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Helen McKean Aug 2011
a perfect, newly unveiled horizon line
ancient and promising
yet reborn as a newborn
to my industrialized eyes.

I haven’t heard sirens in days.

still, there is the hustle and bustle
of movement everywhere,
but not by people
nor Porsches and Escalades
and their infiltrating thick smog.
no inane chatter
and fake oohing and aahing
over Louis’ and who saw who.

no
here the possessions move
the so-called inorganic
the buildings, doors, and gates
yearning to be free
swaying, creaking
their tiny reins of confinement
too much to bear
for their free spirits.
taking their cue
from trees, plants, vines, leaves
which are overgrowing fences
and clambering over walls
a massive riotous uprising at a glacier-pace
to triumph over the bipeds
imagine the horror of the flora
at a sudden interment to La-La-Land
the hopelessness and oppression
at being trimmed twice a week
mutilated and then slaughtered.

no
they are the secret underground rulers
stubbornly proud but humble tyrants
mercifully loving their lowly subjects
feeling sorry for us
we who have been forced into
this unnatural industrial order
not their beautiful chaos.

and yet...
they lie in wait
patiently, silently
anticipating the day
when we throw up our arms in exasperation and relief
and acquiesce to their dominion
a return to times before times.
judy smith Apr 2015
Getting the fashion industry excited about an event is no plum task. And yet season after season, Anna Sui does it with her thoughtful and fun runway shows. Blame it on her ability to transport her audiences deep into her world full of references that range from Pre-Raphaelites to Diaghilev to disco. (Of course, the retro soundtracks and top models don’t hurt, either.)

Lately, Sui’s been sharing her passion for fashion history with a wider audience by taking on many collabs, the latest of which is with O’Neill, in stores now. Just in time for summer, the designer crafted a selection of swimwear and cover-ups that echo the bohemian mood of her main collection but also target a new kind of customer. We caught up with Sui at her Soho store to reflect on her career, her favorite muses, and texting with Anita Pallenberg.

You’ve been doing more collaborations in general lately—why is it important to you to diversify into these arenas?

Well, there are certain limitations that we have as far as production for what we’re able to do. A great way to overcome that is to work with somebody who has the expertise in that product. So working with Frye, they make the coolest, sturdiest boot that you can imagine, and so I think this is my third time collaborating with them. They’re just dreams to work with. It takes you to another place. And also you learn so much, because we’re so limited as far as resources now that it opens up new avenues. I did the same with the Coach bags and with the luggage with Tumi and now this collection with O’Neill.

How did you get involved with O’Neill?

Our sales manager knew somebody at O’Neill, and she started thinking that it would be such a great pair-up between O’Neill and Anna Sui because O’Neill is very much our girl. They’re very print-oriented and known for their surfer style, but we wanted to incorporate our bohemian style with it. I think that we’ve blended it so well. The clothes are just so dreamy; we were all just oohing and ahhing over these lace pieces.

That perfect white lace dress is a very necessary summer item.

It’s so true. I remember one summer I was looking at Naomi [Campbell] pictures on a yacht on Daily Mail or something, and every day she had the most beautiful, little white baby-doll dress. I thought, Where did she find all those?! But she can just zero in on something, too. That’s always been my dream, to have all those gorgeous white baby-doll dresses.

You have the best references season after season—who was the beachy surfer girl that you looked to for this collab?

We wanted to capture that true bohemian feeling of the ladies of Laurel Canyon: Joni Mitchell, Michelle Phillips, all those girls you put pictures on the wall and are like, “I hope I grow up and look like this.” So what we tried to capture was that dream.

I think fashion in general is really swinging toward the Anna Sui vibe, very bohemian.

It’s exciting. It’s kind of like a new beginning again. We’ve had so much reaction from all the stores and press—it’s like when I first started. It’s got that same feeling. It’s wonderful.

How do you define who your customer is and continue to change and grow with her over the years?

I think that somewhere I never grew up, and it’s still that same dream as when I was looking at the pictures of Michelle Phillips. It’s still always that same thing, and no matter where I go with the collection, Vikings or Pre-Raphaelites, there’s still that bohemian girl there. That was always my ideal. As much as I try to veer away from it, there are always a couple of those Michelle Phillips and Joni Mitchells in the collection. Through every collection you can find them.

So what’s the secret to staying young forever then?

I think loving what you do. You can’t ask for more. This is what I wanted to do since I was 4 years old, and just the fact that I’m able to do it and do it globally—I work in Japan and I work in Europe and I work in New York—it’s kind of a dream. It’s a lot of hard work and I’m very, very dedicated to it. I do a lot of sacrificing of other things, but it’s what I’ve always wanted.

