Experimental Writing class #2

Three Poem Mash-up

Lines from three famous poems are scrambled together and divided into three new poems. Can you tell the original sources?

(P.S. okay this blog format is a bit annoying because the width cannot contain the length of some of my verses, they get divided into two lines...)

#1

We shall walk with a walk that is measured and slow because I could not stop for Death.
And you, my father, there on the sad height, rage –
rage against the dying of the light.

Yes we’ll walk with a walk that is measured and slow,
and the dark street winds and bends
feels shorter than the day.
Rage, rage against the dying of the light.

We passed the setting sun
the dews grew quivering and chill
and there the moon-bird rests from his flight.
Rage, rage against the dying of the light.

Grave men, near death, who see with blinding sight the place where the sidewalk ends;
Since then ‘tis centuries, and yet each rage –
rage against the dying of the light.

#2

He kindly stopped for me,
my tippet only tulle,
for only gossamer my gown.

At recess, in the ring,
I first surmised the horses’ heads were toward eternity.

Let us leave this place where the smoke blows black,
the roof was scarcely visible,
and watch where the chalk-white arrows go.

There is a place where the sidewalk ends
past the pits where the asphalt flowers grow,
and there the grass grows soft and white.

We paused before a house that seemed a swelling of the ground,
the cornice but a mound.

For the children, they mark, and children, they know and learn,
too late, they grieved it on its way.
Old age should burn and rave at close of day.

Wild men who caught and sang the sun in flight –
and there the sun burns crimson bright –
do not go gentle into that good night.

#3

For his civility we slowly drove,
he knew no haste,
and before the street begins,
we passed the school where children strove
we passed the fields of gazing grain.

The carriage held but just ourselves,
and we’ll go where the chalk-white arrows go;
and I had put away to cool in the peppermint wind, my labor, and my leisure too.

Though wise men at their end know dark is right,
Curse, bless me now with your fierce tears, I pray.
Or rather, he passed us to the place where the sidewalk ends.
Do not go gentle into that good night.

Good men, the last wave by, crying How Bright!
Blind eyes could blaze like meteors and be gay.
Their frail deeds might have danced in a green bay.
Because their words had forked no lightning, they and Immortality do not go gentle into that good night.
Do not go gentle into that good night.

<3

Where the Sidewalk Ends – Shel Silverstein
Do Not Go Gentle into that Good Night - Dylan Thomas
Because I could not stop for Death – Emily Dickinson

Experimental Writing class #1

you usually leave.

You usually leave –
I idolize lies,
needy, desire fire –
letting tingling linger.

Upset (un)settled led on
come to together get on
You usually leave.
some amour more
Sob problem lament mental tolls.

No more mourning nights.
Run away waywardly leech,
you usually leave.

New York City in a short skirt and a long jacket

Back now at MIT, when faced with the inevitable, repeated, questions of "How was your IAP?" I realize no amount of words could explain it to someone who was not there. I also cannot satisfactorily answer the questions of "What did you do in New York City?" The gerunds eating, shopping, drinking, clubbing ring hollow and indescript. Jason phrased it as, a higher quality of life. I deem it as the NYC lifestyle.

I love walking down the streets on a bright day when the sunlight shines straight down the grid lines of Manhattan, yellow dots honking and tracing into the distance, and human achievements of glass steel and concrete rising in vertigo on both sides. I walk in step with the fast heartbeat of New York, dressed in a grey peacoat, leather & cashmere gloves, and high heeled boots. Breakfast is a bagel or pastry bought at the food trucks outside every Metro exit in the morning. Add a cup of Nespresso to my desk, and my day has begun. Lunch is but an afterthought, and the coming of dinner is signaled by the sun's disappearance over Central Park from my office window. I turn off the lights, lock up the office, and now, starting with dinner, my day has only just begun.




A handful of phone calls later, dinner might be comfort food in Chinatown, or cheap and collegiate in St. Marks and Lower East Side. Or, more often than not this month, an upscale restaurant that satisfies our Epicurean cravings. (My favorites? The Michelin star restaurants Le Cirque and The Modern. Absolutely exquisite.)



On chill days we just hang out in the Wall St apartment lounge, watch a movie, play some pool, thinking about going somewhere but never actually moving. If we're feeling fun, after-dinner drinks at a bar or lounge - soju in a watermelon anyone? - but, as college kids at heart, the guys usually end up running to a liquor store before 10pm and hanging out at the apartment in Little Italy. Quarters, Beirut, Kings, poker... Jersey Shore... good old-fashioned fun and games (and broken cups and mismatched card decks) ensue.



On the nights that we make it out beyond this, there's dancing in a dark grimy bar -- never mind the sketchy old people, because the DJ is good, the friends are good, and the bartender is very good. When we exit a couple of hours later, sweaty, cold, and hungry, our thoughts inevitably turn to K-town Bonchon. Inside the taxi, there is a slight pause in confusion as we wonder what streets exactly are K-town on, but we get there eventually. While waiting for that delicious fried chicken, we comment on particularly cute waitresses, or, upon seeing Shinhan Bank's logo across the street, revert back to MIT-ism and discuss Starcraft 2...

A glimpse into my routine in New York.

And in between all this are my random adventures wandering around Central Park, walking around the block in a circle, getting locked in an out-of-service subway train, trying to give food to homeless people, being confused in Brooklyn, etc. etc.... the usual =)

>> Rest of the pictures on Facebook

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