by day he is a demon drover
who roams with rats in vacant lots
eats pitted dates with monster toads
leaves rinds of snot on rabid stones
his matted mane snares the mist
he shares his mind with dented mates
is atomised by vengeful doves
rants at vets who sieve his dreams
his eyes are stained with totem odes
he vends his verse from vats of steam
stores his rage in raven's drains
strides the street with riven tomes
but when the mares of night invade
the priestly demons that he droves
divest their robes and mitred hats
and rape him on the road
Another poem from my University of Iowa MOOC writing experience. Visit Tuesday Poem for more poems this week.
Tuesday, August 19, 2014
Tuesday, August 5, 2014
Tuesday Poem: Giving birth
It’s scratching, sketching, hatching, culling
reflecting, collecting, selecting, electing
building, stitching, sowing, growing
It’s being mindful while netting metaphors
from speech and prosody's tidal reaches
lapping at our multitudes of selves
It’s saving sonnets lost in others’ words
taking pleasure with the tongue
seeking freedom in constraint
It’s congregation, congress, association
looking, sweating, kissing, cussing
this gestation, this poem writing
Like one or two other Tuesday Poem poets, several other New Zealanders, and over 3,000 global poetry writers, I have over the last 6 weeks been a participant in the University of Iowa's "Writers on Writing Poetry" MOOC. I registered for this online course because I was looking for new ways and techniques to explore and use when writing poems. To this end, I have not been disappointed and have been introduced to several ideas, many processes, and some exciting entrees into writing poetry. The course finishes this week and the above poem was my response to the exercise of writing a "constraint-based" poem. The constraint to be used was ours to choose and mine was to use a word from each of the titles that made up the12 Class Sessions. The words as they appear line by line in the poem are: sketching, collecting, building, mindful, prosody, multitudes, words, pleasure, constraint, association, looking, poem. And if you can get over all the -ing words in the poem, (which is frowned on by certain of today's poetry-writing teachers), I hope you enjoy.
Visit Tuesday Poem for more poems this week.
reflecting, collecting, selecting, electing
building, stitching, sowing, growing
It’s being mindful while netting metaphors
from speech and prosody's tidal reaches
lapping at our multitudes of selves
It’s saving sonnets lost in others’ words
taking pleasure with the tongue
seeking freedom in constraint
It’s congregation, congress, association
looking, sweating, kissing, cussing
this gestation, this poem writing
Like one or two other Tuesday Poem poets, several other New Zealanders, and over 3,000 global poetry writers, I have over the last 6 weeks been a participant in the University of Iowa's "Writers on Writing Poetry" MOOC. I registered for this online course because I was looking for new ways and techniques to explore and use when writing poems. To this end, I have not been disappointed and have been introduced to several ideas, many processes, and some exciting entrees into writing poetry. The course finishes this week and the above poem was my response to the exercise of writing a "constraint-based" poem. The constraint to be used was ours to choose and mine was to use a word from each of the titles that made up the12 Class Sessions. The words as they appear line by line in the poem are: sketching, collecting, building, mindful, prosody, multitudes, words, pleasure, constraint, association, looking, poem. And if you can get over all the -ing words in the poem, (which is frowned on by certain of today's poetry-writing teachers), I hope you enjoy.
Visit Tuesday Poem for more poems this week.
Tuesday, July 22, 2014
Tuesday Poem: The ghost of Abbassia
Why so pale, young soldier-lad
what gloominess is this?
The days are breathing summer’s heat
what can there be amiss?
The boy he gazed into his beer
then looked around real slow
before he told to me this tale
in voice that trembled low:
I was on a signals course
we was testing radio.
We drove out to Abbassia
six months or so ago.
The night was bollocks freezing
there was ice on top of snow
the mountain she was steaming
the moon with blood did glow.
We set up camp and had a feed
but not a drop of booze.
I went outside to take a leak
and saw a bloody ghoul.
His face was black, his lips was burnt
cordite stained his hands.
His battle dress was ripped to shreds
He wore a gunner’s badge.
He said to me his gun had breached
a live one up the spout.
The crew was dead and dying –
go rouse the medics out.
I looked at him and knew he was
not human any more.
The gun it did explode alright
but thirty years before.
I told the ghost to bugger off –
his crew was feeding worms.
The gunner ghoul he swore real foul
then on me laid a curse.
He told me not to venture near
the swamp at Ngamatea
‘specially in the summer
for I would disappear.
