"To keep the review thread clean..."

[EroticOrogeny]

thanks for the comments on my sifted scattered ? can't remember the title, three ss

How do you write the plural of s?

Ss?

ses?

at any rate. I am learning that Seattle's poems are actually anna poems. I am not sure what to do because I am trying the 52 skeedo challenge under Seattle's name. Wonder if I can do a merge of some sort? Have a J's scorecard? I am not in the mood for Seattle poems right now. Maybe I should just fake it. Is there a 52 challenge discussion thread? I cannot believe the points some of y'all are racking up. WTG!

J

The letter 's' is spelled 'ess', plural is 'esses'

 

[butters]

thanks. angiebaby, for your words on LOST.

part two is this:

he sits on steps
gathering snow
a bowling alley with row on
row of uniform white
like pins all knocked down
waiting to be stood again -
a silence of machines

do you think it runs better like this?

he sits on steps
gathering snow
a bowling alley with row on row
of uniform white like pins knocked down
waiting to be stood again -
a silence of machines

 

[Angeline]

thanks. angiebaby, for your words on LOST.

part two is this:

he sits on steps
gathering snow
a bowling alley with row on
row of uniform white
like pins all knocked down
waiting to be stood again -
a silence of machines

do you think it runs better like this?

he sits on steps
gathering snow
a bowling alley with row on row
of uniform white like pins knocked down
waiting to be stood again -
a silence of machines

Yes, I think it works better. Just my silly opinion, of course.

You could also do something like:

he sits on steps
gathering snow
a bowling alley with row
on row of uniform white
like pins knocked down
waiting to be stood again -
a silence of machines

but I do think the main thing (for me) was "row on" standing together because it's not really a complete unit of thought. That's a personal bugaboo of mine, but I have tons of wacky rules that I make for myself (and just as often break)...

(I am chuffed that you took my comment to heart!)

 

[Angeline]

thanks for the comments on my sifted scattered ? can't remember the title, three ss

How do you write the plural of s?

Ss?

ses?

at any rate. I am learning that Seattle's poems are actually anna poems. I am not sure what to do because I am trying the 52 skeedo challenge under Seattle's name. Wonder if I can do a merge of some sort? Have a J's scorecard? I am not in the mood for Seattle poems right now. Maybe I should just fake it. Is there a 52 challenge discussion thread? I cannot believe the points some of y'all are racking up. WTG!

J

I believe everyone will understand if you merge them. I may yet write another "Amante" poem or two and Eleanora Day writes them (ahem, I am sounding a little Three Faces of Eve, here). Anyway if I do, I'll add them to my pick up list. They're still my poems.

I think there is a discussion thread. I'll find it and bump it for you. Anyway, Anna, Seattle or J or whoever ye be, I know you have many many great poems in you. I, for one, never forget that, dear girl.

 

[butters]

Yes, I think it works better. Just my silly opinion, of course.

You could also do something like:

he sits on steps
gathering snow
a bowling alley with row
on row of uniform white
like pins knocked down
waiting to be stood again -
a silence of machines

but I do think the main thing (for me) was "row on" standing together because it's not really a complete unit of thought. That's a personal bugaboo of mine, but I have tons of wacky rules that I make for myself (and just as often break)...

(I am chuffed that you took my comment to heart!)

^^ - that's the other version i have on word - comparing them. yes, it echoes the first more in layout - a little cleaner. :buncharoses: and btw, i always do! i don't necessarily change things right away, but i let the comments absorb slowly, a sort of osmosis if you will - then act of them. sometimes. and if i don't act on them, they're still absorbed ready to bear weight on another write! your comments have gravitas, m'dear.

 

[twelveoone]

*tea-splutter*




and oh-oh, what's been going down? sigh. already had to remove the copy-a-thread spammer from overnight. why it does it i have no idea.

twasn't I.

Is that thing pinned on?

 

[theognis]

Thank you

Many thanks, annaswirls, for your extremely kind comments on my poems Carmel, chocolate petals, and Too Short. Coming from you, such praise is an embarrassment of riches, but more than welcome, you may be sure.

 

[PoetGuy]

at any rate. I am learning that Seattle's poems are actually anna poems. I am not sure what to do because I am trying the 52 skeedo challenge under Seattle's name. Wonder if I can do a merge of some sort? Have a J's scorecard? I am not in the mood for Seattle poems right now. Maybe I should just fake it. Is there a 52 challenge discussion thread? I cannot believe the points some of y'all are racking up. WTG!

