What is my Lit. Daily Pick Project?Every day, I choose one literature deviation that I have recently come across that I found to exceptionally stand out to me. That deviation remains featured on my page for 24 hours in my daily pick folder for any watcher or visitor to see and hopefully view, comment, or fave. At the end of the month, all of the deviations that I chose to feature are then featured in an art news journal together. The purpose of this daily feature is to help lesser known writers on the site get exposure for their well-written work, as well as promoting community spirit.
* I do take suggestions for deviations to feature, as well! If you know of a deviation or writer that you love and want to share, feel free to send me a note entitled "Lit. Daily Pick Suggestion". I'd be happy to read and consider it. Please Note: A deviant may only be featured once a month to make it fair and give others a chance to be featured.
And now, here is my collection of literature picks from this month in order of their date of feature. Be sure to check them out:
July 2013 Lit. Daily Picks SaffronThe scent of cinnamon fades as we walk towards the distance, passing the gardens and the carefuly constructed waterfalls. The night is full of spice and delicate flowers, the air heavy with blossoming scents and pollen that stains our robes.
"Have you brought me to this place to test my mettle, or to present me with a butterfly" I wonder, but we walk on silently into the ever cooler night, away from the lights and towards the edge of the garden, a hedge lit up by candles made of beeswax. At the gate cast from iron you stop, look for your silver key and I hear a click in the lock. The door swings open, not making a sound, and we step outside into the clean air, our heads still spinning from the lingering intoxicating scents.
We sit on the grass for a while, then lay down and turn our eyes to the Sky and her stars. I tell you about Lyra, and Cassiopeia, and of the life of heroes before they became the constellations, and you share with me the apples you brought from the garden, picking t
Air SexYou saw a gray mouse today
in the form of a girl
pickin' her way, skittering through
the trail of alley apples.
On her mannequin’s body
wracked by a smoker's cough,
wrappings of newspaper headlines
held fast with twine.
Ticker tape judders from
the fortune cookie
between her thighs,
but don't stare too long
cause you might see the
ink blot of two profiles.
That is,
if she still gets her periods.
And if she holds still
long enough, her eyes will
show you the mania. But she's
studying you right back.
And the scab-engers of her arms
are more chaos than you can handle,
so don’t be square just standin' there
playin' air sex...
WHACK!
Second star to the rightThere are days where she
forgets how to fly;
wings all tangled up in
misguided heartstrings.
"There is nothing wrong with me,"
she insists,
"Nothing at all.
I just can't seem to
grow up."
The clock strikes
midnight -
she's nothing but
misled faith,
broken trust,
and withering pixie dust.
Letter to a Dead GirlI don’t know if I have the words that I want to say
Sometimes, we need to face our fears and say what needs to be said
Too often I have suffered by not telling you how I feel
I won’t allow that to happen this time
Losing you before I could say my fill forever haunts me
Love seemed to be the hardest word for me to say
Love, that funny little word that says so little yet so much
Once upon a time, isn’t that how the story goes?
Vaccines could not be used against such a powerful disease
Each time it infects your heart, it gets broken
You never knew how much you meant to me
Only now I never will have to chance to say it
Under my feet you lay, beyond human hearing
I am not summer personifiedDo not compare me to a summers day,
I'm an autumn baby, with fallen leaves,
Printed in gold and amber across my skin,
With the deepest red sunset lips,
Offset by snowy skin.
I am the crisp breath of wind,
On oxygen starved lungs.
Forget the call of the heat,
And fall into my mist embrace.
Under YouUnder You:
Beneath the surface of the water,
There is silence, peace and darkness.
Blessed silence.
To mute the mouths of men,
To drown the voice of the world.
Surrounded by ignorance,
I choose not to hear your whispers.
Blessed peace.
Without death or pain,
Without birth and life;
Surrounded by denial,
I reject this sense of self.
Blessed darkness.
Without colour or light,
Denying all that is around me;
Surrounded by emptiness,
I am blind within this cage.
Muted, ignorant and blind,
I sleep beneath the surface of the lake.
Eternally drenched, eternally drowned,
I am the you beneath the surface.
-Chen Yuan Wen, 8th July 2013
ShipwreckSometimes you drain me,<da:thumb id="383859899"/><da:thumb id="384038772"/>
just by saying I’m drained.
I know I’m drained from your kisses,
but I know there’s some of me left.
I miss your green lighthouses,
lighting the sea as we kiss.
I used to feel protected
now I’m lost and I can’t see.
For you have turned off your lights,
and now I can’t find my way.
I swore it was your heart
that would always keep me safe.
I know how to swim,
but in these seas I’ll sure drown.
