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National Poetry Month – Ricochet Challenge
April is National Poetry Month here in the U.S. I haven’t seen any mention here yet of that subject, so I would like to issue a Ricochet poetry challenge. Write a poem on any subject you would like and in any form. That is all there is to the challenge. You can post it here or in a separate thread if you think it deserves one.
Now, some might argue that the world has too much bad poetry already. But in defense of bad poetry, it sometimes leads to better poetry from the writer in the future. I’ve been writing poetry for more than 40 years, and when I started, it was all bad. Now, just most of mine is bad. Or in the words of my old friend Dave Steinke:
“Poetry is like beer. With beer, all beers are good, but some beers are better than others. With poetry on the other hand, all poetry is bad. It’s just that some poems are worse than others.”
So, I want you to be fearless, because you only have to be good enough to suit your own tastes and abilities.
I’ll post one of my own as soon as I write it.
Published in General
And finally it was over with this perfect word:
December 31:
hogmanay, noun;
1. a gift given on New Year’s Eve.
31
And so here at the end, I give you this hogmanay
It arose from a conspiracy
between thee, and me, and the dictionary
31 opportunities for me to say . . .
I love you.
Sorry to inflict all this on you, but you asked for it. Remember Douglas Adams in Hitchhiker’s, when Ford and Arthur are tortured by the Vogon captain – he reads his original poetry to them, and they (and we) scream for mercy.
When I decided to do this, I wanted to be funny but serious, inventive but not pretentious or horribly dull. I’m just a working stiff, not a poet, so no need to over-obsess. At first I thought I’d try out several poetic forms; I could construct a villanelle, maybe even a sonnet. How hard could it be? Dude, not happening! A well-constructed sonnet is crazy hard, and in 18 hours? I think Shakespeare routinely took at least 19 for some of his better ones. In the end I just was satisfied to not have every one be a limerick. (Though some were…..)
Mostly I just tried to get something on paper, usually containing a totally irritating, impossible, ludicrous word. It was really fun.
I was all, “Wha–? Surely he isn’t gonna post all 31 of these!”
But here we are, by God. Here we are.
The Fire
It burns in the world without
And the world within
And millions of worlds
About to begin
It burns in the breathless moment
Splitting stillness apart
It frightens the strongest amongst us
As well as the weak at heart
It burns in a fearful moment
With its flash and spark
At times a faint flicker
But enough to see in the dark
It’s there in the cities aglimmer
Where children lay asleep
And the world without fear
Remembers where the fire runs deep
It burns through the sleepless moment
When the lonely world stares
Silently enraptured
Content to be captured
By the fire that flares
It burns in the endless procession
And through the world without end
It burns in the lover now lost
And then found again
It burns the hand that feeds it
And it consumes the air
And it jealously demands attention
For it burns brightest with care
No, kept all the good ones for myself – cough cough.
Remember – gin.
Very nice, Bruce! You are a poet. I like the idea and think I’ll try it next December for my husband, incorporating memories from our nearly 40 years together. Good idea to use the dictionary.com word of the day. Hmmmm–or maybe I’ll do it during our anniversary month.
Thank you, Bruce. I appreciate your sharing those. Now, what is today’s word?
I once invented my own poetic form, based on slant-rhyme and vowel progression. Here’s how it goes, more or less:
Pick a logical vowel progression, like i-e-ɑ-o-u (pronounced as in IPA, not English). Pick a rhyme coda, and now alter the vowel of the coda according to the vowel progression. For example:
seek (IPA i)
sake (IPA e)
knock (IPA ɑ)
yolk (IPA o)
book (IPA ʊ, which is close to IPA u).
Now turn this into a poem (the following example was composed in the last 5 minutes, so it’s not ultra-awesome poetry, but it gets the idea across):
Brian Watt,
Your poetry is very good.
Forgive me for saying I’m somewhat surprised you had it in you :-) Mostly, you like to play the curmudgeon around here. We don’t often see the ardent poet.
Your poetry reminds me of my own somewhat. But you do it better, I think.
All the best poets are curmudgeons.
Another oldie, called A Piece to Itself:
I once saw a garden with a castle in back;
And the spires and the sculptures did add to the scene,
But the trees that they rivaled were far more serene
And for sure the trees owned the more beautiful track.
It was theirs that I followed, from flower to pond,
And gazed ‘cross the water to a pillar of stone—
The great Alexander astride a god’s roan—
That melded so well with what lied beyond.
I saw it again (the statue I mean),
But did not remember a luster so dull,
Nor edges so sharp, nor expression so droll;
And I wondered… Was it truly this I had seen?
I am now convinced that the face was the same
And his stare had once taunted the fishes below,
But though all of that eloquent power remained,
I knew — it was the trees that had made the statue glow.
PMs still aren’t working yet, apparently.
Your threat, if serious, will result in one of two things: me never sending you any of my poetry (this is the most likely outcome) or me sending you all of it, down to the last inane scribble I wrote while still in middle school. You have been warned ;-)
Thank you for the high praise. I always wanted to be a curmudgeon. :-) Seriously…thanks very much Midge. Now, if I could just finish my dang novel.
Behold the happy bureaucrat:
Her papers gently rustle;
She mutters to them privily
Amid low-level bustle.
Three Ducklings skitter
Across the water
On the edge
Of a mountain stream
On an Indian Summer
Afternoon.
