Tag Archives: mythology

Day 13 – shadows & the probability of lightning births

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 – TIL I 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 

like 276, 676, 000, 000 
   times above it

*less so if you’re a male

Day 12 — geology & non-standard measuring system

Trying to capture the claustrophobia of going underground.

gē


resting


i don’t know how far i’ve come
no idea how far to go
only know
the path seems to be thinner
the path narrower
the way darker
the stones heavier above me


try not to think
of the weight
of all that earth 
& rock
& mud & shale & clay
& gravel & scree & boulder & slate
& soil, sod, clod, loam, silt, dirt, turf & dust


point

Day 12 – TIL about pandas & dairy

buttergrams & buttermetres

A newborn giant panda 
is about the size 
of a stick of        butter.

Since when did butter
become a socially approved
measurement unit?

In which case (for context):

I weighed 31.23 sticks of butter
& was 10.23 buttersticks long
at my birth!

Day 11 — losing a muse + losing mobility

A fragment of a song & a in-depth look at a very real phenomena for older Australians.

museless 

i’ve lost my voice
worse i’ve nothing worth saying
the songs cannot be sung
the notes no longer sound
the words will not form
the world is hoarse
with my grief 

Day 11 – TIL about a highly triggering word

useless

Ackwards is (allegedly)
an old English dialect 
word describing a creature 
lying on its back 
that can’t get up.

I’d just like to say:

1. I’ll have you know 
I’m choosing not to get up,
So, thank you very much

2. Get your damn camera 
Out of my room before
I call the cops big time.

3. It’s a bit awkward that
The only reference I can find
To this on the whole internets
is one. solitary. tweet.*

*Twitter!
Now there’s a creature on its back 
that can no longer get up …

Day 10 – The Ferryman + buggy love buzz

Played with a couple of Charon-related poems today. Big O pleading with Charon (& then from C’s POV). The one I found myself finishing was Dialogue poem as he connives a way to cross the Styx.

This excerpt is the last lines of the poem.

The Ferryman

You will not take my coin?

You cannot cross, coin or no.
This is not a place for mortals.

Herakles crossed.

Herakles is a brute. He beat me up.
I know you’re not like that.

No, I’m not.
I start to sing.

I’m even more brutal.

Day 10 – TIL about cicadaian mating calls

buggy love buzz

over-aroused (if a trifle confused)
female cicadas sometimes mistake
roaring power tools for mating 
calls, occasionally even 
swarming sweaty men 
machoistically mowing lawns

— oh well, there’s one thing 
i’ll be safe from at least

Day 09 — underground again + birdiewatching

A simple poem for Day 1 of the Festival of Grief; the second day of my annual wallowversary not till next weekend. Trying to combine my usual subject matter for this day with The Big O. It works okay. My Poetic Factoid has the potential to include words from other languages but I don’t really have the motivation to make it bigger today.

*****

underground again 
spent the day underground again as i do every day since losing you shouting across the river till my voice is hoarse but no one ever comes its against the rules been broken for me once already they cant be broken again no matter how great the agony how much i plead for mercy from the gods for once no creature listens to me the losing is worse than never having had you at all torture to have been so close to sunlight only to see you swirling dissolving disappearing down the sewer i will never sing again






Day 9 – TIL about taking photographs of Victorians















birdiewatching





where we say “cheese”
as a prompt to make us grin 

Victorians said “prunes”
despite preferring to keep things in





i think that explains
just about                  everything

			

	
	



			
				

	

				
Day 08 — wedding day goat song + title tartling tartan-style
	


		

		






























Today’s volume of poetry was one of Bukowski’s I’d recently bought second hand but never read. Diving into him was like jumping into a lovely warm jacuzzi (where the water had just been freshly added & mine was the only body to have been immersed so it was all quite clean & hygienic thank you very much) — soothing, comfortable, relaxing, delightful, & I wondered why I don’t remember to read/reread my fave poets more often.





With that in mind, I set out to write a Big O poem in B style. I gave myself the added task of just stream of consciousing & not editing it (that can come later).










*****





wedding day goat song





why’d the god-damned 
fool girl go & step
in a snake nest
for anyway
it’s the stupidest
damn thing 
i’ve ever heard
& i’ve been hearing
stupid damn things
all my damn life





& now the wedding guests
are gone home 
& my amphora
is empty 
but i’m still full 
so i step outside
to take a piss
come back in
pick up the amphora
realise it’s empty
still empty
swear at the
fucking gods for
their sick son-of-a-bitch
senses of humour





look about 
for my lyre
till i remember 
i smashed it
after i found
her dead (my 
second best lyre
obviously i’m not
quite so stupid 
as to smash Hecate)





decide i’m no where near
drunk enough
so set out to visit
Calais & see if
i can drown myself
in his ample cellar

























Day 6 – TIL the Scots can deal with forgetfulness










title tartling tartan-style





so the Scots have a word 
for that brief panicked pause 
experienced while you 
temporarily un-remember 
someone’s name as
you rummage through
the haggis-baggage 
of your overworked,
irrelevant fact-clutching,
bewilderbeasted brain





all well & good 





tartle is not that terrible





after all — the name’s known
you’re simply having trouble
accessing the correct
datapoint in the outdated
software system 
of your cerebral substance





but do these paragons 
of polite protocol
these pontificating 
Pict-progeny
have a word to personify
that bowel-clenching juncture
when you realise 
you’ve already forgotten
the name of the person 
introduced to you
mere microseconds ago






			

	
	



			
				

	

				
Day 7  – The Tartatus List + a lollipop lesson
	


		

		

























Today’s prompt was to write a poem that plays with the idea of a list. The example poem was a list that isn’t – it never gets beyond the first entry. I somehow mangled this with a challenge from a couple of days earlier write a poem in which laughter comes at what might otherwise seem an inappropriate moment – or one that the poem invites the reader to think of as inappropriate.





