Auntie's Anti-Poems

[AuntShecky]

Thank you, Blank_Verse and Hawkman for offering comments on this latest number which I had labored over. The form of "Power Outage" was the result of a conscious attempt to mimic (or make a parody of) the kind of poems that used to be published in the Sunday paper. As selected by Ted Kooser, a former U.S. poet laureate, the majority of the reprints seemed to deal with slices of American life, especially (to my observation) middle-class, suburban life.

The poems were all short with short lines, sometimes resembling broken-up lines of prose (though yours fooly did try to inject somewhat less literal elements into this piece.) Although a great many of the Sunday poems were little gems, there was --again, to my way of thinking -- a certain similarity about them, giving the unsettling impression that they could have been composed by the same person.

Certainly there was never, ever anything the least bit offensive "edgy" about any of the them, let alone taking the risk of invoking a litany of the saints in the opening lines, not that the ejaculation here is all that irreverent, but an honest,instantaneous reaction. In line with such non-"family fare" is the "brass ball" metaphor, referring not only to the sun but to the worker who poked the pole. For intestinal fortitude,that guy ranks right up there with Joe Kittinger (Google him.) His nickname must be "B.B." if you catch my drift.

The metaphor introduced in the title was meant to suggest the kind of "power outage" that lasts a lifetime. The third stanza describes the houses ("homes") affected by the blackout-- if "middle-class," then the highest echelon thereof, with imposing football field size lawns fronting each ("meadow-locked.")

Mentioning of the television programs, the microwave, the ceiling light, etc. was a roundabout way (i.e. non-prosaic,non-linear way) of showing that the electricity in the speaker's household stayed on, while the much-better-off neighbors (the "haves") had lost theirs. Despite the temptation to do so, there was no "gloating," but the irony of having the tables turned (for once) was striking.

Now I'm starting to feel sorry for the folks. The incident which was the impetus of this piece occurred on the Sunday following the Fourth of July, a holiday marked by loud fireworks; it happened again last Friday evening, and once more at 4 am (EDT) today. As laypersons we assumed that the explosions and subsequent power outages were caused by a "blown transformer," but we have it on excellent authority (a retiree who did this line of work for several decades) that it wasn't the transformer (though I'm keeping "transform" in my poem.)

Not fifteen feet away from where I sit the power company is preparing to run underground wires as I type this. The vibrations from the excavator are making the screen on my monitor bow in at the middle. But that's not nearly as distressing as it must be for those who have a fancy freezer full of top-of-the-line groceries melting away (though some have back-up generators.)

[AuntShecky]

Still another attempt at--I don't know what it is. I'm pretty sure it ain't that elusive "free verse"

Shoulda, Woulda, Coulda

If only that frothy nag had come in,
or that high fly ball had never been caught;
vindication from a last-chance foul shot,
or redemption from a penalty kick.

Now, say there’d been a better choice of road,
a fast track less bumpy, less litter-strewn–
what if I’d stood out, surpassing the pack,
consoled by its scraps and third-place tickets?

The folktale’s ending stands pat and pretty
were I to wind up coupled with a prince,
along with the sum that comes with his name.

The prime catch would willfully bet it all
on this sparse corpus suddenly made convex,
with newly lustrous hair and star-flecked eyes.

[Hawkman]

I guess it's formalized free verse! Irregular 10 syllable lines with the odd line of blank verse thrown in Makes it rather an uneven read though...

Live and be well - H

[AuntShecky]

I guess it's formalized free verse! Irregular 10 syllable lines with the odd line of blank verse thrown in Makes it rather an uneven read though...

That's it! The poetry realm's first "hybrid"!
Must do something about "lustrous" coming so soon after "lush," though. (OK-- it's fixed.)

Thanks for reading and commenting.

[Haunted]

Power Outage — I like the casualness of it. Full of irony — "the tee-shirted squires", the powerful that becomes powerless in an instant, where the have-nots finding themselves having more than the haves. And how is anyone going to survive without a ballgame and Sixty Minutes on a Sunday? (For me it would be Person of Interest, I would go out of my mind.) And what drama:
Another blast! The foreman
signaled over to our window:
everyone’s okay.