As someone who’s been in the business for so long, how do you stay inspired and not get worn out or jaded?

One of the things that I love the most is research—learning new things and exploring new things. That’s what I do when I work on a collection: I find something that sparks my interest and then I’m obsessed with and I just go into it. It’s like going into the rabbit hole. Then all of a sudden you find out all these other things because one thing leads to another. Like when I did the Ballets Russes collection [Fall 2011], I saw that beautiful Diaghilev exhibit at the V&A; and I thought, OK, now I can be inspired by those Léon Bakst drawings. I remember one of the Ormsby Gore sisters was telling me that the way they started wearing vintage was because of a sale of the Ballets Russes costumes in, like, 1968. They couldn’t afford the principal costumes, but they could afford the costumes of the Sugar Plum Fairies, all these crushed velvets. So they started wearing them on the street, and all of a sudden the Beatles and the Stones and everybody else started following what they were doing. Well, don’t you know, in the Diaghilev exhibit, there was a film of that auction. I was just like, “Oh, my God.” That’s what sparked that whole thing where everyone was looking romantic and medieval. I love finding that connection. That makes my day—that makes my season when I find that out.

Do you feel like it’s harder or easier today to communicate that to your customer? I feel like with the pressures to make Instagrammable moments, it’s become very hard to get people excited about the history of fashion.

There are so many levels in what I do. Somebody like Tim [Blanks] will get the really intricate things, but then the obvious things will be the things that people talk about the most. I always try to bring it all back, make it current, and tie it in to something that’s happening in our pop culture, like the Viking thing. It’s really true—I was watching [the History channel TV series] and I got that idea. It wasn’t an intellectual idea, but that’s really how it happened. I think that you have to put it on different levels.

Is there one specific era or muse you feel like is the most Anna Sui?

My biggest idols are Anita Pallenberg and Keith Richards. So at the end of the day, it’s always like: Is there something that Anita would wear? Is there something that Keith would wear? Is it cool enough for them? And then I usually send Anita an image and say, “This is the outfit that I did for you.”Read more here:marieaustralia.com | www.marieaustralia.com/evening-dresses
onlylovepoetry Jul 2016
"unconditional love dinner-dance"

so names the advert for an evening of a
big shot, posh charitable event,
which the glossy Gatsby East Egg magazine implies,
if you fail to attend said soirée, you nobody, will have no way to claim truly understanding the composition of an
unconditional love dinner dance

laugh internally, swirling,
riffing on eat love pray,
this ditty is what I instantaneously say...

what do these swells,
with their self-appointed importance,
know to probe/defame my claim,
to this poem's title?

these are the factors,
the stepping stones from
my minute to the minute next

love

am I not oathed, bound
unconditionally
by my very own name,
which life bestowed upon me at birth,
to compose of this love
in every etching lineage, signed verse kissed upon our faces,
then, as well, oh so well, so swell,
to kiss our babies
whose smooth skin has no familiarity with
time and all my love
all my love,
uncritically makes no distinction

dinner

she loves me through the silence
of my oohing and ahhing,
these sounds,
escaping willingly,
unconditionally,
as delight unconstrained at the delicate deliciousness her love
has implanted in the dishes she preps,
with which she
preserves us

dance

she love to dine upon
her laughter at
my akimbo'd imitation of
'so idiot, you think you can dance'
hip hop
begging me between crinkling boisterous hardy laughter,
please, not to hurt myself

she, a Martha Graham educated,
Argentine Tango ballet mistress,
a life long dancer whose genes forbid her
to pass by the sound of music
without breaking out, breaking into dance,
in perfect synchronicity
to whatever the composer calls upon her,
to present the music, to inform us,
in body graphic form,
unconditionally
what they intended us to
see within and between each note

I need no tuxedo,
no fancy dress,
no permissions to comprehend
the meaning, the actuality,
the unconditionally of

unconditional love dinner dance


I dine and dance with love daily,
and yes, to be very sure,
unconditionally
for is there any other kind?
Nat Lipstadt Sep 2013
My poetry is an acquired taste,
So come, dear one,
Place your tongue in my mouth.
Pace yourself, there is so much,
Spoke and unwritten,
That fruitions only when spit-shared.

Flick your tongue-tip to mine,
Sealing bond, the salt caramel of my rhymes,
The iambic meter of my tamarind prose,
The buds, flowering, poems forming,
Watered by the admixture of joint, minted saliva.