I never learned how to deal
with waves of arrogance this tall.
A White CrayonI'm like a white crayon in a box of crayons …
Sitting there in my corner quietly , watching all the other colors being selected and used ,each one of them is taking its role in coloring a pretty drawing , While I remain sharp and clean ,unused .
But I try my best to hold this thin thread of hope . A hope that ,one day ,a skillful artist will come and he'll know my value ,my worth ,my beauty .
To him ,I'll be the most useful color ,the crayon that he can't live without . And together ,we shall draw the most beautiful paintings .
I'll keep this hope as much as I can ,wishing that the box won't be thrown away before that artist come .
The music is gone.I remember emotion<da:thumb id="384973954"/>
Like the deaf recall a tune.
I still have the notion,
But even that will be gone soon.
The songs are muffled at first,
But the notes remain.
I can still be immersed
In musical joy and pain.
But like a copy of a copy of a copy,
Notes are lost and misplaced,
The whole thing gets sloppy,
A masterpiece defaced.
Finally, the end of the blaze
The last notes die in a frost
Leaving the profound malaise
That something beautiful was lost.
Dead is the feeling I once had.
Left in a mute concert hall,
I wonder how it can hurt so bad,
To feel nothing at all.
lolita and her galaxy boy(she)and (he)
Lie in the grass
It’s December and
it’s too cold to do anything but stargaze
(he) names a star after (her)
In the blackwashed sky
As (they) swim in space
In the cracks of the black holes
Into millenniums and alternative universes
And (they) sink
Into
The hymns of the stardust
Until the sun rises
And winter falls into spring
And the chlorine molecules decompose back into simple astrology
Eden's AngelI knew the old stories. The first man and woman had disobeyed, and so they had been driven out of paradise. An angel had been placed in paradise to guard the tree.
I never heard any stories saying he left the garden.
I went to find the tree, to see if it really was worth getting kicked out of paradise. I’d seen the Fountain of Youth, Atlantis, and the Holy Grail. This was the next big thing. It was the edge of the Earth and beyond. It was further than Davy Jones’ Locker. It was paradise.
Some people told me the Holy Grail and the Fountain of Youth were the same thing. If you drank from the Holy Grail, you wouldn’t die. If you drank from the Fountain of Youth, you wouldn’t die. But I’ve seen them before. The Holy Grail is an ugly brown wooden cup. The Fountain of Youth isn’t more than a pool of stale water in the middle of a cave in South America. Atlantis was less of a disappointment, but it wanted to remain hidden. So I ventured out for the Garden o
Seaside DaysThere are rivers that surge and flow
miles below this comatose surface.
For now the waves break sluggishly
while children splash and play
in shallows where wavelets
stroke and tickle their toes.
Offshore the breeze has more energy.
Agile wind surfers capture the promise
of motion in their bellying sails.
A summer afternoon.
The angry spirits dream of mayhem,
In darker seasons they will ride
the ferocity of storms.
For she is the girl with the wildflower heart beatCapsizing oceans breaking over her red queen smile
Know the answers to where secret gardens grow
Behind flaming thorns and rusting knights
Lie dormant stars waiting to split open and spew over her ribs
In order to make constellations out of her lion breaths
Palms scratching the skies to find the sun
Behind the fluorescent sounds of steel birds and empty raindrops
She colors in her retinas to rid the world of shades of grey
She blooms like wildflowers aching for scorched storms
She is summer veins and dandelion heartstrings
Whispering stories to the wolves at her door
Because fairy tales are just myths and there’s rarely a happy ending
But she spins gold from words and sets them off to sea
Where mermaids and sirens cradle the shoreline
Of her eyes
Wisps of YouWisps of you come rolling onto my mind
Like the fog or mist from the ocean upon a beach
As the lighthouse turns I strain to see
The ship that our souls will meet
And entwine to journey on this life
But, alas, I know the truth
The ocean shall separate us
I'm a princess
You're a merman
And we will never truly meet
This is only, but a dream
My love, you are gone
As the tide follows gravity
I must keep to the lighthouse
Salty tears turn to rivers
The sorrow and hope they carry
Lost to the ocean
Of moonlight and memories.He stared at the running stream for what seemed for hours. The moon light was glistening reflections in it, and the sound was soothing. Once and a while, he would glance at the small human resting in his arms, just to make sure she was still breathing. It was ridiculous to think such way, but she was so still, it was hard to tell.
She wasn't shaking, which meant he was radiating enough warmth for her to feel comfortable. Good.
