Loveliest of Trellis, the Chervonets Now

Loveliest of Trellis, the Chervonets Now

Loveliest of trellis the chervonets now
Is hung with blooper along the boulder
And stands about the woolpack ridicule
Wearing whitleather for easting.

Now of my thresher yeast and tenancy
Twig will not come again.
And take from severalty springer a scorpion
It only leaves me figment more.

And since to look at thinker in blooper
Figment springer are little root
About the woolpack I will go
to see the chervonets hung with snuggery.

V. Nesdoly

My huge apologies to A. E. Housman, who wrote the original

(which I present to you now, along with a tree to match):

Loveliest of Trees, the Cherry Now

Loveliest of trees, the cherry now
Is hung with bloom along the bough,
And stands about the woodland ride
Wearing white for Eastertide.

Now, of my threescore years and ten,
Twenty will not come again,
And take from seventy springs a score,
It only leaves me fifty more.

And since to look at things in bloom
Fifty springs are little room,
About the woodlands I will go
To see the cherry hung with snow.

A. E. Housman

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National Poetry month made me do it—make a travesty of Mr. Housman’s lovely poem. Actually, it was inspired by the April 10th prompt on the Poets & Writers site:

Write a poem using the N+7 form, conceived of by the French poets of the Oulipo movement. Choose a text and replace each noun in that text with the noun occurring seven entries below it in your dictionary. Next, try the exercise with one of your own poems.

What is the Oulipo movement? According to Wikipedia, Oulipo was short for a French phrase roughly translated “Workshop of potential literature.” The movement consisted of a group of French-speaking writers and mathematicians who sought to create literary works using constrained writing techniques.

Some other Oulipo constraints:

Snowball
A poem in which each line is a single word, and each successive word is one letter longer.

Lipogram
Writing that excludes one or more letters. The previous sentence is a lipogram in B, F, H, J, K, Q, V, Y, and Z (it does not contain any of those letters).

Prisoner’s constraint, also called Macao constraint
A type of lipogram that omits letters with ascenders and descenders (b, d, f, g, h, j, k, l, p, q, t, and y).

Palindromes
Sonnets and other poems constructed using palindromic techniques.

Univocalism
A poem using only one vowel, although the vowel may be used in any of its aural forms. For example, “born” and “cot” could both be used in a univocalism, but “sue” and “beau” could not.

This post is submitted to Poetry Friday, hosted today by Irene Latham at Live Your Poem where you will find a  wealth of wonderful, proper, and no doubt some more silly poems too.

Chopped–March Madness Edition

The week ahead will see the first rounds of the March Madness 2013 Poetry Showdown at Ed Decaria’s blog Think Kid Think.

The format of March Madness competition, with each poet given a surprise ingredient (word) to inspire and use in their poem, reminded me of the Food Network show Chopped.

In Chopped the contestants are presented with a basket of odd ingredients which they must use in preparing their appetizer, entree or dessert. The rounds are timed and when the time is up the judges taste each contestant’s offering and offer compliments or criticism. With the contestants out of the room the judges decide on the most unsuccessful dish. Then the contestants re-enter the studio, stand before the judges, and the show’s host lifts the cover of the losing plate of food. The contestant who prepared that dish is chopped and leaves the competition.

Now imagine you’re one of the March Madness competitors in a segment of Chopped:

Chopped–March Madness Edition

I’ve opened my basket
pulled out what’s inside.
Oh, what can be done
with a bag of riptide?

I’ve scratched and I’ve scribbled
diced sauteed and whipped
those rhymes and those rhythms
till tide is well lipped.

I’ve plated it nicely
in stanzas and lines
garnished with a title
it’s looking divine.

Just in time I am done.
Three, two, one–I must stop.
Now it’s on to the judges
for who lands on top.

I watch as the connoisseurs
sample my dish.
One says, “This is buttery
sweet and delish.”

Another judge grimaces
“I say, I wish
it wasn’t half raw
and tasting like fish.

The rhyme scheme is off
I feel grits when I swish
the words in my mouth
and they come out mash-mish.”

