I am sitting here pretending to work, and I thought now would be a good time to share stories with one another. What's the best story you know/can come up with. It could be real, could be fiction, could be your story, could somebody elses. Could be poetry, too.

To start, here is a poem I wrote (it's a true story. And DON'T steal it).

Enjoy:

The Day I Caught Hundreds

When some crusty fisherman tells
a “fish tale”
or a story from his lifetime
on the water seeking
that giant northern
or a mythical musky
so immense
it would take Two men to heave
the hulk to shore,
we smile
or nod our heads insincerely.
But please believe my story.
I am young; leave the lies
to those ancient anglers
and their fairy-tale fish.

It is the sort of evening
when the bullfrogs chant
good luck hymns
and the setting sun is like a friend
who has happily stayed till the very end
of the party.
It is the last cast of my day
and I catch a snag in the weeds.
This is not uncommon
on small Minnesotan lakes,
to catch your line on weeds
so thick you need to pull
and tug with care
If you wish to keep your lure.
I reel the line until a dark and massive
something rises in the waters
surrounding my father’s boat.
This is not
a great mass of weeds
and is not
(to my disappointment) a fish of unnatural
shape and size. No,
it is a large net intended
for less than legal purposes,
the property of poachers. I haul
yards of net into the boat
until a white,
spectral face emerges.
It is a half-dead carp with flesh
like birch bark that flakes
in pale strips.
Soon, more fish materialize; a shoal
of a hundred silvery smallmouths,
northerns, and walleyes flail
against the weed wrapped net.
I cut a hole in the rope to let the carp sink
to the dark, dark bottom
to die. The rest
I let follow
and flick their fins to freedom.

~ (My real name)

This edit brought to you by Jerry520

Once upon a time, and then they all died. The End!

-My cousin Emily

One of my favorite writers when I was a kid (and still today, don't tell anywone) is Shell Silverstein. Here is one of my favorites:

Too Many Kids in this Tub

There's too many kids in this tub.
There's too many elbows to scrub.
I just washed a behind
I'm sure was not mine.
There's too many kids in this tub.

'What went up, came down'

Deaf Donald is my favorite Shel Silverstein poem. The text in italics means he's using sign language.

Deaf Donald met Talkie Sue
But I Love You was all he could do.
And Sue said, "Donald I sure do like you."
But I Love You was all he could do.
And Sue asked Donald, "Do you like me too?"
But I Love You was all he could do.
"Good-bye then, Donald, I'm leaving you."
But I Love You was all he could do.
And she left forever and she never knew
That I Love You means I Love You!

Aww, how sad. :(

My favorite Poem/short story, would have to be The Raven by Edgar Allan Poe.

I used the link as it's waaaaaaaay to long to post here.

If you like Shel Silverstein, then you might like Tim Burton's poetry.

I like this poem:

Stick Boy and Match Girl in Love

Stick Boy liked Match Girl,
He liked her a lot.
He liked her cute figure,
he thought she was hot.



But could a flame ever burn
for a match and a stick?
It did quite literally;
he burned up quick.

There's a Tim Burton book called 'The melancholy death of oyster boy: And other stories'. It has some cool short stories and poems in it, if you like him its worth buying.

I always loved that one. Great post.

Another Shell Silverstein

Prayer of a Selfish Child

Now I lay me down to sleep,
I pray the Lord my soul to keep,
And if I die before I wake,
I pray the Lord my toys to break.
So none of the other kids can use 'em....
Amen

Under the spreading chestnut tree
The village blacksmith sat
Amusing himself
By abusing himself
And coming off in his hat
- Henry Wadsworth Longfellow

Mending Wall by Robert Frost. I was going to post Fire and Ice, but I don't think it's appropriate at this time.

Something there is that doesn't love a wall,
That sends the frozen-ground-swell under it,
And spills the upper boulders in the sun,
And makes gaps even two can pass abreast.
The work of hunters is another thing:
I have come after them and made repair
Where they have left not one stone on a stone,
But they would have the rabbit out of hiding,
To please the yelping dogs. The gaps I mean,
No one has seen them made or heard them made,
But at spring mending-time we find them there.
I let my neighbor know beyond the hill;
And on a day we meet to walk the line
And set the wall between us once again.
We keep the wall between us as we go.
To each the boulders that have fallen to each.
And some are loaves and some so nearly balls
We have to use a spell to make them balance:
'Stay where you are until our backs are turned!'
We wear our fingers rough with handling them.
Oh, just another kind of out-door game,
One on a side. It comes to little more:
There where it is we do not need the wall:
He is all pine and I am apple orchard.
My apple trees will never get across
And eat the cones under his pines, I tell him.
He only says, 'Good fences make good neighbors'.
Spring is the mischief in me, and I wonder
If I could put a notion in his head:
'Why do they make good neighbors? Isn't it
Where there are cows?
But here there are no cows.
Before I built a wall I'd ask to know
What I was walling in or walling out,
And to whom I was like to give offence.
Something there is that doesn't love a wall,
That wants it down.' I could say 'Elves' to him,
But it's not elves exactly, and I'd rather
He said it for himself. I see him there
Bringing a stone grasped firmly by the top
In each hand, like an old-stone savage armed.
He moves in darkness as it seems to me~
Not of woods only and the shade of trees.
He will not go behind his father's saying,
And he likes having thought of it so well
He says again, "Good fences make good neighbors."

This is my favorite Frost poem. And it is one of the most relevant poems for our era.

I have THE definitive tome on all limericks. If there is enough interest, I'll post some. But remember, limericks are usually filthy.

We don't have any objections to that. Right, fellow Plimates?

Shell Silverstein, one of my favorites:
Oh, The slithery dee
Crawled out of the sea
It may catch all the others
but it won't catch...

OK I'll post limericks here until you all say not to. I have thousands.

#913
There was a young girl who begat
Three brats named Nat, Pat and Tat
It was fun in the breeding,
But hell in the feeding,
When she found there was no tit for Tat.

OK I have found one of my favorite ones...NOT for the faint of heart!

Dare I continue?