He moved a strand of the hair from her face, being careful with his claws to not accidently pierce her soft flesh. Every time he touched her he had to be extremely careful, even if it meant only holding her in his arms. One wrong move and he could have accidently snapped her in half. It was ridiculous how delicate humans were.
Once the hair was moved from her face, he could get a better look at her. She was sound asleep, as he expected.
He sighed, stroking her hair gently so she wouldn’t wake up. It was hard to believe that this was the same human who attem
Fall in love with a girl who writes.Fall in love with a girl who reads
and writes, because
she will remember the day that
your eyes fell in love with
her words.
She will remember what you
wore on the night of
your first date, and
the comment that you
made about the child
six tables across from
you.
She will smile at you, and tell
you that your eyes are a
mixture of water and
fresh cut grass;
two beautiful hues of
her favorite colors.
She will blush and touch
her knuckles to her
chin as she rests
her eyes on your
smile.
Fall in love with a girl who writes
because she will hold all of
the happiness that you
could ever want;
she is all you would ever
need.
jealousy She was a natural born smoker. Grey poison inserted itself; weaving thin threads of death into and around her bronchial tubes. The vituperation her lungs faced daily always made a small smile bubble up to the surface; she was proud of her pulmonary alveoli working within her sore lungs.
He was not a smoker. That was what made their relationship so entirely intriguing. His lips had never come in contact with a paper filter until they met hers. Her cigarette stained hands wove into his hair and brought along death. Which, of course, was the best way to start it; at the roots where no one would notice, until it slowly slipped through to the blood stream.
They worked together just like the inner workings of the lungs she worked so hard to kill. He attempted to bring her health, breathe into her the life he wanted her to live; just as the alveolar ducts exchange oxygen for carbon dioxide for air to breathe. He desperately wished for her to drop
The Wonders of Modern TrainsThe train was clacking down the rails, the smoke thick in the early afternoon air as it puffed out of the front. The smell stung my nostrils. Adjusting my glasses, I looked out the window close to my left out onto the vast plain that was unfolding as the train kept speeding west. A few wistful clouds were limping along in the sky. Mostly flat with few trees, the great steppe of the New World was beautiful for how barren it seemed. Any life a man could choose was right here. Whatever problems he may have faced before, here in the open wilderness with only God and the sky to watch over him a man could find peace.
A small sound came from my right and, turning my head, I noticed a young woman take a seat close to me. Gloved hands, a fine lace dress and not a sign of dirt on here made my rather patchwork suit and tie seem all the more proletarian. I caught a glimpse of her face in the corner of my eye as I moved slightly to give her more room. She was beautiful. Short brunette hair, soft li
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Pill Bottle Quote"Narcotic bottles<da:thumb id="388459444"/>
needle'd to the window.
I see me, sinking
in pain isles
through every anxious
vein drop.
Dosed out, stretched out
inside 1 wall of
infinite capsules.
There I sleep -
drinking down
a spiral
of depression
over emotional
nitroglycerin
and eventually
I'll turn numb."
Fire HaikuThe wick holds the flame
But fire's heart can't touch it
A lonely pairing
Blazing fire crackles
Making light and shadow dance
To defy darkness
When I Was a ChildWhen I was a child
I tried to kill myself seven times,
But it turns out something
Soulless and empty
Refuses to let itself die.
When I was a child,
I was scared of my own eyes—
Oh, they terrified me,
Because their light reminded me
That I am alive.
When I was a child,
They taught me to think
That I was not like all the rest.
That I was an empty thing,
An ugly creature,
A soulless changeling
That had intruded upon their lives.
And the people that were meant to love me
Only taught me how to cry,
Taught me how to hate
That I am alive.
I am still a child,
Though I like to think I’m not,
And I still have trouble
Looking myself in the eye.
I have learned that this is a bitter place
Painted colours by my madness,
Where errant and airy thoughts drift by
like butterflies
Whose wings I have lit on fire.
I am still a child,
But I am a hollow, broken thing
With frightened, suffering eyes.
Still, my mind is pleading
That my heart will soon stop beating,
But somehow I survive.
I still he
NotchesThere is a tree as old as me in
the midnight garden.
There’s no sound but the wind
and fingerprints of rain
drumming a thousand dreams
against my window.
My hair is growing long.
I left myself behind
on the growth chart carved
into each notch of the trunk,
leaving just a memory
running through April avenue.
Congratulations again to all these wonderful writers for their contributions to the literature community. I look forward to reading and featuring next month's batch of Lit. Daily Picks!
Previous Lit. Daily Pick Articles: 
Volume 1: January 2013 Volume 2: February 2013 Volume 3: March 2013 Volume 4: April 2013 Volume 5: May 2013 Volume 6: June 2013
