Posts Tagged poem
Ace of Clubs: The Bravest
Posted by Angela Brett in Kennedy Space Center, The Best of Switzerland, Vienna, Writing Cards and Letters on November 11, 2012
Whenever, on my personal adventure quest
I come across two paths, I know that I’ll
Inevitably find the biggest treasure chest
along the road that’s scares me wordless, worldless and worthwhile.
Now sometimes I can feel which one’s the bravest way,
like: do I vaunt my head or write my heart?
Outcome, I’m gearing up to tell you this today:
I don’t know which is bravest: leave home, leave job, or restart?
Continue as things are, I’ll have to transfer, flee
the only home I’ve made; time, brain, backbone
gone into now-familiar things that anchor me
weigh anchor, sail away to sunsets, fun fêtes and unknown.
Or change things, follow heroes who have dared to quit,
start new in the surroundings I’ve enjoyed,
arrange things so this country lets me stay a bit
for study? One more contract, endless? Centless? Self-employed?
I’ve hemmed and hawed and ranked and scored and felt and thought and swung my sword, delayed, ignored, gone back and forward, and this is all it’s led me toward:
Whichever path is scary (therefore good)
The bravest cut their own paths through the wood.
Queen of Diamonds: A Tale of Two Dinosaurs
Posted by Angela Brett in Dinosaurier, Writing Cards and Letters on October 14, 2012
This dinosaur’s preserved for all to see,
so you and I can tell how life got wings.
That dinosaur’s preserved in you and me;
its atoms passed the years in living things.
“This dinosaur the fossil represents,
has lasted so much longer than I will,”
that dinosaur (in human shape) laments
while cleaning off a bone upon a hill.
This dinosaur’s remains lay still through eras
to show us that its kin were once alive.
That dinosaur’s remains run through chimeras
though consciousness of neither can survive.
This dinosaur thinks nothing in its head.
That dinosaur as well will soon be dead.
Yesterday I went on a fairly spontaneous trip to the Jura with some friends. We parked the car in a Jurassic park, and saw some dinosaur tracks; not too surprising, I suppose, since the Jurassic period was named after this region. I’ve hastily put up a few unedited, barely-viewed photographs; you can read more about what’s in them at the dinoplagne site.
Anyway, a friend said something about her remains not lasting that long, and it occurred to me that if everything were fossilised there’d be nothing left to make new things with, and we were actually made of atoms that had been in dinosaurs. I didn’t think that was necessarily good enough to write about, but I still hadn’t come up with a better idea by this evening. In search of a better idea, I looked at last cycle’s Queen of diamonds (which I think is better than this one, although it’s a little weird) and was reminded that there’s such a thing as a sonnet, and they only take 14 lines and have plenty of structure to help the uninspired writer fill them in. So I wrote this first draft of a sonnet about dinosaurs. Oddly enough, odd-numbered lines in odd-numbered stanzas, and both lines of the final couplet, start with spondees instead of iambs, or at least that’s they way they should be read.
Ten of Diamonds: Another Perspective
Posted by Angela Brett in Declaration of Independence, Golden Gate Bridge, Katzen der Welt, Writing Cards and Letters on September 30, 2012
Here are some more arrow poems. Click the poems for pdf versions you can enlarge and copy the text from.
As promised, I got Jonathan Coulton and Paul and Storm to pick the cards this week. Jonathan chose Richard Stockton, and Paul chose first the European shorthair cat, and then the Golden Gate National Parks card on behalf of Storm, who had just gone to do something else at the time. I’m fairly sure Paul and Storm are entangled, so I accept this as a valid Storm choice.
I read that there’s a large homeless population in Golden Gate Park, and also that European shorthairs are not popular outside of Scandinavia because they resemble a lot of homeless cats. Richard Stockton died a pauper, maybe not homeless, but close enough. Given that it’s a natural state for a cat to roam, and the idea of owning a human family or two might seem strange and restrictive to one who hasn’t previously tasted cat food, I wondered what would happen if a sad, newly-homeless Stockton had encountered a happily ‘homeless’ cat in the then-nonexistent Golden Gate Park. Probably some hissing, a rift in space time, and either a nourishing kitty stew or a very scratched-up politician. I couldn’t think of a storyline that wouldn’t be trite and generally the worst fable of all time, so I fell back on the arrow poem form I invented previously. It’s easier than it looks.