Just for today (given I don’t think it fits tonally with the other poems I’ve written) I’m including the whole thing.





*****





The Tartatus List


trying to prepare 
for my assault on Hades
torches to scare away 
   the damned darkness ;
my life-restoring lute ; 
an obol for the ferryman ;
three bones for the guard dog
   in case Herakles’ trick
   doesn’t work a second time


— but it’s impossible 
                                  to focus
given all i hear 
                       is my mother’s 
         voice
carping on at me to 
                              pack 
          my cape cos
she’s certain            it will be
COLD!  down.  there…
   &  she knows   what
i’m like … when the 
                  weather
       turns 
                                   chilly




















Day 7 – TIL something strange about a lollipop










sweet stuck on a stick





Chupa Chups are Spanish
(the name means something 
close to Sucky Sucks) 
& were designed so they didn’t 
melt in Iberian summer heat. 
They originally cost 
a single peseta each. 





But none of these
are the poetic factoid
that blew me away.
Their logo of brand 
name inside brightly 
coloured daisy
was designed by
— Salvador freaking Dalí 






Aside: he also once sent Harpo 
Marx a supremely surreal Xmas gift 
— a harp with barbed-wire strings

			

	
	



			
				

	

				
Day 06 — Finnish Jar + tit for tat
	


		

		






























Today’s prompt was to find a poem in a language you don’t know. I used the same one as the prompt, because, what the hey; a Finnish poem by Olli Heikkonen. Think about the sound and shape of the words, and the degree to which they remind you of words in your own language. Use those correspondences as the basis for a new poem. The end result doesn’t yet make a 100% sense, but it’s fascinating how easy it was to find images that slotted into my theme.





Finnish Original





Kumarra pihla jaa. Sen alle kasvot ylöspäin
veljesi on haudattu. Maan povessa luut
mustuvat, yrtit versovat nikamiin.
Kumarra pihlajaa, sen ihonkaltaista kuorta, oksan hankaan
ripustettua helminauhaa. Kumarra latvan liekkiä.
Juuret lävistävät veljesi rinnan.
Juuret lävistävät veljesi otsan.
Pihlaja on ääniä täynnä, jotka keväällä
puhkeavat lehdiksi. 










“Literal” Transmogrification into English

Come here phial jar. Sense all cease wot loss of pain
we shall see on hide at you. Man possess lute
must you wait, your heart verse of what nick mine.
Come here phial jar, then I hone kill taster aorta, oxen hanker
Riposte statue helm in a you are. Come here little one like care.
Enduring love is the what we shall see running.
Enduring love is the what we all jetson.
phial jar on any tiny, jot car coverall 
per karat lee discus. Dixie










Extract from Finnish Jar





Come near, fill my jar. Sense my loss, ceaseless pain.
We shall see what hides you. As man possesses lute
So must you wait, your heart a verse that nicks mine.















Day 6 – TIL about tiny punctuation





tit for tat





the dot above
a lowercase 
“i” is a tittle





the fact the line 
beneath is not
called a tattle





makes my eyes 
shove water
— just a jot!




















https://www.poetryinternational.com/en/poets-poems/poems/poem/103-22322_Bow-before-the-mountain-ash#lang-en

			

	
	



			
				

	

				
Day 5 – underground haiku + Bottom-of-the-Sack St
	


		

		

























Read a (mostly mediocre) haiku collection today. Since I really enjoyed the reverse poem creation from a couple of days ago, I applied that technique on several haiku in the collection that kind of felt resonant to my themes. I wasn’t precious about the supposed 5-7-5 structure (some of my regular haiku writing friends say if you’re counting syllables you’re not writing haiku) … all I was interested in was generating content not “pure haiku”. I’ve posted 2 of the 4 verses.





*****





beneath the white mist
an endless sigh of worms
thunder made by earth.

arrowheads of wind
bounce wildly between caverns
rumble away to night.




















Day 5 – TIL about pluralising streets










Bottom-of-the-Sack St





the plural of cul-de-sac 
is culs-de-sac





a bit out of whack
& perhaps off track 





none the less 
that  (i thought) 





[prematurely perhaps]
ended that





but in the spirit of adequate research
i undertook a swift google search 





& let me say my mind did lurch
when i promptly also learnt 





the plural of cul-de-sac 
is also cul-de-sacs





mind blown to the max
so what’s lies & what facts?





i’m stressed & cannot relax 
till i know the correct syntax





— inventors of english 
you’re all maniacs 

			

	
	



			
				

	

				
Day 4 – Cave at Sunset + baby porcupine poem
	


		

		




















Day 4’s challenge was to write a Triolet: rhyme scheme ABaAabAB (where capital letters represent lines repeated verbatim). Such formal structure poetry is always a challenge until you find the right line to serve as the spine. I’m not sure I quite have yet, but it’s a darn sight better than the original version.





*****










Excerpt from Cave at Sunset










From dark within the cave breathes earth
And the wild fireflies all fail to shine
Leaving every heart bereft of mirth










Funfact Day 4 – a baby porcupine poem





 










baby porcupines are called 
quite rightly & quite cutely
porcupettes/





{& nothing more of this poem was written
as the poet spent the reminder of his time
absolutely & overwhelmingly smitten
watching videos & googling porcupics online}