Last week's party was fun. Thanks for indulging us.

In particular was this item of interest, the Drunken Poetry box:

"I went to the worst kind of bar hoping to get killed.
instead I just got drunk again." - words on the poetry box. name that poet.

This box swallowed mounds of literary detritus that night, some of which I'll share below. This is one of the only times you'll be seeing commentary on this site about people's creations. Enjoy.

There was the predictable gibberish of an unpracticed poet on a few beers (bless the effort):

Why is it always me?
The one they seem not to see
Leaving only the slightest trace
Of a man without grace
A man without a place
Just trying to find
            Somewhere kind
Somewhere outside my mind
Somewhere with a penguin
Perhaps with Ursula Le Guinn
But not the mighty Qinn
‘Cos you’ve not seen nothing like him
It’s gonna be a bumpy ride
‘Coz, son, you ain’t got nowhere to hide
except over there in the closet.

**

Ba rumpa rum rum, drunk drum tongue.
Badum dumb dumb, badum um drunk
Drum tongue; tower, ban, stunned –
Bell tower rings for whom + flowers of evil
Bauderie blooms, fungus on the tombstone
Shrooms above bones + blood in the womb –
I mean blook boils in the room.
Bride and groom loom looney as
Cartoons, Beijing car zoom zoom
Ba rumpa rumm, drunk drum tongue
Banging punk rock fun, blunders and no plan
Like Alice in Wonderland.

**

Scary place, the mind of a cat
Fuck that shit, I gotta scat
Nevermind, nevermind, you twat
And what can anyone say to that?

**

He’s too hot to need a fan
So chill, cool off, at least pretend
To like him for who he is, a simple man
That only needs a friend.

**

On a wintry Friday night in Beijing I wandered my way among a bunch of drunken poets.
They handed me some paper, I hoped I wouldn’t blow it
Shit
I blew it.

**

Tomatoe, tomahto
Go fuck yo-self.

Despite this majority flotsam and jetsam, there were indeed real signs of literary prowess at the bottom of those bottles:

A bee goes from flower
Red to flower yellow.
Son takes cookies mom said no about.
Your CEO rounds pennies
None are ever the wiser
The details are never shared
And they die with you
Greed is small in any amount.

**

Lolita’s relief
Children read poems in fields
And put on lipstick.

**

My company is a zoo
All my co-coworkers are animals
There’s a parrot that repeats
And the giraffe in high heels.
All the pigs wear suits
My company is a zoo
Everyone has a pen
Everyone slithers to lunch
Everyone fingerpaints with poop or powerpoints
Everyone is trapped

**

Do not go gentle into
that goodnight,

Old age should burn and
Rave at close of day;

Rage

RAGE

Against the dying
Of the light.

And how can we miss out on the brown-nosers:

There once was a literary gang
Whose launch went off with a bang!
We all got drunk and high
With the ladies of Loreli
“Look, read and listen,” we sang!”

And the cautious mockers:

AMY PLAYS A LOVE SONG
KERRYN RELINQUISHES HER DIGNITY
HANNAH APPLIES LIPSTICK
THE LADIES OF LORELI
PROCREATE LIKE BONOBO

And of course, the heartsick:

The pulses throbbing
Thoughts pounding
So many Jing-A beers pounded
And you, heart throb, on the brain.

**

For too long,
Far too long,
My heart held on,
To something not worth,
My time spent.
It’s time to discover,
What Beijing life has to offer.
To new beginnings! <3

Yep, everyone's favorite, the RAUNCH:

Part 1
Sex is good
Sex is fine
Doggy style
And 69

Part 2
69 is so high school
you try to preserve your virginity
but you think you’re cool
and try to have anal

Part 3
Gotta keep your man satisfied
Gotta keep hymen intact
At sex, you might not be qualified
Other than at having a vagina compact

Part 4
You like to read
But you also like to give head
It’s okay, one day you’ll be dead.

But what came up as unique, which I guess shouldn't be surprising, is people's love-hate tension toward the party, the people, and the Jing:

I can’t read all these characters,
On the signs and streets and the dance floor,
In this city where no one stays.
We’re like beer cans washed up on distant shores,
And there’s snow down in the Sanlitun if you
Know where to look late at night,
And the girls down in the Gulo [sic] dance on
The old things the boys drink and fight.
One liver, and ten more Beijing bars.
One liver.
In this city you can’t see
The stars.

**

Ah, mulled wine – what a drink!
How I love your happy orange slice!
So many hipsters, o so little time
How many hipsters does it take to line
A hutong? Don’t answer that –
More than the milled wine’s spic

**

Beijing’s out to kill.
It’ll lure you into the hutong
To sniff your blood,
And to suck
The ticks of your lifestyle
Out of the flesh they seek.
We think we will be purified.
Instead, we puke,
Listen to Compact Dicks,
And find joy in the defiled.

I get it -- why else do we write if not to unravel the tangle of our heartstrings? And why else be a writer in China if not to ache over our braided feelings toward this country? Just be sure to have a drink and a friend on hand -- no one should be tackling that heartache without serious assistance.