No Takebacks

Thanks, Susuan.

And what a fabulous quote.

From:

scifishipper.livejournal.com

This reminds me of Kara (and everyone else) finding a decimated Earth. I always got the sense that even though she was horrified by finding her body, she knew there was some answer to be found, not that she had just disappeared, lost time, and re-appeared, but that something had changed, irrevocably.

some things must change everything,
sometimes there is no way back.

And for our pilots, after this, there was no way back.

It's a lovely poem. *hugs*

From:

No, there really wasn't any way back for them, was there?

Thanks for the thinky.

From:

So beautiful! A poem... Let's see...

Awakening
In the quiet of the night cycle,
Lying in her rack, alone,
It all makes a simple kind of sense,
She and he.

There is no fear,
Just his face when she closes her eyes,
And an overwhelming longing,
To touch, to be caressed, to mark him as hers.

If only she could hold on,
Bottle the feeling and drink deep of it,
When the actual presence of him breaks the spell,
And her head betrays her heart in panic.

They seem destined, she thinks bitterly,
To dance this dance,
To waste what time they have, circling,
Never on the same page at the same time.

She could go to him,
Crawl into his rack and silence him with her lips,
Go now, while the fear is at bay,
And let the heat of the moment carry them past the doubts.

It has all happened before,
It will all happen again,
And she can't help but wonder,
Will she ever come to terms with what scares her in his eyes?

Absolute trust, so easily broken,
Undying love and devotion, so easily betrayed,
Mistakes made in the day to day,
His heart so dangerously clasped in her fist.

To save him is to sacrifice herself,
Block out the need, the visceral desire,
Push with hands and words and hurtful actions,
Hurt him in small measures and maybe put his heart back in his chest.

She rises, done with thinking,
His rack mere feet away, a constant lure,
And finds him awake,
Unsurprised when she climbs into his rack.

He's been waiting,
Waiting for her to come to terms,
Waiting for the fear to subside, enough,
And the kiss chases away the demons, for now.

From:

Thank you!

And your poem is lovely, too. Poor Lee. He always was waiting, and she never managed to come to him at quite the right time, did she?

From:

Beautiful! It bought tears in my eyes. Oh pilots. They really weren't doomed to go in circles but somehow they just couldn't break the cycle.

From:

That was lovely. Thanks so much for sharing :)

From:

WOW! Very lovely poem!

Hope is the cruelest forgiveness

That was so true for our pilots. They always held on to hope that may just may be one day it will be their turn to be happy.

From:

They always held on to hope that may just may be one day it will be their turn to be happy.

You know, I'd always actually seen them as kind of hopeless (i.e. -- without hope that they could ever work out), but you may be right. They kept coming back to that hope, anyways, even if it wasn't a constant.

From:

If an outsider was watching the show, then they would think the pilots were hopeless. BUT we know them, we've studied them; sadly their time for happiness never came even though they both had more than earned a life of peace and happiness.

From:

Hello ~ I was hoping you all wouldn't mind if I fudged and posted some excerpts from other people's poems? I have written a few verses in my day, but they all tend to be very silly and they also take forever, but I love poetry and I'm always on the look-out for a verse or phrase that strikes me as fitting for a character or storyline. I hope you might enjoy these:

This one sounds like Kara thinking back on her childhood:

The first rose on my rose-tree
Budded, bloomed, and shattered
During sad days when to me
Nothing mattered.
Grief of grief has drained me clean;
Still it seems a pity
No one saw – it must have been
Very pretty.

This one is how I see Lee as a young man, growing up:

The stamina of an old, long-noble race
In the eyebrow’s heavy arches. In blue eyes
The solemn anguish of a child, and – here and there –
Humility; not a fool’s, but feminine,
The look of one who serves.
The mouth quite ordinary, long and straight,
Composed, but not unwilling to speak out when necessary.
The forehead still naïve, most comfortable in shadows,
Looking down.
This as a whole, just hazily foreseen,
Never yet, in any joy or suffering,
Collected for a firm accomplishment.
And yet, as though, from far off, with scattered things,
A serious, true work were being planned.

This one is Lee & Kara being aware of their own subtext:

We talk of taxes, and I call you friend;
Well, such you are – but well enough we know
How thick about us root, how rankly grow
Those subtle weeds no man has need to tend,
That flourish through neglect, and soon must send
Perfume too sweet upon us and overthrow
Our steady senses; how such matters go
We are aware, and how such matters end.

This one is Kara after New Caprica:

I know I have been happiest at your side;
But what is done, is done, and all's to be.
And small the good, to linger dolefully -
Gaily it lived, and gallantly it died.
To you, who never begged me vows or verse,
My gift shall be my absence, while I live;
But after that, my dear, I cannot swear.

And this one is Lee after Maelstrom:

For you there is no song…
Only the shaking
of the voice that meant to sing; the sound of the
strong
voice breaking.
Strange in my hand appears
the pen, and yours broken.
There are ink and tears on the page; only the tears
have spoken.

(Most of those were written by Edna St. Vincent Millay, but #2 was by Rainer Maria Rilke/translated by Stephen Mitchell, and #4 was by Dorothy Parker). Thanks for reading!

From:

Of course, it's okay!

Those are great snippets. Thank you for passing them along.

