[posted to Submit Your Poetry on nov. 24]:
 "DA RAVEN"   by 50 Cento

note on june 13 for next kepler segment:
I don't know what I'm made of but it isn't light. Light hurts me
when it touches me.

submitted to Submit Your Poetry board as: "John Lennon, Upon Learning..."

Here here!!

(nice to see you starting a journal Tom ;) )

B.

Was advised not to use Workshop as workshop so now I'm trying this. I've gotten to like actually working directly on the boards here. Feeling at home. So... ~Tom

What a bizarre piece of advice . . . ???

lol  -   When I was in middle school I memorized "The Raven" (yes, the entire thing) and presented it to my English class.....that was a hoot!  xo M

Glad this feels like home - I do enjoy reading the journals, you're now included!

submitted to Submit Your Poetry as:

Eye-Witness/News-Herald

number 6 - should be on the submit board. It's too good to lounge in your journal. 

Having spent the last ten years acting as an expert witness/custodian of records for a large telephone company, I can attest to the tricky techniques used by attorneys - on both sides.

Love the layout. The skinny column makes the reader feel the experience dragging out; it's also reminiscent of a newspaper column.

Good one.

Your response is very encouraging aka helpful at this point, Lavonne. You make me feel like it CAN go to Submit. But I have to cook it and reread and rewrite a few more cycles, first. Thanks. ~Tom

"Round Raviolis" moved to Submit Your Poetry.

but blanker?

:)

Oh, what fun, you're right there, Lavonne! Problem is, they're not blanker, I don't think.

which is even cooler. :)

Am trying, am trying, but can't do it. The cameos weird me out too much to even joke about a ravioli being blanker! But let's see. Tom

[[/quote]Done only one revision, Lavonne, but I notice I don't want to. It's painful for personal reasons and puts me in a bad place. But I did put it down, did revise once, so we'll see... -Thanks again, Tom

When the time is right.

:)

For your sake and mine,
let the prayers drift by, Pete.
My day of rest is now an inundation.
Omnipotent can't mean I must do everything.
I don't want to hear prayers any more,
light firmaments, clothe lilies or feed birds.

A hamster on a wheel,
my motion makes the world go round
but I am only trying not to get bored,
hurling lightning at a tree, parting a cloud.
I want to go.
The last time I was on a boat
was before Ahab, before Noah--
my honeymoon, when we sailed
to that Rock Resort and Jo swam
ashore for ice; the six-wing seraphs
were in stitches when she got back
with a baggie full of water in her teeth.

I want to retire, with a party.
I want a real watch, carrot cake--
spicy, cream cheese icing, a big
Thanks For Everything
in crimson decorating gel.

Put that ledger down and look at me.
In all these years, have we talked?
Have you ever been to Cathay? Kitty Hawk?
Aren't you curious? Hey, Pete, what say
we drink some Mount Gay Frozen Daiquiris?

posted to Submit Your Poetry.

                Sonnet

      unowned     perfect
        by past     round
             and     red
        childless     drop

          to ask     tempts
     the cause     the tip
          is only     of your
         shallow     finger

       no line is     to offer
       the child     my lip
        nor sire     a taste
        of circle     of ruin

        no love     and then
         sparks     your own
nor quenches     lips
        any fire     taste

         time is     of chard
     just blood     and liver
      still to be     God
          drawn     wet and

        cut the     thin pins
pomegranate     pressed
       and see     in tailor's
      freedom     lips

      the prize     as patient as
     a thought     a mantis

Cleverly writ
16 ways to Sunday
this can be read

"kaleidoscopathillogical" posted to Submit Your Poetry 1-1-09

A Wrong Number - Submitted Jan. '09

"Transcript, Antarctica" posted to Submit Your Poetry

Looks like there's an incomplete sentence in S1 ending iwth "manure."  I like the eeriness of this.  It's really cool.

Ah, Rick, thanks for looking in. Yes, I'm just putting this together bit by bit, a lot incomplete but glad to hear there's another nut out there who likes this kind of weird! I'm gonna need you if I ever finish it and post it! -Tom

Christopher Walkin kills the Raven, I play his reading for my kids every halloween at school, love it!