They dart about
Exploring,
But scurry to a
Soldier’s line
When their mother
Chirrups.
My son and I
Watch with delight–
And sorrow.
Mama duck,
How did Mother Nature
Fool you into
Thinking it was Spring?
Your ducklings will not
Fly before ice and snow
Lay their claim.
I pull my child close.
Surrounded by golden
sun and leaves,
We watch,
One Autumn hour,
Then sadly leave.
I was joking.
So, I heard the flagship podcast, and this thread was mentioned. Mr. Lileks, we would be honored to have your limericks or other poems.
There’s always room for limericks.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-a76OEM_cg8
Gave me a great laugh, especially since one of my friends is the famous limericist, F. R. DuPlantiier, who writes the Politickles limerick every week. I can just imagine Bob going to the “gents for a scribble.”
Hesitant to Assert
No, I will not claim that Spring has come,
Though today is a Spring-like day.
Though it’s not quite the sort you know any more
Out San Fran or Ithaca way.
Stumble I forth my ice-rimmed door
My wondering blinking way.
And now just wander for nothing more
Than to throw lawn twigs away.
Spirits and images, two little boys
Work fresh puddles there;
Engineering waterways,
Bright eyes laugh and dare.
Bright eyes laugh as a boy chows down
Snap peas for the garden row.
Laughing eyes dare as a boy hops on
For a big-boy bicycle show.
Spirit and image, one little girl
Aims at a red squirrel there.
Serious eyes judge carefully –
Through dining-room window quietly –
Arrow let fly unerringly –
Bag that supper meat daringly.
Vision of one little girl.
See how a woman can weep with love?
That was twenty years gone, you claim?
Well. Though I’ll not assert that Spring is come
I concede that it’s on the way.
Juliane Zdrojewski
April 2014
Our president tells only lies,
And so he wins the Nobel Prize!
Mmm mmm mmm, Barack Hussein Obama!
Our president is not a fool,
He sends his kids to private school!
Mmm mmm mmm, Barack Hussein Obama!
Elderly health care caught his eye,
“Take a pain pill then you die!”
Mmm mmm mmm, Barack Hussein Obama!
When he needs a spiritual light,
His savior is the Reverend Wright.
Mmm mmm mmm, Barack Hussein Obama!
When criticized, he gives them heck,
He plays the race card from his deck!
Mmm mmm mmm, Barack Hussein Obama!
His speeches are such elegant prose,
Unless his teleprompter goes.
Mmm mmm mmm, Barack Hussein Obama!
Our president has many czars,
They should all sit behind cell bars.
Mmm mmm mmm, Barack Hussein Obama!
He’s given us the best thing yet:
One hundred years of massive debt!
Mmm mmm mmm, Barack Hussein Obama!
With dictators, he made amends.
Thugs and commies are now his friends!
Mmm mmm mmm, Barack Hussein Obama!
Joe Wilson yelled, and he got whacked.
But Joe was right, and that’s a fact!
Mmm mmm mmm, Barack Hussein Obama!
Mmm mmm mmm, Barack Hussein OBAMA!
Locus Pocus
(With abject apologies to Robert Herrick)
Whenas in fits my scholar goes
And sequence, order, logic mows
To make way for his rampant throes,
I stupefied despair to see
His vain digressions each way free –
What could his metatopic be?
Juliane Zdrojewski
05/2009
Herrick fan here. Well done, jzdro!
Makes me wish I were still publishing a poetry magazine. Nothing like poking libs in the eye with a sharp stick.
Because every poetry thread needs a Shakespearean sonnet, I’ve decided to post this one. It is intended to be part of a science fiction book in my series. It is currently in the fourth book of the series, but may skitter back a book due to my methods of constructing the series. (It was originally intended as one book.) This is set as a poem a young Royal Navy captain writes to his red-haired girlfriend:
Cabin Full of Dreams
When last I saw my love upon the strand,
Her hair like fire shone and blew about.
Soft solid, real, and warm, I held her hand.
Her breath upon my cheek whispered devout
Assurances of true love’s ablest kind.
Sweet scent of flowers’ ultimate bequest
Wreathed both our bodies in a woven skein;
Our hearts filled with proximity’s request.
But now I have a cabin full of dreams,
Of plans to bring my jubilant return,
And papers sketched with daring, foolish schemes.
For like my lady’s hair, I burn, I burn,
And wait upon the day when duties call
Me back to her who holds my thoughts in thrall.
Mr. Henry Crawford,
to Miss Price
Oh, Fanny, dear, please fall in love with me,
Dismay of Aunt and Coz make plain to see!
Their careless treatment of you they shall rue
When they observe how kind I am to you.
Ne’er think I on my Tenant, Servant, Poor;
To manage capital’s but work for boors;
I build no wealth, defend nor land, nor sea;
Yet useful in this world I fain would be.
Oh, I plan to IMPROVE! More every day!
Turn houses ’round, sweep barns and church away!
Nor further toil for you! No sermons drear!
(No sources of your values,) Value, Dear!
And when some Spring I fresh IMPROVEMENT plan
Still kind I’ll be, discreet, the gentleman.
All I now claim, Miss Price, I now think true.
Life’s Speculation all: I bid for you.
Juliane Zdrojewski
02/2000