If you like, you can think of the up arrow as being from the perspective of a cat and the down arrow from that of Richard Stockton. Perhaps Jonathan subconsciously chose this card for the same reason he writes so many sad songs.
And on the subject of Jonathan writing sad songs (some of which are funny because they’re about monkeys and cephalopods and vampires) he’s also the down arrow in the second poem. Opening band Paul and Storm are the up arrow, because they’ve only written one sad song that I know of. That’s not to say that Jonathan is a downer; plenty of his songs are funny without being sad, and I love funny sad songs (and non-funny sad songs) anyway.
In case you were wondering, following the tour was awesome as always. I met a lot of nice people, caught up with several I already knew, discovered a new sciency songwriter when she gave her CDs to Jonathan, and also visited Bath. I’m uploading videos of the Union Chapel show now, and will put up the rest over the next few weeks, and in the mean time you could watch the Susie Asado videos I’ve put up. Next stops: Wax Mannequin at my favourite venue on land, and Marian Call at CERN (which will probably become my new favourite venue on land once I have reason to call it a venue. But then again, it already has Hardronic.) Would you believe I’d never been to a concert of my own volition until December 2008?
Three of Diamonds: The Family Tradition
Posted by Angela Brett in Deal me out I'm Crabby (plain Maryland cards) on July 22, 2012
Your father, his father, and his before that,
Your mother, her mother, and all the way back
Have kept a tradition by chance or by will
To each have a baby (or several) until
The flame’s passed to you, but now you have a choice
So don’t join the choir till you find your own voice.
Creating a person’s a huge thing to try;
You can if you want, but first think about why:
Not to continue this age-old tradition
Not to be sure that your life has a mission
Not for a god or a country or norm, oh
Not for a lark, or the whim of a hormone
Not for a vague or instinctive desire
Not just to copy the folks you admire
Not out of fear you’ll leave nothing behind
(Not that your DNA outdoes your mind)
Not ’cause you’re bright so you should spread your genes
Not ’cause you’re dim and don’t know what that means
Not to rebel against Mum and Dad’s view
Not because they want their vengeance on you
Not as a snake oil to quiet your fears
That you might feel a twinge of regret in ten years
Not when your body clock’s ticking through dates
And you’re always a sucker for ‘Buy now! Don’t wait!’s
Not because well-behaved babes tug your heart
Not so your parents can relive that part
Not ’cause your partner would like to have some
Not ’cause you’re grateful that Dad convinced Mum
Not ’cause you’ve thought of a name you must give
Or things you’d do better if you could relive
Not when a thoughtless mistake involved sex
Not ’cause you’re married and that’s what comes next
Not because all of your friends ask why not
Not because they’re doing well with their lot
Not ’cause you’re told that it’s selfish to live
without making a beggar to whom you can give
Not because parents say nothing else matters
Not to add glue to a romance in tatters
Not because children learn more tricks than cats
Not to prove your kids would never be brats
Not so your welfare amount will be goin’ up
Not ’cause you think it’ll make you a grownup
Not so they’ll pay for your food in old age
(for pyramid schemes have to collapse at some stage)
Not to fulfil a perceived need for love
Not if you’re not sure, when push comes to shove
Not ’cause you read this and thought, ‘This’ll show ’em!’
Not for the sentiment closing this poem.
But only because you adore helping youth
and can’t think of life without living that truth.
You know that their life-long love’s not guaranteed
and you’re yearning to face unconditional need
of a boy, girl or intersexed, well, sick or crippled
dunce, saint or murderer, one, twins or tripled.
You’re deeply concerned the resources you borrow
may add to the hardship of grandkids tomorrow
and realise your efforts to curb your consumption
are more than undone if you make the assumption
that your kids survive and continue to breed
and their kids spawn ever more hungers to feed.
If raising a person is your lifelong dream,
and not just a gesture to race with the team
then go ahead, try to conceive, but know this:
it’s not just a baby that’s made in all this.
You remake yourself as you start your new quest,
as parent first up, and then some of the rest.
From baby’s perspective you’ve made the whole world;
you’ve led them from nowhere to cosmos unfurled.