My poetry, so very complicated,
Hints of currants and ash,
Soil volcanic, basaltic vowels, oh's and eyes,
Cursed verses that commence with I,
Nonetheless, despite soil inhospitable rued,
Compositions flourish, born wetland soluble.

Yours, for the taking,
Yours, for the tasting.

You place your fingers on my waist,
My body of work to contemplate,
My ditties, you spit out,
You want courses, not appetizers,
You want truths, not fluff, lies, menu tastings.

Columbus and Magellan, thy fingers named,
Trace the curvature of my ***,
With tip and tipsy stroked caresses,
You laugh with the pleasure of all the sssssss's.
Hissing all the day your satisfaction,
Capturing my writs, by your tongue's duress,
Recipient-thief of my literary largesse.

I am dressed all in white,
Stripped bare to my native coloring,
Except for two brown nippled spots, you lick,
Imbibing milky thoughts  from fountain-heads *****,
Savoring, relishing, stanzas that praise love's flavor.

With every line, every word-painting accessioned,
You make my soft parts hard,
My hard parts soft, but my liquidity,
My tears, they, that, you drink straight,
Licking, liking, and oohing and ahhing,
You tongue curled, upside down arching,
The storage point of your seduced gatherings.

To drain me full, your incisors cut,
Straight lines, entry points for your *******,
Taking, draining, leaving nothing,
Not even one aleph or bet escaping.

When you acquired my poetry, my verbosity,
Pillaging soul's hiding place, took and *****,
Your acquired the best, breaking my nape,
Imprisoned on and by my island's seascape,
Blanched and pained, a blank tape,
I am tasteless, witless, mockingly, tongue-tied.
Written tonite while driving upon moonlight country roads, departing one island, crossing another,
only to ferry to a third. As I was driving, unable to retain all, but wine and Bach's Brandenburg, withdrew new lines, before I broke, surrendering to a dreamless sleep
Nat Lipstadt Nov 2014
prefer celery to carrots
light scrunch over an orange hard crack,
straw red over berries bluest,
coffee over tea,
skies white clouded
over
all clear, unadulterated uni-tone,
blondes, brunettes, redheads,
even pink or blue haired,
well, ain't going there
(wink wink,
too smart for that...)

but that's just me

colors viral virulent  over manhattan grey~black,
a good Pinot over a glass of Jack,
beach and sea undefined
over lake delimited, outlined bounded,
ocean caught fresh over farm raised,
city slick over country sweet,
striped bass over monk,
tuna bests salmon,
but both miso coated please...

Italian Indian Ethiopian
Sushi and occasionally Chinese,
all grand,
but my kosher deli and dogs, pickles,
yellow mustard ball parked,
tops them all
especially when serving
all-you-can-eat
over tasting portions...

but that's just me

right over left,
naked better than ****,
polite over rude,
Rembrandt tops Vermeer,
but his light nonethess,
extra over ordinarie...

Swiss over white American,
Gruyere beats goat cheese,
citrus tops apples,
sweet melon my
secret passion,
paprika and oregano,
never ever cilantro,
milk over OJ,
especially, grade A
milk of human kindness,
all flavors

love my poems centered,
(except for this one)
with no sugar added,
but a lot of cream and sweat,
both a necessity, not a luxury,
prefer mesmerizing,
crafting hard, laboring,
me writing, you imbibing,
leaving you oohing and loving
me
because of the appreciation built in
over
ditties that are semisweet
sugar nadas that populate the
easy come easy go away
poem of the day

but that's just me

like myself hard
cause when I melt,
to a child's grin shyest,
laughter silly me provoking
it is ever so better so...
tears, any kind, don't mind
laughing and sorrowing pouring,
let genuine be my only test
speed limit barrier unlimited

sorta saved a street crossing
phone-occupied-woman yesterday,
put my arm across her body
fast hard, unasked
so she wasn't
bicycle crashed,
both looks well received,
the *** and the gratitude,
but latter over former,
if I had to choose,
but I dont

but that's just me

Joanie M. over Judy C.,
Amy over Adele,
Eva Cassidy over all...
Zombies over Beatles,
Blunt over Taylor,
Rhyming Simon over Billy Joel,
no typos over flaring,
glaring no caring...

your poetry over mine,
cause it amazes,
cause mine,
just old familiar crazies,
just runaround Sues from yester pester days,
transcribed for a someday later
future grimacing laugh of
good god did I write that!

but that's just me

wrote quite the many
literary escapades
this morning,
like the yore,
good old days,
when every glance,
remark passing
made me run
to tablet them
in perpetuity ASAP

placed them before you
scattered thither and dither,
like all that jazz notes
running hands over planes geometric,
most just average,
but all there in hopes
you would love me better

but that's just me

sneaking inside you with
a wink, a tink-ering whimsy,
a stupid smile, a wicked sinning
humongous grinning
with a belly laughing,
havoc raising, me crazing,

*but that's just me
11-1-14
thinking I like celery better than carrots, and the rest you just read...
Shadow Paradox Feb 2015
~
I requested peace

But instead became fabric
Bought from a store of madness
Those leathery hands touched the silk of my inner
Feeling the quality of my chaos.