J

52 Pickup is not a contest, nor is it a competition. There are no "rules" as such, other than the idea that people write poems and comment on poems.

Simply put any poems "you" (however you define that) write on the same scorecard, whatever screenname they are written under. Same with comments. The idea is to encourage participation, not make a procedural headache for people.

 

[annaswirls]

Merci!

I did not want to cause an ache of the head to anyone either by complicating things.

I will meditate on how I define "you" as well as "idea" and "poem."

Enjoying the 52 pickup, I go through periods of time when I cannot be on lit, but this 52 pickup encourages me to come back time to time.

52 Pickup is not a contest, nor is it a competition. There are no "rules" as such, other than the idea that people write poems and comment on poems.

Simply put any poems "you" (however you define that) write on the same scorecard, whatever screenname they are written under. Same with comments. The idea is to encourage participation, not make a procedural headache for people.

 

[twelveoone]

twasn't I.

Is that thing pinned on?

thank you 1201 for mentioning new poems, whatever, etc. etc. etc, blah, blah
BUT WHAT IS IN IT FOR YOU?

I don't know, I'll have to meditate on it it.

hahahahahahahahahahahahaha
ha

and
ha

 

[butters]

thank you 1201 for mentioning new poems, whatever, etc. etc. etc, blah, blah
BUT WHAT IS IN IT FOR YOU?



hahahahahahahahahahahahaha
ha

and
ha

quit talking to yourself
i can do NP's today, for a nice change

is it pinned on? nope. stuck. it was red-nose day in the UK. it's probably time to change it. i might give it little spidery legs to climb outta there....

he sits on steps
gathering snow
a bowling alley with row on

This bothers me. Is he gathering snow or are the steps? Technically this could also be read as the bowling alley is also the steps gathering snow. A distraction

now, this i will thank you for, twelvio
is it he or the steps gathering snow? both. so i feel ok about leaving that as it is. he sits immobile as the steps, the snow collects on him, collects on them, they're both not serving their purpose as intended during this tragedy....

the him/bowling alley thing - i'll look to see if there's a way around it to reduce the distraction, but i don't mind ambiguity or metaphors. inside he feels as displaced as the bowling alley... a place normally filled with the living, laughter, sound, it is now a place of odd silence and row upon row of white coffins; inside him, his 'knocked down bowling pins' are never going to be stood up again either. there's some activity inside, but it's not life as he knows it kinda thing.

i suppose some punctuation might break it into something less distracting; i'm not convinced (atm) that by doing so i won't lose the deliberate ambiguities within it.

i will definitely consider and work on it. food for thought.

 

[UnderYourSpell]

Just wanted to take up a point made by bogusagain on 'Giselle', I was thinking more of sewing as it is a thread, but your idea of painting works just as well so I thank you for it

 

[butters]

for anyone at all confused by greenmountaineer's poem Last of the Sin-eaters:

it was a custom in the 19th and early 20th C for someone to take on the sins of the dead person by the eating of a crust of bread that had been placed on their chest whilst dying. it was accompanied by ale to wash it down. in some perhaps more rural areas, this task would be allotted to a beggar - it would be their job to visit the deathbeds of all the locals, so that their spirits might rest in peace. it also ensured more food and drink for a beggar...

the 'mother' in her nursing home bed spends her days dallying with old memories bright as new pennies, and it leaves me wondering whose sins she wishes to take on ... the living relatives that rarely visit, so they may rest easy once she is gone, herself, or the sins of a community in general that leaves the elderly in distant 'homes' where they may be forgotten more easily?

nb: anyone who has elderly relatives in nursing homes - my comments are not some barb directed at you, since i am sure they do not apply. they are an overall observation of how it so often pans out....

 

[twelveoone]

I hate when that happens -earlier the poem on top was Angeline's, it still is but they stuck 5 more there.

 

[twelveoone]

Today the gentlemen will have to concede they were bested by the ladies.

What??? when did we introduce a gender race? I concede I may have been breasted by the ladies, but even then it assumes too much. Reminds me of the cold war, the Red Tit Gap, I refuse to play catch up, (catchsup) .

 

[Angeline]

What??? when did we introduce a gender race? I concede I may have been breasted by the ladies, but even then it assumes too much. Reminds me of the cold war, the Red Tit Gap, I refuse to play catch up, (catchsup) .

I don't know either, but I do like being on the winning side, especially with SR's Benko's Gambit which I think is powerfully good.

Thanks all for the comments on Blind as Gloucester. I've been trying not to make myself crazy by watching too much television news about Japan but I've seen enough to be as deeply struck as any of us who've seen the destruction. After a while it feels obscene to me to watch it over and over. Anyway my son and I were talking about it and that somehow devolved to a conversation about humanity as ants or microbes or some tiny insignificant thing that's tossed or forever changed by some whim of the universe.

And with that I was remembering Gloucester's famous quote from King Lear:

Like flies to wanton boys are we to the gods: they kill us for their sport.

And hence the poem was born. Gloucester btw is blinded by one of his sons, so that's where the title comes from.

Oh and Ishtat I think I will take some of your suggestions though if you think I can make a coherent "torahaical" argument, lol, you have way too much faith in me


ETA: a special thanks to our current MIP, Under Your Spell, for her constant support and encouragement. You are the best, Annie!

PSS Chip, the comma is only after worse as it's not really a parenthetical. I did mean that there could be something worse than perdition and that is "less," i.e., nothing.

 

[butters]

thanks for clearing that up, angie

and thankyou, ishtat, for your thoughts. i'm never going to pout over someone's honest opinion. if mediocre to good is yours, then i am pleased you took the time to read and let me know. yes, it does read better without 'like' and 'all'.


he sits on steps
gathering snow
a bowling alley with row
on row of uniform white
pins knocked down
waiting to be stood again -
a silence of machines


i will go amend that in my filing thread. ty!


done. if i riffed off the Flanders fields, it was inspired but not deliberate - however, i did wonder if an allusion to no deus ex machina might come across with my last line....


sigh. layer cakes ain't what they used to be.

 

[bogusagain]

Thanks for your comments on my poem Chip, seattle and 1201. I guess the poem is a little strange but here are some references made. Johnny Jane is the female character in Gainsbourgs film Je t'aime mon non plus. Here's another clip with their clothes on but still a good clip. Then there is the song Ballade de Johnny Jane and the last reference of course Joan of Arc by Leonard Cohen. The poem is really about when I was on a train from Poitiers to Paris, this young beautiful woman got on at Tours and sat opposite me, she was truely a work of art. She left the train at Orleans and I was crushed. It was more a head thing and stuff rushing through my mind. I had actually seen the film Je táime mon non plus the night before and I'd been playing a lot of Cohen around the time. I'd also been reading a lot of novels and stuff, also about the 100 years war and visiting sites. It all sort of melted together. Juxaposed elements that add up to a surreal poem to anyone but me I suppose. It's something that has been floating around my head for years but could never express it until now because I didn't want to leave any elements out. Weird but there you go.

 

[SeattleRain]

Holy cow, thank you for the kind comments on Benko's Gambit. Very humbling.

 

[butters]

thanks for clearing that up, angie

and thankyou, ishtat, for your thoughts. i'm never going to pout over someone's honest opinion. if mediocre to good is yours, then i am pleased you took the time to read and let me know. yes, it does read better without 'like' and 'all'.


he sits on steps
gathering snow
a bowling alley with row
on row of uniform white
pins knocked down
waiting to be stood again -
a silence of machines


i will go amend that in my filing thread. ty!


done. if i riffed off the Flanders fields, it was inspired but not deliberate - however, i did wonder if an allusion to no deus ex machina might come across with my last line....


sigh. layer cakes ain't what they used to be.

just found this in the Daily Mail Online:

A once popular ten-pin bowling alley that would have echoed to the sound of laughter and falling skittles as Japanese families enjoyed a favourite weekend pastime was used as a make-shift morgue.

An eerie silence descended on the Airport Bowl, in the tsunami coast city of Sendai, broken only by muffled sobbing and sporadic wails of despair.

As the body count soared (on Saturday, 2,000 more were recovered from the mud and rubble in this district alone) those crematoriums still left standing were unable to cope.

With typical Japanese practicality, therefore, the vast bowling alley, which was only slightly damaged by the earthquake, has been converted into a mortuary.

Though the bowling balls still remain in their racks, each of its 21 lanes now holds up to a dozen coffins. Some 200 had been laid out neatly there.

The pastel-coloured caskets have viewing windows so that people can identify missing family members, and they filed along the lanes with heavy hearts, never knowing whether they might see a mother, brother or son.

Each anguished cry signified that someone had been found. Then a name tag was placed on the coffin, and after the family had paid their last respects, the window was closed.

