Winter Has Come

Kotaro Takamura

Definitely winter has come.
The evergreen shrub's white flowers have disappeared.
The ginko trees have turned into brooms.

Like a sharp knife piercing, winter has come.
Everyone dislikes winter.
Deserted by grasses and trees, run away from by insects, winter has come.

Winter,
come to me, come to me.
I have winter's strength, winter is my victim.

Permeate through, penetrate into!
Make fires break out! Bury with snow!
Like a sharp knife, winter has come.

- Kotaro Takamura (1883-1956)

The Bridge

At night in the city
from thousands of wounds
blood comes pouring out.

It comes flowing into the canal
that is stagnant, dully,
where the bridge is suspended.
The bridge is neither going forward into a future
nor coming from a past,
just from the opposite shore, to this shore,
it is only hanging
over a dead current
and just fastening together two nights.

When night becomes late, over there at its top
and aged man and a young woman come
and, without appearing confident,
casually hug one another.

- Shiro Murano, trans. Edith Marcombe Shiffert and Yuki Sawa.

The House Was Quiet And The World Was Calm

The house was quiet and the world was calm.
The reader became the book; and summer night

Was like the conscious being of the book.
The house was quiet and the world was calm.

The words were spoken as if there was no book,
Except that the reader leaned above the page,

Wanted to lean, wanted much to be
The scholar to whom his book is true, to whom

The summer night is like a perfection of thought.
The house was quiet because it had to be.

The quiet was part of the meaning, part of the mind:
The access of perfection to the page.

And the world was calm. The truth in a calm world,
In which there is no other meaning, itself

Is calm, itself is summer and night, itself
Is the reader leaning late and reading there.

- Wallace Stevens, (1879-1955)

The Great Paris Cat Massacre

The penultimate assignment for OU AA100 is to write a reflective piece about your study skills and learning experiences on the course.  This seems a fairly easy essay to write, especially for those of us who had to do a similar piece on the preceding course.  When considering my strengths I had noted that I have a very broad range of interests and very much enjoy reading and writing.  On the weaknesses side I put that partly because of my broad range of interests I have a tendency to get sidetracked when doing research for essays.

A case in point was yesterday when I was supposedly reading up on the history of rail infrastructure and the improvement of pay for the working classes in the rise of Blackpool as a leisure destination.  Everything was going well, I was poring through various scholarly historical journals and then...

Le Monde Illustre, April 1871. During the Siege of Paris (Franco-Prussian War) market stalls did a thriving business in cat, dog and rat meat.

The next article in the journal History Today was titled The Great Paris Cat Massacre. Who wouldn't want to read that ? Blackpool and the social history of Lancashire mill workers was forgotten as I read the exploits of two Paris apprentices, who, angered that their employers looked after their vast array of felines better than they did their humans, eventually held a trial for said cats, accused and found them guilty of witchcraft and then beat them all to death with clubs. It was rather gruesome, especially if you are fond of cats, but also blackly hilarious.



Oh kittens, in our hours of ease
Uncertain toys and full of fleas,
When pain and anguish hang o’er men,
We turn you into sausage then.

Audioboo

I'm just having a play with Audioboo.  This is a site where you can record, via a phone app, your own messages / poetry / podcasts etc. and upload them to the internetz.

Here is my first effort, reading out one of my shortest poems On That Day.

Tornados, Snow and Wind, Rain and Ice, Mud and Bird Droppings

Oh, it's good to be alive.

Redux

I am not under a pile of rubble;
My cottage was not washed away;
My land is not baked so hard that even the beetles have left--
I am not at risk for being raped while looking
       for cholera-free water for my starving infants;
I have not been falsely accused of doing someting heinous and selfish (lately);
I have not lost a pet in a while.

I have not had to choose between buying
at the end of the month
a little King Writing Tablet
 for 25 cents or a bottle
of lotion for houseworked hands
as my mother once had
and told me one night
when i was
14 and begging for something.

I worry about the world and the country and the politicians

and while
 they
are going to hell
i presume
in the meantime
life on a poor farm goes on
pretty much like last year
and the year before.

It's good to be alive.

No one has tried to alter or cut away my private bits.
When I go out to collect firewood
 it is for fun and

I look up and see a thousand fat flying geese, calling Hello calling Goodbye
I eat and drink my fill each day in my cooled and warmed silky pillowy nest
with a VeryGood Dog.
My brothers are honorable and my sisters are beautiful laughers and gardengrowers and
all the babies are fine and brilliant.

My pain is self-inflicted.

Those who languish, bitter and lonely
in damp cells with moldy food;
Those who are harvesting the fruits of lies
Those who bear the pain no one else will take
  (those too gentle to stop a cruelty beyond words)
Fill my thoughts
Break my heart
Lead me to Drink
or Prayer
or Sleep.

