Stars and Stripes

nyc

 

The place where it all happens

Oh America, Oh

Or until it does, it doesn’t matter

Oh America, Oh

Home of the internet, land of the free*

Oh America, Oh 

(*offer, first month only)

Where a double-amputee becomes a mermaid and is “sexy”

Oh America, Oh

Where breasts are revered, but not for nursing

Oh America, Oh

And maternity leave leaves mothers cursing

D’oh America, d’oh

Your corporate culture spoiled two of our jobs

Oh America, Oh

Yet we still pander to the US mob

Oh America, Oh

(if I publish this after 6, I’ll get more hits!)

Good morning America, Oh

I grimace at your fears re: Trump

No America, please no

Coz Down Under we had our onion eater – first for once!

Oh Australia, Oh

Of course there’s so much good stuff too

Oh America, Oh

Hamburgers, ice cream – but not just food

Go America, go

A place I’ve been, can’t claim to know

Oh America, Oh

But New York was just how I hoped

Oh America, Oh

Manhattan fire escapes like a Friends set

Oh America, Oh

So many sights I’ll not forget

Oh America, Oh

Houses like Sweet Valley High, upstate NY

Oh America, Oh

And the way the girls said “a dime”

Oh America, Oh

A friend at Coachella saw Gunners live

Oh America, Oh

Of course I’ve also watched The Wire

Woah America, woah

So I’ve seen how it is on the dark side a’right?

Oh America, Oh

And the backdrop of American cities

Oh America, Oh

Buried in my mind, like false memories

Oh America, Oh

Awards for everything under the sky

Oh America, Oh

If you do something great, seems you’d really fly

Oh America, Oh

Then again, it also seems easier to die

Oh America, Oh

When the Twin Towers define our lives

Woe America, woe

And all those Wall Street crises

Oh America, Oh

Are the ambitions of America a lie?

Oh America, Oh

Where self-help’s a religion

Oh America, Oh

And Meg Ryan the patron saint of rom-com

Oh America, Oh, Ohh Ohhhh Ohh!

Selling us that love affair

Oh America, Oh

Sell, sell, sell everywhere

Oh America, Oh

The arrogance of all that arable land

Sow America, sow

Does something to you, I understand

Oh America, Oh

I’ve seen it in Australia, and Russia too

Хорошо, America, Хорошо

Seems no matter what y’all do

Oh America, Oh

Oh America, there’s no getting around you

 

 

Today’s National/Global Poetry Writing Month prompt/challenge was to write a poem that incorporates a call and response.

 

Tiger

tiger

 

I used to like the lion

King of the Jungle, he!

But then I saw – really saw – the tiger

So utterly wild is she

It was in her eyes and how she ranged –

restless but unfree.

So now I like the tiger best

she’s the one for me

 

 

I wrote a poem for today’s prompt but I’m not happy with it. Maybe I’m not happy at all today, for various reasons. ROAR! Might still publish the on-prompt one but, for now, you get this. Thanks to Jade M Wong’s lion poem for reminding me I had this one to write. 

Maudlin in the Morning

egg

 

The horrendous overtopping greed

And craven doltishness

The shit we can’t get over

Why can’t we see

When pollies, pretty pollies,

And the uncomely ones

Act like

Kindergarten kids nicking each others’ sandwiches

Only to put a mellifluous spin on

The situation in the papers

Or is it that the journalists, who surely see

Preternatural beings

In their Mirrors, their Suns, shining sublime

Out of their own nether-regions

They pick their way daintily

Over the susurrating mess of a political landscape

Or the physical one

A bleached reef, an abandoned open-cut mine, a melting pole

All value and pulchritude

Sacrificed to their loquaciousness

One barely notices

A haze of sassafras

Creeping over the terrain

Like a persistent 9.15 train

Trying to make amends

While we hang our wet washing

And throw away old receipts

For plastic things bought, discarded already

Paramount in the moment

As those fucking politicians who

We merely moan over

On Facebook and

Pen poems to zero effect

And I think I need an egg this morning

Because it’s one perfect thing contained

Until it’s broken of course, fractured

In servitude to my greed

 

Today’s National/Global Poetry Writing Month prompt/challenge was to write a list of overly poetic words – words that you think just sound too high-flown to really be used by anyone in everyday speech. Then make a list of words that you might use or hear every day, but which seem too boring or quotidian to be in a poem. Now mix and match examples from both of your lists into a single poem.

