0 comments/ 18056 views/ 2 favorites How To Write A Poem By: Cal Y. Pygia Notice, first of all, please, that the title of this essay is not "How To Write Poetry," for a title of that sort would be presumptuous, and I am more modest than that, or try to be, anyway, most of the time. No, that's not my purpose here (or anywhere else, for that matter). My hope is much more limited: "How To Write A Poem." In fact, I would have called this piece "How To Write A Poem Like Mine," but such a title would be outrageously arrogant. Nevertheless, despite my humbler title, I am, in fact, going to talk about how to write a poem like mine. If you're not interested, that's fine. If you are, here goes. I'm an imagist. According to Wikipedia (and me), an imagist is one who favors "precision of imagery and clear, sharp language." By "imagery," I mean descriptive words and phrases--words and phrases that both create mental images, or pictures, and are concrete--that is, appeal to one or more of the five physical senses--sight, hearing, smell, taste, and/or touch--often by way of a simile or a metaphor. As an imagist, I am more in tune (or in touch) with incongruity, irony, iconoclasm, poetic surrealism, and the like. To put the same idea another way, I point out the fly in the ointment, exhibit the one thing leftover that doesn't quite fit into the neat and tidy Scheme of Things, show how one thing can mean something else (often its opposite), and disappoint the hopes of those who seek simplicity and meaning in simple and "meaningful" persons, places, and things. In other words, I'm pretty much a royal pain in the ass--but a poetic one. Usually, my poems start with an image in my own mind. My verse has a deliberate and effective beat (I said I'm modest, but I'm not falsely so); it often takes the form of short lines; it tends to result in long, seemingly rambling (but actually well controlled) sentences made up of many seemingly interrupting phrases; it seldom rhymes; and it typically confuses by juxtaposing contraries, absurdities, ironies, and, less often, but still somewhat regularly, epiphanies. Wordsworth said we murder to dissect, and, of course, that's true; we do. However, we--or, at least I--also dissect to revive and even to resurrect. Revive experience, I mean, and resurrect perception. When we see the same things the same way a few times too often, we become jaded, take "reality" for granted, and lose a large part of our humanity, if not exactly our souls. But let me exemplify the writing of a poem like mine. As I said, I start with an image in my own mind, and, most often, it is an unusual, even a startling, image, one that upsets the applecart of ordinary experience and clichéd "perception." (Whenever possible, I also toss in something erotic or at least something sexual, because erotic poetry should be erotic and, when it isn't, it should be at least sexual.) I started one poem with a picture in my head of dismembered dolls. Their decapitated rubber heads and limbless plastic bodies and their wide, unblinking blue eyes seemed strange and terrible enough, especially associated with an innocent young girl who sleeps with a teddy bear, I thought. However, what would account for such a state of affairs? I knew at once: her brother, of course! Brothers are known for their cruelty toward their innocent and peaceful, if not altogether docile, sisters, and many a mean-spirited male sibling would take delight in inflicting such cruelties as beheading and dismembering his sister's dolls, perhaps while entertaining fantasies of his own burgeoning manhood. The poem, from that point on, came together nicely, and I called it--what else?--"Sibling Rivalry": The little girl has quite a collection of arms and heads and legs and dismembered torsos among her teddy bears and dolls, and the little boy, her brother, sleeps among dead soldiers and misshapen machines, pretending, no doubt, in his little boy dreams, that he is The Terminator pursuing Sarah Connor across a nightmare landscape strewn with the plastic corpses of slaughtered Ken and Barbie dolls. There is something delightful, if I do say so myself, about the picture of malevolence that lies behind the young boy's seemingly innocent face and fantasies, which renews the experience of the rivalry that most sisters have had, but not necessarily enjoyed, with their brothers. From my youth, I have been a fan of such writers as Edgar Allan Poe and Stephen King, who confront us, through imagery and storylines of the bizarre and the macabre, with renewals of experiences long forgotten or, possibly, repressed. It was with their fiction and (in the case of Poe, if not King) poetry that I started "Seamless Grotesqueries"; however, since I was writing the verse for Literotica--and for its "Erotic Poems," at that--I decided to focus on and explore grotesqueries of a more or less sexual nature, grotesqueries that "masquerade," as I suggest in the opening lines of the poem, as "beauties/ Born of desire," including artists' reclining nudes (with a transsexual difference, or twist, to enhance the surreal effect); a disfigured, but otherwise, beautiful and desirable woman; an old maid who happens also to be both a cross dresser and a librarian (mostly because of the clichés associated with librarians as being asexual, straightforward, no-nonsense pseudo-intellectuals); deceased women who, during their short lifetimes, were considered hot and sexy but who are, sadly, neither, now that death has claimed them (the death of a beautiful young woman, Poe says, is the most poetical topic in the world); the idea that some famous women, as represented, in the poem, by Jamie Lee