Need anything? Email info@theprose.com! 

Refer a non-Prose. writer to join Prose. Black Pill, email proof and we will send each of you $10!

PostsChallengesPortalsAuthorsBooks
Sign Up
Log In
Posts
Challenges
Portals
Authors
Books
beta
Sign Up
Log In
Search
Follow
MaTing
Born in the South.
4 Posts • 5 Followers • 3 Following
Posts
Likes
Challenges
Books
Challenge
Dum spiro spero.
While I breathe, I hope. Prose or poetry.
MaTing

Sleazy

There is somehing sleazy about hope. Creeping up inside in spite of all attempts to deaden the neves. Like a phantom limb. An unquenchable thist. Hope is waiting on an answer that has yet to be imagined. It is freedom in belief of something better. An arangement one makes on a gamble. Putting everything on the line again and again. Hope is waking up to a new day and smiling. Again and again. Like a nervous tic, it reappears when you least expect it. Something you can't ignore and are sure to never forget.

MaTing

All I Can Think About

All I can think about,

Is the way parents often comfort their children at the beginning of long trips.

At the precipice of new and unknown experiences

As they stand facing a daunting and unfamiliar task.

And the parent murmurs platitudes and reassurances:

It will be ok.

Everything is going to be fine.

I am here with you.

It is scary now, but we must.

You must.

All I can think about,

Is when my father first taught my brother and I how to swim.

Although small and infinitely optimistic,

even we, as children, could suffer the fear of unknown.

Unable to fully comprehend the realities of drowning or floating,

But sensing the fine line between here and there; now and soon; alive or dead.

Spurred forward only by our father's adamant reassurance that:

The water was fun and refreshing,

That something new could be exciting, could bring opportunity rather than despair.

That forging into the unknown was necessary for us.

All I can think about,

Are parents whispering hot reassurances into dusty, sweaty little ears.

Are young children, bleary eyed and weary from marching across and into something new

Cradled in the arms of

Holding the hands of

Following in the footsteps of

Those who have placed faith in the unknown.

All I can think about,

Are small minds facing large and insurmountable realities.

Like:

It will not be ok.

Everything is not fine.

I am not there with you.

It is scary now that we have.

For the first time, comprehending the reality of drowning.

Challenge
Take a well-known cliche and make it yours (micro poems only)
MaTing

Opposites Attract

We pulled at each other

like magnets.

North & South

at war,

casting powerful blows.

A split lip, a black eye -

disharges of a static imbalance.

Opposites detract, too.

Challenge
Create your own version of Mad Hatter, let me know what your madness looks like~
MaTing

A hot, hot thought in a fever pitch brain

A hot, hot thought from a fever pitch brain squeezes out like steaming sh-t and plops -- splat -- in the center of polite dinner conversation. Different strains and flows of discussion ebb to a stop, cutlery clinks in the remaining silence. There are murmurs and darted glances, awkward throat clearing while someone tries to figure out what to say next. You look at me from across the table apprehensive yet battle ready. I imagine I return your gaze with wide-eyed terror and disbelief.

I am having an episode in the middle of your fancy corporate dinner party

and,

My brain is a frying pan sizzling each wild thought into choatic perfection.

I need to cool down.

I try to take a sip of wine, but my hands won't stop shaking.

Droplets of red bloom on the immaculate white table cloth.

The patches expand as the color seeps into the fabric, eating up all the purity it touches.

These stains can never be washed out.

The lady to my left asks, "What did you say?".

What I just said is of no consequence now -

the thought burned into oblivion as it escaped my lips;

what's really important is that I tell her the world tilted off its axis 2.4 billion years ago and we are all only the remnants of her remaining dreams.

I am tilted off my axis and I wish I were dreaming.

I am sure the man to my right needs to know we are all demons; that God created Earth as a haven for the damned who still long for heaven.

I am a terrible person and I will never find peace.

I look into your eyes and feel a desperate desire to reassure you, to inform you that every person you meet is simply a reincarnation of one of your past lives: the mailman, my mother, your boss. You were once them all, and they have returned to you.

I wish I could control everyone, every interaction, and every situation.

I wish I could control myself.

Instead, I mumble "excuse me," and stumble in the direction of the bathroom.

The conversation volume rises like wave behind me and I am overtaken.

I am 21 years or older.