That sounds just right, who's more eerie than Christopher Walken? Yeek. Tom

Thanks for visiting, Silent. I'm glad you enjoyed. The Mt. Gay was a walk down Memory Lane for me too, though my real vice during my drunken decades was the black Lemon Hart 151. Straight to the afterlife, that! -Tom

Dear Tom

Thank you
— good to have you here!
keep it coming


ciao


T

Thanks for the welcome, T. I am very happy to have found This Circle. Tom

Moved "Not Entirely a Man" to Submit Your Poetry

— absolutely, positively, great

a woman (that shall remain so)
said to me, not to worry it happens

yes, I replied with a smile, coming
of age is the sexiest time on the planet


— well done, Tom

ciao
 






.

Superb Tom!

Hi, Tomas and Brian. Thank you for looking in and adding energy to this one. I'll ty to get it worked up in the next few days or so, after my daughter's b'day. Tom

"20 Year Old Van" Moved to Submit Your Poetry 12-22

A twenty-some year old van deserves a history. And the passing of time and the passing of Da and some grief.  I like it, Tom and it makes me think of Ireland?

Jill, thank you for stopping in! A cup of nog, maybe? Yeah, Irish here anyway. If you have any ideas as I work on this, feel free... Tom

okie doke, will do. nog maybe not right now but a long night in a good, narrow irish pub with people hanging all over me and music and smoke--that would be really good right now.
Jill

Since the smoke-free laws, I think they pump it in now via an aromatherapy flava they coyly call Anthelmint! Tom

Sacrilege! Guess what we can depend on is change--and memories.

litchy eleprompter, un City submitted 1-7-09

Illusion of Purchasing Rubies
(title line from Lynn Doiron's
"The Jelly Glass" in hand wording)
submitted 12-31

you so funny.

glad to see that line used to purchase more than rubies!
smiles here.

Christmas eve wishes for wonderful tomorrows after gorgeous days ...

lynn

The Cold Ball moved to Submit Your Poetry 1-2-09

whoa.

Glad you peeked, Lynn. It was an odd experience. That "Big Bash" poem somehow summoned me into this one in a way I've never experienced. Tom

Ponzi moved to Submit.

VERY cool!  The repetition along with the flattening really works here.

Rick

Thank you for the encouragement, Rick and silent. I really don't know what format you are seeing, since apparently each browser or computer ends up displaying a different length line and so, in this case, screws up the whole shape; but it's supposed to just be a gradually flattening pyramid that winds up as a prose paragraph. And thanks for the idea too, sl! Tom

Tom....with regard to preserving form......

set the poem in something like WORD

and then save an image of it

and post it here as a jpg

If you happen to be on an Apple computer i can explain this to you
sorry but i have no accomplishments in this area with Windows

My poems are always here as jpgs.....it saves the form
as well as that everyone sees it in the same font

and if someone borrows it there is no chance of typos occurring.

smiles
silent lotus

Thanks, sl, but I don't have apple and I can't find a way on my pc to save text as image. Will keep looking for a way, though. Similar foul-ups happened with my "Transcript, Antarctica" layout. Tom

posted "Kindness Is In It" at Submit Your Poetry 1-4-09

When there were no lights
and no candles and no friggin' matches
anyways, she was there in the night.

Sorry, Tom -- this seemed to ask for a time when kindness came knocking.

Well, that's what it did ask, though it is a great and moving surprise to get your answer. What a great quilt it would be if people did that! Thank you, Lynn. -Tom

Dr. Hyde posted to Submit Your Poetry 1-6-09,
a cento from an open letter to the Rev. Dr. Hyde of Honolulu, from Robert Louis Stevenson, Sydney, October 26, 1889
------------------------------------------------------------------
cento from this excerpt/abridgement:

When leprosy descended and took root in the Eight Islands, God had sent at last an opportunity to your sect's prosperous mission, and to you, as one of its adornments. I know I am touching here upon a nerve acutely sensitive. I know that others of your colleagues look back on the inertia of your Church, and the intrusive and decisive heroism of Damien, with something almost to be called remorse. I am sure it is so with yourself; I am persuaded your letter was inspired by a certain envy, not essentially ignoble, and the one human trait to be espied in that performance. You were thinking of the lost chance, the past day; of that which should have been conceived and was not; of the service due and not rendered. TIME WAS, said the voice in your ear, in your pleasant room, as you sat raging and writing; and if the words written were base beyond parallel, the rage, I am happy to repeat - it is the only compliment I shall pay you - the rage was almost virtuous.