I feel like I often blend the mundane with the maudlin and florid so this wasn’t a huge stretch for me, although I did enjoy slapping out the thesaurus (mental and physical) to use some ridiculously overblown language. 

Saturday Sonnet

Lausanne marina

Bumping the edge of creativity

A boat in a marina

Rocking, chocking ‘gainst the jetty

Heaving, scrapes my lame patina.

Raw below the watermark

Those bits that can’t be altered

Weak spots patched and caulked but dark

Fearing ‘not enough’, I falter.

Should I haul to higher masts

Or try to slip the tethers?

Open water makes more tasks

In work, in life, as ever.

So contain’d by shoreline-cage,

I sculpt water; think of tidal waves

 

 

Today’s National/Global Poetry Writing Month prompt/challenge was to write a sonnet. A sonnet is quite a tricky form and I’m not sure I’ve really nailed it (note to self: write more sonnets). This was something I wanted to write about so I jammed it into this form. Then again, the prompt also talks about how the main point is to “keep your poem tight, not rangy, and to use the shorter confines of the form to fuel the poem’s energy. As Wordsworth put it, in a very formal sonnet indeed, “Nuns fret not at their convent’s narrow room.”” So maybe I’ve managed that, at least.

The Earth / His Purpleness

The earth is sad / Standing in the purple rain

Oceans are dying / I love you more than I did when you were mine

A bleached-white Barrier Reef / Colour me taken aback

Fracking for those last drops of oil / Let’s go crazy

Slaves mine phone components / It’s hard for me to say what’s right when all I wanna do is wrong

An island of plastic bags in the sea / Would you run to me if somebody hurt you, even if that somebody was me?

Burning fossil fuels to light our lives / Tonight we’re gonna party like it’s 1999

Disappearing whales, gorillas, tigers, bees… / Believe it or not, I started to worry

Waters rising, refugees drowning / The times

And we fight about gay marriage / Can’t we just let love decide?

Global leaders do next to nothing  / I’d rather be the pope

We could drop the coal, the nuclear. Use wind and solar / Overcast days never turned me on

Things have got to change. Faster / You’ve got the horn so why don’t you blow it?

Maybe it’s too late / Maybe I’m just like my mother – she’s never satisfied

We’ve only got this one planet / Nothing compares 2 U

 

Today’s National/Global Poetry Writing Month prompt/challenge was to write a poem for Earth Day but I wanted to acknowledge the death of the great musician Prince, whose music has been around as long as I remember, and is an artist Himself and I really bonded over (among others). So I’ve done a cleave poem – a poem in two halves which can be read as two separate but totally different poems, while read together they form a third poem.

The Giant’s Harp
Jack and the Beanstalk illustration by Tony Oliver from Best Ever Treasury of Fairy Tales (Currey O'Neil, 1980)

Jack and the Beanstalk illustration by Tony Oliver from Best Ever Treasury of Fairy Tales (Currey O’Neil, 1980)

 

Every night my master played me

He always hit the note

Drowsing in our celestial chamber

My prow against his throat

 

The way his fingers moved

My body all a’strum

Then one day the small man came

Fee, Fi, Fo Fum

 

I cried out when he took me

Cruel, forcing me back to earth

This lout and his poor mother

Really don’t know what I’m worth

 

Today’s National/Global Poetry Writing Month prompt/challenge was to write a poem in the voice of minor character from a fairy tale or myth.

Anonymous

 

 

Oh, the merry maker

The hour taker

The good feeler

The morning stealer

The cheek reddener

The deadener

The stress reducer

Anxiety producer

Music enhancer

The dancer

Whistle wetter

Makes you better

The kisser

Appointment misser

Messy fucker

Topper upper

Friend faker

Thirst slaker

Freedom bringer

Spoil thinger

The best

Dinner guest

Fight baiter

Hangover creator

Occasion marker

Bringer of laughter

Memory eraser

Life hazer

Talk quickener

Make sickener

Space filler

A killer

Inhibition loosener

Love producer

Naughty and nice

My vice

 

Today’s National/Global Poetry Writing Month prompt/challenge was to think of a single thing or person (a house, your grandmother, etc), and then write a poem that consists of kenning-like descriptions of that thing or person.  A kenning is a riddle-like metaphor used in the Norse sagas. Basically, they are ways of calling something not by its actual name, but by a sort of clever, off-kilter description — for example, the sea would be called the “whale road.”  