Shoulda, Woulda, Coulda — a bit cryptic at times to my peabrain but the summer fun and fantasy is all intact.

All in all, two enjoyable treats!

[Jerrybaldy]

Shoulda woulda coulda. I enjoyed. Took a couple of reads as it should. Then it felt like possible pasts and fleeting moments that could have changed everything and regret perhaps of not following a dream. You are convex in my mind auntie. X

[AuntShecky]

Thank you, Haunted and JerryB--
You hit the nail on the head re: "Power Outage," Haunted, but the reaction it engendered goaded yours fooly into atarting that thread about free verse, a genre in which both you and JB are masters.
The "shoulda, woulda,coulda" was a result of trying to channel the world-view of Delmore Schwartz, especially his "True-Blue American."

[blank|verse]

The latest poem shares its title with a Beverley Knight song, so things are off to a shaky start! Ignoring that, the rest of the poem is intelligently written, with some nice wordplay and recurrent imagery, wringing some wry humour out of a well-worn theme.

However, the argument of the second stanza loses me somewhat. Someone who ‘stood out, surpassing the pack’ sounds like a winner (in contrast to the loser of the first stanza); I don’t see why they would be ‘consoled by its scraps and third-place tickets’, it seems contradictory. Or are you saying the ‘fast track’ would be to a different mind-set, where winning was less important? Either way, it seems unclear.

The ‘prime catch’ is a nice touch, picking up the ‘catch’ of the first stanza (perhaps it would be better if the first catch were dropped, to reflect the change of fortunes). Line 9 should read ‘would stand’ rather than ‘stands’; and the words ‘corpus’ and ‘convex’ read oddly in context, they don’t seem like they belong in this poem.

And, even given the comedic tone of the poem, I wonder if a male poet would get away with objectifying a woman, as the prince does here by ‘betting it all’ on making her look more attractive? (Although the prince is also objectified as a ‘prime catch’.) It strikes a misogynistic tone that makes for an uncomfortable ending.

As for the form, all the lines are iambic pentameter, either 10 or 11 syllables; it’s 14 lines, broken into an octave and sestet with a volta at line 9; so I’d say this is a blank verse sonnet.

Even if you were writing free verse lines that use iambic pentameter as a guide and have predominantly four- or five-stress lines (even with occasional shorter lines), this would mean you’re writing free blank verse, a variation of free verse associated firstly with T.S. Eliot, but which can also be identified in the poetry of Wallace Stevens, Hart Crane, Auden, and more recently I’d add Heaney, Andrew Motion and Don Paterson to that list, among many others, I’m sure.

[AuntShecky]

Thank you very much, Blank_Verse, especially your final paragraph.

Beverley Knight is a new one on me. I will check her him? out on YouTube, or whatever site is free of charge.

L. * "consoled. . ." is an appositive, modifying "pack."

I'd say all of your criticisms are valid. As I said in another thread, yours fooly highly respects your opinion.

[AuntShecky]

Aspirations

Outside the back window
the flash of a feathery thing
couldn’t be the bluebird of happiness --
probably some upstart jay
oblivious of the coming coldness, free
from worry over the real possibility
somebody will forget to fill the feeder.

Still, way down deep gnaws a whim
that at times I’d rather be like him.


You know, as long as I
am flying in the face of reality,
sanity, all those “-ties” that tie
us down, why can’t I swing
for those unattainable fences,
find the egg in a golden nest?

Take a deep breath.

For instance sniffing the whole
earth in a geranium, getting
all greenhouse-y like Roethke
or Heaney, putting
loamy, sod-y words
into other-worldly pots.

Inhale.

I really want to grab you
by the roots and shake
you up until you wilt
from laughter. You sit--
I’ll do stand-up,
like Hicks and Hedberg,
except they’re both dead.

Exhale.