But, sir, when we have failed, and another has succeeded; when we have stood by, and another has stepped in; when we sit and grow bulky in our charming mansions, and a plain, uncouth peasant steps into the battle, under the eyes of God, and succours the afflicted, and consoles the dying, and is himself afflicted in his turn, and dies upon the field of honour - the battle cannot be retrieved as your unhappy irritation has suggested. It is a lost battle, and lost for ever. One thing remained to you in your defeat - some rags of common honour; and these you have made haste to cast away.

Common honour; not the honour of having done anything right, but the honour of not having done aught conspicuously foul; the honour of the inert: that was what remained to you. We are not all expected to be Damiens; a man may conceive his duty more narrowly, he may love his comforts better; and none will cast a stone at him for that. But will a gentleman of your reverend profession allow me an example from the fields of gallantry? When two gentlemen compete for the favour of a lady, and the one succeeds and the other is rejected, and (as will sometimes happen) matter damaging to the successful rival's credit reaches the ear of the defeated, it is held by plain men of no pretensions that his mouth is, in the circumstance, almost necessarily closed. Your Church and Damien's were in Hawaii upon a rivalry to do well: to help, to edify, to set divine examples. You having (in one huge instance) failed, and Damien succeeded, I marvel it should not have occurred to you that you were doomed to silence; that when you had been outstripped in that high rivalry, and sat inglorious in the midst of your well-being, in your pleasant room - and Damien, crowned with glories and horrors, toiled and rotted in that pigsty of his under the cliffs of Kalawao - you, the elect who would not, were the last man on earth to collect and propagate gossip on the volunteer who would and did.

I imagine you to be one of those persons who talk with cheerfulness of that place which oxen and wain-ropes could not drag you to behold. You, who do not even know its situation on the map, probably denounce sensational descriptions, stretching your limbs the while in your pleasant parlour on Beretania Street. When I was pulled ashore there one early morning, there sat with me in the boat two sisters, bidding farewell (in humble imitation of Damien) to the lights and joys of human life. One of these wept silently; I could not withhold myself from joining her. Had you been there, it is my belief that nature would have triumphed even in you; and as the boat drew but a little nearer, and you beheld the stairs crowded with abominable deformations of our common manhood, and saw yourself landing in the midst of such a population as only now and then surrounds us in the horror of a nightmare - what a haggard eye you would have rolled over your reluctant shoulder towards the house on Beretania Street! Had you gone on; had you found every fourth face a blot upon the landscape; had you visited the hospital and seen the butt-ends of human beings lying there almost unrecognisable, but still breathing, still thinking, still remembering; you would have understood that life in the lazaretto is an ordeal from which the nerves of a man's spirit shrink, even as his eye quails under the brightness of the sun; you would have felt it was (even today) a pitiful place to visit and a hell to dwell in. It is not the fear of possible infection. That seems a little thing when compared with the pain, the pity, and the disgust of the visitor's surroundings, and the atmosphere of affliction, disease, and physical disgrace in which he breathes. I do not think I am a man more than usually timid; but I never recall the days and nights I spent upon that island promontory (eight days and seven nights), without heartfelt thankfulness that I am somewhere else.

And observe: that which I saw and suffered from was a settlement purged, bettered, beautified; the new village built, the hospital and the Bishop-Home excellently arranged; the sisters, the poctor, and the missionaries, all indefatigable in their noble tasks. It was a different place when Damien came there and made this great renunciation, and slept that first night under a tree amidst his rotting brethren: alone with pestilence; and looking forward (with what courage, with what pitiful sinkings of dread, God only knows) to a lifetime of dressing sores and stumps.

And I take it that you are one of those who have an eye for faults and failures; that you take a pleasure to find and publish them; and that, having found them, you make haste to forget the overvailing virtues and the real success which had alone introduced them to your knowledge. It is a dangerous frame of mind. That you may understand how dangerous, and into what a situation it has already brought you, we will (if you please) go hand-in-hand through the different phrases of your letter, and candidly examine each from the point of view of its truth, its appositeness, and its charity.