Curtis, may be men in disguise, as it were; the jilted woman in her suffering; the self-destructive woman who, despite her beauty, has low self-esteem; and selfless women whose suffering as mothers gives birth, both figuratively and literally, at times to creative sons, all within a framework of polymorphous perversity, as represented by the refrain, "I will look at anything sexual./ How about you?": Seamless grotesqueries Masquerading as beauties Born of desire; There are so many I cannot count them all! I will look at anything sexual. How about you? Sexy Rebecca reclines nude On her pink-backed divan, A blanket of moons and stars Covering her Buttocks and thighs, Reading, by the light Of a shrunken moon, Thick tomes of enchantment, Signs and symbols Intelligible only to her Kind of women, Sisters of the coven Of transsexual sinners, On the wall overhead. I will look at anything sexual. How about you? Under the full moon, Ulrike's woman Needs a lantern Because she's lost an eye; If anything, she looks More beautiful than before And less offensive For the plucking. I will look at anything sexual. How about you? David's librarian is a cross dresser; She looks rather maidenly, In a spinsterish sort of way, The tiny skulls that take the place Of heads upon the pins with which She skewers her graying hair Give her a certain air Of the austere, And she is, for her age, Well preserved; one might mistake Her for one of the living, Were it not for the worms Crawling through the shoulder Of her matron's gown. The bony finger To her schoolmarm's lips Should be taken seriously, indeed, For there is no title On the cover Of the tome she reads. I will look at anything sexual. How about you? Zombies are people, too; They have their hang-ups And their pinups; The latter wear skulls Upon their panties and bras; Some even wear the tattered Corsets and lingerie In which they were buried On the day Of their cemetery debuts. I will look at anything sexual. How about you? Some say Jamie Lee Curtis Looks like a man Despite breasts And buttocks Any woman, Even Angelina, Would kill for-- Tell the truth, now: Were you ever Aroused By her, Ever Hardened With desire For her? I will look at anything sexual. How about you? Sometimes, my inner demon Cannot decide what to be Once evening gives way To midnight, but that's okay; I am willing to be anything at all. I will look at anything sexual. How about you? The queen of broken hearts Holds a rose in one hand, A dagger in the other, And the tears she cries Look like drops of blood, But she says, "It's only my mascara; It runs when I bleed." Sometimes, I think she may beat me With her wings, assault me With her desire to be whole And free of the likes of you and me. She has pretty breasts, despite the scar That decorates her abdomen, Making her who she is And us what we are likely to be Some day. I will look at anything sexual. How about you? She, too, is beautiful, but intense, With three parallel scars Starting to heal Below her left eye, A look of grief Upon her haggard face, And, instead of stars, Tiny skulls in the pupils Of her catatonic eyes. I will look at anything sexual. How about you? Her sister, the one who exfoliates Her face with barbed wire, Looks lovely, too, the lacerations Like grooves imparted By an acid tongue; She looks expectant In the field of corn, Beneath the ragged scarecrow's gaze; Perhaps she's been here before, Seeking the caresses of razor-wire Or something else With which to cut herself. I will look at anything sexual. How about you? If your poem contains a word Like "breasts" or "cunt," "testicles," "balls," "buttocks," Or, above all, "cock," Critics will call it "pornographic," Although most whores Lack poetic elegance, Except, perhaps, in bed. I will look at anything sexual. How about you? The dentist told my mother To "count backward from a hundred," And she drifted away, Giving birth to experimental decay, Calling out of the darkness, Wanting to know, "Why are the maidens Naked, and why do the dragons care?" She gave birth, right there in the chair, To existential angst brighter Than the rubies in Pandora's fabled box. I will look at anything sexual. How about you? Seamless grotesqueries Masquerading as beauties Born of desire; There are so many I cannot count them all! That's how (and why) I write my poems the way I do. It's certainly not the only way, and, quite likely, it's not even the best way, but it's a fun way, and it's a way that works, and it is, therefore, a way that you, too, may write a poem, if you are of the mind to do so. How to Write a Porn Review Okay you want to know how to write a porn review? There are several reasons why this might interest you, perhaps you found a website that is willing to pay quality reviewers, maybe you just found a website that will ship you free porn if you're willing to write a report on it and maybe you're just curious. Whatever the case is I've got a pretty good formula for mine that while they may not be the worlds greatest they are several notches above the average reviewer in my opinion. I always start a review by telling you what I'm expecting from a movie, this is based on the cast, the company the stars and whatever they put on the cover. Its important that you know where my head was going in because of course it effects the review, but also because you might have some of the same thoughts racing through your head. I mean if the title says something like "Deep in Black Ass" you head in expecting anal. If your favorite porn star is featured on the cover you expect her to be in the movie. There are companies you've heard of and that you're comfortably with. For me I have pretty