That 4th one... It's easy to get mad at Kara after New Caprica, but... I ache for her, too. Because how deeply damaged does someone have to be to know the thing they want is right there in their hands and still throw it away? **sniffs and hugs Kara**

From:

Ack, Kara on New Caprica, so frustrating, but yes it just makes you realize how broken she really is inside. I added a few more verses below that reminded me of her in that moment.

And I'm sorry I didn't say so earlier, but I loved your introductory poem; I really admire those who can write their own verses, it doesn't come easily or naturally to most people, including myself. But you have a lovely sense of rhythm, you can hear it in the words as they flow. My favorite phrase is: "her heart mended by close-held pain." That is so Kara - she does seem almost dependent on suffering and self-sabotage, as if her pain is the one aspect of her life she is determined to control.

Thanks so much ~ I've enjoyed all the great creative topics this week!

From:

Thanks! I'm glad you appreciate it.

From:

These are great! Thanks for sharing.

From:

cosetteferaud.livejournal.com

That’s a beautiful poem, Jen. I am totally biased, I know, but this poem screams Kara to me, it reminds me the way she tries to reach for hope, happiness... love? over and over, despite her deep-rooted belief that her love is poisonous. Maybe this half-remembered thing that makes her whole is the night she spent with Lee on New Caprica, that only time she allowed herself some happiness...

Hope is the cruelest forgiveness,
some things must change everything,
sometimes there is no way back.

Wow. And this made me think of Kara's choice to leave Lee and marry Anders. It changed everything between them and, maybe, it was their point of no return. But I love that despite all the pain they inflicted upon each other and the mess they made of things, pilots always were hopeful, in a way, they could never let go and kept on trying.

From:

they could never let go and kept on trying.

This is very true. No matter what happened, they could never just walk away.

From:

I promise I will stop after this, but poems are such great windows into the emotions that characters would never actually express, and I've come across a few that made me understand Kara better, I think.

New Caprica, version one: she's scared by how far he has seen inside her (and has a very bleak image of her own inner life):

This door you might not open, and you did;
So enter now, and see for what slight thing
You are betrayed ... Here is no treasure hid,
But only what you see. Look yet again –
An empty room, cobwebbed and comfortless.
Yet this alone out of my life I kept
Unto myself, lest any know me quite;
And you did so profane me when you crept
Unto the threshold of this room to-night
That I must never more behold your face.
This now is yours. I seek another place.

And New Caprica, version two: the aftermath, when she begins to realize that even though he's gone there's really no getting away from each other emotionally, and has to deal with the joy and grief that comes with knowing that:

Go from me. Yet I feel that I shall stand
Henceforward in thy shadow. Nevermore
Alone upon the threshold of my door
Of individual life, I shall command
The uses of my soul, nor lift my hand
Serenely in the sunshine as before,
Without the sense of that which I forbore –
Thy touch upon the palm. The widest land
Doom takes to part us, leaves thy heart in mine
With pulses that beat double. What I do
And what I dream include thee, as the wine
Must taste of its own grapes. And when I sue
God for myself, He hears that name of thine,
And sees within my eyes the tears of two.

(The first author is Edna St Vincent Millay again, the second is Elizabeth Barrett Browning). Oh, the angst! :)

From:

poems are such great windows into the emotions that characters would never actually express

They really are. When they're well-written, they can speak to us on a visceral level that the heart understands even when the head doesn't quite follow.

I really love that Elizabeth Barrett Browning poem. That's... fabulous.

From:

I feel the need to lighten the mood after reading all the wonderful and angsty poetry above. My daughter has been having me read Mother Goose quite a bit lately so I have limericks on the brain. Let me try my hand with piloty ones:

Kara:

There once was a pilot from Caprica
Who would dare the whole 'verse to frak with her
Her true love was Lee
But she pushed him to Dee
Then poofed so he couldn't come after her

Lee:

When you're CAG in the Colonial fleet
And the Cylons won't accept defeat
Loving Starbuck
It kinda does suck
Two spouses, no stomach to cheat

From:

Hee! Fun. I'm not sure we escaped the angst, but they're definitely funnier than the others have been. :)

From:

I quickly realized there was no angstless pilot poetry in me. :)

From:

SO. AWESOME.

Those are perfect! I especially love Kara's, the limmerick form seems to capture her spirit, somehow :)

Thanks so much.

From:

These are great! Kinda start out funny but get angsty a bit later, kinda like our pilots.

From:

Ninjamonkey73 has inspired me - here are a few more pilot limericks:

Kara:

She taught nuggets, and Zak was the worst.
In the cockpit, she thought he was cursed.
But in romance he soared,
with a grin she adored,
so she fell for the wrong brother first.

Lee:

As a kid, his Dad’s absences made
it clear ‘loving’ meant being betrayed.
But he found his own voice,
Tried to make his own choice,
Yet the woman he chose never stayed.

Kara & Lee:

Lee Adama was fun to annoy;
Kara taunted and haunted the boy,
Picking fights every second
Till finally they reckoned
Their combat was truly their joy.

From:

Lee Adama was fun to annoy;
Kara taunted and haunted the boy,
Picking fights every second
Till finally they reckoned
Their combat was truly their joy.

WIN!

From:

Oh pilots! The angst, its their beauty!

From: