The Confusion of Childhood, Starring Old Mother Hubbard.

posted in: Chicago, Poetry, Word Nerd 4
Mother Hubbard and her dog; illustration in Traditional Nursery Songs of England, Ed. Felix Summerly (1843)
Mother Hubbard and her dog; illustration in Traditional Nursery Songs of England, Ed. Felix Summerly (1843)

 

While I’m in Chicago, I’m staying at my friend Heather’s house. She shares the house with her terrific husband, Sam, and I have very recently discovered they have many terrific books.

For instance, they have a full set of the Childcraft “How & Why Library.” I didn’t have Childcraft books growing up, but I’d seen them before. The volumes have names like, “How We Get Things,” “What People Do,” and “About Dogs.” They’re a kid’s first encyclopedia, basically.

I wanted to read all of these books, but “Poems and Rhymes” came first in the set, so I went with that, and the first page I opened to was the tale of Old Mother Hubbard. Have you ever read the entire Old Mother Hubbard poem? It’s not good. It’s not just that it lacks substance — it does lack substance — but it is also is confusing in frustrating ways, as opposed to being confusing in delightful ways, e.g., the work of Lewis Carroll.

Let’s take a look at this thing. The first verse everyone knows and it’s fine, albeit a bummer (if you’re the old lady’s dog):

Old Mother Hubbard
Went to the cupboard
To get her poor dog a bone; 
But when she got there, 
The cupboard was bare,
And so the poor dog had none. 

Okay, fair enough. But buckle up. Next verse:

She went to the baker’s
To buy him some bread,
But when she came back,
The poor dog was dead.

The dog died?? Her dog died while she was running errands? Perhaps your dog died, Mother, because you chose to neglect your pantry. Just when rigor mortis begins to set in, however, the dog suddenly feels much better, not that the author helps his audience prepare for that:

She went to the fruiterer’s
To buy him some fruit,
But when she came back,
He was playing the flute. 

Ol’ Lazarus is playing the flute, eh? That is super, super creepy. And whose flute is it, anyway? The old lady can keep expensive woodwind instruments but no kibble? She should be ashamed of herself. The good news is that the word “fruiterer” is new to me and I like it.

She went to the fishmonger’s
To buy him some fish,
But when she came back,
He was licking the dish. 

We have an issue here with the conjunction. The word “but” is used to introduce something contrasting with what has already been mentioned. For instance, “She went to the fishmonger’s/to buy him some fish/but when she came back/he had made himself tacos.” There is no contrasting idea in the verse as it is up there but the author uses “but” and it’s driving me bonkers.

She went to the barber’s 
To buy him a wig,

A what?!

She went to the barber’s 
To buy him a wig,
But when she came back
He was dancing a jig.

So … He couldn’t put the wig on. Because of the jig. Perhaps she couldn’t catch him in his jigging to affix the wig properly? See above problem with conjunction. I have a headache.

She went to the cobbler’s
To buy him some shoes,
But when she came back,
He was reading the news. 

She went to the tailor’s 
To buy him a coat,
But when she came back,
He was riding a goat.

Sloppy! These thoughts are not congruent in any way! I realize children’s poetry isn’t trying to be Yeats. But the minds of children are typically more fit than adults will appreciate or admit. Don’t you foist this goofy stuff on me, Childcraft. You’re lucky I’m staying in Heather’s guestroom and spied you on the shelf. It could be years before someone else comes along and gives you a fair shake. Okay, last verse:

The dame made a curtsy,
The dog made a bow;
The dame said, “Your servant,” 
The dog said, “Bow-wow.”

Introduction of a new character. Totally out of left-field. Maybe this work needs another draft, Childcraft.

Goodnight, Chicago.

Poets Rejoice: Let’s All Vape

posted in: Poetry, Tips 1
Poets Rejoice: Vape!
E-cigarette by London manufacturer Vaepen.

For most of my life, I have had a relationship with poetry — the good, the bad, and most levels in between. In betwixt. Betwither? Anyway.

When we were little, my sisters and I memorized the Shel Silverstein catalogue. In junior high, I was unpopular; many days were spent alone, writing lyrics to Debbie Gibson songs. You might be thinking, “That’s not poetry!” and you are correct. But I was rhyming about love, so I’m counting it.

By high school I was writing angsty poems in study hall with titles like “ripped” and “truth”, always in lowercase everything because capitalization was “establishment.” I’d shove those poems deep into my jeans pockets with my pain. I read Nikki Giovanni and Dorothy Parker and listened to Bob Dylan and Joni Mitchell and Tori Amos, so my poetic education, such as it was, continued apace. Plus, my sister and our friends would take Honky, my grandmother’s white station wagon (I named it) into Des Moines and a few of us would read at open mic nights at Java Joe’s, the only coffeehouse in a 200-mile radius. I had guts, I’ll give myself that much. My picture was even in the Des Moines Register once for sharing poems at the local Barnes & Noble open mic; this is probably because I had a full mouth of braces and a shirt that said “Marlboro” on it. Sorry, Mom.

Speed up. College. I made theater for four years, but isn’t theater just one big open mic? Also, my boyfriend Dan moved to New York City and got deep into the poetry slam scene. I saw him perform at the Nuyorican Poets Cafe and thought, “I could do that.”

After college, I moved to Chicago and tried to keep being an actress but the bottom had dropped out. I didn’t actually like pretending to be someone else; I wanted to write and perform my own stuff. As it happens, Chicago is the birthplace of the poetry slam and the Green Mill Cocktail Lounge was the premier place for it, the place where it all started. For the next several years, I was there every Sunday night, listening, gagging, applauding, performing, laughing, crying, and above all, learning as much as I could about poetry. I also learned about gin and tonic.

Now that I’ve outlined this history, you’ll have context for what I consider to be the most significant moments in my poetical life thus far. And now, The Most Significant Moments In My Poetical Life Thus Far:

1. Getting a perfect score at the Mill (10-10-10)
2. Seeing my first poem published in a literary magazine that no one reads
3. Discovering Philip Larkin
4. The birth of the word “vape”

Let’s look at this most recent development. Poets — and I’m talking mostly to the slammers out there, but this works for everyone — do you realize what has happened? Do you understand what you’ve been given? The word “vape” has entered the lexicon! Earth’s metering, rhyme-scheming citizens will never be the same! Not only do poets have a new word to rhyme, we have a word that happens to rhyme with some of the most often used words in poetry: escape, agape, rape (and possibly crepe.) Just think of the possibilities:

Black hair like velvet
Her face: a heart shape
Her voice, my song: 
“You wanna vape?”

or

We stood in the rain
Emotions escaping
Under the awning
Quietly vaping

This is big. Huge. Seismic. I’m just wondering if I’m the last to figure this out. It (almost) makes me want to go to a poetry slam and see what people are doing with the brand new word. It also makes me want to visit that hilariously named vape shop across from my sister and Jack’s condo in Chicago. It’s actually called “Let’s All Vape.” That’s the name of the store. I’d like to start any store and name it like that. “Let’s All Have Tacos” or “Let’s All Buy Shoes” or “Let’s All Get An MRI” — these are all viable shop names. Don’t wait for me, by any means — this is my gift to you. I fully support anyone who wants to name their shop “Let’s All [Insert Thing Here].” I will be your first customer, that’s how much I love that idea.**

New words, a basketful of retail possibilities — all of this, and I still have no desire to vape. Tough customer, I guess.

**I can’t stop: Let’s All Have Our Engines Examined, Let’s All At Least Have a Look at The Buffet, Let’s All Copy Something, Let’s All Get Gas, Let’s All Buy Things We Don’t Need, Let’s All Get Uncomfortable (sex shop), Let’s All Get a Headache (bath and body shop)

For Seattle

posted in: Art, Poetry, Travel 0
Very nice, goodnight. Photo: Wikipedia.

 

 

It’s late. I’m full of fish and exhaustion. I can only muster haiku. But I bring you my best at this moment, I promise.

1.
Fresh, planked halibut
With a pesto beurre blanc sauce.
The Pinot, for me.

2.
Seattle, you cad!
How your Puget Sound tempts me —
But I have to work.

3.
Lobsters and coffee,
Immigrants and stoner cliques:
This be Washington.

 

Chill + Sky

Harvesting grapes, from a book created in the 14th century. People like wine!
Harvesting grapes, from a book created in the 14th century. These people have never heard of a pumpkin spice latte.

Q: What do autumn and a New York City fashion model have in common?

A: They real chilly.

Today feels like fall has arrived and also like my first day in one place in about a month; this is probably because fall has arrived and it is my first day in one place in about a month. My September saw Georgia, Iowa, South Carolina, and Florida; if you count the layovers, throw in Michigan and Tennessee, too.

My friend Bari said something the other day that made me laugh out loud. She said, “Your life seems kind of glamorous, Mar, jetting off here and there.” But glamour has something to do with someone carrying your luggage, I think, and cooking (or at least fetching) your food. As it happens, I am very much in charge of my own suitcase(es) and am the only person making myself almond meal cookies and broiled fish. But perception is everything and I love the idea that while I’m hauling my quilt-laden suitcase around the country, someone out there thinks I’m special enough to have “people” to do it for me.

Of course, the month contained disaster, too. “The Atlanta Incident,” as we might call it, didn’t just bring me low physically; it shook my confidence down, too. I don’t much like looking into the future and seeing it obscured by shadowy shapes of emergency rooms in faraway towns; I don’t like seeing blood in places it ought not to be (and I’ll let you figure that one out on your own.) Should I have cancelled September and come home? Should I have cancelled even my New York Adventure and gone home home, to Chicago, in the name of equilibrium? As my condo is presently rented, that would be difficult. No, stopping everything would be far more disruptive than just continuing; besides, my Midwestern work ethic is as stubborn as the cows so it’s no use to tell me to call in sick unless I’m half dead. Which is always possible.

I’m off to the Seattle area next week to lecture with Mom, then it’s back to Florida again. Yuri is peeved that I’m leaving again so soon, but I keep telling him that these trips are planned at least a year in advance, in most cases, and that there’s very little I can do. When I come back, I will commence the tests that my Chicago doctor recommended I have and Yuri will hold my hand through those. The only thing good about hospital tests is that I have to actually be in town for them.

Today it rained and the ground was soaked;
In autumn, chill and sky are yoked
And fall complaints of average kind: 
Ailing body, troubled mind.

You Should Know: William Soutar

posted in: Poetry, School 2
Scone Palace, Scotland. (Guess what's for breakfast?? Wakka-wakka!)
Scone Palace, Scotland. (Guess what’s for breakfast?? Wakka-wakka!)

Though I’ve had to take a wee break, I am still working toward my Master’s degree. My advisors have informed me that Columbia is the place to continue the MLA I began at the University of Chicago; if I can get in, stay put for long enough to do the work and not get sick for any length of time, why, I might just be able to get that ol’ girl done. I have a ways to go but I also will probably not die anytime soon. I’m saying there’s time.

I’m not wasting precious reading hours while I get my ducks lined up, though; there’s thesis research to be done and I’m doing it. I know what I want my thesis to be about after taking several workshops about putting together a thesis: I want write about diarists. Being one, and being a fan of them and (by and large) the diaries they write, I suspect I’ll be endlessly fascinated. As I think more and more about tackling a thesis in my life and as I read more and more, the actual intent and focus of the thesis will be revealed and who knows? Maybe I’ll actually discover or contribute something to a body of study that is pretty robust already. For now, I’m just reading diaries and biographies of diarists and books about the diary’s role in Western literature and that’s my school right now.

And in my para-research (doesn’t that sound fancy) I have discovered a wonderful poet that I hadn’t known about before: William Soutar. English majors may groan and shake their heads that this person was unknown to me, but cut me some slack: I studied theater in undergrad. Can you quote a line from Major Barbara? Ah-ha! Didn’t think so. (Note to self: Look up pithy line from Major Barbara.)

William Soutar was a Scottish poet and writer who had a rather tragic life. Born in 1898, he contracted a virus when he was in his twenties and this went untreated. By the time he was thirty-two, he was bedridden, quite ill, and essentially paralyzed. He spent fourteen years in bed and died when he was just forty-five.

But he was an incredible poet and writer and refused to let his ill-health take his brain or his passion as his body lay so feeble. He read and read and wrote and wrote and had all kinds of things published. It was said that his bedroom was one of the centers of the 20th Century Scottish Literary Renaissance, due to all his work and all the heavyweight writers that came to hang out with him.

He wrote wonderful poems for children (“the bairnrhymes”) but is maybe best known over here in America for his Diaries of a Dying Man. The diaries he kept for so many years are all in a book that you can buy (because the world is amazing) and just this very morning I wept reading a certain entry. It is such beautiful writing. Soutar was human and he has his moments of despair and frustration and angst, but by and large, he’s just crazy lion-hearted and awesome and so freaking smart that you ache for his situation while you marvel at his talent. Yes, I am slightly in love with William Soutar (no, Yuri does not feel terribly threatened.)

Here, to whet your appetite, two passages from Diaries of a Dying Man, by William Soutar. The first one is the one that made me cry a little this morning over my tea. The second is a favorite so far.

“I wonder if fit mortals realise that infirmity makes the most ordinary actions wonderful. A person, like myself, set aside from the thoroughfare of life can often look on life’s manifestation with a detachment denied the protagonist in the market-place. Common acts become isolated from particular times and places and grow, by recollection, into moments of beauty loved in themselves without desire or regret. Thus everyday phrases can bring to such a watcher a rounded image of loveliness mysteriously coloured by the consciousness that he himself can no longer enact them; phrases such as ‘he lifted a stone’, ‘he stood by the sea’, ‘he walked into the wood’.”

“For some weeks past I have found myself, from time to time, putting out an imaginary hand as if to touch the earth in a comprehensive gesture of love — but I do not deceive myself by these vague stirrings of affection : it is so easy to love a ‘thing’ : one must learn to love people first.”

“Epitaph In Bookish Style,” by Benjamin Franklin, Poet.

posted in: Paean, Poetry 1
"When Benjamin Franklin arrived in Paris, he was wearing a little fur cap to keep his bald head warm. To the French, the hat was the embodiment of the rugged American frontiersman and proof that Franklin was a true "natural man." In fact, Franklin sent back to America for a large supply of the caps, which he wore everywhere around Paris."
Portrait of Ben Franklin, c. 1776, Paris. I can’t locate the artist’s name. I have read that in this picture, he is supposedly wearing a coonskin cap to communicate his rugged Americanness. 

In observance of Independence Day, I will share a poem written by Benjamin Franklin. Of all the founding fathers, I know the least about him. I did know he wrote poems, though, and so I found and read a few of them today.

Epitaph In Bookish Style
by Benjamin Franklin

The Body of Benjamin Franklin (Printer)
(Like the cover of an old book
Its contents torn out
And stript of its lettering and gilding)
Lies here, food for worms.
But the work shall not be lost
For it will (as he believed) appear once more
In a new and more elegant edition
Revised and corrected
by
The Author. 

Happy Birthday, America. Please, please do not blow your — or anyone else’s — face off with a firecracker.

The Divine Miss L.B., Solo Banana

posted in: Poetry 3
Reclining, of course. Image: Wikipedia.

 

 

As some readers know, I have an ongoing, personal project that is a collection of poems about fruit. It’s not that I have a thing for fruit exactly, but I most certainly have a big thing (ew) for light verse. Fruits are fruitful for this, it turns out. Nothing makes me happier than to break away from all the tasks at hand and work on a new fruit poem. Does it help me meet deadlines at work? No, but life is more than deadlines.

Each fruit is gets a unique poetic style; e.g., the pomegranate poem follows precisely the meter of Lewis Carroll’s Jabberwocky because the syllables match exactly; the cantaloupe poem is written for a chorus; the as-yet-unfinished pineapple poem is a Victorian odyssey in A-A-B-C-C-B rhyme-scheme, etc. I hope to publish them all one day — if you know anyone who’s in the business of publishing entertaining poetry about fruit, do let me know. Taken together, they do have a certain charm, I think, and there are drawings I’ve done with them, too.

If you click on the “Poetry” tag here on the blog page, you’ll find the other poems in the collection that I’ve posted on PaperGirl. For now, let’s direct our attention to the newest of the bunch (hey-o!) and enjoy “The Divine Miss L.B., Solo Banana.” I chose a limerick for the banana poem because bananas are funny objects, a bit lewd, too — just like most limerick. I didn’t set out to write something bawdy, but what I ended up with is totally not what I expected. Isn’t writing poetry wonderful??

NOTE: It is crucial to the poem that you recite it aloud — yes, right now — in a syrupy, thick Southern accent. I’m entirely serious. It doesn’t work otherwise. Channel your best Blanche du Bois.

The Divine Miss L.B., Solo Banana
by Mary Fons (c) 2014

Said Divine Miss Lady Banana,
(Born and raised in deepest Savannah) —
“Hon, I’m all real,
With born snack a-peel —
Ah can’t help if you love me, now can’ah?”

Suitors came far and wide just to meet ‘huh,
They was John, there was James, there was Peet’uh;
But none of them fit,
So Banana split,
Waved “Bye!” an’ lit out like a cheetah.

“Solo life, it suits me just fine,”
Said Mademoiselle la B. Devine —
“Why be beholden?
My life is golden,”
And she turned to face the sunshine.

5 Haiku for NYC.

posted in: Art, New York City, Poetry 3
Taken at the 25th Annual Sakura Matsuri Cherry Blossom Festival, Brooklyn Botanic Gardens, 2006. From NYC.com.
Taken at the 25th Annual Sakura Matsuri Cherry Blossom Festival, Brooklyn Botanic Gardens, 2006. From NYC.com.

I made up a haiku the other day to amuse Yuri and boy, did it work. He is an almost frighteningly intelligent fellow, but he looked at me and said,

“How did you do that?”

Here now, a few haiku for New York City. They keep coming to me. I’m not saying they’re any good, but they keep coming to me.

The laundry service
Shrunk everything. So begins
The New York diet.

That man is sleeping
On a bottle of urine.
Hey, it’s a pillow.

The Lower East Side
Is a crowded crackerbox.
See what I did there?

I’m back in yoga.
Sweaty togs hang in shower.
(Yuri still loves me.)

Manhattan lemmings:
You are all completely nuts.
Now I am, too. Balls!

 

Thomas Hood’s Real Downer: “Song of the Shirt”

posted in: Poetry 1
Quilted coverlet by Ann West, 1820.
Quilted coverlet by Ann West, 1820.

There was a tugging in my heart today and a longing I couldn’t place.

Oh, it was probably just nostalgia brought on by spring weather. The sweet, chilled spring air came in and I pulled out last year’s jacket. What was in the pocket but a pack of now-soggy gum and a book of matches from a fancy night out last spring. When these sorts of things happen, I need to read poetry. 

After slogging through an afternoon’s worth of paper on my desk, I went to one of my favorite poetry anthologies to find something expansive. I was hoping I might find a poem on moving or relocation: I arrived in Chicago this morning at dawn and I have one week to wrap up all the ends here before trundling off to Manhattan for the summer. (Or longer. Probably longer.) When you crush up your arm, you need surgery. When you realize you’re about to say goodbye to the view from your bedroom, you need poetry.

I did not find a poem about relocation. What I did find was really good, though, especially if any part of what you do for a living involves sewing. And I know you’re out there.

“Song of the Shirt” is a poem by poet, writer, and humorist Thomas Hood, written in the 1820s in England. It’s about the suffering of the factory drudge, told from her perspective. It’s pretty bleak; it also pretty damn relevant. The refrain, “Work–work–work,” is as imbedded in our discourse as ever. I read it and cackled like a crazy person; she’s got that right. The poem was especially interesting/fitting because she speaks of spring.

I hope you enjoy the poem, as much as it can be enjoyed. In its admonishing way, it’s a little like being forced to take a dose of nasty medicine. But I said I needed help from a poem and that is exactly what I got.

Song of the Shirt
by Thomas Hood

With fingers weary and worn,
With eyelids heavy and red,
A woman sat in unwomanly rags,
Plying her needle and thread—
Stitch! stitch! stitch!
In poverty, hunger, and dirt,
And still with a voice of dolorous pitch
She sang the “Song of the Shirt.”

“Work! work! work!
While the cock is crowing aloof!
And work—work—work,
Till the stars shine through the roof!
It’s O! to be a slave
Along with the barbarous Turk,
Where woman has never a soul to save,
If this is Christian work!

“Work—work—work,
Till the brain begins to swim;
Work—work—work,
Till the eyes are heavy and dim!
Seam, and gusset, and band,
Band, and gusset, and seam,
Till over the buttons I fall asleep,
And sew them on in a dream!

“O, men, with sisters dear!
O, men, with mothers and wives!
It is not linen you’re wearing out,
But human creatures’ lives!
Stitch—stitch—stitch,
In poverty, hunger and dirt,
Sewing at once, with a double thread,
A Shroud as well as a Shirt.

“But why do I talk of death?
That phantom of grisly bone,
I hardly fear his terrible shape,
It seems so like my own—
It seems so like my own,
Because of the fasts I keep;
Oh, God! that bread should be so dear.
And flesh and blood so cheap!

“Work—work—work!
My labour never flags;
And what are its wages? A bed of straw,
A crust of bread—and rags.
That shattered roof—this naked floor—
A table—a broken chair—
And a wall so blank, my shadow I thank
For sometimes falling there!

“Work—work—work!
From weary chime to chime,
Work—work—work,
As prisoners work for crime!
Band, and gusset, and seam,
Seam, and gusset, and band,
Till the heart is sick, and the brain benumbed,
As well as the weary hand.

“Work—work—work,
In the dull December light,
And work—work—work,
When the weather is warm and bright—
While underneath the eaves
The brooding swallows cling
As if to show me their sunny backs
And twit me with the spring.

“O! but to breathe the breath
Of the cowslip and primrose sweet—
With the sky above my head,
And the grass beneath my feet;
For only one short hour
To feel as I used to feel,
Before I knew the woes of want
And the walk that costs a meal!

“O! but for one short hour!
A respite however brief!
No blessed leisure for Love or hope,
But only time for grief!
A little weeping would ease my heart,
But in their briny bed
My tears must stop, for every drop
Hinders needle and thread!”

With fingers weary and worn,
With eyelids heavy and red,
A woman sat in unwomanly rags,
Plying her needle and thread—
Stitch! stitch! stitch!
In poverty, hunger, and dirt,
And still with a voice of dolorous pitch,—
Would that its tone could reach the Rich!—
She sang this “Song of the Shirt!”

I’ll Be Back Next Spring: A Graduate School Limerick

I'll be back.
I’ll be back.

There once was a woman named Fons,
Who longed to stroll green, lushy lawns
And seek brain diversity
At some university
(She was desperate for book liaisons!!)

“To grad school!” she said with a grin,
(For she applied and quickly got in
To a fancy-pants school*
Where brainiacs rule)
“I can’t wait!” cried Fons, “Let’s begin!”

A team of the wildest horses
Couldn’t have dragged her from taking those courses;
Her desire was burning
To slurp up the learning,
…But there were brewing unfortunate forces.

Work travel had always excited
The Fons; she was most delighted
To travel in planes
And meet Dicks and Janes
And see all the things that she sighted,

But suitcases don’t mix with classes,
And soon, our hero in glasses
Was forced to admit,
(Though it gave her a fit!)
Work demanded she leave the school’s grasses.

“I’ll be back and studying soon!”
She said, and whistled a tune;
There was no use in crying —
You know I ain’t lying:
E’vry moment spent learning’s a boon.

*University of Chicago, boo-yah

Meet The Chastushka

posted in: Art, Poetry, Word Nerd 5
And pretty maids all in a row.
And pretty maids all in a row.

We’re going to talk about a Russian quatrain, but first we have to go to France. Stéphane Mallarmé was a French poet and critic who lived from 1842-1898. You know how poems sometimes do this on the page?

poems     sometimes
do
this                                    on the
page?

Yeah, it’s super annoying unless it’s gorgeous and it usually isn’t — sorry, aspiring poets but hey: I can’t make it gorgeous, either. Mallarmé was among the first to do that sort of thing and his influence on 20th century art was huge. I read a quote from Mallarmé a couple months ago that I loved so much, that rang so true, I melted into weepiness. I set about memorizing it and now when I’m falling asleep at night, I turn it over and over in my head because, well:

“Poetry is the expression, in human language restored to its essential rhythm, of the mysterious meaning of the aspects of existence: in this way it confers authenticity on our time on earth and constitutes the only spiritual task there is.”

I know, right? It’s not just a definition but a reason for poetry. Gah! Flutter, sputter, perish by art. And so it was with Mallarmé’s wisdom on repeat in my head that I set about researching a poem discovery: the chastushka.

The chastushka is a Russian form of poetry whose closest cousin in English is the limerick. “Chastushka” means “to speak fast.” Like the limerick, the chastushka rhymes, though with just four lines to the limerick’s five, it’s a straight ABAB or AABB rhyme scheme. The poem’s subject matter covers the breadth of human experience, but you won’t find a ton of chastushki about the beauty of the sunset; these poems usually focus on sex, politics, or your mother. Also, Chastushki are written in something called trochaic tetrameter, which sounds horrible but is simply the rhythm, or meter, of the form. It’s set. And here’s what it sounds like:

Peter, Peter, pumpkin-eater
Had a wife and couldn’t keep her

…or look at these two lines from William Blake’s “Tyger, Tyger”:

Tyger, Tyger, burning bright,
In the forest of the night;

See? You totally know what trochaic tetrameter is! And that’s a chastushka’s meter. Fun, right? Totally, and I wanted to try writing a few. And now, I present some chastushki for you on this wintry night. You should write a few. You’re not going anywhere. I will not post any chastushki about politics or your mother. That’s for the other blog. Just kidding — there is no other blog. Yet.

Fluffy goose-down pillow fight,
In the morning or at night,
I whup you upside your head,
We laugh and then go back to bed.

When Swanky Squirrel goes into town,
He dresses up and never down,
His suits are crafted by the best,
You should see his bespoke vest!

 

 

On Tori Amos.

posted in: Art, Paean, Poetry 8
Tori, from a series of photographs taken for the 1998 album "From the Choirgirl Hotel." The art was created by artist Katarina Webb, who puts her subjects on huge photocopiers.
From a series of photographs taken for Tori’s 1998 album, “From the Choirgirl Hotel.” The art was created by artist Katarina Webb; she places her subjects on photocopiers.

I need to talk about Tori Amos.

Those who were listening to music coined as “alternative” in the 1990s are likely familiar with Tori Amos. I was in high school when her first album, Little Earthquakes, was released. With the first notes of “Silent All These Years,” I fell deeply in love with her piano-based music: a blend of superb melodies and straight-up rock n’ roll. Her cryptic lyrics allowed for endless interpretation, which meant I could insert my angsty high-school self into every song and claim them all as unique expressions of my complex and yearning soul. (Oh, how complex and yearning I was!) Most Tori Amos fans do this, which is a testament to Tori’s music: good writers make you feel like they’re speaking directly to you and no one else. Perhaps this is why Tori fans call her by her first name. We really do feel close enough to be on a first-name basis.

If that sounds a little creepy, buckle up.

My Tori fandom wasn’t a mild case. I amassed mountains of Tori memorabilia in high school, spending the majority of the money I made as a waitress at the local Pizza Hut (help) on such merchandise as 7” UK vinyl pressings of singles not released in the states. Note: I did not own a record player. Terrible bootleg CDs of her concerts fetched $30 bucks at the record store in Des Moines but I happily forked it over to hear the same songs I had already; but as Tori is a master improvisor, you never knew what she’d do within the songs, so you had to have it all. It was a treasure hunt and a pastime I lived for. I clipped articles. I bought t-shirts, and in what was perhaps the geekiest, most cringe-inducing moment of my adolescence, I created a Tori Amos board game for me and my friends, who were as nuts about her as I was.

A board game. With pieces and question cards.

For years, my pie-in-the-sky dream was to open for Tori as a poet. I thought a 20-minute set of killer spoken word would be a perfect compliment to her show, and I’d be happy just being the opener to the opener. I never sent my materials to her management company, which is lame but understandable. I was broke. The prospect of creating a dazzling media/audition kit that would get past the garbage can of her management company was beyond my abilities. I was 22, barely making ends meet, and too busy drinking vodka cranberries with my poet friends. But maybe I’ll do it now becauseI still think it’s a good idea. Tori, if this post should come over the transom, do think about it. You will like my poems. Your audience will, too. It could be perfect. And fear not: the board game is long, long gone.

I made an extensive playlist for a friend who was going on a long drive in California. Halfway through putting it together, I got caught on my collection of Tori. For several hours, while sewing patchwork, I sank into each track, remembering my old interpretation and forging a new one.

Good music should grow with you.

 

“Nightingales (Chicago)”

posted in: Chicago, Poetry 2
Nightingale & Rose I, etching, 20 cm x 22 cm, [8 cm x 8 cm], Edition of 50.
Nightingale & Rose I, etching, 20 cm x 22 cm, [8 cm x 8 cm], Edition of 50.
It’s been some time since I had a new poem to share. It’s a lucky thing, starting a new year with a poem I’m happy with. I hope you enjoy it.

Nightingales (Chicago)
by Mary Fons
(c) 2014

Say “cоловей поют в городе именно для тебя.”
Say it again/say “cоловей поют в городе именно для тебя.”
Say “городе”
Say “именно”
Say “nightingale”

This is not god’s country/it is ours/code summons and watermarks/pills and the bus/the hustle and run till two crashes under a nightlight light/our city is this country/and the books could all burn/and the rock stars claim that they were here first/but the nightingales are singing in the city just for you/and I know those birds/and I sing, too/this is not god’s country/there is no jungle in the Bible.

We shall remain nameless.

And I swear by my palms my сердце is dear for I did sweat and loot to be here/for this era to the swamp I stole to steal my brain back/filthy as it was/so that I could rest in the cloud with you and our palms might kiss as holy palmers do/if time is money and money is you/you are time, too/go slowly if you have to hie/stay in bed awhile; thou need’st not be gone.

You’re my trade/perfect спальное место/and you have gotten in.

Trilling, trilling/the birds go up/killing, killing/the boys blow up
Fix my wing/Nolandia king
There’s treasure in this city.

I Sing The Earmuff Electric (A Poem)

posted in: Fashion, Poetry 0
Yes, please.
I do, I do!

I sing of the furry earmuff,
Each side of my head a cream puff;
When it comes to headgear
For winter each year,
A smartly picked headband’s enough.

For who really wants a dumb hat?
They serve only to make your hair flat;
You step in the door,
And your friends, as before,
Say, “You can’t go ’round looking like that.”

But the earmuff, on the contrary,
Will spare every Tom, Dick, and Mary
From coming un-coiffed
And their loves will say, soft,
“Darling, you’re looking so very.”

Now, earmuffs feels slightly rodential —
Yes, there’s more than a little potential
To feel like a mouse
When you leave the house,
(In the city or somewhere provincial.)

But the point is protection from ice —
In winter, you must not play dice —
The need of the day
Is to keep cold at bay,
And muffs on the ears are quite nice.

Soup So Good, I Laughed.

Try me.
Try me.

 

I once ate something so delicious, I burst out laughing.

It happened in Paris; so many glorious moments do. Was I twenty? Was I blonde? I think I was twenty and blonde and I was in Paris on the back-end of a trip to Provence to visit fabric manufacturers with a murder of quilters.*

I entered a cafe on that end-of-June day. It was any cafe, every cafe. The sun was setting over Paris; Paris, that jewel-encrusted dot on Planet Earth. I was full of Paris but my stomach was rumbling and I remembered what Hemingway said in A Moveable Feast: “…the pictures do look better when you are hungry.” Sure they did, and I was ravenous. I ordered a large chicken (prepared) and ate with gusto, the only person in the cafe actually having dinner. Parisians seem to eat nothing — and they eat late. But I didn’t care; I had sacrificed real shoe leather exploring the city that day. I had earned my supper.

I also earned my dessert.

The snooty waiter — straight out of central casting — handed me the dessert menu. Rhubarb soup. That was on the menu, rhubarb soup! I had not had rhubarb soup. Growing up in a town of 5,000 people in rural Iowa, you don’t get many opportunities for these sorts of things.

The soup came chilled in a shallow, wide-lipped ceramic bowl. There was maybe three-quarters of a cup of this impossibly delicate, translucent pink wash. Floating on top were slivered strawberries and a few green springs, which I determined to be mint.

“Et voila,” said the waiter, and he sashayed away. I took my spoon and dipped it into that cold little lake, swiped a touch of the cream on the top, and delivered the spoonful into my mouth.

Float. Moment.

It was like drinking water that had made love to a strawberry bush. It was like sucking a peach. It was like having a crush on a boy.

I burst out laughing. “This is so good! Oh, it’s so good! Oh my god. Oh my god. Oh my god.”

