# July Challenge: Books



## candid petunia (Jul 1, 2013)

You may read those books and explore the hidden worlds all you want, but remember, no talking. This is a library. :read:
Gumby and Lace, the winners of our June Challenge, have decided on *Books*​ to be our next prompt. 

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.

*This challenge will close on the 15th July, 8 p.m. GMT. 
*Do not post entries in this thread. *All entries should be sent by PM either to Chester's Daughter, or to me (candid petunia), and we'll post your poems for you.
*
If you wish to protect your first rights and want your entry posted in *the workshop thread*, simply mention that in the PM. :smile:
Remember poems posted once will not be edited. So please make sure your entries are properly formatted and edited before you send them to us.



Do not post comments in this thread. Any discussion related to the challenge can take place in the Bards' Bistro. Please also refrain from using the "like" button until the challenge has been closed and the poll opened. 


All right, now let's get writing! :smile:


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## Chesters Daughter (Jul 7, 2013)

Libraries are Not Romantic

Picked the harlequin romance off the shelf.
Read cover to cover. Three hours.

It was terrible.
My date was not impressed.


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## candid petunia (Jul 8, 2013)

*3:00pm soy latte:*


I relish the sight of those who write 
in my coffee shop on the corner.
I smile at the last sliver of their grounding humanness
pulling at them inexorably,
to sit amongst the cacophony of spritely white noise,
and to remember what people are like,
for her books, one girl told me.
And I was fortunate, I think, 
for while fixing her coffee,
I caught a moment of sheer surrender
as she dipped into some sprawling world 
behind her vivid green eyes—


A deep sigh. A wayward glance. 


I knew as she turned back to the page,
with the slightest smile touching the corners of her mouth,
that she had a heart that had once cried out
for the reprieve that first brought her pen to paper. 


I knew from that glance and that sigh,
that she is not a person one can pin down,
like a butterfly for a collection,
with a number on a napkin and a charming smile.


No, she has no haven and she has no home,
and she leaves no footprints behind her.
She eats so sparingly from this world;
for this is world of mere morsels.


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## Chesters Daughter (Jul 8, 2013)

*Open Books*

Sitting; studying 
the people that pass,
observing the world
from a small patch of grass.


Cyclists in lycra,
skeletally thin.
Preparing en-masse
for their next racing win.


Drunks with brown bags, sneak
sips between prattle.
Vagrants and outcasts
all losing their battle.


Couples watch children
lift high on the swings;
savour the delight 
shown for frivolous things.


Junkies and addicts
thin, veiny and wan,
seek cover from glares,
and the heat of the sun. 


Visions of the life
of a town: quaint, small.
The people within
read like open books, all.


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## candid petunia (Jul 9, 2013)

Untitled (slight language)

Years, ages, lives
all leather bound and silky script
chunks of history, apotheosis
of nameless serfs and saints
trudging on through time in spaces
little more than cupboards
shelves and vaults and museums
troves of trusted truths
writ softly to the rasping noise
of dying scholars, by candle light

we're meant to believe
these cryptic scratchings are enough
that primal, proven providence 
courses through their inky veins
that omniscience somehow seeped into
the aged pages of our past
blessed by hands that made the world
scrawled by men who knew the word
that was
in the beginning

but its all bullshit


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## Chesters Daughter (Jul 11, 2013)

*Ancient*


Pages torn,
Leather in tatters,
Cover old and worn.

Spine rotten,
Binding loose,
Dust jacket long forgotten.

Ink faded,
Credits gone,
Book moldy and dated.

Tomes hold,
Life embodied,
We all grow old...
Eventually.


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## Chesters Daughter (Jul 13, 2013)

The Book.

The book lay open,
surrendering to the elements.
Its pages fluttering,
effortlessly in the breeze, 

like wings, without flying.

Stooping down, I picked it up,
examined the cover,
observed the title.

“The Big Sleep.” 
She was sleeping now,
never to awaken. 
“Good night, my lovely.”


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## Chesters Daughter (Jul 13, 2013)

*Onset of Obsession*

My first grade teacher
handed us the keys
to the universe.
They numbered twenty-six,
and with them,
some of us became
expert locksmiths.

