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Post by joew on Mar 16, 2007 17:46:14 GMT -5
Yikes! A twist of fate, (or should I say font), a fold in space time, a quontom Bleep! Get back ye Satan!! Spring hath sprung and the Mother of us all shall cast ye out. Alas it snowed here too. And as I read the above the announcer on KCME in Colorado Springs was saying that they are expecting daytime highs of 70°F out there.
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Post by Trusty on Mar 17, 2007 7:05:56 GMT -5
This reminds me of the remark attributed to Mae West. Someone asked her opinion of beer and she replied, "Pour it back into the horse." Mae West? I always thought that was my mother's original saying.
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Post by rogesgallery on Mar 17, 2007 12:48:50 GMT -5
Setting little stepping stones on Mothers garden path today I think it's a slip'ry slope but Tis what she wants so that she'll hath And I'll go by and bleach'em When 'ere the the moss does grow To stave off broken hips from slips Tis...age we seldom see or know
That's better
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Post by joew on Mar 17, 2007 12:49:43 GMT -5
Was she born earlier enough for Mae to have stolen it from her?
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Post by slb2 on Mar 17, 2007 21:56:26 GMT -5
our snow was yesterday. None today.
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Post by rogesgallery on Mar 17, 2007 22:23:54 GMT -5
Nobody here but me and a couple o dead poets.
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Post by slb2 on Mar 19, 2007 15:41:31 GMT -5
Medicine
Two days after my sister died and the pussy willow fattened, I stopped by the clinic to refill a prescription.
Rain soaked the ground, running rivers along the concrete curb, sailing wine corks stabbed with toothpick flags into the gutter.
The pharmacy had just what I needed, and an old woman fighting with the glassed doors, but no raincoat. I offered to walk her to her car,
hiding her under my umbrella, sheltering her from the chilling rain ushering her safely to her Oldsmobile, crying as she drove away.
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Post by Gracie on Mar 19, 2007 18:35:48 GMT -5
Slb, that is just lovely. I have a mental picture of your daughter, flowering into the next phase of her life....you know how beautiful a rose in bloom is, and that's what I see....complete with the dew.
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Post by rogesgallery on Mar 19, 2007 19:10:09 GMT -5
Ya gotta put the flame pretty close to the lemon juis ink to see the spring in that SLB but its a winner in my book!! Arf Arf
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Post by rogesgallery on Mar 19, 2007 19:39:46 GMT -5
Medicine,,,,,Hmmm
It is a beautiful slice of Americana and illustrates quite vividly, for me, the most puzzling of our antitheses. The last verse ties the first very effectively to the continuous bond between the living and those who have passed from this life just as miraculously as they arrived.
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Post by slb2 on Mar 19, 2007 22:53:12 GMT -5
thanks for your comments, roges. With the birthday poem, to me it's so clearly spring because my daughter's birthday is April 7th. But for those who wouldn't know that, I might make it more clear, if only for the sake of the contest.
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Post by joew on Mar 20, 2007 13:13:05 GMT -5
Winter waited. Then snow and rain and cold combine For ice on Valentine. Again we wait and parch With hard freeze in March — Seeing one warm day come and go — Till winter's deepest snow Arrives just before St. Pat. A funny winter, that!
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Post by booklady on Mar 21, 2007 5:43:37 GMT -5
Spring is sprung The grass is riz I wonder where The boids all is?
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Post by Gracie on Mar 21, 2007 7:10:32 GMT -5
They is building a nest in the eaves of my house. And they is squabbling about it. I know, because I hear them every day:
"Don't you DARE put that shelf up there!"
"Well, where else am I going to set the boom box?'
"I TOLD you paint wasn't a good idea. You never listen to me! I wanted that Laura Ashley wallpaper, but nooooooooooooooooooooooooo!"
"Why don't you just go sit on some eggs!"
I think that's what they said, anyway. It was either that, or, "IF you're not gonna eat it, refrigerate it!"
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Post by slb2 on Mar 22, 2007 13:21:47 GMT -5
Here's my re-write. I'd love to hear your thoughts. Is this one an improvement or did you like the first one better?
Turning Sixteen My daughter will be sixteen She's waited her whole life To change from the in between It slices her youth like a knife
She's waited her whole life A tadpole's launching leap It slices her youth like a knife She rises from deep sleep
A tadpole's launching leap It's her birthday in the morn She rises from deep sleep Beginning the day she was born
It's her birthday in the morn She's wet with April dew Beginning the day she was born When everything was new
She's wet with April dew But she shakes it like a dog When everything was new Emerging from the fog
But she shakes it like a dog To change from the in between Emerging from the fog My daughter will be sixteen
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Post by Jane on Mar 22, 2007 13:24:58 GMT -5
You're so good, Susan. But I suppose you already know that.
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Post by slb2 on Mar 22, 2007 15:33:42 GMT -5
pssstt, just between you and me, Jane, I won't believe it until I get published. I think anything (poetry) that I write that momentarily looks good is just a delusion. This month and in April I'm submiting to a whole handful of journals. sigh. The envelopes of rejections for poetry give me more paper cuts than the magazines turning down nonfiction articles. Thanks for your encouragement. It holds me up.
