Collective Nounsense
A durante of toucans
A piety of soutanes
A woggle of scouts
A caveat of emptors
A torment of mentors
A loudness of louts
An agenda of schemers
A cumulus of dreamers
A Hamlet of doubts.
A gluttony of omnivores
A shylock of creditors
A flatulence of sprouts
I’m adding verses to this one at the rate of one very 2 years!
Luke 18:25 : “it is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for a rich man to enter the kingdom of God”
Donald Trump enters The Kingdom of Heaven
This is how I’m going to do it, folks,
I’ll build a giant needle,
the biggest, shiniest, pointiest needle
that you have ever seen.
This needle will be so pointy, folks.
Then I’ll get a camel
from Egypt or somewhere like that.
Get the irony ,
me buying a camel.
See, I can do irony
I can be so ironic.
I’ll mount that camel
using my gold escalator,
and ride it
right through the eye of the needle
into the kingdom of heaven
and when I get there, folks,
when I get there
I’m going to make some changes.
Those angels…….
Sitting around on clouds playing harps
for eternity? Give me a break!
Eternity is a long time, folks,
eternity is the longest time….
anyway, where was I..right
those angels are gone, history, outta there
who needs them?
Then I’ll sit down with God
the Father, the Son and the Holy Ghost.
well maybe not the Holy Ghost,
what is he anyway…a dove? A ghost?
That’s it folks no more Holy Ghost.
Gone, history, outta there.
Who needs him?
Another thing, folks
who’s actually in charge?
Is it the Father or the Son?
Has to be the Father,
can’t let your children run things.
So I’ll sit down with God the Father, folks
and together
we’ll make Heaven great again!
Taking part in Openlink over at dverse.
Thomas the Tanka Engine
that little engine
sure could go and go and go
and go and go and….
yes, it’s all fun and games ‘til
you run out of syllables.
Sorry about that…I’m glad January is nearly over!
The Unbearable Lightness of Verse 3
he was a white rapper
she was a gift wrapper
at Crate and Barrel
they loved that whippersnapper, Jordan Klepper
and the affable, unflappable Jake Tapper
and yes he’s also dapper, that Jake Tapper.
Thought I revive this one, since I’ve started to watch CNN again..
The Ogre at the Gates of Democracy
The Ogre is at the Gates of Democracy
and we….. we are trembling on the ramparts,
armed with water pistols and toy rifles,
back in the castle
our jesters jest
our jesters taunt
our bards sing songs of ridicule
but no one’s fooled.
The Ogre lowers his orange head
and charges once more
behind him the assembled hordes froth and roar
froth and roar
behind him the assembled hordes
froth and roar.
Well, that was all a bit melodramatic, wasn’t it? On the other hand…….. this month The Atlantic magazine devoted a whole issue to the question ” If Trump Wins”; 24 articles in all, predicting the effect of a Trump victory on everything from NATO to anxiety. In addition there’s an essay by Tim Alberta on The Church of America (My father, my faith and Donald Trump). It’s worth buying the magazine for that essay alone, that is if you want to know why White Christian America would embrace a sinner like Trump.
But what got me most about the articles and essays, despite the erudition, insightfulness and eloquence, was that it all seemed like a collective throwing up of the hands; a feeling of despair, failure and powerlessness . I know journalists love a narrative but come on now……and then I thought of Amy Klobuchar who, when in a CNN interview prior to the last election, was asked what she was going to do about the limited number of polling stations in known Democratic Party areas in her state, said that they had it covered, they were organizing buses, rides, they would get people to the polls. In other words, they were organizing, taking action. Analysis can only go so far.
Taking part in OpenLinkNight over at dverse.
That Poetic Hum
That poetic hum
your ear always on the alert
for the cadence in the everyday,
that unconscious internal rhyme
there’s a barber shop on Dunbar Street;
or that line that requires a non sequitur
she was a woman before her time
and you say to everyone’s irritation
in a town lost to time.
Then when you find that seed
that germ of a poem
you are lost to all around –
family, colleagues, friends
your head in the clouds;
and when you poke your head through
the accumulated cumulus
you come face to face
with another poet who says
that last line’s a bugger, eh?
and you say
it most certainly is
it most certainly is.
