly... I too have played that game,
endlessly for hours, years after years, lives upon lives until reaching the inferno!

But scars are just chasms of grand design, a molten tribute to our spirits and minds. And they are merely statues and art, reminders of the tragic beauty we have lived to achieve.

And I have lived only for that endeavor...
To inspire is the greatest gift of them all!
So let my hand be a flame and let my heart be a rocket!
I will burn it for all my kin and their kind as well.
And no one will ever be able to say that I did not know love!


2003 Aryl Shanti

Ok, folks, what about you?

Well, as you know, I adore your poetry. I love what you do and it always inspires me. The ending of this particular one will live on past us I know.

Here's one of mine I wrote after 9/11/2001

Quote :

100 Plus Stories Up


We kept the sundae of our labours
It was like a fried ice cream
Muddy pie faced darwinian laugh
That sent us choking for water
Between the dry suction, that bitter-
Sweet taste of Armageddon.

We had a joke that made us laugh
Like two drunken old winos
Who knew each other's paths from youth
Our daring smiles were the products
Of the degradation of the bronx
And a Holy bottle of Holy Night Train, Holy Shit
We took an Amen from the bottom drops of it

And waking up Tuesday morning the joke
Smelled acrid; it blew holes in my mind
It wasn't funny anymore -- it was appauling
How we are fitzgeraldian in our swagger!
Our minds contemplating a technical suicide;
A decision on which air current to ride outside or
Inhale the smoke and fry like joan d'new yark.

I'd like to be born again -- the hatchling of some bird
Brave, yet tired Bald Eagle, the bitter-eye piss
Of a decendant Archaeopteryx ready
To spread my wings; let out a cry!
To crumble Gods held way too high!

and brave the jump with my friend
100 plus stories up -- shock the body
Numb the head, fled, bled, dead
On the streets of ruddy ash and weeping lead

2001 Loa Shanti

loaluvsyourlife wrote:

Well, as you know, I adore your poetry. I love what you do and it always inspires me.

Right back atcha my love!!!