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Post by slb2 on Mar 23, 2007 15:06:01 GMT -5
Okay, this next one is my third consideration for that APHC contest. A Month of Days In the beginning, it was like any other month, but there were missing figures on the ledger where the facts should have been. And her fingers curled curiously when she stretched to pull the chain while turning on her bedside light, which was needed to warm up from the rain. November in Kansas still brings rain. It’s funny that way, how the month is yet changing over to snow, and the light fades to almost nothing. She wonders where it’s gone--her brain has a hard time trying to pull up facts and sort reality with cold, cramped fingers. And that’s just it. It was the tremor in her fingers that betrayed her, not the limp or the rain. Though my mother said it hurt like hell to watch her pull her left leg around like a lame dog that’s been leashed for a month to the back of the shed, barking in agony, where were the owners, couldn’t they have left on a light? By January, the light advances, illuminating her bare head and wizened fingers. And the question of treatment no longer centers on where, but how much? We wonder if she’ll hold on until the rain falls again in spring. We stop counting by month and begin numbering weeks-- death’s dank pull. March is fraught with needles; even the pull tab on her zipper leaves her twisted and light headed. It’s the last month I see her with moving lips and warm fingers. From the sky, clouds move in to rain on our souls, soaking into nowhere. April holds no refuge. There is no where to run to avoid this dizzying pain, the pull to wrap up in fantasy falls like rain. She sees the light through closed eyes as her fingers reach out to touch a new reality, beyond this cruel month. She spends five days of this last month with us then spreads her arms and fingers. I shall not see her again in this light. ==================== So, now we have A Month of Days, Turning Sixteen, and Medicine. I've been working on a brand new one, but it's still steeping. For those three, which one do you think GK will like best?
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Post by booklady on Mar 23, 2007 19:10:55 GMT -5
slb, I have a daylong thing to go to tomorrow, but 'll try to give your poems a careful reading in the morning when I'm fresh and before I leave.
I think I'm going to try to write something for the Dylan Days writing competition.
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Post by slb2 on Mar 24, 2007 0:27:24 GMT -5
Thanks for saying something, books. I was beginning to feel very exposed and embarrassed.
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Post by booklady on Mar 24, 2007 6:36:55 GMT -5
I'm sorry slb. It's been kind of a busy week for me, with brain cells engaged in other matters. Once this weekend is over, I'll be able to think again.
I'm printing out your poems, now.
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Post by booklady on Mar 24, 2007 6:45:22 GMT -5
Well, I can't print them out right now because of my balky printer.
A Month of Days has left me in tears and being able to feel my heart in my chest.
I don't know how to vote. You can only submit one?
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Post by Trusty on Mar 24, 2007 14:03:08 GMT -5
A Month of Days has left me in tears and being able to feel my heart in my chest. "The Poet's Need for Redundancy"
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Post by booklady on Mar 24, 2007 15:12:46 GMT -5
Trusty, I don't understand your post.
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Post by booklady on Mar 24, 2007 16:48:45 GMT -5
slb, I don't know what to tell you, girl. A Month of Days leaves me weeping. It's a powerful poem. So is Medicine. They are all good. I went off looking for the rules and guidelines for submission, can't find it here, and am going to the APHC website.
In the meantime, where is my Roges? And where is my friend Gail? When will they be back? I'm about to post the lyrics to Dylan's "Abandoned Love." Like political insults to some of us, being abandoned, to me, is so very hard to take.
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Post by joew on Mar 24, 2007 19:00:58 GMT -5
Well, slb, if you can only submit one, I'd suggest that "Medicine" may be a bit more accessible. "A Month of Days" is more heart-wrenching, but may need closer attention.
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Post by slb2 on Mar 25, 2007 13:06:34 GMT -5
Hmmm. I'm getting votes for different poems, but no consensus. I happen to like the Turning Sixteen one. Others have an opinion?
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Post by booklady on Mar 25, 2007 16:22:18 GMT -5
slb, I like all three of the poems, for different reasons. I'm not sure that any of them make me think of spring, but I don't think that's necessary according to the contest guidelines. There just needs to be a reference to spring.
Each of them move me in different ways. If I had to pick, I'd probably choose "Medicine." I love the way your grief is turned around into action helping an elderly lady, while the sky cries (and you do, too).
I was wondering what you would think about putting a period after the line, "The pharmacy had just what I needed" and then perhaps offering both an ambiguity and a contrast in the next few lines about the old woman, like this:
The pharmacy had just what I needed. An old woman fighting with the glass doors Had no raincoat....
The ambiguity being, of course, that we're not sure whether the woman may be been that thing you needed. I kind of want her to be.
I'd like to know why you are leaning toward "Sixteen," not because I don't think it's good, but because I'm interested in your reasoning.
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Post by booklady on Mar 25, 2007 20:19:13 GMT -5
Bumping this thread back up to the top hoping slb will notice.
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Post by slb2 on Mar 25, 2007 20:30:57 GMT -5
It's surprising because Medicine is my least favorite. But my poetry editor/best friend also just recommended it in a private e-mail. Your suggestion is a good one, books. I definitely wanted to give the impression that the old woman is just what I needed because she was. That poem is the most narrative of the three I offered, plus it is 100% true. I wrote it down within days after the event. Why do I like Turning Sixteen? Because I love my daughter and it expresses, to me, my love for her and my shining eyes as I looked at her while she grew from a young teen into a young woman, which is what seemed to happen when she turned 16. Also, I love to write structured or formal poetry and Turning Sixteen is a pantoum, a French form, which I find very lyrical. So that moves me toward thinking of the contest because GK wants lyrics and poetry. I think I see joew's point about A Month of Days being more challenging. But again, because it's a sestina with lots of repetition, I think that lends a lyrical element as well. I'm so glad for the replies here because I love discussing poetry, mine or anyone else's. And I'm so pleased, books, that you made a suggestion. That makes me feel read, if you know what I mean. But all this focus on ME brings me back to Jane's comment, and I'm sure that whoever wills this contest will make my submission look embarrassingly weak and I'll want to run back here and delete all of my posts with my tail between my legs. Just watch and see if I don't. =sigh= Thanks everyone. Sincerely, thank you.
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