Ellen degeneres on guys that like guys

I do not know if she herself feels this way, but many like her do

She doesn't like them!

the-encounter by Vladimir Nabokov

the encounter

by Vladimir Nabokov

enchanted by this strange proximity

Longing, and mystery, and delight…
as if from the swaying blackness
of some slow-motion masquerade
onto the dim bridge you came.

And night flowed, and silent there floated
into its satin streams
that black mask’s wolf-like profile
and those tender lips of yours.

And under the chestnuts, along the canal
you passed, luring me askance.
What did my heart discern in you,
how did you move me so?

In your momentary tenderness,
or in the changing contour of your shoulders,
did I experience a dim sketch
of other—irrevocable—encounters?

Perhaps romantic pity
led you to understand
what had set trembling that arrow
now piercing through my verse?

I know nothing. Strangely
the verse vibrates, and in it, an arrow…
Perhaps you, still nameless, were
the genuine, the awaited one?

But sorrow not yet quite cried out
perturbed our starry hour.
Into the night returned the double fissure
of your eyes, eyes not yet illumed.

For long? For ever? Far off
I wander, and strain to hear
the movement of the stars above our encounter
and what if you are to be my fate…

Longing, and mystery, and delight,
and like a distant supplication….
My heart must travel on.
But if you are to be my fate…

To the Swimmer BY COUNTEE CULLEN

To the Swimmer

BY COUNTEE CULLEN

Now as I watch you, strong of arm and endurance, battling and struggling

With the waves that rush against you, ever with invincible strength returning

Into my heart, grown each day more tranquil and peaceful, comes a fierce longing

Of mind and soul...

One With Others [Not the mental lethargy in which the days enveloped her]

C. D. Wright - 1949-2016

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• 
• 
• 
• 

       Not the mental lethargy in which the days enveloped her

       Nor the depleted breasts not the hand that never knew

       tenderness nor eyes that glistened

       Not the people dragging canvas bags

       through the ragged fields

       Not the high mean whine of mosquitoes

       Not another year of shoe-top cotton

       No more white buck shoes for Henry

       No peaches this year on the Ridge, and no other elevation

       around to coast another mile out of the tank

       No eel in L'Anguille

       Not the aphrodisiac of crossing over

       Not the hole in the muffler circling the house

       Not a shot of whiskey before a piece of bread

       Not to live anymore as a distended beast

       Not the lying-in again

       Not the suicide of the goldfish

       Not the father's D.T's

       Not the map of no-name islands in the river

       Not the car burning in the parking lot

       Not the sound but the shape of the sound

       Not the clouds rucked up over the clothesline

       The copperhead in the coleus

       Not the air hung with malathion

       Not the boomerang of bad feelings

       Not stacks of poetry, long-playing albums, the visions of Goya and friends

       Not to be resuscitated

       and absolutely no priests, up on her elbows, the priests confound you

and then they confound you again. They only come clear when you're on your

deathbed. We must speak by the card or equivocation will undo us.




       Look into the dark heart and you will see what the dark eats other than

your heart




       The world is not ineluctably finished




       though the watchfires have been doused




       more walls have come down




       more walls are being built




       Sound of the future, uncanny how close




       to the sound of the old




       At Daddy's Eyes




       "Pusherman" still on the jukebox




       Everybody's past redacted

From One With Others by C. D. Wright. Copyright © 2011 by C. D. Wright. Published by Copper Canyon Press. Used by permission of the publisher. All rights reserved.

Lake Echo, Dear BY C. D. WRIGHT

Lake Echo, Dear

BY C. D. WRIGHT

Is the woman in the pool of light

really reading or just staring

at what is written

Is the man walking in the soft rain

naked or is it the rain

that makes his shirt transparent

The boy in the iron cot

is he asleep or still

fingering the springs underneath

Did you honestly believe

three lives could be complete

The bottle of green liquid

on the sill is it real

The bottle on the peeling sill

is it filled with green

Or is the liquid an illusion

of fullness

How summer’s children turn

into fish and rain softens men

How the elements of summer

nights bid us to get down with each other

on the unplaned floor

And this feels painfully beautiful

whether or not

it will change the world one drop

C. D. Wright, “Lake Echo, Dear” from Steal Away: New and Selected Poems. Copyright © 2002 by C. D. Wright. Reprinted with the permission of Copper Canyon Press, P. O. Box 271, Port Townsend, WA 98368-0271, www.coppercanyonpress.org.

Source: Steal Away: New and Selected Poems (Copper Canyon Press, 2002)

• • 
    

prime directive

a redshirt's perspective on the prime directive surrounding us: a billion stars

Natasha Teller Dec 2013

a redshirt's perspective on the prime directive

surrounding us: a billion stars
in a time when a trip to mars is like walking around the block
and captain kirk and mister spock are arguing
about the prime directive.

we’re beaming to a planet’s surface. now listen:
i know about inverse tachyon beams
i know about coded klingon screams
i know about going to warp factor eight
i know about redshirts' survival rate.
(no. chance.)

i’m beaming down with the main crew
to the surface of minerva II
we've got a malfunctioning interstellar transceiver which is distressing-- dysgraphing? dismantling…
…i don't know.
scotty said it was defective.

so we’re on this planet,
standing on one side of a thick forest packed with monster janeks,
starfleet says we need to fix this thing yesterday, and we’re in a panic—
and **** it, mccoy is a doctor, not a lumberjack,
and kirk says we should just burn through the middle with phasers,
and spock says we must preserve respect for all life forms no matter the situation.

now please remember kirk’s the captain.
that means he runs this show
but kirk always listens to spock,
so
we spend two days walking through the forest.

surrounding us: a billion trees
in a place where a strange disease is rare as feathers in a flock
and captain kirk and mister spock are arguing
about the prime directive.

halfway through this dark-lit trip
things go wrong (obviously)
and an alien with shellac for skin captures the captain.
said alien grabs a vine, ascends into the canopy of the trees,
and for one glorious moment
i believe kirk’s the dead guy in this episode, not me!

but spock, in his calm and logical vulcan voice,
orders us to exercise any necessary force to recover the captain.
translation: **** EVERYTHING. JUST GET KIRK BACK.

we reach the janek village.
being a good redshirt, i rush in, phaser blasting, ready to complete the heroic rescue of our captain—
and get killed instantly.

as i was dying, i heard the sound of thousands of janeks dying beside me
saw spock help kirk off the ground
and the last words I heard were theirs:
“captain, are you in need of immediate medical attention?”
“nah, spock, i’m fine—”
“mr. scott. the captain is hurt. beam us aboard immediately.”
one’s arm over the other’s shoulders,
they vanished.

surrounding them: a billion stars
in a time when a trip to mars is like walking around the block
and captain kirk and mister spock are arguing
about the prime directive—

but the prime directive
was never the real objective.

My very first attempt at slam poetry, back in the day... this was written for a sci-fi slam. Live long & prosper.