The Climate Change book I finished today concludes with several chapters on fertility — both the earth’s & the author’s. In so doing she mentions a beautiful word I have long loved & long wanted to use in a poem. That word is fallow. The poem isn’t quite there, though the verse I’m gonna share, is close. It also prompted a parallel poem instead of a Poetic Factoid.
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fallow
by growing single crops super-intensively the brutal industrial-agricultural industry has abandoned an ancient methodology for keeping the earth fertile — they forget fallow
so desperate are they for continuous every increasing crop yields they dump on (usually chemical) fertiliser, irrigate heavily & dump more chemicals on to kill the weeds, insects & other pests that thrive on monoculture
more traditional agricultural societies use natural methods to maintain soil fertility including allowing fields to lie fallow rest, regenerate and re-submit energy into the soil often by planting nitrogen-fixing legumes like beans into a variety of crops grown side by side.
but even if the moderns can’t do this they can allow fields to rest fallow let the dirt grow dormant, go quiet, move more slow rest recuperate recharge
fallow also works in humans
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Day 17 A special +1 poem
A love poem with a difference. 100 years.
fallowsoul
Souls, like farm fields, need to lie fallow for a time before returning richer than before so rest now in that far off fallow gold sea — & may we meet again in the years that follow
There’s lots of research concerning the devastation caused by BP’s 2010 Deepwater Horizon 3 month long oil leak around the Gulf of Mexico. This poem, explores one of the least reported/appreciated consequences. One which didn’t make the news cycle because the effects weren’t felt for three, four, five years — but the experts, the fishermen of the gulf knew what was happening.[3 longish verses aren’t being published.]
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missing fish
missing fish don’t make the news ; there’s no dramatic footage
no bodies wash onto beaches just thousands of bubbles of nothing
following BP’s deepwater disaster fish embryos didn’t grow
…
missing fish don’t make the news … but they should
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Day 16 – TILa lot of fish related fun facts. (Ironically, at this point last year I wrote my flamingo triptych which was one of the highlight poems of last season. Today I find myself with lots & lots of fish facts, so I decided to replicate the idea.)
fish triptych
i. something odd (& gross) is happening in the waters of Britain — a third of all male fish are changing sex due to human sewage pollution
ii. Atlantic hagfish produce enough slime in a minute to fill a bucket — no, no i don’t care about the size of the bucket that’s all the information i need, cheers
iii. fish “speak” using a variety of low-pitched sounds
The Festival of Grief feels somewhat lessened this time around. Perhaps partly because I. of the publication of my poetry books last year. And II. Because only one date falls into Na/GloPoWriMo timeframe. And just for today I’m ignoring the Poetic Factoid component to write a second free form poetical sketch.
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FOGhead
My foggy head has ached all morning & I cannot understand why Grateful outside is a slow still day The only anniversary this year As Easter Sunday was the last Mad day of a manic March
I sit underneath the sunshine & hear the multiplicity of birds Who share my trees carry on Countless continuous conversations Always moving through air urgent To be some where they are not
Whereas it is my everlasting wish To be wherever you are when you went
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Day 15 – TI Ignored the Poetic Factoid assignment
interdimensional radar
as much as i want to take pain relief to less the graine
i also don’t in case it’s caused by you trying to get through
Today’s main poem has exploded. I’ve been collecting billionaire facts & memes for several years & today I began the exciting but overwhelming task of trying to poetify some of them. There are currently about 7 sections (the borders are amorphous) some are datapoems, others more like actual poems, one is quite lyrical. They’ve been fun to play with (& I don’t think I’m finished yet). They make a nice sequence (even if that too is ever-changing.)
