# January Challenge: "Remembering the Old; Embracing the New"



## Chesters Daughter

The prompt for this month's challenge, as chosen by John Oberon is: *Remembering the Old; Embracing the New*

You are free to interpret the prompt in any way you wish, though of course, site rules apply. If you are unsure of the challenge rules please read the 'stickies' at the top of the board.

We are continuing to allow optional anonymity this month. You may post your entries yourself, or, if you'd like to remain anonymous, you may PM your entry to me, *Chester's Daughter.* If you are posting anonymously, please indicate in your PM which board, public or workshop, you desire your entry posted on.

Kindly make sure your entry is properly formatted and error free before you submit. You have a *ten minute grace period* to edit your piece, but anything edited after that will likely see your entry excluded from the challenge. 

As usual, if you'd wish to protect your first rights, post your entry in the *workshop thread,* *and post a link to it in this thread. Failure to do so runs the risk of your entry being disqualified.

Do not post comments in this thread. Any discussion related to the challenge can take place in the Bards' Bistro.

Now that the 'like" function is again blessing us with its presence, we respectfully request that you refrain from using it until this thread has been closed and the poll has been opened.

This challenge will close on the 15th of January at 9pm EST.*


----------



## vangoghsear

Remembering the Old; Embracing the New
By Vangoghsear

The past moves
silhouetted
against the
purple pink sunset

its features,
a shadowy spirit
a mist evaporating
with the last light.

its voice,
a song that repeats
awhile
till the tune recedes
defeated, replaced.

New music, embraced,
floats resplendent
in the fresh scent
of innocence

Venus rises, virginal,
alluring,
supple nude skin
touched only by the
rosy glow of morning
awaits

the mystery
of what’s to be
the weak kneed
sensual shiver
the tentative touch.

The past watches.
a voyeur,
unacknowledged
but known. 
not unseen
but obscured.
jealous of the view
lingers, witnesses
the embracing
of the new.


----------



## Fats Velvet

brainstorm

Psycho caught in a cyclone
stands in the eye.
Psycho brainstorms the cycle
and flies.


----------



## Gargh

Eighteen, again


----------



## Pidgeon84

Enchantress 


Walk the stairs, through haze 
All round the temple 
The temple of time and phase
Home to the archaic enchantress 


Step forth lightly
Step forth strong
Step forth mindful
For she sings the sweetest song


Go forward now 
with yesterday far behind 
and today staring you hard in the eye


She will thrust you through 
Through to the other side
Swimming the oceans of time


She will smile her grin so white
Her bosom so bare 
Will heave with a mighty weight
The weight of unremitting aeons 


Her hair so angelic
will dance freely 
in the air so thick
Her eyes will color the walls
The steam from her baths 
begin to luminesce


Her effervescent beauty 
draws your breath away 
Only her scent so sweet 
Draws you astray


Feel her now
Feel her up and down 
She begins her ritual 
Bodies pressed and muscles tensed




She enters your body
She enters your mind
Consuming your every pore

She laughs with vanity
She laughs with hunger


She will give you what you need
Tonight, the enchantress will feed


----------



## Boofy

A link to my submission ^^


----------



## aj47

*A Star is Born*

Nova livestreaming—
_Photons Herald Stellar Birth!_
Already old news.​


----------



## escorial

remembering
--------------
out with the old
in with the new
out with the new
in with the old


----------



## Awanita

Link to my poem.

Gone
http://www.writingforums.com/thread...-Embracing-the-New-quot?p=1810996#post1810996


----------



## Gumby

*Old Bringers of the New*


----------



## apple

*Eighteen: And Now the World*

Eighteen: And Now the World 


The faeries are dying, fluttering,
dropping from treetops, blossoms
and from butterfly rides.
Tinkerbell drowns in a water glass.

Underneath the bed,
a baby doll named Zacamariah,
reaches out her rubber arms 
as mommy’s room morphs 
against pink flowers and white,
into purples and cardamom gold, 
and veils of fog and candlelight.

Woody and the Scarecrow despair
to be left  askew and upside down 
in a toy box full of childhood. 
The tender wedding vows, 
as real as the hearts she gave them,
now broken.

