Wordle MLMM- Three Dodoitsu – April 12, 2016

 

needless painful heartbreak comes
upon each awakening
with monumental effort
she fills empty space

the macrocosm of love
where’s the sweet of philosophy
of subtle nuzzling ’til noon
[lovingly kissing]

it would lacerate her soul
to indiscreetly reveal
the history of her people
[she’s monachopsis]

© G.s.k. ‘16

 

 

“Dodoitsu is a form of Japanese poetry developed towards the end of the Edo Period. Often concerning love or work, and usually comical, Dodoitsu poems consist of four lines with the syllabic structure 7-7-7-5 and no rhyme or metre.

It was a traditional form for popular and folk songs and the name (“quickly city to city”) appears to refer to the speed with which such new songs spread. In Japanese, the “dodoitsu” contains twenty-six sound units (onji) composed of four phrases in 7-7-7-5 sound units. It’s hard to find examples of “dodoitsu” among literature because most of these songs, sung accompanied with the shamisen (a banjo-like instrument with three strings), relied on the oral tradition and are therefore lost to us. Since the subject matter was either love or humor as viewed by inhabitants of the pleasure quarters, the existing works have attracted very little attention in English.”

 

Wordle #105 “April 11th, 2016” Mindlovesmisery’s Menagerie

Happy Day 12 of NaPoWriMo and GloPoWriMo, all!

 

Peril of a Blatherskite – Nonet Poem – March 24, 2016

 

We struggle with that blatherskite, Mike,
For hard-earned ephemera peace,
(Yes, an addictive nostrum
He carelessly disturbs)
“Just rigor mortis,
Will bring relief!”
Said Johnson:
“Kill him –
Now!”

 

“Oh!”
Said I,
“How absurd!
Termination
Is far, far too much!”
I’ve found the solution,
For Mike’s irritating style,
Tonight I must decide to act,
Before Johnson takes the poor guy out!

© G.s.k. ‘16

 

Nonet ~ a poem of nine lines and a syllable pattern of 9-8-7-6-5-4-3-2-1, with rhyme optional

1.Struggle 2. Blatherskite (a person given to voluble, empty talk. nonsense; blather.) 3. Ephemera (anything short-lived or ephemeral. ephemera, items designed to be usefulor important for only a short time, especially pamphlets, notices, tickets, etc.) 4. Careless 5. Addictive 6. Nostrum (a medicine sold with false or exaggerated claims and with no demonstrablevalue; quack medicine. a scheme, theory, device, etc., especially one to remedy socialor political ills; panacea. a medicine made by the person who recommends it. a patentmedicine.) 7. Terminate 8. Rigor Mortis 9. Notify 10. Decide 11. Concave 12. Episodic

Just 11 of the words used – I couldn’t work Concave in.

Wordle #102 “March 21, 2016”

 

 

The Novitiate – Gothic Horror – March 16, 2016

– Brooke Shaden

The glare of the sullen sunset beamed upon the lone novitiate who would be ordained to the night, in the cathedral-like structure dedicated to Lady Nyctophilia – patroness of those who lurk in the gloom. Ironically, she’d been quite the eristic and really very clever in her negation of vampires and the sort, yet there she stood, looking like a puppet with irregular strings attached about her head, ready to be pulled into the very heavens.  One couldn’t deny however,  that she really wasn’t quite herself.

Going back just a few hours before, she’d walked into the Metropolitan to meet her young man, a handsome swarthy gentleman, *oriundo from Sardegna, or so he’d said.  She sat down at his table and he asked the waiter to bring him the lady’s drink and the soda siphon.  She’d gotten used to his quirky idea that he should personally splash her drink from the soda siphon. This time however, the siphon had been sophisticated and contained a subtle drug.  She drank her drink and gradually began to feel detached from herself.

He led her out of the hotel and that  was the last time anyone from her set would ever see her.  He put her into a Rolls Royce which actually belonged to the “Lady Nyctophilia”, known to everyone else as the Countess of San Severino.  She was driven to the Cathedral of the Night.  Once she arrived, she was disrobed and a tiny tattoo was placed upon her just above the erogenous zone known as the mount of Venus.  What followed would terrorize you or I, but she was beyond terror, in the Rolls the swarthy young man, had made passionate love to her and she was now his, in body and soul – as testified the two tiny marks upon her neck.