[Hawkman]

Sadly, I have no knowledge of Hicks & Hedberg but I could always substitute them in my mind with Peter Cook and Dudley Moor - sic transit gloria mundi.

I really enjoyed this one Auntie. I still respire, aspire and I'm filled with ire at all the missed swings Oh, and when did blue get bifurcated, you know, happiness and sorrow both represented by the same colour:

Oh I woke up this morning
I was feelin' kind o' blue
Oh I woke up this morning
I knew my happiness was through
That blue-bird who's so happy -
he's gone - just upped and flew

Oh yeah....

Live and be well - H

[prendrelemick]

1.
Foggity, Hoggity,
Limbaugh, on radio,
Rush-es where patriots
oft fear to tread.

Liberals: tongues wagging
Ultraconservative
paranoid listeners:
rocks in their heads.


2.
Parsily, Farcily,
Simon and Garfunkel,
songwriting troubadours,
dabbling in rhyme.

Absent of irony,
sentimentality
wore out their wholesomeness,
stuck in their time.

3.
Hippity, Hypety,
Phineas T. Barnum
schlepping his circus to
parts near and far.

Faking zoology
incontrovertibly
showed to the world just what
monkeys we are.

4.
Hartily, tartily,
Sisters Kardashian,
plastered on tabloid sheets,
talent unknown.

Hawking “reality,”
pseudocelebrity
blasted its horn brashly:
Culture’s last groan.



Double Dactyl

I've just found these. So simple, so clever.

[Gilliatt Gurgle]

Aspirations

Outside the back window
the flash of a feathery thing
couldn’t be the bluebird of happiness --
probably some upstart jay
oblivious of the coming cold, free
from worry over the real possibility
somebody will forget to fill the feeder.
...

Nice.
Raucous Jays, keeping the feeder full especially during winter, trying to keep the Squirrels out of the feeder - a day in my life.
Clearly there is more to it than your opening lines, but they struck home for me.

[AuntShecky]

September 15, 1963*
The shy quartet prepared to praise
the Source of life in a modest way.
Across a mouth a hand was raised
to stanch a laugh in Church, that day.

The mirror shone back youthful skin.
More hands flew up, clamped tight, remained
still. Above the shattered porcelain
and glass–- some colorless, some stained–-

in rubble hung the silenced bell,
like faith too patiently expressed
with justice absent in its knell:
the sense of utter senselessness.

If any hope from it derives,
old wounds cry out for true suture,
demanding from four stolen lives
deprived of futures: the future.

*

For the historical significance of the date click this link to a newspaper article.







A Millimeter to the Left

The old habit hates to budge
from its familiar, thus comfortable, perch
and seldom sees the point
of changing its baseline position.
The quo protects its status;
compensation stays unsought.

Stuck on melancholy,
the needle might shimmy
when blue clarity
overcomes an autumnal sky
or a sudden shimmer of moonlight
splashes the kitchen floor.

[Hawkman]

Well I've finally got around to giving these a serious look - sorry for the delay but I've had a rather busy week. The first of the two offerings did require me to follow the link for the exposition. About the only thing I remember about 1963 are the winter and Dallas, but the date was wrong for the latter.

The most powerful stanza is the second. I was particularly impressed with your use of enjambment here in the transition from L2 to L3. That single word, still, is very effective. The first three verses work very well - in fact I'm inclined to suggest that the poem should be confined to three. The comment on senselessness at the end of S3 is probably sufficient comment. The last stanza is over egging the pudding, I feel. Compared with the three which precede it, it's a bit clunky in execution. The suture, futures, future doesn't really work and the syntactical inversion - placing derives at the end of the first line - come across as a bit laboured.

The second poem I rather enjoyed, although one line does trouble me slightly. At the end of S1 you say, "compensation stays unsought." Given the preceding lines, which seem to dwell on the comfortable, the familiar as the norm, why would one require "compensation"? Diversion, perhaps, but I feel compensation isn't really the right word. Love the second stanza.

Enjoyed reading both.

Live and be well - H