Birds in Bone Chilling Winter HERE

￭ Now that my house has been burned down,

I have an unobstructed view of the rising moon.

Traditional Buddhist wisdom.

more Konza Moons

A Love Poem Goodbye

May I Go?

Do you think the time is right?
May I say goodbye to pain-filled days and endless lonely nights?

I've lived my life and done my best, an example tried to be.

So can I take that step beyond, and set my spirit free?
I didn't want to go at first, I fought with all my might.
But something seems to draw me now to a warm and living light.

I want to go, I really do; it's difficult to stay.
But I will try as best I can to live just one more day.
To give you time to care for me and share your love and fears.

I know you're sad and afraid, because I see your tears.
I'll not be far, I promise that, and hope you'll always know,
That my spirit will be close to you wherever you may go.
Thank you so for loving me. You know I love you too,
And that's why it's hard to say goodbye and end this life with you.
So hold me now just one more time and let me hear you say,

Because you care so much for me, you'll let me go today.

By Susan A. Jackson


The Rainbow Bridge click HERE

Love Poem for Wild Animals

 Funny and sweet. Consider different species' 'Romantic Moments'. Poem from Tony Hoagland's collection of poems, Unincorporated Persons in the Late Honda Dynasty.
 I think this was written after a couple went to a movie on a first date and unexpectedly, the movie featured a large number of wild animals mating.

Romantic Moment

After seeing the nature documentary we walk down Canyon Road,
onto the plaza of art galleries and high end clothing stores
where the orange trees are fragrant in the summer night
and the smooth adobe walls glow fleshlike in the dark.

It is just our second date, and we sit down on a bench,
holding hands, not looking at each other,
and if I were a bull penguin right now I would lean over
and vomit softly into the mouth of my beloved

and if I were a peacock I’d flex my gluteal muscles to
erect and spread the quills of my Cinemax tail.
If she were a female walkingstick bug she might
insert her hypodermic probiscus directly into my neck

and inject me with a rich hormonal sedative
before attaching her egg sac to my thoracic undercarriage,
and if I were a young chimpanzee I would break off a nearby tree limb
and smash all the windows in the plaza jewelry stores.

And if she was a Brazilian leopard frog she would wrap her impressive
tongue three times around my right thigh and
pummel me softly against the surface of our pond
and I would know her feelings were sincere.

Instead we sit awhile in silence, until
she remarks that in the relative context of tortoises and igunanas,
human males seem to be actually rather expressive.
And I say that female crocodiles really don’t receive

enough credit for their gentleness,
Then she suggests that it is time for us to go
do something personal, hidden, and human.

(Tony Hoagland, from Unincorporated Persons in the Late Honda Dynasty, Graywolf Press 2010)

Picture from the yard in kansas:

mating walking sticks

More wild animals click Here and also HERE

also: http://www.pbs.org/newshour/bb/entertainment/jan-june12/rachelsimon_02-09.html

Library Raid

Cover of Wolfwatching

A large haul as I'm expecting it to be rather quiet in the next few weeks....

Cathedrals in Britain and Ireland - William Anderson & Clive Hicks

The History of Christianity - Jonathan Hill

Wolfwatching - Ted Hughes

Churches and Cathedrals - Helen and Richard Leacroft

A Hundred Doors - Michael Longley

English Parish Churches - Edwin Smith, Olive Cook, Graham Hutton

Catholicism - Peter Stanford

A Practical View of Christianity - William Wilberforce

Sorry to anyone else in Ilkley wishing to study Christianity or church architecture, I think I grabbed the lot.

The poem THE RED CARNATION (1871) by Louise Michel

"If were to go to the black cemetery
Brothers, throw on your sister,
As a final hope,
Some red 'carnations' in bloom.
In the final days of Empire,
When the people were awakening,
It was your smile red carnation
which told us that all was being reborn.
Today, go blossom in the shadow of the black and sad prisons.
Go, bloom near the somber captive,
And tell him/her truly that we love him/her.
Tell that through fleeting time
Everything belongs to the future
That the livid-browed conqueror
can die more surely than the conquered."

Image via Wikipedia'A chili-pepper,
give it wings,
a red dragonfly' - Basho

'Pull of the wings of a red dragonfly,
a chili-pepper' - Kikakou

Pic - Basho by Hokusai

Seven Types Of Rhyme

RHYME –


• bit bat = alliteration

• cool food = assonance

• knack sock = consonance

• sock rock = full or strict rhyme

• crick crack = half , slant or para-rhyme

• knack gnat = reverse rhyme

• wood would = identical rhyme or rime riche

Stress, Unstress, Repeat

“As a stressed syllable ends, other things being equal, to be pronounced with higher pitch than weak syllables, a purely ‘iambic’ line will tend towards a higher tone at the end, but according to general phonetic laws this is a sign that something more is to be expected. Consequently it is in iambic verses easy to knit line to line in natural continuation.” – Otto Jesperson, Notes On Metre, 1933

we do not see things as they are

The Blackbirds
gather
like roaches
they scatter
when
i step out
Their shiny dark backs
like armor
turn
the light away
They pester
They swarm
my rotting heart no longer sees birds
"we do not see things as they are
but as we are..."