He said the swamp would swallow me
like all them sheeps ‘n cattle
my bony bits would marry theirs
and never even rattle.
I laughed away that ghostie’s curse
when we was back in base
until today when Sarge he said
with malice on his face
‘You lot is slack and need a run
stay off the smokes ‘n beer
tomorrow sharp at sparrow’s fart
we head for Ngamatea.’
I wish I’d never seen nor dissed
the ghost of Abbassia –
tomorrow I’ll be drowning in
that swamp at Ngamatea.
I wrote this ballad several years ago (apologies to Keats for the first two lines). It is based on a couple of incidents I experienced when I was a boy soldier in the 1960s. The ghost observation was reported by several of my colleagues during training when they were based at an NZ Army satellite camp (Abbassia, near Waiouru). Research later revealed that a gunner had been killed there 30 years previously when a shell exploded in a gun barrel during live-firing practice. We were also spun many stories about the Ngamatea (Nah-ma-tee-ah) swamp and how we would one day have to run through it during our physical training. These combined in my over-active but slow imagination 45 years later to spark this poem.
Visit Tuesday Poem for more poems and where this week's post is 'News from the Island' by Tracey Sullivan.
what gloominess is this?
The days are breathing summer’s heat
what can there be amiss?
The boy he gazed into his beer
then looked around real slow
before he told to me this tale
in voice that trembled low:
I was on a signals course
we was testing radio.
We drove out to Abbassia
six months or so ago.
The night was bollocks freezing
there was ice on top of snow
the mountain she was steaming
the moon with blood did glow.
We set up camp and had a feed
but not a drop of booze.
I went outside to take a leak
and saw a bloody ghoul.
His face was black, his lips was burnt
cordite stained his hands.
His battle dress was ripped to shreds
He wore a gunner’s badge.
He said to me his gun had breached
a live one up the spout.
The crew was dead and dying –
go rouse the medics out.
I looked at him and knew he was
not human any more.
The gun it did explode alright
but thirty years before.
I told the ghost to bugger off –
his crew was feeding worms.
The gunner ghoul he swore real foul
then on me laid a curse.
He told me not to venture near
the swamp at Ngamatea
‘specially in the summer
for I would disappear.
He said the swamp would swallow me
like all them sheeps ‘n cattle
my bony bits would marry theirs
and never even rattle.
I laughed away that ghostie’s curse
when we was back in base
until today when Sarge he said
with malice on his face
‘You lot is slack and need a run
stay off the smokes ‘n beer
tomorrow sharp at sparrow’s fart
we head for Ngamatea.’
I wish I’d never seen nor dissed
the ghost of Abbassia –
tomorrow I’ll be drowning in
that swamp at Ngamatea.
I wrote this ballad several years ago (apologies to Keats for the first two lines). It is based on a couple of incidents I experienced when I was a boy soldier in the 1960s. The ghost observation was reported by several of my colleagues during training when they were based at an NZ Army satellite camp (Abbassia, near Waiouru). Research later revealed that a gunner had been killed there 30 years previously when a shell exploded in a gun barrel during live-firing practice. We were also spun many stories about the Ngamatea (Nah-ma-tee-ah) swamp and how we would one day have to run through it during our physical training. These combined in my over-active but slow imagination 45 years later to spark this poem.
Visit Tuesday Poem for more poems and where this week's post is 'News from the Island' by Tracey Sullivan.
Tuesday, June 24, 2014
Tuesday Poem: Facial impressions
On the map it’s a runny nose
dripping Florida’s Keys
into the Gulf of Mexico.
But when the Beach Boys sing Kokomo
I still join in – Key Largo, Montego…
Come on pretty mama
That’s where you wanna go…
Although you can’t say Everglades to me
without large birds flapping their gantry wings
as they fly away from the evil
that slithers into the swamp
near those ghoul-like cypress trees
dreadlocked in Spanish moss.
And you can’t say Lake Okeechobee
without me seeing the mass murderer
who is really innocent
running through the lake-edge water
looking over his shoulder and tripping
when he hears the sound
of the blood hounds
that he can’t see through the mist
that parts then shrouds
the spectral trees.
And if you say Miami to me
I say vice, Don Johnson
the film whose names I can’t remember
with the Florida chapter of the mafia
that the Chicago Godfather
wants to rub out/pencil in
for an unstable alliance
between the New York bosses
and the Cuban connection
that morphs to the Pelican Brief
that changes into Scarface
starring Al Pacino.
