Miscellaneous:

[SuzyQ]

Life's Phantom

Throughout my life—
     silent as a thought—
          a phantom stalked me.
                     I never saw it
            but I felt it
b r e a t h i n g  
                  D
                  O
                  W
                  N 
                    my neck—
                            S
                               L
                                  I
                                   T
                                      H  
                                    E
                                 R
                                    I
                                       N
                                          G  into my head—
                                maliciously infecting
                       random thoughts—
           shattering the innocence
     of my youth
with its deviant  
                  S
                     L
                       A
                         N
                           T  
                              on life.
                                       It seeped 
                                                D
                                                E
                                                E
                                                P
                                    into my heart
                        only to smother
             my childhood dreams.
   This serpentine phantom
continues to
             W
               E
             A
               V
              E  
                 my existence into a
                               perpetual nightmare— 
                                               as it feeds upon
                                                               each lost moment
                                                                                of my life.

---------- Post added at 07:49 PM ---------- Previous post was at 07:45 PM ----------

Sheesh.... this was hard getting the spacing to display correctly!

[Lane]

g`s how cool is that! had to read it more than once to take it in. I`m not much of a critic so you have to put up with these short comments. I love it.

[MsJacquiiC]

I love it too and don't know how I managed to miss this one.
A really poignant write Ms Suzy. And yeah - posting on forums is kinda difficult to get the formatting 100% correct, but you did and it's impressive. I love the formatting, it gives the poem more of a literal meaning. It's like a poem made as a feast for the senses.

I like how the poem "slithers" from the very left side to the very right end ==> Ingenious.

Hmmmm - I don't believe this write is really a shape/concrete/pattern poem... And don't call me stupid LOL - but what do you call this type of stylistically formatted poetry?

Anyway - this made for a great read, both content wise and stylistically.
Thanks for the share!

J.

[mermaidsong]

How very creative. I loved reading and experiencing this. Nicely done.

[jakeminick]

really cool and entertaining to read, but still genuine. i can really relate to phantom aspect. i guess we all have beasts that need to be satisfied, or we have to mutate to take away their power, which is damn near immpossible (for me at least). thank you for this great write.

[SuzyQ]

Thank you everybody who read and posted a response to this creation of mine.

Jacquii... If this isn't concrete poetry, I'm not sure what it is. It's definitely "visual". It might actually be rather dull without the form to go with it.

[tham]

How about you, Suzy Q, you had my eyes slithering,also can you help me get that thing off my back,nicely done

[nomadicrhymer]

This was a delight to read, especially because of the stylized wording, literally enunciating the words themselves... awesome!! I loved it. Definitely worth the pain of the formatting I think.

Because the poem itself is so good, the style did detract a little from the absorption of the meaning and the ease of reading... but overall a masterful job!

Nomad

[Wind]

this is wonderful...as though it saying we all have shadows that are unseen and watchign and making are very exsentice a hassle

[MsJacquiiC]

The Following Text Is Quoted:

Originally Posted by SuzyQ

Jacquii... If this isn't concrete poetry, I'm not sure what it is. It's definitely "visual". It might actually be rather dull without the form to go with it.

I suppose it is concrete poetry hmmm. I'd always simply thought of concrete poetry as an actual shape, rather than stylized formatting. But you know - your stylized text really does "read" the poem to the reader --- if such a thing were possible. Again = a really brilliant write! I seriously doubt the piece would be dull without the stylized text though

J.