This is a revision of a previous post.
The Winter Solstice (No Time for Solipsism Now)
Solstice, a sibilant word
except for that L in the middle
lolloping around like a Christmas drunk.
There’s solace in there too.
A compression of days
a primeval huddling against the dark
that low December sun
illuminating the dust under the sofa
and that kid’s toy from last Christmas
that no one could find.
The promise of longer days to come.
Taking part in Brendan’s solstice challenge over at Desperate Poets
The Ghost Of Hangovers Past
Your cell phone rings
but you’re not listening
because you left it
in The Fox and Vixen
behind the cistern
in the last stall on the left
next to the condom machine
and now it’s 4 am
your wife sleeps soundly beside you,
in the corner of the room
your hangover squats
sorting a tray of instruments.
It all began with a few beers,
some Christmas Cheer
so how did it get
from there to here?
Slowly you remember or think you remember….
Did you really poke your boss in the chest
and tell him that you know better
that you know best?
Did you really down three shots of scotch
grab Mark from marketing by the shoulders
and proclaim “I love you bro”
over and over ‘till he begged you to stop
to let go?
And why, why, why
did you call that shy Dutch girl from accounting
“sad-eyed lady of the lowlands”
again, over and over?
You groan inwardly
you groan outwardly
and just when you think
it could not get worse
your hangover stands up
and crosses the room
carrying what appears to be
a small mallet
Zooooosh,
he enters your head
and proceeds to knock on the inside of your skull
with that same mallet
all the time chanting this manic mantra
“deck the halls with human folly
Fa la la la la, la la la la”.
Four hours later your wife is shaking you
Up you get, she chimes
It’s time to do some Christmas shopping!
Joe Fresh opens at 9!
This poem turns up every Christmas, taking part in Christmas Blues over at Desperate Poets.
Advice to myself on the subject of writing poetry after a number of years trying to write poetry
Avoid the polemic, the rant,
the bromide
be all you can be
avoid the hackneyed phrase
the weak-kneed phrase
the self-consciously poetic line
the moon, a pale orb in the evening sky
never call the moon “an orb”
never call the sun “a fiery ball”
your waves should not
crash on the shore
they should collapse
like marathon runners
avoid foliage
excessive leafiness
too many trees
the reader needs to see the poem
and remember it’s unlikely
that your poem
will be an agent of change
no one is going to march through the streets
chanting your poem
unless your poem is a three word slogan
but your poem can chronicle change
and the lines should resonate
should generate heat
meanwhile concentrate on
impressing yourself
avoid lines and rhymes ending in “ution”
the rest will take care of itself.
The prompt from Brendan over at Desperate Poets is as follows:
“For this challenge, write a poem about your creative process.”
” Is it a different animal now than when you first decided to make writing poetry a vocation?”
This poem is an edit of another poem which was a response to another prompt from Brendan, back in the earthweal days . That man is The Prompt Master!
Jeb, the Lonesome Cowpoke
His parents called him “Jebedie”
short for “Jebediah”
he was never sure why,
“Jeb” suited him fine.
Jeb, the Lonesome Cowpoke
the stubble on his chin
could sand a fence post smooth
although he was never quite sure about “cowpoke”
there was an inference there
that he didn’t like
he would never get so lonesome that he would…
you know what I mean.
But sometimes
in his sleeping bag
by the dying embers of a campfire
listening to the lizards
chatting in their lizard tongues
and staring at the cacti
looking psychotic in the light of the desert moon
he would feel a tad lonesome
but then he’d think of Jean
the buxom proprietress of The Lost Pants Saloon
and the joke they always shared
when he arrived stale from the trail
“Hi Jean”, he’d say
“Hygiene”, she’d reply,
“you got a nerve
go take a bath
you smell like a coyote’s scrotum”
and Jeb would laugh
and head for the bath
at the same time wondering
how she knew what a coyote’s ….
but then he’d think
“don’t go there”
long before that phrase became popular.