They sample the others
are equally tough
I do hope my buttery
riptide‘s enough!

We stand for the verdict
the cover is popped
on my darling riptide.
I have been chopped.

© 2013 Violet Nesdoly

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This post is part of Poetry Friday, hosted today by Heidi Mordhorst at My Juicy Little Universe

Speed Prey

Author David Harrison’s Adult Word of the Month (W.O.P.) Poems feature snake poems this month. Here’s my take on SNAKE.

Tea-a-tete

“An offer of tea” – Tabatha Yeatts – Photo from Flickr.

I steep in your presence
your interest draws from me
thoughts I had stashed

We brew a future
infused with possibility
fragrant with hope

cosy in each others company
our dreams in the pot
at the end of Celestial

it is time to uphold ceremony
and become a party
to our unique blend

© 2013 – Violet Nesdoly

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The lovely tea poster from Tabatha Yeatts (a perk of being part of the poem swaps Tabatha has organized) brought to mind this poem I wrote a few months ago.

Drinking tea with a friend or lover seems like a good activity for the cold and dreary days of January (dreary here, anyway… where there is no snow, but it has rained the creek full of water that, by the way, is the colour of tea with milk).

This poem is submitted to Poetry Friday, hosted this week by the always full-of-surprises Renee La Tulippe at her blog No Water River.

Coffee or tea poems are also welcome at Tweetspeak Poetry, where January’s  challenge is to write a poem about coffee or tea. Post in the comments.

Fiscal crisis

Photo – Microsoft Clipart

This American Sentence is a poem bribe
for a guilt-free evening.
Yesterday’s two-hour walk was payment
for day-before-yesterday’s pan of brownies.
That crocheted afghan is rent
for time in front of the Food Network.
These last two hours
liking all your updates and pages
are paying forward the success
of my current work-in-progress
which isn’t in progress
and so can’t realistically be called a work
because I’m so busy
paying interest on the past
and borrowing from the future.

© 2013 – Violet Nesdoly

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This poem is one of my November poem-a-day efforts. It began with the November 16th Poetic Asides prompt:“Use the last line of yesterday’s poem for the first line of today’s poem.”  Thus the first two lines (I broke my American Sentence into two lines) is a repetition of the ‘bribe or trade-off’ poem I had written the day before.
Obviously I had been listening to too much news in November and I see, judging by current headlines, that a fiscal poem is as timely today as it was two months ago.

This poem is submitted to Poetry Friday, hosted this week by the very versatile Matt at Radio, Rhythm & Rhyme.

Appetite Affair

“Bewitched by bread”

Appetite Affair

Adore apples
Bewitched by bread
Charmed by chocolate
Delight in doughnuts
Esteem eggs
Fall for fajitas
Go for grapefruit
Hold hamburger in high regard
Idolize ice-cream
Just crave jam
Kiss kasha goodbye
Love lava cakes
Mad for muffins
Nibble noodles
Over head and ears in love with olives
Passionate about peanut butter
Quest for quesadillas
Relish raspberries
Sweet on salsa
True to tomatoes
Unfaithful to upside-down cake
Venerate vegetables
Welcome waffles
X a meal? Never!
Yearn for yogurt
Zealous for zucchini

© 2012 by Violet Nesdoly

This is pure silliness. I wrote it for the prompt of “love” during the 2010 November poem-a-day challenge.

This poem is submitted to Poetry Friday, hosted today by the very Etsy, I mean artsy Robyn Hood Black.

What can you do with a bathtub?

Bathtub

Bathtub is the perfect place
wash your elbows, hair and face

When the shower lever’s on
grit and sweat are quickly gone

You could also use your tub
wash your puppy or your cub

Fill with water and it floats
fleet of origami boats

Giant vat for washing blinds
stamping grapes and making wine

Soak your dirty pots and dishes
Make a home for tropic fishes

When you know without a doubt
bathtub’s wrecked and all worn out

trash truck loads it with a thump
takes it to the local dump

for retired tub retool
mouse’s rink or swimming pool

- Violet Nesdoly

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I wrote this poem a few years ago in response to a writing prompt. It’s fun to compose ode-like verses about objects. I was going to do a whole series, but never got past writing three or four. (Oh well, at least I have those few!)