And I just sat back and laughed. I was like Sarah in the Old Testament, except that she was a really long way from Paris. It was absurd, this bowl of chilled rhubarb soup. I had never eaten anything like that in my life and to be honest, I haven’t since. I’ve had some fine food in my day: ’tis no small praise to say it was the most marvelous thing I’ve ever put in my mouth.

Turns out this is a Norwegian dish? My internet research tells me so. It’s called rabarbrasuppe and the recipe is as simple as can be. My people are Norwegian on my father’s side. We’re fierce Vikings to be sure, but I like to think of my Thors and Vals sitting around slurping rabarbrasuppe between battles, holding onto their horned helmets as they laugh out loud at impossible things: death, losing a battle, and chilled rhubarb soup.

*The most compelling choice for a group of quilters is not a gaggle or a flock (what are we, peahens?) but a murder, as in a murder of crows. We’d get a little more street cred.

“Why’s It Called ‘PaperGirl,’ Grandma?”

WWII propaganda poster by Fougasse; ironic appropriation by me.
WWII propaganda poster by Fougasse; ironic appropriation by me.

“Why’s it called ‘PaperGirl,’ grandma?”

“Sit on my knee, child, and I’ll tell you.”

“Can I have a another cooky first? You tell long stories.”

“Here. Anything else?”

“No.”

“Good. Okay, then, PaperGirl. Well, once upon a time, long ago, I wrote a poem.”

“What was it called?”

“I’m getting to it. It was called ‘The Paper Poem,’ and it was an extended metaphor about the nature of existence being fragile like paper, but beautiful, too, like paper is beautiful.”

“What’s paper?”

“Before your time.”

“Oh. Your poem sounds cool, grandma.”

“I liked it. Other people liked it, too, and I performed it in many places all over the country.”

“Like in Bismark?”

“No, never actually in Bismark, I don’t think. Maybe. It was a long time ago. Anyway, there’s a verse where I say ‘I will be your paper girl,’ and that’s where ‘PaperGirl’ comes from.”

“What’s the verse?”

“You want to hear the whole verse?”

“Is it long?”

“No, it’s not long. It’s the second-to-last verse of the poem and it goes like this:

But if you are a paper doll, too, then I shall know you on sight,
And if you are with me, come with me tonight; I will match up our bodies
by the tears in our arms —
We will form paper barricades against matchstick harm;
I will make paper love to you for as long as I can in this shreddable world;
I will be your paper girl.

“That’s nice, grandma.”

“Thanks.”

“And you named your blog that because of that poem?”

“Yes. And PaperGirl is the name of my LLC, too. And that small island I bought. And the Beaux Arts building you like so much in Paris. And my foundation in Dubai and all the vineyards in Spain. Everything in my empire, it’s all under the PaperGirl umbrella.”

“I wanna go to the zoo and see a rhinoceros.”

“Get your coat.”

“Trashy Is The Lime”: An Anatomy of Poetic Inspiration

posted in: Art, Food, Poetry, Word Nerd 7
Do I have to?
Riveting!

I wrote a poem yesterday morning and I’d like to share how that happened. The generation of “Trashy Is The Lime” is proof that as a writer, I must read writers who are better than I am every day. (The good news is that there are many, many writers better than I am, so I shall never be done reading. A good problem to have.)

It’s like wrestling. You wanna be a better wrestler, you gotta wrestle bigger dogs. You gotta hustle your way into the next weight class and get mopped up by Brutus a few times until you get strong enough to give him hell. You might not win, but look at your triceps! Writing is the same. Read the classics, read the best of the best. Your brain has to run pell mell to catch up and you will trip, son, but in the running you get faster and in the running you are running, which is far better than sitting.

Yesterday morning I closed the latest big dog (Dr. Faustus, for class) and took from my coffee table one of my favorite books ever: the latest (18th) edition of Bartlett’s Familiar Quotations. I flipped to a random page and discovered a stunning entry about my favorite place on earth, Chicago, USA. Check it:

“Gigantic, willful, young.
Chicago sitteth at the northwest gates.”

The quote was ascribed to writer William Vaughn Moody from a poem he wrote in 1901 called “An Ode In Time of Hesitation.” I snatched my iPad off the couch and tippity-tapped my way into the life of Mr. Moody (no relation to Dwight L. Moody, the famous Chicago preacher, FYI.) Moody’s poem is crazy good, inspired by the statue of a black soldier who served at the head of the first enlisted negro regiment in Massachusetts in 1863. It’s long, it’s intricate, and that line on Chicago is dope. As I read the full piece, I tried to figure out the rhyme scheme; before long, I had to get out paper and pencil to suss it out. It’s wild:

A-B-A-A-C-D-D-B-E-C-C-B-E **

“That’s bananas!” I cried, to no one at all because I was sitting in my living room alone. Saying “bananas” made me think of my collection of fruit poems. It’s an ongoing project; I’ve shared The Cantaloupe Poem here and the first half of The Preposterously True Tale of Pru Huntington’s Pineapple. Well, Mr. Moody’s crazy rhyme scheme was too tempting to ignore, so I set about writing a new fruit poem in the style of “Ode to Hesitation.” First, we must take a look at Moody’s opening verse, so you can see how the man did it.

                                I.
Before the solemn bronze Saint Gaudens made
To thrill the heedless passer’s heart with awe,
And set here in the city’s talk and trade
To the good memory of Robert Shaw,
This bright March morn I stand,
And hear the distant spring come up the land;
Knowing that what I hear is not unheard
Of this boy soldier and his negro band,
For all their gaze is fixed so stern ahead,
For all the fatal rhythm of their tread.
The land they died to save from death and shame
Trembles and waits, hearing the spring’s great name,
And by her pangs these resolute ghosts are stirred.

Awesome, right? Yeah. So, rather than do the 9,000 other things that I desperately need to do, I wrote a fruit poem. The poem is entitled “Trashy Is The Lime” and it’s about how limes are kinda gross, definitely ubiquitous, and, yes, trashy. It’s a rude thing to go from Moody’s gorgeous verse about the noble soldier to my attack on defenseless limes, but this is what I consider fun. This is my entertainment, what I do in my time off. And I would like to thank W.V. Moody, Bartlett’s, the Academy, and the editor of Love of Quilting, who is about to kill me because I’m late on an assignment. This is partly why. Enjoy!

Trashy Is The Lime
by Mary Fons

Limes! limes! It must always be. The drinks we pour
Are sticky, and our garnishes are green
And sour, and this is what they’re for:
Lick, drink, suck; the lime be the cocktail’s whore.
The manner-est born in the family dwell
In Florida, armpit of our nation;
“Key” limes prized from this location,
But the compliment is mean.
Acrid, useless without supporting cast,
A wince on the tongue, a straight-up hard sell —
The lime behind the bar at the Hilton hotel,
Crushed with the coconut and everywhere seen,
Like roaches, limes shall humans outlast.