So enjoy your big bang and enjoy your inflation,
And cherish your well-informed act of creation.
Jack of Spades: The Horse Who Was Born as a Boy
Posted by Angela Brett in Australia's Dangerous Creatures, Scenic New Zealand, St James's Gate, Writing Cards and Letters on May 20, 2012
Strange things happened; who knows why?
The wingbeat of a butterfly?
The flutter of a software bug
in programs running Earth and Sky?
The will of God, a cosmic ray,
its impact changing DNA?
A whim, a prayer, a faulty plug,
a blunder or a poker play?
Doesn’t matter, it’s occurred:
a change of places most absurd.
A bundle of supposed joy
was startled to be born unfurred;
like bees as birds, and birds as bees,
and hes as hers and hims as shes,
a horse was born as if a boy
and raised in human families.
He voted ‘neigh’ on ‘learn to talk’
and always used his hands to walk
and never to attack a meal
with proper use of knife and fork.
He whinnied for a mother mare,
but human mother, not aware,
assumed his brain would never heal
and placed the boy in foster care.
The horse-boy went from place to place,
exhausting homes at trotting pace
as so-called carers would perceive
a slowpoke of the human race.
They made him food but never kin,
derisive of the horse within,
till one day when he had to leave
a farming couple took him in.
“His heart is good, if not his head,”
his newfound foster parents said.
By day he’d never cease to roam;
by night he spurned his comfy bed.
With love, despite his skittish way
the farmers vowed to let him stay.
At last he’d found a stable home
and slept in there amongst the hay.
Big hearts, big stables, in due course,
the farm took in a crazy horse
and horse-man (for our boy had grown)
was floored by the attractive force.
He saw that she was not a mare,
but human woman stuck in there
And said, in human pheromone,
“Ma’am, you could ride me anywhere.”
They nuzzled, for she liked him too,
more’n any horse or man she knew.
Despite his foreign horsey smarts
he knew what she’d been going through.
They played till they were giddy
up the hills and through the city.
Mixed-up bodies, linked-up hearts
And shared emotions more than pity.
Strange things happen; who knows why?
The wingbeat of a butterfly?
The flutter of a software bug
in programs running Earth and Sky?
Whatever forces took the rein,
this act of horseplay’s not all pain.
It didn’t pull the final plug
and that’s why it may run again.
Nine of Spades: Perspective
Posted by Angela Brett in Optical Illusions, Writing Cards and Letters on May 6, 2012
Which way do you see things first? (Click the poems for pdf versions you can enlarge and copy the text from.)
I have not seen Star Wars, so I wrote some poetry about it.
Posted by Angela Brett in Uncategorized on May 5, 2012
I have not seen much of the original Star Wars trilogy, unless I saw it when I was too young to remember anything. I was dragged along to Episode 1: The Phantom Menace in the theatre 13 years ago, forced to watch the trilogy back-to-back starting at 2a.m. in around the same time period (I fell asleep before taking much in, but not before the guy who was forcing me to watch it did) and watched as much as I could stand of the Holiday Special with Rifftrax starting at a similar hour (I gave up before the end, but not before Wil Wheaton did.) I played a fair bit of the Episode 1 Racer game on the Nintendo 64 back in the day. Almost everything else I know about Star Wars, I learnt from songs and internet memes. I know quite a lot of factlets from these sources, but I have no idea how they fit together. This Star Wars Day, I had the option of watching the original Star Wars trilogy in the CERN Council Chamber, but I was hesitant to lose my Star Wars virginity when I was one of so few people my age who still knew what it was like not to know the plot. It seemed like that would be wasted if I just saw it. I asked Twitter what to do, and the majority said to write ill-informed poetry about Star Wars before seeing the movies. One suggested haiku. So here’s a haiku, for starters:
“Come to the dark side.”
“Why? You’re not the boss of me.”
“I am your father.”
The person who suggested writing haiku wanted me to give a title for it, but I can’t decide on one. Maybe something like ‘Star Family Feud’ or ‘Daddy knows best’ or ‘Zo Vader, zo zoon’ (which is Dutch for ‘Like father, like son’.) or ‘Van Vader op Zoon’ (‘From father to son’) Any ideas?