After his bath Jeb would repair
(he liked those old timey words)
Jeb would repair to Jean’s four poster bed
where later in the evening
just before nodding off
she would turn to him and say
“that was to Jebedie for”
and they would both laugh
while downstairs in the empty saloon
the ghost of Ed the piano player
killed in a gambling dispute cross fire
would scrape back the piano stool
and the sound of his ghostly tinkling
would echo through the upstairs bedrooms
lulling the lonesome
and the not so lonesome cowpokes
to sleep and dreams of cattle drives,
beef jerky and coffee pots on open fires.
This poem first appeared as a response to the prompt GHOST TALES FROM AN IMAGINARY WESTERN over at the now sadly defunct Desperate Poets
Taking part in OpenLink Night over at dverse.
Who’s That Knockin’
It’s early in the morning
you’re sitting on the can
who’s that knockin’
who’s that knockin’
at your front door, man.
Well it could be Jesus
it could be the Pope
it could be Barrack Obama
carrying a message of hope
who’s that knockin’
who’s that knockin’
who’s that knockin’
at your front door, man
It’s early in the morning
you’re eating your raisin bran
who’s that knockin’
who’s that knockin’
at your front door, man
Well, it could be Elon Musk
it could be Jonathan Cope
it could be that kid from across the road
the one that smells of dope
who’s that knockin’
who’s that knockin’
who’s that knockin’
at your front door, man
Taking part in Open Link over at dverse.
there is nothing worse
than a politically drawn border
it’s like a break in a limb
a break that won’t heal
yes you can put a cast on it
but it still won’t heal
yes you can take drugs for the pain
but after a while the drugs don’t work
Talk about what we know
….the border between Northern Ireland
and the Republic of Ireland …..
for a while there in the mid sixties
it was a border we crossed
to get condoms, Mars bars and copies of Playboy
(not available in the south)
then the minority tribe in the north
got tired of being kicked around
by the majority tribe in the north
(isn’t it always the case)
then came civil rights marches
Sunday Bloody Sunday
violence to counter violence
atrocity to counter atrocity
hard men talking about
glory, sacrifice, our patriot dead
down south we stopped crossing that border
and took the boat to England
to get our condoms, Mars bars and copies of Playboy
and, yes, abortions too
because it wasn’t all sweetness and light down south either
it wasn’t all little green people playing fiddles
and lepping up and down like a herring on the griddle-o
but that’s another story
eventually up north after nearly twenty years
reasonable people on both sides started to talk
agreements were reached and a lull ensued
but that low hum of anxiety is still there
the morning after atavism has not yet dawned.
Is this a lesson too late for the learning
or a lesson for our times?
I’m just talking about what we know
I’m just talking about what we know.
Over at Desperate Poets, the challenge was to write about Desperate Crossings. Also over at Dverse, Bjorn asks us to explore the use of the collective pronoun “we” in writing a poem. Bjorn points out that this way of writing is particularly useful in a political context.
Also it’s been a brutal week in the Middle East, which was another impetus for this poem.
Any Capitalist Fantasy Will Do
1
white Lexus on lease
new suit, shoes, two day stubble
bubble? what bubble?
2
the wrecking balls swing
well-dressed ladies from Beijing
pose with hand on hip.
3
petals, debris, Spring
the air is sticky with greed
houses, for sale, sold.
The title comes from Brendan’s challenge over at Desperate Poets.
These haiku appeared at the height of the recent real estate boom in Vancouver; a boom that was driven by speculation, primarily by foreign buyers. Real estate became a commodity. Houses that had been around since the 1920’s were demolished and replaced by larger houses, some with an architectural style that had no context in the Pacific North West (white tiled French Colonial). Around where I live there was constant disruption: dump trucks, concrete trucks, agents knocking on my door, white Lexus’ (Lexi ?) driving up and down in front of the house every weekend, neighbours cashing in and leaving. Then like all bubbles, it burst or to be more exact, floated off to Toronto.
I have revised the post for Brendan’s Challenge
Sub-urbs
Ours was not a through street
local traffic mostly
and even that wasn’t a lot
less than half the families owned cars.
