Archive for the ‘Of Poem’ Category
Entry 1734 — “Poem Meets His Author”
Tuesday, February 24th, 2015
Poem Meets His Author One day Poem found him self sitting at a pic nic table in a pleasantly sunny park facing a weird, bald-headed old man with a pony-tail and an engaging smile. Immediately he knew who the man was: his author. No mystery how he knew: everything he knew his author provided him when his author needed him to know it (seldom when he did). Poem wondered what was up. That came from his most essential self--i.e., the personality, character, exterior or whatever you wanted to call it, that his author had given him when creating him. More accurately, it was what the author himself had gotten from, who knows where, at some point in his growth toward what he had been when what he was made him recognize the need for an later ego that, in turn caused him to bring forth Poem. "Blah," Poem thought. "This joker is just another alter ego of Bob Grumman's, just one maybe closer to his real self." "Does that make a difference?" asked the text's Bob Grumman. Before Poem couldanswerthepoemstopped.
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Entry 1732 — “Marmalooted But Carrying On”
Sunday, February 22nd, 2015
I was planning to tell you about my horrible last night. For some reason the word, “marmalooted” occurred to me, and it seemed for who-knows-why to described what happened to me. Then “unluted” followed it into my verblageniusse brain and I thought, why not instead a new Poem poem!!! Ergo, whether it’s any good or not:
Marmalooted But Carrying On Poem was so sure for the first three hours of the evening that he'd be unluted the rest of his miserable life, that he regretted he had no gods to pray that he'd quickly die to. No, that's not quite accurate: he did not wish for death because certain of it (as he always had been when his body felt significantly more screwed up than it always felt since, at 57, he had actually been afflicted with something life- threatening for the first time (prostate cancer). Be that as it may, every time he moved any part of his body, he shivered instantly below zero, in spite of the four layers of clothing he'd put on including his winter overcoat, and the three blankets and comforter he was lying under. This was not the first time he'd been attacked for some unknown reason by severe chills. Not only had he always survived them, but he always got over them no more than a few hours after they'd begun, and the after-effects were minor and lasted no more than a day. No exception this time. This was unfortunate, for it resulted in this wretchedly marmalooted report.
Good but far from great this might be as a prose text, but DOA (dead on arrival) as a poem. Hmmm, I think I would call it informrature, or a factual report rather than a poem. Oh, well, whatever it is, it’s another daily entry here.
Note: I originally put it in my blog’s “From My Poetry Workshop” category. I think it’s finished now, though–i.e. I don’t think it worth trying to improve even if I had any idea how that might be done. So it’s in the “Of Poem” category (which I’m happy to realize doesn’t claim it to be a poem).
Entry 1729 — “A Quanthrille of Grrr-rille”
Thursday, February 19th, 2015
I found another Poem poem from that batch of 39 I made early in 2014 and discovered I liked it quite a bit:
There’s a large problem with this, though: it’s too much like this, which I posted back on the seventh:
A Quadrille of Deedle The rain lifted, but over-churched somewhere by the glymmyr the first ocean's philosophy, Poem fell into the West lighk a thousand spandered leaves A prayer away, a cloud rose just behind the dis tant wharf and remained in place. A girl in pale blue loy tered on it. Wordsworth and Shelley joined her. The rain re turned. Heavily. The girl dissolved to the left of the poets, silently, in an obsolete meaning of "the."
There’s at least one more variation on the above. What to do? I suppose just making a theme and variations set? Or perhaps a splice of the two here with some of the repeated material changed? The bottom one seems before the second. I’ll have to think a while about them. . . .
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Entry 1723 — A Single Poem from Three
Friday, February 13th, 2015
I didn’t spend too much time on this but really like the way it came out:
At the First At the first ocean-wisdom, the lazy questions of the dolphins, folooping around his starplug, centered what thoughts Poem had. Gradually, his vocabulary wore away into warmth, proud to the touch, and galleoned to the top of the laughing April morning unnorming, unnorming, unnorming every worn where a syllable was abled against. Poem was uninquiserentlyy delubricated about what the word, “starplug” meant. Of course he knew it wasn’t a word the way, “way” or “why” were, just a nonciation of his high-blimeyed cre ator. Still it whatted for him at the leastest least's fringe. Was that girl somewhere in it? The one in that poem of long ago who was not at the whirlf? A potentially usable vocabulea far dis tant but still in view, Poem inquiserently salubricated the grrrlplug into his deepest wayre duculently achime in the Agincourt of his widening kingship. True merry the celubriation now inned around the now full-faring flitter Titania had choired about the many-whatted girll, and all the long-agone youmth of a particular summmermurrrr dayyy renorming into cockleblithe murmythry. . .
No doubt I’m too close to it to tell, but it seems right now the best of my revisions of the 39. I don’t think it’s quite finished, though.
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Entry 1721 — Yet Another Poem Poem
Wednesday, February 11th, 2015
My excuse for taking care of another entry with just another Poem poem from the 39 is a better one: it is that I want to use as much of the day as I can to take care of a project I consider IMPORTANT! It’s just a book review to be post at Amazon, but will include passages for use in the final edition of my Shakespeare and the Rigidniks, which is one of my Major Life’s Projects. Anyway: here is today’s poem:
A Small Stone’s Whisper On the top of a pine a small stone’s whisper away from Poem, Crow burst into ex cathedra laughter, scarlet in the iambic greyness of the Massachusetts winter snowing into April. Poem looked up in wonderment, never having come on Crow in any of the hinterskies that had overhung his dull excursions. The lane that Poem had been slowly walking on unwogged—but only briefly. Then it snarled halfway up the still-bleak sky, Poem tumbling off it. Mean while Crow frayed out of sight. Poem got up from the snow and went on hindering awry, destined to be unnoticed so long as men have breath or eyes to see but too tired to care.