Damien was COARSE.

It is very possible. You make us sorry for the lepers, who had only a coarse old peasant for their friend and father. But you, who were so refined, why were you not there, to cheer them with the lights of culture? Or may I remind you that we have some reason to doubt if John the Baptist were genteel; and in the case of Peter, on whose career your doubtless dwell approvingly in the pulpit, no doubt at all he was a "coarse, headstrong" fisherman! Yet even in
our Protestant Bibles Peter is called Saint.

Damien was DIRTY.

He was. Think of the poor lepers annoyed with this dirty comrade! But the clean Dr. Hyde was at his food in a fine house.

Damien was HEADSTRONG.

I believe you are right again; and I thank God for his strong head and heart.

But I fear you scarce appreciate how you appear to your fellow-men; and to bring it home to you, I will suppose your story to be true. I will suppose - and God forgive me for supposing it - that Damien faltered and stumbled in his narrow path of duty; I will suppose that, in the horror of his isolation, perhaps in the fever of incipient disease, he, who was doing so much more than he had sworn, failed in the letter of his priestly oath - he, who was so much a better man than either you or me, who did what we have never dreamed of daring - he too tasted of our common frailty. "O, Iago, the pity of it!" The least tender should be moved to tears; the most incredulous to prayer. And all that you could do was to pen your letter to the Reverend H. B. Gage!

Is it growing at all clear to you what a picture you have drawn of your own heart? I will try yet once again to make it clearer. You had a father: suppose this tale were about him, and some informant brought it to you, proof in hand: I am not making too high an estimate of your emotional nature when I suppose you would regret the circumstance? that you would feel the tale of frailty the more keenly since it shamed the author of your days? and that the last thing you would do would be to publish it in the religious press? Well, the man who tried to do what Damien did, is my father, and the father of the man in the Apia bar, and the father of all who love goodness; and he was your father too, if God had given you grace to see it.

Thanks for looking, silent.
Chanukah, Chanukkah, Chanuka, Hanukah, Hanukkah, Hanuka are all familiar transliterations to me, though I come across others too.
Jews will never agree about the beginning or the end of anything, just don't mess with the anuk!
-Tom

You've been busy Tom!! Quite a crop you're growing down here!

B.

Yeah, move 'em in, work on them in this stuffy room until I can't stand it any more, and them move 'em out to Submit for some air. Had that litchy eleprompter piece in here for a month, realized the damn thing would bury me if I left it in here much longer, so finally ushered it out today! Thanks for the "studio" visit. I guess it's time for me to drop in by you, too. Tom

"Man Piaba" & Joanna

The publicist went into labor
Her husband was at school
Harry Belafonte shooed her
To his Ford and sped downtown

De woman piaba an' de man piaba
Crept into his head like a neighborhood cat
As he raced by Saint John the Divine
An' de famous grandy scratch scratch

Well I travel' far an' I travel' wide
An' I don' even 'ave me self a bride
De song an' de wife bot' born dat day
T'anks to spur-o'-de-moment car ride

I say I owe it all to Belafonte
But my father-in-law points out
It was his and his wife's piaba
No no, not Harry's I must thank

Yes it was de teacher's piaba
Yes it was de publicist's piaba
De beginning o' time an' creativity
Yes what give de poet his piaba

This is great Tom. Great internal rhymes and then the shift in tone in that penultimate stanza -- very deft.
Not so big on those end lines, reads a little flat to me, on a first read. But as it's still in the studio, I'll leave it to you to think through.

B.

Yeah, still slugging away at it...Thanks for the valued feedback. -T.

Actually Tom, how does it read with that last stanza cut? Just a thought.

B.

Well, I'm going to try for it, B., and if I can't get it, then will think more about what you suggest, or other exit strategy! -T.

There, I think I see it.