I lay
Waiting

I am bought
Spread across a table
The scissors
Those scissors
Cut through me
Measuring me like haunted opinions.

I'm stuck with pins
Slicked with sweat from my creators fingers

Why?

Why are you doing this to me?
I want to cry
But I am nothing but fabric
Sewed into what others want me to be

To do

To see

I am all sewed up and priced up
I am bought again
Although I am something different
My new owner puts me on
Oohing and ahhing
I've heard the phrase

“Wear the clothes and don’t let the clothes wear you.”

I'm going to wear this human today

The fabric becomes skin
Because my ambition is stronger now
The details and lines are my veins
Those flowery designs....
That’s part of my heart
I am human art formed by earth
I refuse to be on anybody’s cutting table
Instead I am a canvas

My skin
My mind
My heart
My soul

…Is the very ink of creativity
The very fabric of who I am
No scissors and needle will affect me

I am liquid

The threaded revelation that manipulates form
I am a new world within
A fabric of understanding, learning and loving

I will not let those designs of my life fade
Like ancient cloth
I will constantly be refreshed
Like seasonal rain on grass and flowers

I will forever grow and shine
Fighting negative emotions
Serendipity May 30
Dashing, charming,
full of foolery,
She unwinds with legs of poison
sitting still on top the table,
seeping deep into my mind.

The image stains the flesh
and how I wish I could undress
the bottle of her sickly cyanide.

But taste testing pills and potions
made to drowse and **** the roses
are not nearly as sweet as implied.

So I admire from afar
oohing and awing at the bar
staring at the glass
and not taking a bite.
jeffrey robin Apr 2015
()
/ ( ( \
/ \

••

Behold !

The massive throbbing *****

Hanging from the heavens

That are seen thru the depths

Reverberating in blue Eyes !

//

Above the mighty Healing Hands

Whose touch is Purest Ecstacy

Upon Golden *******

of subtlest Nurturing Power

to feed the World

//

And when the mighty *****

comes into the Sacred Entering Place

and there is the

Pump Pump Pump

and the

Bump Bump  Bump

and we grind away

With an oohing and an aahing

Til we are satiated and spent

And there is but one thing left

To make it all complete

//

To turn to another person at the party
And say

WON'T YA PASS ME THE WHISKEY BOTTLE

PLEASE ?
The Fire Burns Sep 2016
Fourth of July

Its Fourth of July, doesn't matter what year,
Friends  heading over with coolers of beer.
Wife’s in the kitchen makes guacamole,
One look at her you think holy moly

God dang she’s hot; it’s just not fair,
My buddy walks up unfolds a lawn chair.
He sits down, and cracks a beer,
Hands me one, I said glad you're here.

His wife walks up, dessert in hand,
Radios playing, hey what’s that band.
He doesn't know, and it doesn't matter,
I crank it up, the wife hands me a platter.

It’s filled with chicken and shrimp with dill,
I look over charcoal's ready to grill.
Look down at the lake, kids are all swimming,
Splashing and smiling and jumping and grinning.

Washer pit is set up, ready to toss,
More friends arrive; I say what’s up hoss.
I look around, down the cove,
Neighbors getting ready for, a fireworks show.

His wife’s bikini, man it clashes,
Mix match top and bottom, but she's hot as new ashes
We’ll sit out, under the stars,
Oohing and ahhing over flashes and sparks.

When fireworks are over, we'll grab a drink,
Ice Cream and cobbler and try to think.
How this could get any better?
Friends wife walks up, I’m glad I met her.

She says its late, thanks for having them,
But she has a date, with my friend,
And when they get home,
It’s going to be their own, fireworks show.
I wrote this as a summer answer to Merry Christmas from the family by Robert Earl Keen, But this is pretty much how the fourth goes down at my place.
Hunger pangs fuel mine poetic juices,
yours truly moost best be famished
resembling lovely bag of bones
beyond irreparable damage
wrought courtesy anorexia nervosa
nevertheless literary masterpieces
one written quick succession after another
profusely gushes forth

unstoppable tsunami surges rhythmically
metaphorically allowing,
enabling, and providing
voluminous water logged noggin
able, ready and willing
to burst infinite outpouring
at Möbius strip cerebral seams.

