Week 3: Acrostic/stanzaic Chance Poems

1.

The New Bling

Think “higher end –
New economy wealth!
Bling like investing (never) glases.

There, homes extreme,
November entertains Warhol´s
Bishops. Lees inhabits near gold-plated

Terrace houses. Excessively
normal, everything without
Bottles. London in noise glassware.

This was formed from an article in The Guardian weekend Saturday supplement (29.01.11) about the ridiculous spending habits of the super rich when it comes to home furnishings, even in this "age of austerity".

2.

State of Clay

State “These anemone thrive evergreen”
Of fear
Clay leaves are yellow.

Struggling, the autumn-topped edge
of foliage
(classic like adding year

sticky types) acquired tall elegant
orange flowers.
Colourful loveable actually yellow.

Taken from the same issue of The Guardian, this time from an article giving advice on planting in clay/sticky soil.


3.

From Bad to Verse

Fantastically read, open moment
blisters are dreadful:
Tell odes,
Verse evil, recite shivers, equilibrium

Favourites roll orange-spined marrow
books, although doom
Thursday. One
voice, emotional, reasons “summon Esterhaus”.

I hate poetry

Inheritance.
Hardbacks always tell evil
poetry of equilibrium. Thursday reads you.

Inches.
Heartbreak although tragedy. Emotional
Pants one even told recite yourself.

Imagination,
however ancient, terrifying, especially
power, odes Esterhaus. Terror rolls you

These two were created from a brilliant article by Lucy Mangan (available here: http://www.guardian.co.uk/lifeandstyle/2010/oct/02/national-poetry-day-2010) where she sets out by stating how she hates poetry and by the end of the article she´s demonstrated just how wonderful poetry is. I tried it first with the title "From bad to verse" and then again with the line "I hate poetry". I admit I cheated a bit with the second one, selecting a better word from the text on occasion.

Overall I found I had to use punctuation to create meaning. This perhaps is a hinderance for the independent reader, as maybe one should find one´s own meaning from the punctuation free poem. However I found it more rewarding for me as the poet to create meaning in this way out of what seemed to be a nonsense exercise. In the end, it seems to have produced some interesting concepts.

Week 2: Charles Bernstein experiments

Experiment 2: He Do the Police in Voices: Dialect & Idiolect. Dialectise a poem using the dialectizer.

1- Sonnet 116 à la Elmer Fudd

Wet me not to the mawwiage of twue minds
Admit impediments. Oh, dat scwewy wabbit! Wove is not wove
Which awtews when it awtewation finds,
Ow bends wif the wemovew to wemove:
O no! it is an evew-fixed mawk
Dat wooks on tempests and is nevew shaken;
It is the staw to evewy wandewing bawk,
Whose wowth's unknown, awthough his height be taken, uh-hah-hah-hah.
Wove's not Time's foow, though wosy wips and cheeks
Within his bending sickwe's compass come:
Wove awtews not wif his bwief houws and weeks,
But beaws it out even to the edge of doom.
If this be ewwow and upon me pwoved,
I nevew wwit, now no man evew woved.

reflections: perhaps didn´t work quite as well as the meaning is little changed. However visually it´s rather harsh due to the excess amount of w´s. Perhaps the meaning is changed a little though, as its Elmer Fudd taking about that scwewwy wabbit, Bugs Bunny, who he perpetually hunts, so it´s rather a different type of love!

2. When ah' am an old honky chick (in "jive" dialect) by Jenny Joseph

When ah' am an old honky chick, ah' shall wear purple
wid some red fedora dat duzn't go, and duzn't suit me.
And ah' shall spend mah' pension on brandy and summa' gloves
and satin kindles, and say we've no bre'd fo' butter.
Ah be baaad... I shall sit waaay down on de pavement when ah' am tired
and gobble down samples in shops and press alarm bells
and run mah' stick along de public railin's
and make down fo' de sobriety uh my ya'd.
I shall go out in mah' slippuh's in de rain
and pick de flowers in oda' sucka's's gardens
and learn t'spit.