My Study Diary - by Mike aged 43

"Almost a month since I wrote my first entry for the study diary.

I feel that I am making good progress so far, I have grabbed bits of time to study here and there and have completed up to Activity 29 in the study book. I do feel that I now have a decent grasp of the basics of poetry, although some practise and repetition certainly won’t harm.

I have really enjoyed the poetry section, and learning about the forms, structure and context of poetry has helped both my understanding and enjoyment of the module so far. I feel confident that I have understood most aspects of the poetry module and that I have made good progress.

I have read some other poetry, some by Sylvia Plath, and I am half way through the set poetry book for AA100, so I am gradually widening my knowledge of poetry. I have also read some books which are related to study in general or arts and history, The Study Skills Handbook - Stella Cottrell, Wilfred Owen : War Poems and Others - Ed. Dominic Hibberb, Learning To Look At Modern Art – Mary Acton and taken notes.

Areas that I would still like to develop – I still struggle a bit with iambic pentameter, and I have found from the ‘comments’ section that there are often layers of meaning within poems that I have not always understood, or in at least one case, agreed with. This last point refers to ‘The Fat Black Woman Goes Shopping’ which I found hard to see as a protest poem when placed alongside some of the other poets, perhaps in relation to the larger body of Nichols’ work it would make more sense."

Pussy Willow

Image via Wikipedia"I have a little pussy,
Her coat is silver grey,
I found her in the meadow,
Not very far away,
My little silver pussy,
Will never be a cat,
'Cause she's a pussy-willow,
Now what do you think of that' - trad. rhyme.

Pussy willow fronds were often collected when families 'went a-palming' to collect plants suitable to stand in for palm fronds for Palm Sunday.

How To Scan A Poem

How to scan a poem

Theodore Roethke - I Knew A Woman. Psychopaths, Poetry, Dylan and Three Girls' Tales from NPR in the Morning

It is nice to hear poetry in the morning. The one read this morning was so lovely--morning mists, glisten rain on the darkly cloudfilled sky. entire poem below.

If you have not been to the NPR webpage, you are missing a treasure trove.
 From the Books:  Girls Girls Girls: A Trio Of Epic Adventures

http://www.npr.org/2011/05/25/135952459/girls-girls-girls-a-trio-of-epic-adventures
 
My forte, The Psychopath! One of my most used researchers, Hare, who you've read on this blog previously, has a fun article: A Psychopath Walks Into A Room. Can You Tell?
 

http://www.npr.org/2011/05/21/136462824/a-psychopath-walks-into-a-room-can-you-tell?ps=cprs
 
  PS Bob Dylan turns 70-- listen here: http://www.npr.org/2011/05/24/136470340/cake-is-just-a-four-letter-word-dylan-turns-70
 


Theodore Roethke - I Knew A Woman

analysis I Knew a Woman

I knew a woman, lovely in her bones,
When small birds sighed, she would sigh back at them;
Ah, when she moved, she moved more ways than one:
The shapes a bright container can contain!
Of her choice virtues only gods should speak,
Or English poets who grew up on Greek
(I'd have them sing in chorus, cheek to cheek.)

How well her wishes went! She stroked my chin,
She taught me Turn, and Counter-turn, and stand;
She taught me Touch, that undulant white skin:
I nibbled meekly from her proffered hand;
She was the sickle; I, poor I, the rake,
Coming behind her for her pretty sake

(But what prodigious mowing did we make.)


Love likes a gander, and adores a goose:
Her full lips pursed, the errant note to seize;
She played it quick, she played it light and loose;
My eyes, they dazzled at her flowing knees;
Her several parts could keep a pure repose,
Or one hip quiver with a mobile nose

(She moved in circles, and those circles moved.)

Let seed be grass, and grass turn into hay:
I'm martyr to a motion not my own;
What's freedom for? To know eternity.
I swear she cast a shadow white as stone.
But who would count eternity in days?
These old bones live to learn her wanton ways:
(I measure time by how a body sways.)

large color art version here.

more T.R.

picture from this poetry blog:

Remember to Surface

forget forget forget

Surface

to

knowledge strength realization perception

forget

Surface

listening awake present compassion LoveGraceGod

forget

surface

clearsight understanding peace gentleness Wonder

forget

forget

forget

forget

Surface you idiot

Adrian Mitchell - Tell Me Lies about Iraq