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Jun 20, 2026
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Cogitor
As a Descartes suggestion,
The years move simply forward.
An illusion daily dies
And rockets on the sky,
Its successor evidential truth.
Two and two is four,
Equlateral mates equidistant,
Kinships and betrayals are occurences
As sensible as elements.
Whimsy on the mouth of
Change is a practiced wrinkle,
The way a river's bend is cut,
Carved closer to the core come Spring.
She is whispered-yelling in varnished eyes;
A lacquered tear zigs from the
Duct in storm-front winds,
Mopped by fingers in macrame.
These are the things that happen to you.
Eternal spirit is evidenced through concept:
I think, so I am.
Nexus is built.
God tipped over a glass.
Away it goes,
Originating where points converge,
Saturating infinite points,
A forgotten memory of treated playground scrapes.
Thus, precision advances,
One chiseled notch.
The stylized hand of disenchantment
Sustains its forward march.
There is no portrait,
Poem, story, song,
That has not been
Scorned by a know-it-all on cushions;
Leaned up in
Leather to a street lamp,
Dragging from a Camel;
Behind thick glasses
In a class on literary masters.
The back door mopes in shadows,
Like a secret of the mind,
Mentioned late,
When a person tries to rest.
It's lonely here with all these people.
— d-rayl-d, Jun 20, 2026
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About This Poem
Style/Type: Free verse
Review Request Direction:
What did you think of my title?
How was my language use?
What did you think of the rhythm or pattern or pacing?
How does this theme appeal to you?
How was the beginning/ending of the poem?
Is the internal logic consistent?
Review Request Intensity: I appreciate moderate constructive criticism
Editing Stage: Polished draft
Critiques
Lavender
2 weeks 5 days ago
Cogitor
Perfect title...without realizing it, the poem sent my mind journeying. I am lost in my own thoughts. A mesmerizing blend of logic and imagery.
Thank you!
Lavender
d-rayl-d
2 weeks 4 days ago
Thank you Lavender! I doubt…
Thank you Lavender!
I doubt if I can think of any better compliment than for someone to say that something I've written has put them lost in thought. More than any single line or stanza, to conjure something in people is the highest thing I can ever hope to do I think. You have your own eloquence, which makes it all the more satisfying.
Thank you so much! I'll consider this a final draft, maybe the only one I have.
David
Geezer
2 weeks 5 days ago
I really...
appreciated the thoughts of logic first thing this morning, when my thoughts are usually scrambled. But then... I noticed that "She" was yelling in varnished eyes. I have the feeling that the eyes themselves are varnished to make them glossy. The eyes are probably in a sculpture or a painting, which means that the personage is a really important figure. [ Imagine being drawn to that particular line in all of this well thought out log of informational logic]?
Anyway, I did like this; it certainly piqued my interest. I hope that you find the kinship you need here.
Welcome to Neo. ~ Geezer
d-rayl-d
2 weeks 4 days ago
Hi Geezer,I'm already coming…
Hi Geezer,
I'm already coming to appreciate you as something of a sensai. The fact that I sense you tell it like you see it, I'm honored that you saw this piece as logical. Some of my work, like my first submission, is one and done consciousness. Cogitor is one that was a week in the making, with several revisions since.
The stanza that you fixed on has always felt out of place in relation to everything else. It's a creative aside that falls within the piece's realm I feel, my own creative license to my work to personify it with a character. I didn't know how it would be received here. I think that many characters in writing channel the writer, and I leave those open to interpretation. They belong to a reader as much as they do to me, and my own interpretation of what it means is no more valid than a reader's. The imagery of "She" that you propose is so much more vivid than I imagined in writing her, that your own interpretation puts an image for me in my head that will forever alter my own reading of this piece from now on, and it adds a whole new dimension to it that wasn't there before.
I haven't found a member of this site so far that doesn't enhance the human experience for me. I think I'll stick around.
David
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