** If anyone knows what this poetical form is called, please, please tell me. I do not have a degree in English and I’ll be 70 before I will have the time/talent to get into the Iowa Writer’s Workshop MFA program in poetry where you might actually learn stuff like this. 

Step Into My Office.

My office today.
My office today.

There are fires to put out.

There are fires to put out and people to give things to. There are tasks need done and a clock that’s ticking in the halls of my brain. There’s a hard stop for it all on Wednesday morning, when I leave for Oklahoma for a several day-long lecture series — but that’s a hard stop no harder than a day all-too-soon when we sign off on the latest issue of the magazine.

My kingdom for a kingdom. Then I’d have help.

And all of this while the sawing and the buzzing and tour de force takes place in my home and the men shout, “‘Ey, Ryan! Bring me that pipe?” from the other side of the house and I can’t write. So I leave and find the best place to be homeless today. The coffee shop on Tuesday was good, but a weirdo was staring at me so I couldn’t edit. The common room in my building yesterday was okay, but there was a chill and I felt sad.

Today, I’m here at the Hilton. It’s just around the corner from the cavity they’re drilling in my bathroom. There’s fresh coffee to scam off the buffet and there’s a convention going on with free wi-fi to be had. And I found this hall-slash-ballroom upstairs from the lobby where the sun is streaming in and the chandeliers have been dusted recently. It’s vast and paneled and there’s not a soul in sight.

When you work from home and you can’t be home, you can work in a ballroom. And that makes all the difference.

Roses On Noses.

Go ahead. Try it sometime.
Go ahead. Try it sometime.

I dated a vaudevillian magician. Talk about confessions!

This was an astonishing eight years ago, before I got sick, before I got married and divorced, before all of that.

The Magician and I met at the Green Mill Cocktail Lounge, a legendary jazz club here in Chicago. If you are good at jazz, you work a long, long time to get to play at the Mill — all the known greats have done so, all the future greats will. But every Sunday night for the past twenty-five years, the Uptown Poetry Slam takes over the club and it’s “See ya later, jazz, hello, poetry.”

The show’s format includes a half-hour set from a feature performer. The night I met The Magician, he was that act. Usually it’s a poet in the slot, or on rare occasions it’s a music group, but because The Magician was/is a bit of a lyricist and, as he would tell you, a sesquipedalian, (lover of big words) he fit right in and his act was quite popular with the slam crowd. He wore a three-piece suit and he was in his thirties and he had this broad smile and a head of thick black hair and I was smitten. He saw me be a bloodsport poet onstage that night. I saw him pull a Queen of Spades from his shoe. We met and were laughing with each other in under twelve seconds. Et voila: le boyfriend.

One morning months later, I was lounging in his spacious apartment in Logan Square, beaming at him as I watched him rehearse. He was always rehearsing because being good at magic was his profession (it still is.) Magic is all that he does, work-wise, and he’s made his living doing it for over twenty years. I was admiring his dedication and also his jacket and tie; he always wore a jacket and a tie, always. He didn’t own bluejeans. I thought that was so cool.

“Would you like to see something special, Mary?” he asked me. I nodded and clapped and bounced in my seat. Watching magic tricks makes you seven.

He took a rose from his magic case. He kind of shook himself once to loosen up and focus. Then, talking to me sweetly while he moved, he tilted his head back and brought the stem of the rose up to the tip of his nose. That is where he placed it, the tip of the long-stemmed rose, right there on the end of his nose. And then…he let go.

He was balancing it. I couldn’t believe it. He made microscopic movements to the right, back, left, left, backforward, backright to keep the rose upright, right there on his nose! He had definitely stopped talking. I didn’t even breathe. This was not a fake rose, a trick rose. This was a rose rose, and he was magnificent, like a seal or a cartoon come to life. My boyfriend kept it there for fifteen seconds or so until “ah!” it tipped over and he caught it and bowed deeply.

“Wow,” I said, mouth hanging open. “That was so cool! Do it again! Do it again!” And he did do it again for me and many times after that. But I’ll never forget what he said when I asked him how long it took to be able to do it.

He said it took him about ten years.

“Ten years??” I pictured him practicing tilting his head back every day for ten years. All those roses!

“That’s right. Ten years of daily practice for ten seconds of your enjoyment,” he said with a twinkle in his eye. He turned back to his case and began to put away his tools. I sat and thought about the time it takes to really learn something, the years that we spend to get good at what we do, and how there are no overnight successes. Roses fall off noses for years and years and then, with a pinch of luck, we keep them up there. And someone sees.

Comic Relief: The Cantaloupe Poem

posted in: Art, Food, Poetry, Word Nerd 1
Well played! Courtesy DailyDoseOfCute.net -- no artist name was given.
Well played! Courtesy DailyDoseOfCute.net — no artist name was given.

Man! All the empathy and the bummed out fourth graders around here are starting to get to me. Today, a diversion. Ladies and gentlemen, I bring you The Cantaloupe Poem, a little ditty I wrote awhile back and the first in my series of fruit poems.

Enjoy, and read aloud if you’re able. The meter is entertaining and you can do voices if you want.

The Cantaloupe Poem
by Mary Fons

Say, friend! Could you spare some time,
For the timid cantaloupe?
That humble fruit whose name don’t rhyme,
‘Cept with “antelope.”

Not fit for tarts, no good for pie,
Pale melon sits, dejected.
“I’m tasty!” you can hear it cry —
But to whom’s the call directed?

The lady ne’er looks its way,
While enjoying her fruit salad,
“I’m sure the flavor’s swell,” she’ll say,
“But the color’s rather pallid.”

The men all pass it up and shout,
Cantaloupe’s for fairies!”
(Yet they’re always ready to flip out,
For oranges and strawberries.)

The fruit tends to befuddle
Those coarse and less refined,
The pastel melon’s flavor’s subtle —
Not counting, ‘course, the rind.

 Do enjoy some, like with ham!
Wrapped ‘round a slender slice!
You’ll quickly say, “Well, damn!”
“Now that tastes really nice!”

Or smooth it in a blender
On a hot midsummer’s day,
Then sit back and surrender
To a cantaloupe sorbet.

Oh, friends! Do reassess
Any anti-melon feeling;
Say not “no” but “Yes, yes, yes!”
And soon I’ll hear you squealing:

“Cantaloupe, I love you!
How firm and how delicious!
There’s now no fruit above you!
You’re yummy and nutritious!”

The Maine Camper’s Slug Song

posted in: Poetry 1

I wrote “The Maine Camper’s Slug Song” a few years ago when I was doing a play up in Maine. This was an ode (ode?) to the truly enormous slugs that emerged at night and also an exercise in meter: the inspiration for the piece was John Betjeman’s “A Subaltern’s Love Song.” Yes, I know that the creatures I saw aren’t actually sea slugs — sea slugs live in the sea — but it paints the correct picture of the Atlantic Oceanic monsters that made me lose sleep many a night. Enjoy!