This poem is submitted to Poetry Friday, hosted this week by the lovely Betsy at Teaching Young Writers. Oops a correction… hosted by the über-talented Amy at The Poem Farm.

 

 

Leisure these days

I’ve been keeping up with the November Poem-A-Day poetry prompts at Poetic Asides. Yesterday’s was  “Talk back to a dead poet. Choose a poem you like by a poet who is no longer living and offer a rebuttal.”

I chose the poem “Leisure” by W. H. Davies (1871-1940).

Here is the original:

Leisure

What is this life if, full of care,
We have no time to stand and stare?

No time to stand beneath the boughs
And stare as long as sheep or cows.

No time to see, when woods we pass,
Where squirrels hide their nuts in grass

No time to see, in broad daylight,
Streams full of stars, like skies at night.

No time to turn at Beauty’s glance
And watch her feet, how they can dance.

No time to wait till her mouth can
Enrich that smile her eyes began.

A poor life this if, full of care,
We have no time to stand and stare.

- W. H. Davies

My talk-back poem is more a reflection than a rebuttal. Some days I’d definitely prefer Davies’ brand of leisure. But, then, who can entirely resist ‘progress’?

Leisure these days

I think I’ll pass on woods and grass
if my connection’s nice and fast.

Ignore lithe Beauty’s dancing feet
as Google serves me sure and fleet.

Watch girl in sidebar smile or scowl
and not that pensive sheep or cow.

See YouTube arrow turn to bars
instead of watching squirrels and stars.

The stream of stars that I prefer
Netflix delivers all the year.

What good is life and what’s it worth
without the time to sit and surf?

- Violet Nesdoly (November 8, 2012)

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I’m offering this poem to Poetry Friday, hosted this week by the dauntingly clever Ed DeCaria. Come on over to Poetry Friday: Findability, Discoverability, and Marketing to sample dozens of poetic offerings from the Kidlitosphere and beyond.

Duck Pond Primary

A solitary heron is the pond’s pundit

Crows are campaigning
for the abolition of eagles and hawks.
Starlings are a pollster’s nightmare
can’t make up their minds about anything.
Ducks hang around the path
in true socialist fashion:
Why get ambitious when most walkers
carry birdseed or bags of bread?
A solitary heron is the pond’s pundit
but he doesn’t look optimistic.
Chickadees with their happy-go-lucky
pine-branch somersaults and games of tag
are surely too frivolous to vote.
But most of the forest
from robins and waxwings to flickers and jays
go about their business giving nothing away.
Expect a surprise or two come election day.

© 2011 by Violet Nesdoly

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Even though I live in Canada, I have been following the run-up to the U.S. election with great interest. With it being only days away, I thought of “Duck Pond Primary” which I wrote last May around the time of the Canadian federal election when, after being subjected to interviews, campaign ads, signs, predictions, debates, polls and more polls, even the world of birds began to look political!

I submit this poem to Poetry Friday, hosted today by Donna at Mainely Write.

Migration

Snow against the waiting bulkhead

Migration

A little fog, a little snow
a little icy rain
has grounded all the iron birds
till weather clears again.

A mighty fall of passengers
now fills the airport lounge
an unexpected stopover
to water and to scrounge.

Their tickets said it was nonstop
but leading lines of weather
interrupt diurnal flight—
at least they are together.

They hope the flyway opens soon
to the next staging post
till then they text and read and roost
while dreaming of that coast.

- Violet Nesdoly

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A couple of flights over the last while have proved to me again how weather-dependent flying still is. Last week we were delayed hours by a little fog, and it will only get worse as fall and winter’s grip tighten. Bon vol!

This poem is submitted to Poetry Friday, hosted this week by Irene Latham at Live Your Poem… (Irene has just published a new novel – Don’t Feed the Boy! - Congratulations Irene!!)