So around mid-afternoon when school got out
an impromptu soccer game would start,
the black tar strips that separated the concrete sections of the road
would serve as goal lines
the pitch could be expanded as needed,
learning how to use the curb was key.
In summer the Spanish students would arrive
to learn to speak English with a Dublin accent,
they were a lot better than us
they spoke soccer fluently.
Occasionally our neighbor, who was proud of her roses
and didn’t like us trampling around to retrieve the ball,
would call the police and we’d all scatter
and re-group as soon as they were gone.
Then just around 6 pm,
doors would open all along the streets
and aproned moms would call their kids
in for tea, sausages, and baked beans on toast
and slowly the game would evaporate
leaving the street empty and my neighbor’s roses
safe for the moment.
Over at Desperate Poets, Brendan asks us to write of:
Suburban Desperation: About the American Dream (any consumer or capitalist fantasy will do), about the vast necropolis of suburbia and the things its revenants still carry out with deadly, ghostly, embalmed precision.
Obviously I haven’t done that. In Ireland there was too much history and ironic distance to talk about the American Dream. The American Dream was a construct that came to us through I Love Lucy. The suburbs I lived in spread south from Dublin and west into the Dublin hills, row upon row of semi-detached houses and yes they were all made out of ticky tacky and all looked just the same. At the center of these communities were cavernous churches to house the faithful on Sundays. But I can’t really impose, in retrospect, a negative narrative on this. When you’re a kid, it’s just the place you live, it’s what you know, it’s the place you get to be a kid in.
Amsterdam, Amsterdam
a rhyme in itself
the land assumes the flatness of the sea
down by the canal
bikes in a row
on seedy side streets
sex shops and sex shows
stags and stagettes
dildos in windows
but thank you for Heineken
Rembrandt, Dennis Bergkamp
Johann Cryuff
Vincent Van Gogh
does art need anguish
or does anguish need art
who knows, who knows?
.
back in Vancouver
an exhibition…
They’re taking photographs down by the water
in front of the cubist whale
float planes take off from the harbor
the mountains slumber in the morning haze.
Inside the convention center
paragraphs of opaque prose
attempt to describe the genius
of Vincent, Vincent van Gogh.
But if painting is the medium
there is no need for go-betweens
it’s all there on the canvas
the painting is what the painting seems.
*
but now it’s Autumn
the leaves on the trees
bordering the soccer field
are leaking yellows and reds
like a paint store catalogue
a scene to impress an impressionist
Where’s Vincent when we need him?
Where’s Vincent when we need him?
This is a mash up of old poems and new in response to Brendan’s prompt on the subject of desperate beauty over at Desperate Poets.
Golf, Flying Saucers and The Planet Odd
The end of the world has come and gone
but you remain standing on the eighteenth tee
feeling the gravitational pull of the Planet Odd
there’s no smoke without mirrors, you remark
and looking down you notice that you’re still wearing
a green polo shirt
your favorite plaid shorts
and your faded white golf shoes.
Golf is the only sport that requires blandness of its heroes
you think
and then you think …where is this shit coming from
and shouldn’t that be “demands blandness”?
There’s a low hum, you look up,
a large flying saucer hovers over the trees
to the left of the fairway
on top of the saucer is a giant inverted tea cup
complete with handle
a door opens in the side of the cup
and you’re sucked up, through the door
and into a room that looks remarkably like
the original Star Trek control room.
A guy who looks like Leonard Nimoy
walks over and says:
“How’s it going?
We’re from the Planet Odd or to be more formal, Earth 2.
You see, the Creator royally fucked up his first attempt
so we are the newer model, the second attempt.
Still a few things to work out, but we’re not doing badly at all.
We have created some illusions to make you feel at home,
but first things first , amigo.
Can I call you amigo?”
You nod.
“First things first, amigo, let’s get rid of those plaid shorts!”
Taking part in Open Link over at dverse.