Six-Hinged Weather-Vane Semi-Cento

                                    growing onions smell
                                    around flying crows
                                    in tangled sparrows
                                    wildly spinning cock
                here to clean
           dry spider plants
               and round the
 first raindrops splashing
                                    del blanco oso
                                    auroras de tembloroso
                                    y gnomos, brisas,
                                    maestro, chopo, verdad
                still you must
               wax and wane
               as winds blow
     moons and sea-tides
                                   dreams lean and
                                   become day one
                                   layers dry like
                                   shadows chasing me
             clouds to come
              eyes turned to
           finally face what
                   up and left



Cento Sources (full texts in Journalese, "Things in the pipeline," p. 5):
Alan Safarik "Weather Vane" (un-hinged "growing...")
Maureen Boyle "Weather Vane" (hinged "here...")
Federico García Lorca "Veleta" (un-hinged "del...")
Evaleen Stein "The Weather-Vane" (hinged "still...")
Salvatore Amico M. Buttaci "The Weather Vane" (un-hinged "dreams...")
Nicky Mehta "Weather Vane" (hinged "cloud...")


-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------
*visible text

smell onions growing       *growing onions smell
crows flying around                       around flying crows
sparrows tangled in      in tangled sparrows
cock spinning wildly      wildly spinning cock

*here to clean         clean to here
dry spider plants      plants spider dry
and round the         the round and
first raindrops splashing   splashing raindrops first

oso blanco del         *del blanco oso
tembloroso de auroras      auroras de tembloroso
brisas, gnomos y      y gnomos, brisas,
verdad, chopo, maestro   maestro, chopo, verdad

*still you must         must you still
wax and wane         wane and wax
as winds blow         blow winds as
moons and sea-tides      sea-tides and moons

and lean dreams      *dreams lean and
one day become      become day one
like dry layers         layers dry like
me chasing shadows      shadows chasing me

*clouds to come                   come to clouds
eyes turned to                           to turned eyes
finally face what      what face finally
up and left                                 left and up
--------------------------------------------------------------------------
"Weather Vane" by Allan Safarik
   
Sparrows tangled in horse hair
build their nest in the crotch
of choke cherry wood
I wander in the fields
looking for good stones
for medicine dreams
Watch the hawk soaring
against the river of air

In a few minutes the sun
drops behind the horizon
bloody sun spreading
in sandy coloured clouds
I walk back beside the garden
smell onions growing
in the black earth
listen to shiny winged
crows flying around
their roost in a frenzy

Every day a day of wind
but for weeks,
the spring rain holds off
Thunder heads pass by
rumbling in the distance
Every few seconds another
flash of lightning across
the front of the sky
Cock spinning wildly
on the barn roof

By morning only half
an inch of rain in the glass
the dry wind already
licking it up in a swirling
cloud of dust
Damn bird turning
this way and that way
making a dry thirsty noise
like a rusty gate
 
---

"Weather Vane" by Maureen Boyle

Your love, Lord reaches to heaven
your truth to the skies.
--Psalmody

I am on the roof this breezy day,
in the sixth month of my pregnancy,
picking off the moss and lichen and tossing them
in soft bouquets to the ground.

Above me are the chimneys –
their stacks the colour of sand
and round the tops, circles of hearts
opening… to the sky.

I am a billowing blown crow
in my dark work clothes
and this is punishment for vanity.
For finding my face in a bucket of blue

Sister brought me up the back stairs.
The slates I clean are greens and shell-greys
that turn dark ink-blue in rain.
Today is a weather-breeder

the nuns say, presaging a storm,
so I am here to clean the way
and the rain will wash the loosened moss
in green runnels when it comes.

I am as high as the monkey puzzle,
Its open branches wide smiles
at the level of my eye, arms outstretched -
as if they’d catch me.
Down below is the road I will walk
my baby across to give him away
he, in a big dicky-up pram,
me, all dressed. Every Monday

the nuns take me to the parlour
to write a card telling everyone
who needs to know: that I am well,
that the sea is wild, that I am working hard,

that I miss them, when all the while:
I’m sitting at an oak table -
the smell of polish heavy in the air,
the grandmother clock ticking nearby,

dry spider plants on the windowsills
and a sad-eyed Mary hanging her head
in the corner. They take a lot of trouble
with the cards. The gardener runs them

up to Portrush and posts them there
so that the stamp’s right, so that the postman
can tell everyone I’m grand
and it’s not just my parents’ word on it.