How to be happy

Have children, they make your life complete

You’ll learn more from them than they ever will from you

As long as you use these parenting methods… no, wait

Don’t have children, they’ll ruin your lifestyle

They bring joy but also pain and annoyance

 

Find your dream job

Unlikely?

Don’t work. It sucks. We support you.

Find something fulfilling to do that is not-work

Maybe parenting?

 

Think big

Or give up your dreams. Both will have similar results on net happiness within 3%

Be a good wife/mother/daughter while perusing your dreams

Understand that the dreams of your 30s and 40s are not the same as those of your teens and 20s

But think back to what you loved doing as a child and do that

 

Exercise regularly

Make time for yoga and/or pilates

Practise mindfulness

Limit screen time

Take some me time. Where did all the time go?

 

Get your body back after childbirth

But make sure you breastfeed for around 4 years (world average!)

Some of those long-breastfeeding societies may also still smack their kids

Or practise female circumcision

Don’t do that

 

Travel – it broadens the mind

Always be aware of your carbon footprint though

Also spend time on not-travel, because travel can be stressful

And expensive

You need to switch off!

 

Banish negative thoughts, anxiety and judgement

Although, since those thoughts are part of you,

Observe them, but let them pass you by, like cars on a highway

Not real cars of course

Too polluting. Just like those negative thoughts. You don’t want to get cancer

 

Learn a new skill

With all that spare time you have

Explore astrophysics.

Teach yourself German

Sehr gut

 

Avoid banks and call centres

unless you work in one.

It’s not the worst job, right?

Be the best middle-manager you can be

Job satisfaction is important!

 

Shop local

Buy beautiful, artisanal, unique products

Like everyone else

You’ll notice a big difference when the producer really cares

But save by getting the basics from Lidl, Aldi and Ikea

 

Be careful using your card details online

As a good, global e-commerce citizen

Shopping online reduces your carbon footprint!

And it’s so quick

Cheaper, too

 

Eat organic, local, seasonal products

Even if organic is just damned lies and marketing

Watch those food miles, even though your smartphone is from Korea

With components sourced by slaves

(I know. I know… But I need it)

 

Cut out sugar and trans fats

Except the occasional treat – you deserve it!

Or if you’re really sleep deprived

I think pulled-pork on a brioche bun with hand-cut chips is OK

But a Big Mac Menu is not

 

Care about the environment

Sign petitions and Donate here!!!

It feels so good to give something back

The pebbles in my garden come from a mine in India but

I buy dolphin-friendly tuna

 

Plant a garden

Bake a cake, learn to knit, jump into a mountaintop jacuzzi

Do some adult colouring-in

Spend quality time with everyone you know, and your kids, and don’t forget to factor in some me-time

Once you achieve all this, there is no excuse not to be happy

 

Today’s National/Global Poetry Writing Month prompt/challenge was to write a didactic poem that focuses on a practical skill. I hope I’ve covered all the tips for a happy life here, but if I’ve forgotten anything, please let me know in the comments below… 

In Adelaide

 

 

Try to remember what my nana, Floss, would say

Someone’s telling a story and she’s amazed

It wasn’t “fancy” or “I’ll be blowed”

Maybe it was “nev-er!” or “say it’s not so”?

I think it was “true” — either question or statement.

And what of my childish chat, no abatement?

As she worked like billy-oh to run the house smooth

I’d follow, try to help, mostly intrude

(strife, kids are prolific)

She’d listen and grin and ’twas always: “Triffic!”

 

Today’s National/Global Poetry Writing Month (NaPoWriMo / GloPoWriMo) prompt/challenge was to think back to your childhood, and the figures of speech and particular ways of talking that the people around you used, and which you may not hear anymore.