Man! You's kin wear terrible shirts and grow mo'e fat
and feed da bud dree pounds uh sausages at some go
o' only bread and pickles fo' some week
and ho'd pens and pencils and bea' nuts and doodads in boxes.

But now we gots'ta have clodes dat keep us dry
and pay our rent and not swear in de damn street
and set some baaaad 'esample fo' de kids. 'S coo',
bro. We gots'ta have homeys t'dinna' and eyeball de sheets.
But maybe ah' ought t'practice some little now?
So's sucka's who know me is not too shocked and surprised
When suddenly ah' am old, and start t'wear purple.

reflections: this poem works much better, probably because it is contemporary, allowing it to be believable in this dialect.

Experiment 17 - Alphabet poems. Write a poem where each word begins with the next letter of the alphabet. Do it again, though the next time with the letters jumbled up.

Ants bundle carefully
down each flimsy gstring
hovering in
juxtaposition
knowing love might never offer
peculiar questions. Roaming
sideways
they uncover violets whispering
XL yoddles zealously.

Jaded nettles often frollick
hugging pansies in shades,
aware dragonflies zoom by
under tutelage.
Yet grass will linger
cursing xylology.
Quietly vicars mutter
repeating eulogies.

reflection: It seemed to work rather well! It was a struggle to keep some sort of theme flowing through them as the ordered structure was constraining. The first one flowed out easily. The second one was a bit of a struggle, and admittedly I changed some verbs (eg. move became mutter, fight became frollick, xenophobes became xylology) to allow some semblance of meaning.

week1

The Wine Challenge

First carried out after hours in the Blue Duck pub in Milford Sound, New Zealand, January 2007

Aims: To prove Big Dave and those snap-happy guys from Magic memories wrong and save Gemma from shame for not rising to their dare – that it is possible to drink a bottle of wine in under 5 minutes.

Hypothesis: Big Dave set the challenge thinking it was impossible. Being 18, I thought it was. Therefore, my hypothesis is that it is possible to drink a bottle of wine in under 5 minutes. However I did state that it would only be possible if the wine was white, as the red variety proves rather to heavy for the stomach. Therefore, after consultation of the menu, we selected Montana´s Sauvignon Blanc. If I was to succeed, Big Dave would pay the bill for it.

Method: Big Dave times me on his watch. On his mark, I pour the wine into the glass and start chugging and dont stop until the bottle is gone. As this was my experiment, I deemed it would only be possible if the wine was drunk from a glass, and not from necking it back. This also had the advantage of adding some class to the activity.

Results:

• The bottle was drunk in three minutes and 26 seconds. Time should be subtracted for the pauses taken to pour the wine into each glass. However given that it is well within the aim of 5 minutes, this was disregarded.

• Big Dave sat back in awe, his bushy blonde moustache framing his open-mouthed gape.

• Gemma yelled “Sweet!” and patted me on the back as I finished.

• Contrary to expectation, after three more minutes I began to feel the effects of the alcohol seeping through my body. Although an unforseen consequence of the experiment, as I was stone cold sober before the dare was set, this aspect gave the most exciting insight into the process of inebriation:

I was sitting on the stool, smug in my moment of glory, when suddenly my feet slipped off their perch on the footrest. They felt like lead weights. Then I could feel a tingly sensation crawl hastily up my legs, causing my thighs to sink into the seat, followed by my entire upper body slouching involuntarily and my neck losing all control. My head flopped onto my chest and I found myself as floppy and flexible as a puppet, unable to stay seated on the chair. My brain stayed completely sober though for at least another two minutes. In that time, I asked Gemma to carry me over to the bar, her freckly face morphing from amusement to concern and finally to hilarity as she realised what was happening. Erin the barman shared his cold pizza with me, although I couldn´t pick it up with my fingers so I tried to lap it up with my tongue (and I can´t begin to describe the humiliation of that in front of this American stud). Soon after, I passed out.

Conclusion: Yes, it is possible to drink a bottle of wine in under 5 minutes.

Evaluation: It was legendary to some, stupid, rash and dangerous to others, but the worst hangover in the world to me.