I revised this one more than I’ve revised the others from the 39 so far post, but nothing major. The quotation from Shakespeare is new. I’m not sure it works.
Note: I’ll probably not post many more from the 39–the ones remaining seem pretty poor to me. The one above I consider a keeper, but just barely.
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Entry 1720 — “Arsummal”
Tuesday, February 10th, 2015
Another day of running around, tennis in the morning, and errands, and next, a meeting of my little local writers’ group. Ergo, nothing here but another Poem poem from my 39 thrown-togethers:
I love the image of the “unmarried knowledge,” but doubt I’ll ever know what it means.
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Entry 1719 — “The Game Drees Awn”
Monday, February 9th, 2015
Today the first of the Poem poems in the quartet (I think):
Again, I’m using my 39 “done-with-minimal-thought” Poem poems to get a blog entry out of the way. It looks like there won’t be much else for a while–good for me, because it will mean I’m busy with things more important to me; bad for you, unless you’re one of the few who like my Poem poems. (Note: the Joyce in these things is obvious, but, to me, the Dylan Thomas is much more loud.)
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Entry 1718 — “In the Key of Null Flat”
Sunday, February 8th, 2015
Today another of my 39 quickly-done Poem poems from a year or so ago because I want to get this entry out of the way quickly so I can concentrate on my latest Work-the-will-make-me-Famous:
In the Key of Null Flat A red chord silenced by sleet; in the distance, the wharf, listened into down to Poem’s long lost secret fortress in the marshes; banjo-sharp 11-year-old boys aglow in possibililities never to history than accountancy, turning into snow Did Wordsworth ever write a poem about snow . . . ?
This one (which I’ve slightly revised, changing an order of lines, and just a few other smaller things) I don’t think much of, but I think it’s the introductory poem to my wharf sequence, or one of them.
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Entry 1717 — “A Quadrille of Deedle”
Saturday, February 7th, 2015
Here’s another of my 30 spontaneous poems, except it’s no longer spontaneous, ’cause I revised it just now, my main change being the addition of the last three lines, which make it another masterpiece:
A Quadrille of Deedle The rain lifted, but over-churched somewhere by the glymmyr the first ocean's philosophy, Poem fell into the West lighk a thousand spandered leaves A prayer away, a cloud rose just behind the dis tant wharf and remained in place. A girl in pale blue loy tered on it. Wordsworth and Shelley joined her. The rain re turned. Heavily. The girl dissolved to the left of the poets, silently, in an obsolete meaning of "the."
Apparently I had religion on my mind while composing these poems. Interestingly, I think.
Note: “Quadrille” is some kind of wordplay on “quartet–due to my making a set of four poems about the wharf and Wordsworth and Shelley, etc. This one, I believe, is the fourth in the set. My impression is that the wharf comes up in more than four of the 39 poems. I love the image of “the wharf,” a receiver from afar and entrance into afar . . . Among so much else.
A thought: posting one of my 39 poems daily here until there are no more to post and seeing how many regular visitors I lose. . . . (My megalomania assures me that even these poems will be too good to attract new visitors.)
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Entry 1716 — “Bar Cripe”
Friday, February 6th, 2015
While going through my diary in search of accomplishments, I came across a poetry exercise I’d begun in March: the standard write-a-poem-a-day exercises many have tried–spontaneously, without worrying about whether or not what you wrote was any good. I’d forgotten all about it even though I wrote 39 Poem poems over the course of 39 day, putting them in my diary entries but not here (so far as I know). Often I wrote how bad they were although once in a while I thought one had possibilities. I just skimmed through them yesterday, but collected them into a single file and printed them after noticing a few I thought I might make something of. Looking over my print out, I read the very last poem of the series, and thought it possibly one of my best ever, so decided to feature it in this entry:
Actually, the above has been slightly revised. I had trouble carrying its formatting over into this entry, and at one point accidentally stuck the end of it under the rest of the poem tilted. I liked the effect, so used it as shown. Some of it depends on a reader’s knowledge of other Poem poems of mine, but I think it reasonably accessible to anyone who has read widely in poetry without know my poetry. I love the ending. Note: I myself am unsure exactly what a few locutions mean but keep them for what seems to me their tonal effect.
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marton koppany 
You know that Kevin Kelly guy always reminded me of Surllama for some reason.
I’ve always suspected they were one and the same–the two l’s in Surllama are strong evidence of it. And, of course, they are both maximally crude fellows. . . .
Ha, ha! Remember Todd Russell aka Huck Finch? He told me before I moved to California, something to the effect of: “Don’t let California change you, Surllama, I mean Kevin” and I remember thinking, “Nothing can change me!” … and then I became a snob. It happened about four years ago, to be exact. I’ll have to admit, it felt good to give in, like a warm bath of salt.
But seriously, sir, I’m trying to ONLY comment on the stuff I like (hence, the scarcity of any comments … I kid!) … and I like this here poem. I have to admit, I’ve always liked your poetry when you start talking about the tide and the phone ringing to itself, etc. My favorite line by far: “like misspelled lemonade” Good imagery! So there.
Well, I’ve always said negative comments are more helpful than positive ones, but your positive ones have definitely been helpful. As for Huck, we’ve exchanged e.mails since you’ve left. He’s sent me invitations to the parties he yearly has, but I’ve not yet been able to get to one. You should e.mail him, or facebook him. I think he’s on Facebook.