© G.s.k. ‘16

 

*oriundo – native (of a place, especially a native of Italy but living abroad)

Photo Challenge #104 and Wordle #101 “March 14, 2016”

1.Glare 2. Nyctophilia (a love or preference for night, darkness) 3. Novitiate (the state or period of being a novice of a religious order or congregation. the quarters occupied by religious novices during probation. the state or period of being a beginner in anything. a novice.) 4. Structure 5. Tattoo 6. Eristic (a person who engages in debate; conversationalist. the art of disputation.) 7. Erogenous 8. Irregular 9. Adjust 10. Lurk 11. Siphon 12. Terrorize

Goody good blah blah blahs – Kyoka/Senryu/Shadorma – January 8, 2016

calendar poets
penning New Year platitudes
gotta eat – I know
but, is that a good reason
to waste all of those trees?

calendar pulchritude
with tepid affirmations
each season painted
in arrhythmic platitudes
[sad punitive devices]

but first …

swallow your pill
then write aquamarine lies
in cursive caps

oh my lands …
do they never tire
of cute dogs
and kittens
don’t forget yoga – om y’all!
fuzzy warm deceits

© G.s.k. ‘16

1.Punitive 2. Tepid 3. Calendar 4. Season 5. Sad 6. Arrhythmic (any disturbance in the rhythm of the heartbeat.) 7. Cursive 8. Tomorrow 9. Swallow 10. Aquamarine 11. Affirmation 12. Pulchritude (physical beauty; comeliness.)

Wordle #92 “January 4, 2016” – Mindlovemisery’s Menagerie

Blood-crows – Wordleing – December 8, 2015

Blood-crows hover o’er the land,
Tracking down empty men’s apathy
‘Til thrown one dreaded night, was
A gauntlet through a tiny aperture.
“Reach out reach out for life’s vein
And hammer in these coffin nails”
Came a ghostly marauder’s refrain.
“Men still sip stale Empyreal belief –
So we raise fanatics for their graves,
Let’s hang them then with a ladies corset
Pulled up by archaic whalebone stays.”
Was it a marauder or a pious holy man?
No matter, another field of death was sown,
Hear now – yet another blood-crow caws.

 

1.Vein 2. Track 3. Throw 4. Fanatic 5. Blood-crow (a person who scavenges battlefields for treasure) 6. Nails 7. Reach 8. Aperture (an opening, as a hole, slit, crack, gap, etc.) 9. Apathy 10. Dread 11. Whalebone (an elastic, horny substance growing in place of teeth in the upper jaw of certain whales, and forming a series of thin, parallel plates on each side of the palate; baleen. a thin strip of this substance, for stiffening a corset.) 12. Empyreal (pertaining to the sky; celestial: empyreal blue, pertaining to the highest heaven in the cosmology of the ancients. Formed of pure fire or light: empyreal radiance.)

Wordle #88 “December 7, 2015”

OctPoWriMo Day 22 – Trinet Wordleling – October 22, 2015

Hummingbird moth
[Nexus nunchi]
Lissome avian – from flower to flower –
Gamboled with bonhomie – puncturing-sucking nectar …
Clay pottery
Holding plants
Suddenly shattered

Predatory bird
Swooping down
Had attacked the moth’s tenable position
Which flew laterally in a vacuum
Of safety
Avoiding neatly
Getting et

© G.s.k. ‘15

This is a scheduled post, since today I’m in Padua for my son’s graduation. Thanks for reading this post.  Georgia (Bastet)

1.Tenable (capable of being held, maintained, or defended, as against attack or dispute) 2. Lateral 3. Avian 4. Lissome (supple, flexible) 5. Nunchi (the subtle art of listening which allows you to gauge other people’s mood and respond appropriately.) 6. Gambol (to skip about, frolic) 7. Puncture 8. Nexus 9. Pottery 10. Trachea 11. Vacuum 12. Bonhomie (frank and simple good-heartedness; a good-natured manner;friendliness; geniality.)

