Surreal Fruits and Flavors: A Preview of Le Li

So, how the hell do I promote a book that I wrote without sounding like a douche? By saying as little about it as possible and allowing our fine (and probably incredibly handsome) Alternative Control readers make up their own minds on whether this stuff connects with them or not. I’ll provide this short introduction to give you all a feel for what I attempted to do with this book, and then unleash a few examples. Here we go!

Le Li is a collection of rhyme poetry and a work of psychedelic lyricism. The book acts as a journey and a cycle through a 24 hour period in American suburbia. The poems are divided into two chapters that represent day and night entitled Lemonade Sun and Limeade Moon. From here, you can probably guess that the predominant visual elements of these poems are in fact, lemons and limes. Using these two simple pieces of imagery, I set the book’s structure as a stringent representation of symmetry and contradiction. Basically, every poem in the first chapter has a corresponding sister poem in the second chapter that complements structurally, but expresses an opposing idea or emotional base. Because of the complexity of this arrangement, and rhyming’s limitations on poetic freedom, I was sometimes forced to make very unorthodox phrases and wild metaphors in attempt to express what I wanted. Because of this, the book has a naturally chaotic nature which supports the whole idea that this is supposed to be a psychedelic work, and the fact that poetic nonsense is a pretty important part of that literary world.

I wrote this book purely for self-satisfaction. I gave myself a challenge, and I’m proud that I was able to meet that challenge and complete what could be the most complex thing that I’ve attempted. After a few years of fine-tuning, a lot of headache medicine and pulled hair, Le Li is finally complete and I’m fucking relieved. If you like what you see in the few samples I’ve given, then please, grab a copy! You can get one from me personally, but they’re also available on Amazon.com (!!!).

Jim Clegg is responsible for all the artwork involved in this project, and he did a hell of a job. Make sure that you tell him how awesome he is either in person, or in the comment section below. Thank you!

Fire’s Inquisition: Our Frailty 

Sun fell to the trees

Resting in the tops

Tired from the dive

Rain’s relief deprived

 

Igniting the leaves

Fires in the boughs

Lemons into orbs

Tiny flaming storms

 

So the rains they then came down

Not from sky but from the roofs

Like an autumn’s sloppy chew

Spills its crumbs unmindfully

 

Made of fire, acid, juice

To the skin they bred attack

Engulfed in late afternoon

Land and life now fire twins

 

Sun explodes in sweat

Starry heat sponged out

And becoming pain

Scars and melting stain

 

We now burn alive

Frail in lemons fried

Boiling to death

Beaten to the bed

 

All we’ve built to prove

Strength and power’s will

Swept and cleared of spare

Hopefulness or care

 

So the rapid flames wore crown

Ruling merciless, aloof

Trees and grass to sizzled brew

Ruin’s fruition in spree

 

Burnt toast and charred cocoa mousse

Mixed with yellow strokes our backs

Tears us down with cracking croon

Whips us bare and flame ridden

 

Evening bares its wick

Tapping at the sun

Scratching for the red

Underbelly bled

 

Blood-stained fire fights

Through the lemonade

Aiding sour taste

With a spicy glaze

 

Pain so dizzying

Whirlwind knives to nerves

As the sparks like bugs they spread

On the body’s bread

 

All the land is scorched

Bloody lemons lie

Along with the people spent

Starved by devil’s lent

 

Frailty: the party ends

Misery is yellow dense

Color of a perished life

Taste of elder rot and strife

 

Frailty: it’s all that’s left

Evening’s regrets red in breath

Sun has skewered the trees in half

On its steady downward path

 

Frailty: the spirit scalds

Left the mirth of gardens bald

Lemons now of great appeal

We chew but can’t break the peel

 

Teeth pushed into gums shall break

Blood vessels inside the mouth

So we can’t speak or then make

Hopeful words from burning doubt

 

Fire’s Inquisition: Our Ferocity

Limes we break apart

Throw them all in heaps

So the fires start

Fueled by green debris

 

Tall like water grass

Bright like precious stone

Glimmering like glass

The inferno rose

 

Fires burned throughout the woods

Camps like stars in clear night skies

Waving cloths of shapeless form

From the stones and bark they dance

 

Testaments of nature’s wrath

Just how destructive it is

Yet we keep confined their space

Gathered round their sporting lines

 

Flames of green and grace

Smoke of tattered dreams

Decorate the face

With a scarring piece

 

Though it burns with fierce

Grave agility

We endure and pierce

Our skin with green

 

Unharmed we remain

Scarred but steady life

Children of the flame

Eating of the scythe

 

In a festive swell of goods

Meat and drink in massive size

By the light of fire swarm

In an ancient step we prance

 

Drumming coals in flaming bath

Oral sex with scalding jiz

We are invincible race

Joyous kinds of hungry minds

 

Blooded now with hell

Mortals we convert

Jumping over bell

Of campfire’s skirt

 

Swaying lights are eyes

Windows to the fleece

That in fire lies

Death’s disturbing peace

 

Arms like solar flares

Legs like burning swords

Smoky lime smell of the flames

Makes us feel like lords

 

Green like magic flicks

Of the leprechaun

Colors us outside the lines

Of the skin we’re drawn

 

Fire and the melding of

Power and relentless force

Becomes our armored cart

Through the conquering endorsed