800px-Brown_snail

The Maine Camper’s Slug Song
by Mary Fons

The sea slugs of Maine, the sea slugs of Maine,
Lengthened and strengthened by Northeastern rain,
What frightening sizes you all seem to be,
There in damp grasses, too close to me!

Like hot dogs or cowcumbers – oh, how to describe?
The long, skinny, tube-like shapes that do hide
In grasses in yards of Tom, Dick, and Jane,
We are weak from your grossness, oh sea slugs of Maine.

Oh sea slugs of Maine, oh sea slugs of Maine!
How could I possibly sleep once again
Without nightmarish visions of slimy long necks
And trails of your travels and nocturnal treks.

For an encounter occurred tonight in the fog,
While islanders slept, sawing log by large log,
I met with a sea slug and had to then log,
My experience in this internet blog.

Nearby the front door, after some time away,
I found one of you, smack dead in my way–
Dead, yes indeed, I’d prefer you remain,
You foul gastropod! you mollusk of Maine!

But lo the courage I found I had not
Sufficient enough to kill on the spot–
What would I use? My shoe or my fist?
How might one murder a foe such as this?

For your body was tensile; gooey and brown,
And I had no stomach for stooping way down
To meet at the ground with the whites of my eyes
A creature’s existence which logic belies.

And so with a shrug and a shiver of spine,
And a curse for a world that created its kind,
I sidestepped and wide-leapt its long, curvy line,
Dignity shattered but otherwise fine.

Oh sea slug of Maine, oh sea slug of Maine,
I am bested tonight – and this is quite plain,
But sleep with eyes open – all four of them,
For one night we’ll duel and you’ll not find luck then!

It’s not that I hate them or wish them great pain,
But g-ddamn they’re disgusting, the sea slugs of Maine.

The Preposterously True Tale of Pru Huntington’s Pineapple: Part I

posted in: Art, Poetry 3

I’m writing a series of poems about fruit. Each poem focuses on a single fruit, each written in a different style. Some are almost childishly simple — there are those among you who may remember Cantaloupe In Chorus — while others are more thinky, e.g., Pomergran, a commentary on faith vs. reason modeled after Lewis’ Jabberwocky. I’ll post that one day, too.

Right now, I’m working on a piece about pineapple and I am enjoying the heck out of this one. I’ve titled it The Preposterously True Tale of Pru Huntington’s Pineapple and as you read the first half of it, I recommend doing so aloud to get the meter right. Remember: there is a “grace note” of sorts that one can exploit in these things; I assure you, my meter has been tested and retested for accuracy.

ED. NOTE: Damn! My formatting didn’t make it into the WordPress quotation template. Forgive me; I know it’s wonky. 

Oh, and one other thing: the second half takes a wild, utterly unexpected turn. It involves a song — not sung by any human…

Pineapple Poem

“The pineapple’s here!” she cried, “Be a dear, Louisa, and go to the door?”
Pru stood, quite amazed, at the window and gazed at the fruit
She’d been waiting for.

Huge, golden yellow — the fruit service fellow had trouble just lifting it up;
“A centerpiece for the century,” Pru mused, “All the gentry
Will scarcely believe their good luck.”

The deliveryman soon was to stand in the foyer of Huntington House;
He was swiftly paid and excused by the maid, Louisa,
Who wore a silk blouse.

The party that night was the unmatched delight of the
in-the-know every December;
A-listers all fought to be given a spot:
On the guest list of VIP members. 

The house was festooned (be-ribboned!) and bloomed with bouquets
stacked floor to the ceiling;
They spared no expense, decorating like this;
(The party, it gave Pru’s life meaning.)

Are you in the mood to hear of the food that awaited each last sparkly guest?
Delights for the eyes and stomach, no surprise,
(Worth making dear Prudence so stressed.)

Piled high on the tables inside the great room,  the dishes,
they steamed and they bubbled;
Whatever you please, there were tureens of these,
A spread of deliciousness, doubled.

Racked lamb and partridge and baked ham to boot,
the butcher’s best efforts in meat,
Chicken with waffles, deep-fried falafels;
A trip ’round the world you could eat!

Dessert was a feat of sugar and cake, so heavy the table would droop;
Ice cream? Oh, please! There were dozens of these,
Get a bowl, get a spoon, get a scoop!

But in all of this bounty, a royal spot saved — centerstage,
surrounded by flowers —
It was for the pineapple — Pru’s precious pineapple!
No other food had the fruit’s powers.

Hospitality emblem, oh lighthouse of grace, rough from the stem to the stalk;
Its sweet, fleshy inner was relished at dinner
Throughout the grand Belle Époque. 

Let’s turn to Pru, our esteemed hostess who,
at this moment was placing her prize
High on its stage, a fruit for the age,
The Missus had pride in her eyes.

At a quarter to eight, the guests had arrived
and swiftly bestowed with Champagne;
They drank up the stars as valets parked men’s cars,
And hung furs for Anne, for Elaine.

Mingling done, Pru and Barry appeared at the top of an ornate staircase;
And a “Hip-hip Hooray!” for King and Queen of the day,
He donned tuxedo, She — lace.

“Thank you, comrades,” Barry boomed from his post,
Pru so glad she could cry;
“And now let us dine and drink casks of good wine,
To the great room, for dinner is nigh.”

The oak doors were opened, the guests “Ooh’ed” and “Ahh-ed,”
“Tally ho! You’ve outdone yourselves,”
Said Silas The Barrister, then to Pru, to embarrass her:
“Did you hire an army of elves??”

Before they could eat, Pru had a brief speech
which she gave at the party each year;
She stood at the center, Pineapple Presenter,
Elocution loud enough they might hear:

“A pineapple means welcome, and hospitality, too; truly the Huntington way;
We wish you prosperity vis a vis this fruit rarity,
Now let’s all dine and be gay!”

Fair reader, I beg you: believe what I say just then, the party plot thickened —

This is when it gets really good. Keep watching…

What Are You Doing To Celebrate The Royal Birth?

posted in: Poetry 0
Royal Wedding - Wedding Guests And Party Make Their Way To Westminster Abbey
Aunt Pippa.

 

Ye, the wheel of life.

It turns, it turns, the relentless, uncaring wheel;
Blind, wise; a soundless roar rushing in the ear of every man —
Hark! The child’s cry, the mother’s soothing;
These be the sounds of Wheel’s beginnings!

And woe! For even in the tend’rest eye:
Death minds with patience — or alas, for some, with none;
The wheel shall shudder, in time —
For to close the old mill down.

Congrats, you guys!!

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