News from the bike path of life
August 13, 2015
That’s a link to a very nice appreciation of my chapbook Paths Into Inner Canberra, written by Ian Warden. He is kind enough to write that:
‘She writes poetically, deftly and quirkily. The needle on my highly sensitive cliche-detector didn’t flicker once during my reading.’
Lovely stuff! I write hoping that I may surprise a few readers with an image or a reflection, and it is gratifying to read that this was the case with Ian Warden. Here is the cover, with a photograph by Geoffrey Dunn:
The book can be purchased from me (for those who ride bikes/drink too much coffee at cafes), from Book Lore, Lyneham, in Canberra, or from the publisher, Ginninderra Press. It is $4 (plus postage, if you order online). It is a prose essay with two poems.
It snowed yesterday in Canberra, so I was not on my bike. Snow is an occasional surprise here, and everyone was armed with their smartphones to record the phenomenon of cold dandruff. It has never settled on the collar of the pavement, though, that I can remember.
Tuesday poems: Via link
August 10, 2015
http://www.eurekastreet.com.au/article.aspx?aeid=45121#.VcgdN2thiK0
No, there is not a poem called ‘Via link’ at that link, but there is one called ‘The laws of cricket rewritten for the fairy world’ and one called ‘All the ships of the world’. I am obviously overwhelmingly worldly. The publication is Eureka Street.
I am very happy with the cricket poem, as it combines a couple of interests, namely, weird imaginary creatures and sport.
It was written a couple of months back, and is therefore not a feeble attempt to escape the true hideousness of the Ashes* by an escape into fantasy. But please, if you wish to read it that way, be my guest. Leave a comment at Eureka Street, if you feel that way inclined.
Magic!
The ships of the world poem is far angrier and political, although it does contain several puns. You have been warned.
Other Tuesday Poets may or may not be celebrating England’s victory in the Ashes. Some may not even follow cricket. Read the works of the other Tuesday Poets around the world by pressing here.
I’m going to watch some netball.
*That means the Ashes series for men in this post.
Tuesday poem: Crying over spilt light
August 3, 2015
Crying over spilt light
About one-fifth of the world’s population can no longer detect the Milky Way with the naked eye due to light pollution. (Reported in Cosmos magazine, August/September 2009.)
Obesity of light blankets black,
clogs the arteries of recognition.
Blindness comes from the stroke
of too easy ignition; the fatty candle
of conjoined cities chokes imagination.
No matter; search the lost skies
by screen’s unblinking gaze,
and rediscover what Neanderthals
once mind-wandered quite for free.
Erasure of night by carrion globe,
pecking out eyes of speculation.
P.S. Cottier
I wrote this one back in 2009, and it was published in The Specusphere. I thought I would republish it as this year is the International Year of Light.
It struck me as ironic that the light we use to free ourselves from darkness in fact blinds us to the stars.
Have other poets have been writing about light?
Read the works of the other Tuesday Poets around the world by pressing here.
Tuesday poem: Is it a haiku?
July 20, 2015
winter strawberries
nipples in snow
limacine dreams
P.S. Cottier
I was tossing up whether to have an image of a slug or a strawberry. Looks like I opted for perky and nice with this Deborah Griscom Passmore painting of a type of strawberry called Parker Earle. Planted in the glorious field we call Public Domain.
Don’t think about that wee poem too much, or rather unpleasant images may occur. By the way, there is no shame in having to look up the word ‘limacine’, which is not a kind of expensive car. I trolled around for ages before I found ‘as ovine is to sheep, X is to slug’. And the word is perfect, I think.
Being a poet is a tough job, but someone has to do it.
Read the works of the other Tuesday Poets around the world by pressing here.
The asparagus fields of Peru are visible from space
1.
Little green rockets
counting down pushing up
tips pierce the moon
2.
Ballistic veggies
spears thrown up to satelleyes
sparrowgrass has landed
3.
Green fingers reaching out
Romero horror film
Night of the single crop
P.S. Cottier
The Victorians sometimes referred to asparagus as sparrowgrass:
“‘It’s a stew of tripe,’ said the landlord smacking his lips, ‘and cow-heel,’ smacking them again, ‘and bacon,’ smacking them once more, ‘and steak,’ smacking them for the fourth time, ‘and peas, cauliflowers, new potatoes, and sparrow-grass, all working up together in one delicious gravy.'”
(Dickens The Old Curiosity Shop Chapter 18)
My brain being what it is, I now picture thousands of guinea pigs lost in the vast fields of asparagus…pretty fat guinea pigs.
Whether there is any other poetry of an eco-poetic slant at Tuesday Poem this week, I know not. Read the works of the other Tuesday Poets around the world by pressing here.
photo by Muffet (cc licence attribution generic 2.0 Wikimedia Commons)
PS Cottier 