much blind faith in Platinum X, Red Light District and New Sensations. There are companies that I've usually had bad experiences with like Pink Visual or Devil's Films so of course company is taken into account and then content. I'm not a big fan of lesbians, I still review my fair share when it comes my way but lesbians bore me for the most part. On the other hand even a plain looking girl who is willing to go ass to mouth gets me rock hard in an instant. So start by telling your reader what it was you expected to get before you've seen anything. Every industry has its own language and unless you want to look silly writing your review (or worse confuse people) you need to have a decent understanding of the language of porn. I'm going to list a few of the abc's of porn here, this is by no means a comprehensive list, some things are going to be left off because if you don't already know what doggy style is there is no point in trying to explain to you what a ATOGM is and since some of these things are legends I'm not going to bother explaining a donkey punch to anybody who doesn't already know. So here are a few things you might be unfamiliar with or at least might not have terms for. PTM/P2M: Any time something, usually a dick, goes straight from a girl's pussy to her mouth without being wiped clean in between. ATM/A2M: See above only with anal. ATOGM: Ass to other girl's mouth DP: Double penetration DA: Double Anal DV: Double Vag DVDA: Combine the above, I'm convinced this is just a legend that old pornstars tell young pornstars so they'll eat their vegetables or something like that. Cowgirl and Reverse Cowgirl: The woman is on top of the man facing him, if she's facing away so he can watch her delicious bubble butt bouncing that's a reverse cowgirl. Facial: Good ole goo splatter of course on the face. Creampie: When a man cums inside of a woman. It's a waste of perfectly good man sauce if there nobody eats the cream pie. MMF: Male, male female FFM: Female, female, Male IR: Interracial. I don't intend to go into a tirade because I think it is unnecessary. However in the porn industry interracial means sex with an African American. Asian girls and white men, not IR. Latino women and white men, not IR. Black man and black woman. . .sometimes IR. It's that stupid. I think that about covers the major lingo that you need to know in order just to communicate with your fellow purveyors of filth, which leads me to the next part of the review, the cast and play by play part of the review. Some people like to write this as one big portion glossing over the stars and the scenes and basically giving a thumbs up or thumbs down on the section. I personally like to go into a little more detail, a short paragraph for each girl. There is a reason for this, not everybody is as porn savvy as I am. There are men who could walk into a room and not know Sasha Grey from Jada Fire and so you need to give them a brief description of the girl, especially if she's a new girl they might not have seen yet. Unless her outfit is simply incredible I'm not sure I would really bother talking about it and the same goes for the set. This is porn, we see couches and beds all the time, now if a bunch of girls are getting it on in a shower you might want to mention that. Here is the next thing you need to know. This is not the NFL and you are not John Madden. Do not go into a detailed play by play of everything and every position. Give more of a highlights real. Jada Fire looks incredible in the anal reverse cowgirl and just to prove she's every bit the whore you want her to be she takes makes several withdrawals at her local A2M before devouring her own anal cream pie! Is usually more than enough. You want the reader to have a decent idea of the action, not start stroking himself to you description. Extras is where I throw in not only the extra features but anything that wasn't directly part of the film that caught my attention. This will often include photo galleries (like I really want to watch pictures, on my DVD of girls frozen in time when I've got them moaning on the same DVD.) cum shot recaps and trailers for other movies that they want you to buy. This is also where I would mention little gripes, like too few chapter breaks (I'm looking at you Gangland series.) or poor identification (This ones for you Private) of the ladies. If I happened to really enjoy the cover art (Brazzer's Big Butts like it Big 2) or if I completely hated the opening credits. I think it's important to finish with a heading out section. I use this space to explain how my opinion of the film has changed since I started watching it. Maybe it was like Red Light District's Be My Bitch series where I learned that lesbians don't have to be boring. Maybe it was like Shane Diesels adventures where I was expecting average porn and got crap with boat sounds in the background. Its also important because it helps put things into perspective for the reader. I know I don't like lesbians, so an average lesbian movie might get a below average score from me and the reader should know that and factor it in. Another example is a recent video called Apprentass 10. It wasn't labeled as a jump to compilation. So I felt lied to, there were still some good scenes but what I expected and what happened were so far different that it lowered my opinion. So I suggest you consider a similar section. Above all you have to be comfortable with your writing. It should flow relatively easily, if it doesn't you may want to consider more practice. Of course there is no shortage of things to review in the world. I hope this has been helpful in learning how to write porn reviews!