Hyperbole employed
regarding above attestation
regarding conducive ******
state to whip out
acceptable, passable and
reasonable rhyming creation

to experience and
witness poetic emancipation,
whereby until the end
of time modest glorification
endowed upon me who
imbues vast majority inspiration

of contemporaries, plus unborn peoples...
imagine renowned said
author wannabe just for kicks
(sinks false teeth
into verboten rotten apple -
oohing and aahing yum zuck)

subsequently vicious rumor affecting
millions future generations
debauched learned primates
inescapably slide into behavioral mosh pit
analogous to eventual
senescent cellular detritus

sloughed off vis a vis keratinization
anyway figuratively swinging around
deftly cycling back thru
imaginary infinite jesting loop
unlikely neither chance fame nor fortune
promises me financial materialization,

nope, not even until hell freezes over,
nor when grim reaper feasts upon
**** sapiens obliteration
witnessing every flora and fauna
molecular repurposing quantification
simulates signifying universal recycling

umpteenth big bang occurrence
erasing all cosmic consciousness
nary trace left behind
encompassing collective satisfaction
since genesis wrought life forms

wherein primitive organisms
begot reproduction fast forward bajillion years
madding crowd punctuated
planet Earth avast urbanization
essentially branding oblate spheroid
viz totally tubular vinyl city westernization.
Volition, orientation familiarization aahing
and oohing within restrictive paradigm molding
inviolable honorable gentility -
flagrantly, desirously, clearly boyz abandoning
willfully skirting, panting (heavily)
forfeiting abominably, (no Joe King) abiding

chomping at bit, damning delineated, or obscure
parameters, between one acceding
Earthlinked selfish living
psychosexual pining human bing,
and another ardently avowedly ambitious
altruistic agent provocateur (lol)

at first blush hinting Moulin Rouge adulation
under dim (witted) lighting accenting
individual randy salient
traits savoring tête-à-tête
tasty hors d'oeuvres accentuating
nuances highlighting flirtatious countenance

initially unconditionally stubbornly accepting
dire hormonal straits
as prickly fledgling acquaintanceship
quivers, negotiates, kickstarts abolishing
inchoate biochemical protracted coupling
conveniently interpreting accessing

breeching, catapulting Dickensian estuary,
non verbal communication nsync abridging
painstakingly erecting complex edifice
suavely, urbanely, wittily accessorising
tried and truevalue tricks acclaiming
debonair heroic manliness princely

qualities dutifully dominate directing
demure damsel in distress absconding
convincing, foreplaying, jimmying,
rollicking readily acclimatizing
challenges ****** up gracefully parlaying
most savvy serious similarly sophisticated

totally tubular testosterone tactics
versatile repartee accomplishing
dynamics cultivating atavistic romantic ballet
on duh poe whit tick abutting
metaphorical foot accoutering

trappings adorned since mythological
Adam and Eve accrediting
latter, sans virile unavoidable temptation
savoir faire verboten fruit, accelerating
action whereby unsuspecting, slithering,
lurking serpent teen accounting
rattle unheard by apse cent church fathers

subsequently excoriating, condemning, accusing,
nonetheless indomitable transcendence achieving
pinnacle of prostrate poignancy
inexpressible ecstasy acquiescing
nonpareil acquisition adulation activating
ascendence assaying administering
amorousness activating. aching.
sandra wyllie Aug 2019
You grow-up with people
oohing and ahhing over you. And end
up with people leaving you
alone. That’s what it’s like in this

desolate home. Propped up
in chairs and beds in front of television
sets. Each face that I pass has a blank
expression. It’s as if they’re all waiting

around to die. They don’t have the
desire to even cry. Only apathetic looks
on their faces, as if they accepted what someone
has chosen for them. Someone else chooses

when they eat, what they eat, when they
bathe, what they wear – every little detail
just as if they were an infant again. Who knows
the lives that each one of them have lived. Who knows

the choices each one of them made before
they were waiting as prisoners to enter
their graves. Not one smile on anyone. Not one
sound of laughter or excitement.  They all look

like holocaust victims, sitting and
waiting for the end. Maybe if they’re lucky
someone visits them from the outside for a
short time. But it’s only a sad reminder

that there’s life outside these doors. It’s only
a bitter reminder that they no longer have
what they had before – their independence
their freedom. Is there any kind of life without that?

— The End —