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idols? false
II how much is a billion?
postulation 2.1 — basically the same
if you believe billionaires are just, like, slightly richer millionaires !! think again
a million seconds is 11.5 days
a billion seconds is thirty one years !! six months !!! plus a handful of loose days ! (the maths eventually got too complicated for me)
postulation 2.2 — conclusion
billionaires ! are ! immoral
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Day 09 – TIL about the truth concerning dragons
the truth concerning dragons
In the Old English saga the dragon was once a wealthy king jealously hoarding & brooding until selfishness & avarice turned him into a monster — till Beowulf kills him
Smaug amassed vast loot in his Lonely Mountain lair plundering Middlearth over millennia stealing from hapless mortals hoarding gold Elvish armour dwarven gems — till Bard kills him
who says fiction doesn’t teach us how to deal with real-world issues?
Climate Change is going to affect different parts of the world slightly differently (mostly the same broad brush strokes, but the detail will vary from place to place). For several years I’ve been collecting examples of things that will in all probability be affected right here in Oz (itself a wildly diverse ecosystem/area) under the working titles of — ecosystems : species : food and farming : water : coastal erosion : health : damage to homes & property : coral bleaching : miscellaneous.
The poem is a poetic attempt at breaking down all the fun things we’ve got to look forward to. I’m sharing just the Species section of the poem. (Not doubt this first draft will have new consequences added to it, as I research further. It’s been ever growing for the past 4 years, don’t see it changing now.)
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So many consequences …
ii. species
One in six : faces ex:tinc:tion risk
To survive plants : animals : & birds alike must : move : adapt or : die
But climate change : is happening : so fast it’s often im:possible : for species to adapt : swiftly enough : to evolve : with their ever-changing : environments : with changing seasons : with timings in the rest of the web : altered : delayed : enhanced : shunted : days, even weeks : out of whack
And even : if they could : move : swiftly enough the sheer : volume of human-driven : habitat destruction makes moving : moot ; kinda hard to move : when : there’s no place left
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Day 08 – TIL about the pachyderms outside the room
Bill’s Moving Tales
1. Supposedly the average person (Bill) moves residences 11.7 times in their lives 2. Allegedly it is the 3rd most stressful event in Bill’s life (behind death & divorce) 3. Apparently 55% of Bill’s moves happen in the summer 4. Purportedly Bill needs around 60 cardboard boxes to move all their stuff 4b. Reputedly 60 cardboard boxes is equivalent to around 6,500 pounds — or as part of the penchant for Americans using anything except the metric system to describe things — the size of a smallish-sized elephant
5. All I know is, when the truck with the shipping container filled to the brim with most of my books tried, it couldn’t make it up the gentle slope of Gully Hill & had to go the long way round (not enough torque or cylinder size or something — definitely *not* too. many. books).
Monday’s volume of poetry read was a recent purchase & one I’ve been saving for the end of the month: Brian Bilston’s Alexa, what is there to know about love? I was saving Bilston for the end because he’s so fun & playful & cheeky & clever in his word game poems — & I suspected/knew I’d need an energising pick me up (this month more than usual; or perhaps not, perhaps it always feels this way by the end. I suspect it does, we just choose to blank it out).
“Love in the Age of Google” is a poem made up of single lines from google’s predictive text. I’ve seen a couple of other attempts at this type of poem & thought today is a good day to test it out (for reasons which will hopefilly become clearer in Poem 2). Curation of results has taken place. I wish I made more time to make both poems shorter, tighter, but I don’t …
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Predicting Orpheus
1. DuckDuckGo (yes other search engines are available)
did orpheus save eurydice did orpheus look back did orpheus die did orpheus have children did orpheus see eurydice in the underworld
— think most of these are pretty easy to answer, though the children one pulls me up short
why did orpheus look back why did orpheus look back at eurydice why did orpheus decide to rescue his wife why did orpheus go to the underworld why did orpheus die
— hmmm, feel like these are questions i should’ve asked at the start of the month. life mightabeen easier.
why was orpheus why was orpheus killed why was orpheus adored in thrace why was ephesus abandoned why was ephesus an important city why was morpheus recast
— sometimes the algorithm breaks down, yes, even before i do
2. Google
i. did orpheus what instrument did orpheus play …..oh good, an easy one. the lute. ah, harp. the lyre, the lyre… what did orpheus do …..wandered round the place singing. after that, things get ugly how did orpheus get into the underworld …..excellent question, one which took me considerable …..time in my books & online to answer how did orpheus die …..not pleasantly. will that suffice?