I say it’s the front tooth of a mouth
which is really a womb
annually spawning several children
each with chainsaw limbs
only one eye
and a murderer’s heart.
This poem appeared in Tongues of Ash. Visit Tuesday Poem for more poems this week.
dripping Florida’s Keys
into the Gulf of Mexico.
But when the Beach Boys sing Kokomo
I still join in – Key Largo, Montego…
Come on pretty mama
That’s where you wanna go…
Although you can’t say Everglades to me
without large birds flapping their gantry wings
as they fly away from the evil
that slithers into the swamp
near those ghoul-like cypress trees
dreadlocked in Spanish moss.
And you can’t say Lake Okeechobee
without me seeing the mass murderer
who is really innocent
running through the lake-edge water
looking over his shoulder and tripping
when he hears the sound
of the blood hounds
that he can’t see through the mist
that parts then shrouds
the spectral trees.
And if you say Miami to me
I say vice, Don Johnson
the film whose names I can’t remember
with the Florida chapter of the mafia
that the Chicago Godfather
wants to rub out/pencil in
for an unstable alliance
between the New York bosses
and the Cuban connection
that morphs to the Pelican Brief
that changes into Scarface
starring Al Pacino.
I say it’s the front tooth of a mouth
which is really a womb
annually spawning several children
each with chainsaw limbs
only one eye
and a murderer’s heart.
This poem appeared in Tongues of Ash. Visit Tuesday Poem for more poems this week.
Tuesday, June 3, 2014
Tuesday Poem: Today, there are twenty-three
Dead leaves
scratch the city street.
The sky is light-weak,
wearing another winter’s
manifest on a sleeve
abstained by blue.
The street’s address
is solid Golden Mile,
where Versace, Gucci,
and Swarovski sup with
the Saatchi brothers.
It is voting season too,
the season of evasion,
sanitised reports,
lies disguised as promises,
squabbles about deciles
of squalor, poverty, jobs,
housing, inequality;
during which politicians
will make the brothers
even richer.
On Golden Mile
beggars squat.
Today, there are twenty-three
between Manners Street
and Parliament.
Dead leaves
scuffle round their feet.
We are just coming into New Zealand's winter and we have a general election in September. Hopefully (or perhaps not), the poem says it all.
I'm also the hub Tuesday Poem editor this week, and the poem I've chosen is "Quail Flat, 1960" by Kerry Popplewell. Check it out at the main Tuesday Poem blog, and don't forget to check out the poems in the sidebar as well!
scratch the city street.
The sky is light-weak,
wearing another winter’s
manifest on a sleeve
abstained by blue.
The street’s address
is solid Golden Mile,
where Versace, Gucci,
and Swarovski sup with
the Saatchi brothers.
It is voting season too,
the season of evasion,
sanitised reports,
lies disguised as promises,
squabbles about deciles
of squalor, poverty, jobs,
housing, inequality;
during which politicians
will make the brothers
even richer.
On Golden Mile
beggars squat.
Today, there are twenty-three
between Manners Street
and Parliament.
Dead leaves
scuffle round their feet.
We are just coming into New Zealand's winter and we have a general election in September. Hopefully (or perhaps not), the poem says it all.
I'm also the hub Tuesday Poem editor this week, and the poem I've chosen is "Quail Flat, 1960" by Kerry Popplewell. Check it out at the main Tuesday Poem blog, and don't forget to check out the poems in the sidebar as well!
Tuesday, April 29, 2014
Tuesday Poem: My Boy Jack by Rudyard Kipling
“Have you news of my boy Jack?”
Not this tide.
“When d’you think that he’ll come back?”
Not with this wind blowing, and this tide.
“Has any one else had word of him?”
Not this tide.
For what is sunk will hardly swim,
Not with this wind blowing, and this tide.
“Oh, dear, what comfort can I find?”
None this tide,
Nor any tide,
Except he did not shame his kind —
Not even with that wind blowing, and that tide.
Then hold your head up all the more,
This tide,
And every tide;
Because he was the son you bore,
And gave to that wind blowing and that tide!
This month has seen not only the 99th anniversary of ANZAC day, but also 100 years since the outbreak of WW1. Given these events, I have chosen a poem by Rudyard Kipling for this post. Kipling lost his own son John (Jack) in September 1915 at the Battle of Loos and while the poem is emotionally driven by that loss, it is also about the generic loss of loved ones in battle. Kipling wrote the poem as a prelude to a story about the Battle of Jutland in 1916, so the "Jack" can also be a reference to sailors (Jack Tars). I like the repetitive questions and use of the words 'tide' and 'wind blowing' in the poem, they echo the ebb and flow of the sea - and life.