Everything and everywhere
previously hidden
in snippets of heaven,
beautifully bound,
but with treasures unfound
for a lack a language
had locked them away,
was now ours 
for the taking.

Once I saw Spot run,
nothing seemed as fun.
Snippet after snippet,
little bits of everything
became mine alone
and ousted poor Barbie
from her pink home.
As she cried plastic tears,
I drew the universe near.

Once piles touched the ceiling,
Daddy bought some shelves.
I didn't see him build them,
far too busy was I
consuming best sells.

I cracked spines 
in my desk
during class.
Slipped some heaven
in the missal
during Mass.
Got lost in letters
in three hour baths.
Had to turn pages
while I ate
and brought Stephen King
on every date.

In the subway, the market,
or at the beach,
hanging with friends
who labeled me geek,
whether pristine and perfumed
or with jaundiced dog-ears,
a novel was always
within my reach.

Decades later,
it's still the same,
and in this age of video games

I feel for kids

too few locks can be tumbled
with keys so lame.


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## candid petunia (Jul 14, 2013)

*Tickets to Adventure*

Please book me tickets for two
to wild islands and safari, ma'am.
I'm expecting dragons soon
under the twilight of full moon.

If time permits, my lady Wolowitz,
I'd also like them ghost spirits.
And please! Throw in the Souls
of Gogol, and the March of Marx.

My arms have not yet lost the feel,
so I might need help from heavy stuff,
I'll take Kant, Hegel, Goeth and--Uff!

Would you mind a hand? I can't get up.


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## candid petunia (Jul 14, 2013)

*The Lewis Carroll Scholar*

One afternoon under golden sun,
I took a stroll through Regent Park
and, with the term of lectures done,
I stepped spry, feeling free as a lark.
I had in mind my leisure to take
and wandered down to Boating Lake.

At the water's edge upon the grass,
sat a well-dressed enchanting girl
who was reading _Through the Looking-Glass_
and I could see her brow begin to furl.
"Dear child," said I, "do you understand
what you are reading of Looking-Glass Land?"

She looked up towards me with a grin
and said, "I understand most every word
and the story is interesting, but then again
Alice's adventures seem quite absurd."
"Please," she continued with an eager look,
"explain, if you can, the meaning of this book."

And then I, being a tenured Oxford don
who had studied this author for thirty years,
straightened up tall like a true paragon
who is rightly admired by all his peers.
I opened my mouth to impart the teaching
for which this young girl was beseeching.

Yet the words I spoke were not what I intended
and they poured forth quite in spite of myself:
"Twas brillig, and the slithy wended
did gyre and gimble in the welf!"
At this, the immensity of my surprise
did not surpass the same in that girl's eyes.


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## candid petunia (Jul 15, 2013)

*Plotting futures



*Lost worlds of paper,
dinosaurs,
are resurrected in
that one hot
stifling classroom
Crafting Cathedrals -
stone by stone 
Follies of fascination


Distilled, evoked, the
truth of life
becomes the smell of print
Of ink freshly
minted, extracts
A world of words
selected
for intimate connection


Life leaps from pages -
follows home
in hearts of lacklustre
once sore souls
Now standing straight,
walking tall
in ideas, inspired
to live in recognition


In the leaves of books we learn to live
In the leaves of books we fly


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## Chesters Daughter (Jul 15, 2013)

Kindles and Dinosaurs 



How can a Kindle be a treasured friend
this plastic book with no page to bend.
Not dog-eared or torn, stained with salty tears,
margins pencilled with notes from passing years.

They won’t change my mind or feelings cajole
for this plastic usurper, with no soul.
They say it’s great but I don’t understand,
so this Kindle book in our house, is banned!


You’re not listening I say, real books are fine.
I don’t care for Kindle’s latest design.
Gizmos and gadgets don’t interest me
I like the feel of a real book, you see.

I huff, as my battle with words is lost
what price a Kindle with the hidden cost?
Will libraries be a thing of the past
as Kindles advance and the die is cast?

Friends give me their best “I-know-it-all” look
as they chant: Kindles now replace the book.
I sigh, mindful of all the friends I’ve read.
I’m a dinosaur; are books really dead?


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## Chesters Daughter (Jul 15, 2013)

This challenge is now closed. Please proceed to *the voting thread* to cast your votes.


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