ii. why did orpheus why did orpheus go to the underworld …..even not knowing the tale, surely this is work-outable why did orpheus look back …..which is, of course, the crux why did eurydice run away from orpheus …..run away? really? that’s the verb you’ve chosen. why did orpheus look back at eurydice …..it really all comes back to this, doesn’t it? why did the maenads kill orpheus …..is “it’s complicated” a good enough reply?
iii. outtakes & bloopers (in the interest of balance, google had its share of quirky predictions too)
~why did roman kill orpheus wife ~why did hades give orpheus a condition ~why did the gods gave condition to orpheus ~why did thanatos come out of orpheus ~why did morpheus kill orpheus
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Day 26 — TACD (Today Another Company Died)
The Online Jungle — worse than the real Amazon
i. Audiobookstand, Avalon Books, Bookpages, BookSurge, Telebook, TobyPress, & Waldenbooks
all book-related businesses Amazon has bought & closed (sometimes parts are “merged”)
sadly today Book Depository has been added to that list
a UK online book store once known for its wild range affordability, & free worldwide D
launched in 2004 Amazon “acquired” the company in 2011 (it was several years before i realised my protest purchasing was still lining bald Jeff’s pockets)
but don’t feel too bad (Amazon don’t)
they still own: Audible, Abebooks, GoodReads, ComiXology
none of which they developed themselves. all bought out to prop up/become part of the Bezos behemoth
& this isn’t all of them
there’s MGM, Twitch, IMDb, Kiva, WholeFoods & countless others across disciplines i’ve not even listed at least 115, possibly more
ii. these “killer acquisitions” aren’t limited to the cut throat world of books
fossil fuel companies do it buy green startups shut them down because they don’t want the competition
pharmaceutical companies buy rivals to eliminate competing therapies under development so theirs is the only alternative
it’s something we should all care about it’s why our antitrust laws need to be given real teeth
The superimposed theme has made this year’s Anzac Day Poem a trifle harder than previous years. I’m pleased with the angle taken, though I think it might be expanded upon in a future draft…
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the dead down under
long squatting on a rock observing the ferryman
causes me to note the dead do not seem to ever cease arriving
lately though it’s easy to tell some het up petty king up above
must be arguing with some other equally belligerent lord
cos the deadstream of bewildered soldiers is wider swifter & deeper than Styx itself
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Day 25 — TIL about biscuits
The Original Anzac Biscuit
i. first up: the delicious sweet biscuit of childhood rolled oats & golden syrup is not the original Gallipoli treat (*even if it is best)
ii. hardtack biscuits are exactly as tasty as they sound having been a soldier’s staple ration for centuries (& some allegedly were that old)
iii. a bread substitute whose best attribute is it doesn’t go mouldy (well yum) unlike bread, they’re very, very hard not to mention pretty well unpalatable
iv. to make them semi-digestible they were ground into a kind of gruel by grating & adding water — for something more exotic (once soaked) jam was added before baking over a fire into “tarts” not quite like mother used to make
v. if you didn’t want to eat them (& why would you) you could also to write letters to loved ones & send them home or use them as paint canvases or photo frames one even transformed to “christmas card” with that most christmas of topics — a tropical scene — painted on it including the wonderful verse WE’RE SENDING THIS / (WE’LL RISK IT) / XMAS CARDS ARE VERY / SCARCE SO WE / WROTE IT ON A BISCUIT
With Big O & Eurydice being the theme this year, it feels a little like every day/poem explores the issue of grief so at times I’m not sure whose writing what about whom or when. The only thing I am sure of is why.
dream
always know when you dream of me — it’s why i never sleep.
abandon the rasping light of day to pretend you’re calling my name.
the hazy lamps murky blue dragging me from the road.
walk on without knowing the way repeating thought eternally fast, faster.
tracing back black stone steps down again into echoing caves.
the dog by the great gates barks three times, or once each.
the blood river creases & curdles with endless ponderous energy.
always knowing i’ll never find you — we exist in incompatible worlds.