 

[greenmountaineer]

for anyone at all confused by greenmountaineer's poem Last of the Sin-eaters:

it was a custom in the 19th and early 20th C for someone to take on the sins of the dead person by the eating of a crust of bread that had been placed on their chest whilst dying. it was accompanied by ale to wash it down. in some perhaps more rural areas, this task would be allotted to a beggar - it would be their job to visit the deathbeds of all the locals, so that their spirits might rest in peace. it also ensured more food and drink for a beggar...

the 'mother' in her nursing home bed spends her days dallying with old memories bright as new pennies, and it leaves me wondering whose sins she wishes to take on ... the living relatives that rarely visit, so they may rest easy once she is gone, herself, or the sins of a community in general that leaves the elderly in distant 'homes' where they may be forgotten more easily?

nb: anyone who has elderly relatives in nursing homes - my comments are not some barb directed at you, since i am sure they do not apply. they are an overall observation of how it so often pans out....

Thanks, chipbutty. You wrote it well. I've been on a bit of kick about nursing homes lately. They're not bad in themselves; the staff are dedicated. My grandmother lived in one for many years, received excellent care, and was a joyful person until the end of her life. Rather, I see them as a metaphor for how we have "out-sourced" the universal reality of the end of life in the modern West. While I can't speak authoritatively about current practices in Oriental countries, the stereotype of respect for the elderly remains when I think of life there. I say "stereotype" because I have to believe that the global economy and the changes it brings are signficantly changing the cultural icons there also.

I've read that the "last of the sin-eaters" died in Wales; hence, the location of the poem. "Gwyneth" was not a beggar in the old sense, but in the modern sense was by virtue of her subservience to her parents and the little gratitude of her one son later.

 

[UnderYourSpell]

Thank you to SeattleRain (I can't bring myself to put SR seeing as it's a toothpaste! can I please go back to calling you Anna?), Green, Chippy and One thousand two hundred and one for your kind comments on 'My Son'

 

[butters]

thanks, bulltlr and twelvio, for your reads and comments.
appreciated.

1201, i knew you wouldn't like that one. too indulgent for your tastes.

 

[twelveoone]

now, this i will thank you for, twelvio
is it he or the steps gathering snow? both. so i feel ok about leaving that as it is. he sits immobile as the steps, the snow collects on him, collects on them, they're both not serving their purpose as intended during this tragedy....

the him/bowling alley thing - i'll look to see if there's a way around it to reduce the distraction, but i don't mind ambiguity or metaphors. inside he feels as displaced as the bowling alley... a place normally filled with the living, laughter, sound, it is now a place of odd silence and row upon row of white coffins; inside him, his 'knocked down bowling pins' are never going to be stood up again either. there's some activity inside, but it's not life as he knows it kinda thing.

i suppose some punctuation might break it into something less distracting; i'm not convinced (atm) that by doing so i won't lose the deliberate ambiguities within it.

i will definitely consider and work on it. food for thought.

take a look, chip.
Here I stand on the path
That snakes
Trod down in sage grasses
Condemned

Anyway, greenmountaineer, I take it as a rather high compliment that you read it 5 or 6 times. As far "I wasn't sure if you were mocking Nietsche's Eternal Return or agreeing with it," in most of my work there is a real ambivalence, and self mockery involved. And you can read it that way or as a path that snakes. Trod down...condemned.. I think front end caps was the style at the time. Right before his breakdown, he did weep for an ass (donkey). Thank you. Thank you Seattle Rain, as for your Q.
The greatest weight.-- What, if some day or night a demon were to steal after you into your loneliest loneliness and say to you: "This life as you now live it and have lived it, you will have to live once more and innumerable times more; and there will be nothing new in it, but every pain and every joy and every thought and sigh and everything unutterably small or great in your life will have to return to you, all in the same succession and sequence - even this spider and this moonlight between the trees, and even this moment and I myself. The eternal hourglass of existence is turned upside down again and again, and you with it, speck of dust!"
Would you not throw yourself down and gnash your teeth and curse the demon who spoke thus?... Or how well disposed would you have to become to yourself and to life to crave nothing more fervently than this ultimate eternal confirmation and seal? Nietzsche

which may explain why grasses was pluralized, but that is another philosophical question

 

[twelveoone]

thank you UYS, I do try to keep my drivel confined to the threads. Bog, I had misread nasty instead of natty at first. It's that too. Thanks.