 

Mindlovemisery’s Monday Wordle – Mindlovemisery’s Photo Challenge# 82, October 13, 2015 and B&P’s Shadorma & Beyond – Trinet

OctPoWriMo Day 22

Katydid and Lychee – Wordleing – October 12, 2015

Katydid and Lychee

It was written in the stars
the Laotong between
Katydid and Lychee.
Odd melancholic thoughts
would make both vacillate and cry,
and they shared their nocturnal flights,
crossing the ravine of continents,
assisted by their bond.
Bound by their placenta,
(given to them by a white witch
the day that they were born
enclosed in a golden amulet)
they were as close as the sea and sky,
although one girl still lived in Hunan
and the other in Japan.
Just a twitch on their keepsake
and one linked the other,
creating a communication
far better than our anemic words.

© G.s.k. ‘15

1.Katydid 2. Placenta 3. Melancholy 4. Nocturnal 5. Vacillate (to waver in mind or opinion; be indecisive or irresolute: to sway unsteadily; waver; totter; stagger.) 6. Laotong (in English: old sames; written: 老同 in Mandarin is a type of relationship within Chinese culture, which was practiced in Hunan, that bonded two girls together for eternity as kindred sisters.) 7. Written 8. Twitch 9. Ravine 10. Lychee (a Chinese fruit, can also refer to the tree looks like so http://sociallizard.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/04/Lychee.jpg) 11. Assist 12. Anemic

Written for: Mindlovemisery’s Monday Wordle

Tatterdemalion – Fairy Tale – September 14, 2015

Once upon a time when the world was new … on the edge of a gloomy wood lived a handsome man whom everyone called, Tatterdemalion.  He was tall and as lithe as a willow with fair skin, dark hair and hazel eyes.  Some thought he was a hermit, some a luminary others still thought he was just lazy and a ne’er-do-well.

In point of fact, he was the descendant of a great king, but couldn’t ascend to the throne until he’d killed the leopardess Bryndle. Tatterdemalion wasn’t the sort of person who liked to grope in mortal combat with leopards, in fact, he’d rather have made friends with the beast.  So, he’d left his father’s kingdom and found this tiny cottage on the edge of the gloomy wood and draped himself in rags to hide his origins.

One day while out walking in the woods gathering mushrooms to make his dinner, he came upon that very leopard he’d been pledged to kill the day he was born.

The leopardess sidled up to the tree he’d scrambled up when he spotted her and said, “I’ve been informed that you are no common woodsman draped in rags, but a prince.”

“And who told you this?” Tatterdemalion asked warily.

“I’ve my informants.  They also say that you are supposed to kill me.”

“Yes, I’m a prince and I’m supposed to kill you but as you can see, I prefer a woodman’s life to a king’s life.”

The leopard looked at the prince and said: “You wouldn’t be a very good hunter, don’t you know that leopards can climb trees?”

“No I didn’t, nor did I know that leopards could speak with a human voice.”

“And do you know why you’re supposed to kill me?”

“No.”

“Well then let me tell you the tale.”

And here is her story:

When you were being born, your father went out hunting to calm his nerves.  He came upon my father, the great leopard king Mauer who was out hunting as I was being born.  Your father and mine had come upon a herd of gazelle and chose the same male to hunt down.  They mutually agreed that whoever caught the gazelle would take it home and keep it’s skull as a trophy but also as a reminder that one day their heir would be required to hunt and kill the heir of the other in order to reign.

They made their vow before the fairy king Simerson who placed the pledge in a potent magic prism with this apothegm : “An heir is only an heir by keeping birth rite pledges.”

“And so, Bryndle you’ve come to kill me today?”

“No, I went to my fairy god-mother Bast, who is the mother of Simerson and asked for her to find a way to break the prism and free us from that stupid pledge!  There is only one way.  We should marry! So, she gave me a potion and upon drinking it, we will be of the same species and thus we can break the pledge … so neither of us will be required to kill the other.”

Tatterdemalion thought and thought … “And what species will we be?”

“I’m not sure … I think it will be a new one which will be able to live with both humans and leopards.”

And so, Tatterdemalion and Bryndle drank the potion and married living happily ever after.  The results can still be seen today we call their children, brindled cats.

© G.s.k. ‘15

(images via: Science Photo Library, Science Notes and Volker’s Blurb)

Tale Weaver 30: once upon a time . . .