Day 15 – NTBLAILabout more than a forgotten letter of the alphabet
In Celebration of &
the ampersand’s formed from the ligature of the letters ET — the Latin word for “and”
… & the term “ampersand” is a corruption of and (&) per se and which literally means “(the character) & by itself (is the word) and”
… & this small odd looking character was actually once (kind of) the 27th member of the English alphabet*
… & when reciting the alphabet in the 1800s long-suffering schoolchildren would sing-song-say, “X, Y, Z, and per se and” so the students were essentially chanting “X, Y, Z, and by itself and”
… & being lazy children this was routinely slurred to the mondegreen ampersand & thus entered common usage
… & there’s a graffiti & in Pompeii from 79 CE
… & when it appears as &c where it means etc. (the ampersand time travels back into its E & T bones)
… & in screenplays, an & denotes a writing team [the word and designates the writers wrote separately, read: someone rewrote, & if there’s more than three ands on a credit, it’s a good sign you should probably stay the hell away from that movie]
… & when creating new type faces the & character allows designers to inject a little joie de vivre & artistic flair into proceedings
… not to mention some quite nice poets really love it & if that’s not a cause for celebration — then there isn’t one
*the thorn and the wynn are also membersof the Former Members Of The Alphabet Club but sadly we don’t have time (in this pome)to learn what led to their demises
2 Bob’s worth: a bonus poem
i. Jerk Bob that old bundle of chuckles the joy-killing chump Robert Hartwell Fiske in his dreary, dull AND utterly unreadable Dictionary of Unendurable English: A Compendium of Mistakes in Grammar, Usage, and Spelling with Commentary on Lexicographers and Linguists believes ampersands should only exist in proper names, business names, book titles, and the like never in place of the word and
he further opines: aside from the hurried, the only people inclined to use & in place of and are those who have scant sense of self and scant sense of style, and believe using & somehow swells them both.
ii. Lovely Bob Robert Nares in his far more charming highly erudite & intellectual work A Glossary; or, Collection of words, phrases, names, and allusions to customs, proverbs, etc., which have been thought to require illustration in the works of English authors, particularly Shakespeare and his contemporaries. Vol. I. A new ed., with considerable additions both of words and examples believes the ampersand’s calligraphic qualities make it a compelling design element that can add visual appeal & personality to any page.
For someone who loves this myth, I’m really struggling for quality content. Wondering if I should abandon it for something different for last half of the month. The Poetic Factoids, however, remain a treat to create.
lost with, out haven
since : losing, you twice : in, two worlds : one green, light : one shadow, mist : find myself : lost : always, wandering : looking for a, home : that, never approaches : heart : out, of land : out of, hope : out, of, tune : every moment : miss you : more, than human heart : should : or can : this side, madness
Day 14 – TIL how deeply brain & body are connected
vocalisations
when your “inner voice” whispers wisdom deep within the wetness of your brain tiny muscle motions trigger in your larynx
no wonder i suffer so many sore throats after my multiple personalities have had their say on every conceivable topic
the muscular cacophony leaves my chords, exhausted
I’m really struggling to find Big O’s voice in this project. I’ve tried not writing in first person but it comes off very cold (which I suppose could be good thing) but I always end up flipping it back again. Worse, the words which are coming out are far more banal than the ideas which sound in my head. Frustrating, yes. Unusual, no.
the shadow of today
one long year ago i was abruptly evicted from your world for no good reason
no reason at all really
after foolishly
trying to rescue you & failing
which i suppose was all just a half-cocked attempt to save myself from insanity’s solitude
now i am worse than i was before
having forgotten how to sing
or even — why i once did
Day 13 – TILI learnt about birth & lightning but not maths
the odds of — giving birth to a baby at 12:01am on January 1 are around 1 in 526,000*
which is roughly the same as getting struck by lightning
the odds of — giving birth to a baby at 12:01am on January 1 while getting struck by lightning
involves — knowledge of maths way way above my pay grade
gareth roi poet boi 