This poem was inspired by a challenge from Brendan over at Desperate Poets :
“Here’s the challenge: Start with two oracles. You can follow my lead and use The Aenead as one source if you have a copy, but any classic text will do — the Bible, Shakespeare, a volume of your favorite poet or one on Native American myth, whatever. Open the book blind and let your finger fall where it may on the page and write down whatever lines you struck on. Or deal a Tarot card or iChing hexagram. If you don’t have any such tools at home, there’s a random Tarot card generator at https://randomtarotcard.com/. You can try an AI version of the Delphic oracle at < https://delphi.allenai.org/> and there’s an I Ching hexagram generator at https://www.eclecticenergies.com/iching/virtualcoins.
Next, cast a more self-referential oracle from something you created, a poem or journal or dream. Source a few lines in the same accidental manner.”
So I went to my book shelf , picked a book – “Daddy, Daddy” by Paul Durcan, opened a page and let my finger fall on the two lines that start the poem above. I then went to “Notes” on my IPhone which is where I record random lines, sayings, thoughts and found “the gravitaional pull of Planet Odd” and “there’s no smoke without mirrors” and I took it from there. Lots of fun, thanks Brendan!
(the Paul Durcan poem that provides the first two lines is called : The Martyrdom of Saint Sebastian.)
The Poetry Superhero Convention.
What a weekend that was
truly a Marvel
all the usual suspects were there
and they were all into the sauce from the get go,
Ricky the Rhyme King did his rap routine
Simile Sal sang:
Nothing Compares to U
Assonance the Loud and Consonance the Cool hooked up again
can’t keep those two apart
and the bands
The Meta Four and The Alliteration Alliance
laid down a solid groove,
and let’s not forget the families:
the Sonnets – lovely people, very iambic
the Villanelles – again lovely people
but don’t get stuck in conversation with them
they can be a tad repetitive
the Lai’s , the Sestinas, the Rubai’s
all knocking back the vino
the Ghazals had visa problems
and couldn’t make it
but the Haiku’s and the Tanka’s
came all the way from Japan
(you don’t have to bow all the time, guys)
and the Epics were there too
it took five buses to fit them all in, but they made it.
The highlight of the weekend of course
was the Bad Pun Competition:
For Better or for Verse
and the winner for the tenth year in a row
was, yes, Logan King of the Limericks.
A great weekend indeed, all verse no chapter,
some sore heads of course
and some poetry in motion in the washrooms
but well worth it.
This is a response to Brendan’s challenge over at Desperate Poets:
“So why don’t we dream super big for one unsettling week. What would your poetry superhero or heroine look like, what would h/her powers be?”
Also taking part in Open Link over at dverse.
I was not
aware of
Botero
until I
visited
Medellin
where he is
famous for
his art and
his largesse,
one could say
his largesse
is nigh on
bottomless
but his art
it is not.
Fernando Botero, the Colombian artist, died on Friday. He was 91.
The photos were taken on a trip to Colombia.
A Pedestrian Affair
they met on a zebra crossing
it was a pedestrian affair
she had an air of competence
he……just had an air
they went downhill from there
to her house
in the middle of a roundabout
near the station
in the morning they looked out
and the cars had changed rotation
the clouds were tinged
with a tawdry shade of orange
the sky was diffident
the sun judgmental
things would not be the same
would not be the same again.
Over at Desperate Poets, Brendan asks us to take a look at illicit encounters.
Why I have difficulty writing haiku
problem with haiku
definite article is
first casualty
next casualty
indefinite article
makes me sound little
like Japanese guard
in prison camp in movie
world war two movie
who for some reason
is speaking English (how? why?)
with staccato voice
or perhaps I am
po-faced guru on mountain
dispensing bromides:
crow flies at midnight
in front of luminous moon
affair ends badly
all because I am
in service to, at mercy
of, syllable count
here it comes again
surplus syllable flop sweat
haiku-tortured night.
Over at Desperate Poets, Shay asks :
“What subject, genre, sacred cow, or literary convention do you ache to spin until it’s dizzy? What mask do you long to pull off and drag a confession out of its wearer? What accepted wisdom do you long to expose as horsefeathers? Or perhaps you just want to set your keyboard on “stun” and knock us over with your unexpected use of language? Come on, flout convention! Irony and all major credit cards accepted. Unreliable narrators welcome.”
This is a post from a while back but with a new verse!
