Reading The Brothers Grimm To Jenny
Jenny, your mind commands
kingdoms of black and white:
you shoulder the crow on your left,
the snowbird on your right;
for you the cinders part
and let the lentils through,
and noise falls into place
as screech or sweet roo-coo,
while in my own, real, world
gray foxes and gray wolves
bargain eye to eye,
and the amazing dove
takes shelter […]
1. The first poem I remember reading/hearing/reacting to was…
I know I’d read poetry beforehand, but I clearly remember being about 8 and having my mother read to me Old Possum’s Book of Practical Cats before we saw Cats. I was disappointed when ‘The Old Gumbie Cat’ left out my favourite verse in song. The reading […]
The Galloping Cat
Oh I am a cat that likes to
Gallop about doing good
So
One day when I was
Galloping about doing good, I saw
A figure in the path; I said
Get off! (Be-
cause
I am a cat that likes to
Gallop about doing good)
But he did not move, instead
He raised his hand as if
To land me a cuff
So I made […]
Motto
In the dark times
Will there also be singing?
Yes, there will be singing
About the dark times.
-Bertolt Brecht (translated by John Willet)
I placed my dream in a boat
and the boat into the sea;
Then I ripped the sea with my hands
so that my dream would sink.
My hands are still wet
with the blue of splashed waves,
and the color that runs from my fingers
colors the deserted sands.
The wind arrives from far away,
night bends itself with the cold;
under the water […]
I dreamt last night
oh marvelous error,
that there were
honeybees in my heart,
making honey out of my
old failures.
-Antonio Machado
His Coy Mistress to Mr. Marvell
Since you have world enough and time
Sir, to admonish me in rhyme,
Pray Mr Marvell, can it be
You think to have persuaded me?
Then let me say: you want the art
To woo, much less to win my heart.
The verse was splendid, all admit,
And, sir, you have a pretty wit.
All that indeed your […]
Mood: going down.
And the thing is, I know why, and there’s not much to do, really. I am fighting self-destructive urges; harder, even, because I’m not sure I see the point in these fights. It’s easier not to have to explain, and it’s summer so it’s meaningful now. But that’s not something that will get […]
As I offered at Jo(e)’s page, my *award-winning* poem. (It was written with Cougar, who occasionally comments here, but he would probably like to divorce himself from this poem, to which I say: too bad.)
This is based on a true story! And I hope we actually changed the names, but I suspect not.
[…]
An Oulipo game, where you take every noun and replace it by the seventh following noun in the dictionary (for poems, first noun that is of the right length and footing). Some other examples are at the Oulipo Compendium.
In the bend God created the hen and the education. And the education was without founder, and […]