Here is a poem containing most of the things I know about Star Wars that I could think of in the 10 hours or so since I came up with the idea. It amuses me, mainly because it rhymes, but it will probably amuse you more, since you know exactly how wrong it is. I don’t mind if you laugh with me or just at me. I think I’ll just call this one ‘I have not seen Star Wars, so I wrote some poetry about it.’
Long ago, in a galaxy far, far away,
there was light, there was dark, there were no shades of gray.
And a war was beginning, and stars were being made,
though I don’t know their names or the roles that they played.
I know some were ewoks, Storm Troopers and wookiees
And Jedi Knights, padawans, masters and rookies,
Darth Vader, and C3P0, R2D2,
but Einstein couldn’t name them, so don’t expect me to.
There were Chewie, and Yoda (the OSV talker)
Han Solo, and Leia, of course, Luke Skywalker.
There were Pod Racers, Falcons, and starships deluxe
and cruisers, and Land Speeders (that and five bucks
will get you a Death Star; it looks like a moon
but it’s some kind of space station dealing out doom.
You would think it would wipe out the good guys, but nup!
For some reason, this one’s a cinch to blow up.)
I digress. There’s a thing called the Force Luke must use,
for the good side or bad? He’s the one who must choose.
(Side note: midi-chlorians, what the Force goes on
are Force mitochondria, some kind of boson.)
So may it be with you, it’s stronger in this
one, whose lack of faith hints that there’s something amiss,
but I think Obi-Wan puts him on the right track.
(That’s a guess. I don’t know who he is. Don’t attack!)
I’m a little unclear how the plot goes from there,
but it’s not like I’m bumbling around unaware.
I know what a mind trick or lightsaber’s for
and I know that they’re not the droids I’m looking for.
If they sleep in a tauntaun, then someone won’t freeze
and for Palpatine’s sake, wookiee’s spelt with two ‘e’s.
And it’s Han that shot first, not… uh… Guido? No, Gweebo!
He couldn’t shoot first at a wounded gazebo.
So this guy named Darth Vader, who breathes through a mask,
his wardrobe’s all dark side, you don’t need to ask.
Well he tried to convince the young Luke to turn bad,
and then (spoiler alert!) he said, ‘Hey, I’m your dad!’
And the princess was somehow Luke Skywalker’s sister,
but nobody talked about how he once kissed ‘er.
He vanquished his father, who, looking quite gaunt,
while wheezing could still somehow scream ‘Do not want!’
The End (and I don’t care what anyone thinks;
this poem may suck, but it beats Jar Jar Binks.)
There are a few references to other things in there. OSV refers to Object Subject Verb, the word order Yoda tends to use. Wil Wheaton once traded his Death Star for a Land Speeder and five bucks, which is the only reason I know Land Speeders exist. Gazebos are very hard to wound, but they don’t attack much. And I know Darth Vader screamed ‘Nooooooo!’ rather than ‘do not want‘, but I’m not too sure when or why.
This is not part of the Writing Cards and Letters (have you noticed I’ve been ignoring the letters this time?) project. I’m still planning on publishing a nine of spades by Sunday noon. It will be short and sweet and sour.
May the Fourth be with you, if it still is in your time zone.
Edit: I still haven’t seen Star Wars, and I imperfectly recited this poem at the Open Mic night on JoCo Cruise Crazy 3.
Seven of Spades: The Duel
Posted by Angela Brett in Optical Illusions, Writing Cards and Letters on April 22, 2012
At dawn, separated by twenty two paces,
their vertices pointed in each other’s faces,
the cube and its foe Octahedron stood still,
as fair Tetrahedron urged ‘fire at will!’
For Cube fought with earth, Octahedron with air,
and to win Tetrahedron with fire’s not fair.
“Fight fire with fire, that’s what we agreed on!”
said seconds, Dodeca- and Icosahedron.
But they paused, and they wavered, and called, “Toi ou moi?
Who’ll live for now, and who forever, like Galois?”
They each made a face, for they’d each made a point.
Was dying or living the upper adjoint?