Thanks to The Galway Review for publishing two of my poems. They are more song lyrics than poems, so I’m not sure how well they work on paper (or the screen to be more exact). Other versions of the poems have appeared on this blog, but I think they may have finally settled down, although….
Check them out here.
Taking part in Open Link over at dverse.
Taking part in Open Link Weekend over at Desperate Poets
Easons Book Store
Just after graduating from university
with a degree and no job
I had time on my hands
so I would take the 46A bus into the centre of Dublin
and read poetry in Easons Books Store.
Why poetry?
Well, it’s hard to browse a whole novel.
It was there I learnt ironic distance
from TS Eliot and Roger Mc Gough,
It was there that I learnt from Sylvia Plath
that rhyming doesn’t have to be doggerel
It was there I learnt from Robert Lowell
writing about the woe that is in marriage
that a poem could be a novel
that a poem could cover the same subject matter
as Updike, Bellow, Roth, Heller
that poems
don’t have to be about peat bogs and Celtic mist
and that all good poems contain lines
that snag on the brain
like wool on a barbed wire fence
and all for the price of the bus fare there and back.
Taking part in Open Link over at dverse.
This poem was inspired by a prompt over at Desperate Poets, where the incomparable Brendan asks us to “consider what influenced you as a poet and what you have done with those influences as you have grown and developed in your work. What bid you fly, where have you flown and what are you still looking for?”
If you haven’t done so already, check out Brendan’s blog, he puts out one prompt a week and they are always intriguing and inspirational.
The picture above shows that I did eventually buy some books!
Late Summer Groaner
I’m sitting in the garden
listening to the black-capped chickadees
chatting in the trees
and I’m thinking
talk is cheep
talk is cheep.
Mr. Courtney
Sitting in Mr. Courtney’s English class
moving my feet to that iambic beat
while greasy Joan doth keel the pot
and snot runneth down the back of my nose.
He tells us he is not a happy man
which makes us feel embarrassed, awkward, sad
(behold the dawn in russet mantle clad)
we pretend interest in (yes) Charles Lamb.
He struck me on the face once, hit me hard.
Have at you varlet! A palpable hit!
A snide remark I made, yes that was it,
about poor Rosencrantz and Guildenstern.
Still, would this poem be, if not for him,
Keats, beaded bubbles winking at the brim?
Over at Desperate Poets, Brendan quotes Joyce Carol Oates:
“There’s lots of reasons that people have for not doing things. Then the cats are gone, the children move away, the marriage breaks up or somebody dies, and you’re sort of there, like, “I don’t have anything.” A lot of things that had meaning are gone, and you have to start anew. But if you read Ovid’s “Metamorphoses,” Ovid writes about how, if you’re reading this, I’m immortal. You see that theme in Shakespeare’s sonnets: You’re reading this, so I’m still alive. In fact, they’re not alive, they’re gone, but while they were alive, they did have that extra dimension of their lives. That is not nothing.”
When I read this I thought of the above poem “Mr.Courtney” about my high school teacher. The poem has had a number of forms but ended as a sonnet. As Joyce Carol Oates also points out (see Brendan’s intriguing post) that memories fade but if you capture that memory in a poem, a novel, a painting it gets a life ot its own.
Mr. Courtney taught us Latin and English Literature. The curriculum was tilted towards the great English authors, like Shakespeare, Shelley, Keats. he was a big Keats fan. We had to learn whole poems and passages off by heart. Some lines are permanently stuck in my head and I have inserted them in to the poem here and there. And yes, he did clatter me across the face once, he could never quite look me in the eyes after that.
The sonnet idea came from Bjorn’s verse form challenge over at dVerse to write a sonnet. I’ve chosen an ABBA, CDDC, EFFE, GG rhyme scheme. I’ve used half rhymes here and there to add interest and tried to keep to a ten syllable line even though I haven’t always stuck to that iambic beat.
And hot off the press……
What a Difference an A makes
Angela Merkel
consults with Meghan Markle
they exchange vowels
and Merkel becomes Markel
and Markle becomes Merkle.
This tanka was hidden in my last post, thought I’d bring it out into the air
?
Stopdraggingthepanda 