1. Grope 2. Hazel 3. Skull 4. Mutual 5. Luminary (A celestial body, as the sun or moon. A person who has attained eminence in his or her field or is an inspiration to others.) 6. Leopard 7. Potency 8. Tatterdemalion (A person in tattered clothing; a shabby person.) 9. Sidle (to move sideways or obliquely.) 10. Prism 11. Apothegm (a short, pithy, instructive saying; a terse remark or aphorism.) 12. Drape

Wordle #77 “September 7, 2015”

Sanatorium – Thoughts – September 3, 2015

Can you imagine being in a sanatorium, let’s say in the late 1800s.  Perhaps where you are suffering from the late stages of tuberculosis or as it was known then, of consumption.

You would have been given a bed in a ward with many others, where you could have listened to the concert of each one coughing with their own variety of gentle or not so gentle cough.

Blood mixed with phlegm and rivulets of spittle would most likely run down your chin and dirty the not very hygienic sheets.  Since you were suffering from consumption … that is a malady believed back then to be caused by your passionate spirit, the obvious thing to do was to feed you with the dullest food possible – to calm that passionate and ardent spirit and aid you to regain your precarious health.  So you would have had probably thin barley soup – barley is said to be “refreshing” to the soul and body. Of course, if the sanatorium was on an upper class level you would be taken to the sulphur bathes where you would be lowered into the water with a special bathing costume … never nude … an embasan in Filipino.

Laying there, in that sombre ward imagine looking out of a window (certainly closed) and seeing a beautiful park with a tree, full of birds and bird houses.  Your mind isn’t ill, just your body, so perhaps you imagine as you watch the volitant activity of the birds, your own flight of freedom from all that dull horror of your everyday life.  Up up and away – into the brilliant blue sky of a bright Indian summer day finally free from pain and misery.

Of course, if you weren’t rich you wouldn’t even have had the opportunity to go to a sanatorium, you might have joined the ranks of those who died unattended, perhaps on the street.

File this all away for thought because here and now in the twenty-first century, we are free for the most part in our western world, of that terrible scourge and even if it were not so, I don’t think we would find such unhygienic sanatoriums in Western Europe or North America (not legal ones anyway) even the terrible insane asylums were closed in Italy in the 70s and 80s.

Many died from tuberculosis, before the cause and consequent campaign began to pasteurize milk, eliminate the cows that carried the malady and to vaccinate the population.  Milk pasteurization?  How many of us remember that the bacteria which caused so many deaths from, not only tuberculosis but also meningitis, was carried in infected milk?  Before the 1930s, many were the victims of tuberculosis, thanks to drinking milk, though of course there were other vectors this was one of the worst one of all.

© G.s.k. ‘15

 

Written for Mindlovesmisery’s Menagerie’s  Wordle and Photo Challenge

1. Sterile 2. Dull 3. Rivulet 4. Barley 5. Volitant (engaged in or having the power of flight. Active; moving.) 6. Phlegm 7. Embasan (to wear clothes while taking a bath) 8. Precarious 9. Sanatorium (a hospital for the treatment of chronic diseases, as tuberculosis or various nervous or mental disorders.) 10. File 11. Sombre (it is just the British spelling of somber use whichever form you prefer) 12. Soup

 

She wept … Wordle – August 27, 2015

Mourning Woman Seated on a Basket – Vincent van Gogh – 1883

Orpheus, faithless,
looked back.
Did he think
that Eurydice would not follow?

Then, bleary eyed and stumbling
in the deafening silence
that accompanied him
through the simulacrum
of his life
(always proximate to death)
he preserved the memory of his faithlessness …
and
… as his life continued
he wrote the tale of his woe
in songs he never sung.

In the meantime,
of his each passing day
he lived with her –
a lowly woman,
considerate –
she warmed his bed,
kept his charcoal fire burning
and served him his rice …

Of her – he wrote no song
nor even knew her name –
hers was not a faculty
for invisibility –
outside of his own tragedy
she just went unseen
in her normality –
she wept her silent tears
for the twice faithless lover.

© G.s.k. ‘15

1. Orpheus (Greek Legend. a poet and musician, a son of Calliope, who followed his dead wife, Eurydice, to the underworld. By charming Hades, he obtained permission to lead her away, provided he did not look back at her until they returned to earth. But at the last moment he looked, and she was lost to him forever.) 2. Follow 3. Meantime 4. Bleary 5. Considerate 6. Deafening 7. Proximate 8. Faculty 9. Simulacrum (a slight, unreal, or superficial likeness or semblance) 10. Preserve 11. Rice 12. Charcoal

Written for:

Mindlovesmisery’s Menagerie : Wordle #75 “August 24, 2015″