For more good poems this week, visit Tuesday Poem.
Not this tide.
“When d’you think that he’ll come back?”
Not with this wind blowing, and this tide.
“Has any one else had word of him?”
Not this tide.
For what is sunk will hardly swim,
Not with this wind blowing, and this tide.
“Oh, dear, what comfort can I find?”
None this tide,
Nor any tide,
Except he did not shame his kind —
Not even with that wind blowing, and that tide.
Then hold your head up all the more,
This tide,
And every tide;
Because he was the son you bore,
And gave to that wind blowing and that tide!
This month has seen not only the 99th anniversary of ANZAC day, but also 100 years since the outbreak of WW1. Given these events, I have chosen a poem by Rudyard Kipling for this post. Kipling lost his own son John (Jack) in September 1915 at the Battle of Loos and while the poem is emotionally driven by that loss, it is also about the generic loss of loved ones in battle. Kipling wrote the poem as a prelude to a story about the Battle of Jutland in 1916, so the "Jack" can also be a reference to sailors (Jack Tars). I like the repetitive questions and use of the words 'tide' and 'wind blowing' in the poem, they echo the ebb and flow of the sea - and life.
For more good poems this week, visit Tuesday Poem.
Tuesday, April 1, 2014
Tuesday Poem: The Condensed Modified Mercalli Scale
I - V
Delicately suspended objects may swing
Many people do not recognise it
Vibration like passing of truck
At night some awakened
Walls make cracking sound
Disturbance of trees, poles, and other tall objects
Pendulum clocks may stop
VI - IX
Many frightened and run outdoors
Some chimneys broken
Noticed by persons driving motorcars
Fall of columns, monuments, walls
Heavy furniture overturned
Changes in well water
Ground cracked conspicuously
X - XII
Shifts sand and mud
Water slopped over banks
Broad fissures in ground
Earth slumps
Rails bent greatly
Waves seen on ground
Lines of sight distorted
Found in the 'Modified Mercalli (MM) Intensity Scale', from An Encyclopaedia of New Zealand, edited by A. H. McLintock, originally published in 1966.
In a recent post, I quoted the middle stanza of The Condensed Modified Mercalli Scale, a found poem I wrote as part of a small collection of quake poetry with a working title of Felt Intensity. Today, the Central Hawkes Bay towns of Waipukurau and Waipawa experienced a swarm of earthquakes, the biggest of which was 5.2 on the Richter Scale. Little damage has been reported to date. The quakes have prompted me to post the complete Condensed Modified Mercalli Scale.
Visit Tuesday Poem for more poems this week and read TP's special 4th birthday poem, each line written by a different Tuesday Poem Poet without knowing what the other poets had written. The whole poem was knitted together by three editors and the result is fantastic.
Delicately suspended objects may swing
Many people do not recognise it
Vibration like passing of truck
At night some awakened
Walls make cracking sound
Disturbance of trees, poles, and other tall objects
Pendulum clocks may stop
VI - IX
Many frightened and run outdoors
Some chimneys broken
Noticed by persons driving motorcars
Fall of columns, monuments, walls
Heavy furniture overturned
Changes in well water
Ground cracked conspicuously
X - XII
Shifts sand and mud
Water slopped over banks
Broad fissures in ground
Earth slumps
Rails bent greatly
Waves seen on ground
Lines of sight distorted
Found in the 'Modified Mercalli (MM) Intensity Scale', from An Encyclopaedia of New Zealand, edited by A. H. McLintock, originally published in 1966.
In a recent post, I quoted the middle stanza of The Condensed Modified Mercalli Scale, a found poem I wrote as part of a small collection of quake poetry with a working title of Felt Intensity. Today, the Central Hawkes Bay towns of Waipukurau and Waipawa experienced a swarm of earthquakes, the biggest of which was 5.2 on the Richter Scale. Little damage has been reported to date. The quakes have prompted me to post the complete Condensed Modified Mercalli Scale.
Visit Tuesday Poem for more poems this week and read TP's special 4th birthday poem, each line written by a different Tuesday Poem Poet without knowing what the other poets had written. The whole poem was knitted together by three editors and the result is fantastic.
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