Today she invents her mask,
painting it fierce with impossible colors;
unknown splashes to match the horizon 
of tangles and jungled wild.
So full of will, 
she prickles to her Kismet.


In that thrill, 
she leaps edge to sky.
A warrior’s leap that spans possibilities,
apron strings and clutching hands.
She kicks hard into that number;
that age of nascent Woman,
as her little feet still warm in white bunny slippers.


----------



## qwertyportne

Last of the Ling Sisters


----------



## rcallaci

*Life*

Life

out of the womb
and
into the grave
it’s what’s in between that counts…​


----------



## jenthepen

*Secrets old, Secrets new

*
Dreams and remembrance of long ago,
marked by a little secret smile.
She’s often there in the park by the track,
thinking and smiling and making me wonder
about her life and all she’s lost
and how the cost of pain she’s known
seems not enough to drain her joy
or make her less, now on her own.

One day I ventured to enquire about
her way of staying bright, despite
the troubles that she’s seen; ill-health
and poverty and loss and all the other
life-borne dross. She smiled at me 
and looked surprised as if to say,
‘You’ve not surmised? Why dear,
just look around you here.’

The park was empty and I guessed
she spoke of sunshine and the rest that
blessed the morning warm and soft. 
And so I nodded and concurred and
told her that I much preferred the
simple things of life.
She looked at me and seemed perplexed,
“You do?” she said, “For me, it’s sex.”


----------



## ArrowInTheBowOfTheLord

*​Cord*
Fingerprints in wax on the lampstand of  the world
Unforgotton, and yet unknown
Embedded in memory forever
By the cord that runs through everything

By this eternal silver cord
I have found the edge of this wasteland
And that we cannot step beyond it
Not yet.

But take heart!
I have been given a lantern from the mast of a ship
Hanging from the crossbeam
Near the torn rigging
Anointed by spheres of lightning that is like blue flame

Eyes to the ends of the earth and on the highest heaven
The forever that is not mine to remember
Has been planted in the depths of my heart
The cord not shaken by any wind goes on ahead of me
And behind me
And in me
And forever


----------



## Chesters Daughter

*The Walk-in Collection*

I've shed much flesh
but keep it in my closet
for it served me well
and has such stories to tell.

When time permits,
I finger slough scars
which reveal how far
I've come
aided by One.

So sad battle attire
must be retired
once you've outgrown 
its seams
yet must always be kept
lest one forget
how ends
are justified by means.

Newly unveiled skin
once protected within
is beautifully unblemished
but oh so painfully thin
and only time
will remedy
its fragility.

Refreshed invincibility
accepted with humility
sans an ounce of pride;
nary a cell kissed by tragedy
guided by eyes
that have never cried.

But the greedy sweep
of ceaseless hands
cannot be denied,
and once keloids grace
my next too tiny hide

a hanger awaits
on which the old
will draped
to assume its place
amongst those already
bought and sold.

Each held in glory
for the sum of its stories
but none more loved
than the newborn skin
I'll be battling in

for organic armor
without fail begins thin

yet blessed 
by its Designer's
preset perseverance

by God
how it thickens.


----------



## Mutimir

*The Devil in Short Shorts*

Wrecked and shattered
By a demon in short shorts
Amongst burned wreckage floating aimlessly
Alone in a lonely cove, grasping to memories 
Drifting along, a broken soul slowly giving in
I curse the devil as she wages new wars

Watching the flames burn away a mountainside
I hear the innocent people cry
Asking pity and empathy
But these voices fail to hit home
Their bodies left to burn and turn to ash
By a devil laughing without sympathy

As the darkness creeps in
Consuming a pitiful broken soul whole
The concentration suddenly breaks
By a vision standing on the shore of the cove
She begins to talk, offering one last chance
Rise above it all and try to break even

Crawling from the darkness
I see a  figure without any wings or halo
Saying things to humble me with mockery
Comparing a petty plight to that of immaturity
Yet giving her hand without superiority
And I believe this is the start ofsomething new
Something burning in my chest with ferocity


----------



## PiP

*Remembering The Old*


----------



## Chesters Daughter

This challenge is now closed.


----------