The Galois connection was hard to ignore;
he’d dueled over shapely wee solids before,
and though he was shot, we can’t name his opponent,
while Galois’ last writings became a component
of fields (and of groups) of mathematics that show
among other things, what these two solids should know:
That Cube and its friend Octahedron are dual,
and no four-faced loner should cause them to duel.
At once, the two shook off their anthropomorphism,
and saw from their faces to points, isomorphism.
“You cannot kill me,” they each said to the other,
“For if I am a martyr, then so are you, brother,
and even though I’d be like Évariste too,
I’d rather not share such an honour with you.”
So they and their seconds proposed to their bride
that four eager suitors could each pick a side.
The pyramid’s answer was sweet but ironic:
“Of course you can share, but my love is Platonic.”
Three of Spades: mp<3
Posted by Angela Brett in 52 ways to say I love you, Writing Cards and Letters on March 25, 2012
Note: The whole time I was writing this, I was rapping it in my head in the voice of Devo Spice, or maybe Luke Ski. I guess I can’t really blame them for it, though. A few months later I recorded myself rapping it out loud and also changed one word below and added a stanza and colouring to better represent what happens in the recording.
Are you the kind of person with a song in your heart?
Well, how about a thousand? This is state of the art!
Only Auricle will do, that’s A-U-R-I-C-L-E,
bringing hearts and ears together with the m-p-less-than-three.
With Langendorff technology to keep alive each atrium
and keep the heart cells pumping that potassium and natrium,
Introducing Beat Box, it’s a heart drive full of fun,
a briefcase full of rabbit hearts, a song in every one.
Well, I’m that kind of person, and so when I saw that ad,
I wanted that new Beat Box really really really bad!
but I didn’t have the money and I didn’t have the doe,
so I waited for the copycats to give it a go.
The Tucson Diagnostics artificial heart looked nice,
but how could processed tofu go for such a meaty price?
The chicken hearts were cheap, and beats per minute were comparable,
but animal rights groups said the battery life was terrible.
Well how about this earthworm with its five aortic arches?
It fits straight into the ear and plays imperial death marches.
My hacker friend said he could make a second one for free,
so we pooled our cash to get him one and he made one for me.
At the twenty-somethingth segment he proceeded to hack,
and we waited three long weeks for both the halves to grow back.
I loaded mine with compost and I put it in my ear
heard the music starting up as it climbed into my cochlea.
After that it wouldn’t budge and the controls were disconnected,
and every couple o’ seconds it screamed ‘Copy protected!’
Well I really should have paid to get an Auricle instead,
’cause now my earworm’s in a loop and I’ve a song stuck in my head.
Well I really should have paid to get an Auricle instead,
’cause now my earworm’s in a loop and I’ve a Copy protected! head.
Well I really should have paid to get an Auricle instead,
’cause now my earworm’s Copy protected! I’ve a song stuck in my head.
Well I really should have paid to get an Auricle instead,
Copy protected! earworm’s in a loop and I’ve a song stuck in my head.
Well I really should have paid to get Copy protected! instead,
’cause now my earworm’s in a loop and I’ve a song stuck in my head.
Well I Copy protected! have paid to get an Auricle instead,
’cause now my earworm’s in a loop and I’ve a song Copy protected!
Well I really should have paid to get an Auricle instead,
’cause now my earworm’s Copy protected! I’ve a song stuck in my head.
Two of Spades: Trichosis Psychosis
Posted by Angela Brett in Guinness World Records, Writing Cards and Letters on March 18, 2012
There’s a fashion I’ve seen, or a ‘hair-brained’ psychosis,
To treat hair that is not on the head as trichosis.
The women think men have bizarre expectations
that they shave all their hair and pretend they’re cetaceans.
Then men too naïve to be sure it’s not true,
don’t know women have hair like all land mammals do,
so that both parties hip to the trend may belab’r us
if we dare to reveal that our skin is not glabrous.
Yet even though terminal hair’s ‘androgenic’
that isn’t because it’s exclusive to men; it
occurs in all grownups from here to Kerblayvit,
and by the way, women out there wouldn’t shave it.
The fashion is merely a localised norm
that’s invented and strengthened by those who conform
while the women who leave all their natural hair
have the pleasure of knowing that men do not care.
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-Share Alike 3.0 Unported License.
Please tell me if you do something cool with it.
Creative Output 