I talk to my baby up here.
We’re not supposed to but the wind
takes the words away.
They say Our Lady had no pain

in either the making or getting of God
and she was allowed to keep him.
I’d have liked mine to have an angel for a father –
he’d have been light on me.

I mind my Granny saying
that when the midwife helping Mary
put her hand in to touch
it withered away.

Who’ll help me when the time comes?
It’ll be one of them and I think I’d love
to have that power to wither their hands.
My hands are cold; the first raindrops splashing
on the slate. The red bricks of the walls burn
in the dying sun’s colour and the birds have gone,
taking the little offerings of moss and lichen.
They’ll line their nests with them.

---

"Veleta" por Federico García Lorca

Julio de 1920
(Fuente Vaqueros, Granada)

Viento del Sur,
moreno, ardiente,
llegas sobre mi carne,
trayéndome semilla
de brillantes
miradas, empapado
de azahares.

Pones roja la luna
y sollozantes
los álamos cautivos, pero vienes
¡demasiado tarde!
¡Ya he enrollado la noche de mi cuento
en el estante!

Sin ningún viento,
¡hazme caso!,
gira, corazón;
gira, corazón.

Aire del Norte,
¡oso blanco del viento!
Llegas sobre mi carne
tembloroso de auroras
boreales,
con tu capa de espectros
capitanes,
y riyéndote a gritos
del Dante.
¡Oh pulidor de estrellas!
Pero vienes
demasiado tarde.
Mi almario está musgoso
y he perdido la llave.

Sin ningún viento,
¡hazme caso!,
gira, corazón;
gira, corazón.

Brisas, gnomos y vientos
de ninguna parte.
Mosquitos de la rosa
de pétalos pirámides.
Alisios destetados
entre los rudos árboles,
flautas en la tormenta,
¡dejadme!
Tiene recias cadenas
mi recuerdo,
y está cautiva el ave
que dibuja con trinos
la tarde.

Las cosas que se van no vuelven nunca,
todo el mundo lo sabe,
y entre el claro gentío de los vientos
es inútil quejarse.
¿Verdad, chopo, maestro de la brisa?
¡Es inútil quejarse!

Sin ningún viento.
¡hazme caso!
gira, corazón;
gira, corazón.

------------

"The Weather-Vane" by Evaleen Stein

Turn, turn, when pelting rain
Rushes down the window-pane;
Turn, turn, and turn again
When the sun shines, weather-vane!

  Fie! Fie! to always be
  Emblem of uncertainty!
  Followed by the restless sea,
Changeful moons may wax and wane,
  Yet the moons and sea-tides, too,
  Constant are compared to you!
Fickle still you must remain
Long as winds blow, weather-vane!

------------

"The Weather Vane" by Sal Amico M. Buttaci

the me you saw yesterday
the me you heard singing off key
in the shower
rock ‘n roll songs
from the fabled old fifties

this me who once carried
a lucky Ace comb
for the dark pompadour I sported

like Frankie Avalon
you never heard of

the me you insist talks poems
in my sleep
who once wore black leather
who still looks for my father
down dark lonely streets

the me shuffling years
into fat and lean dreams
the me leaning over
the bridge of the Arno
me in a sun ray

in the crack of a door
me clumsily groping
for time making faces
in unkind funhouse mirrors
in dark morning puddles

in the windows of strangers
in gold magic lamps
rubbed the wrong way
the me chasing shadows
high as the moonlight

the me of the now and before
of the never again
the me and the me and
the me you saw touching
the smooth granite of graves

the me peeling dead seconds
like dry layers of skin
the me who I am, have been,
might one day become
the me you say totters

like a weather-vane rooster
flapping my arms
as if I had wings
the me on the roof slant
reaching for heaven

daring the windfall
humming old rock songs
predicting the direction
two hearts will take
the me on the roof slant
loved by an
angel 

--------

"Weather Vane" by Nicky Mehta (from album Weather Vane)

Maybe I know it but I can't take that it turned out his way
Now you're tripping that light in your town
I slept a few days but the rain never came
So I read fictions about thunder and floods

But it's not enough
I want these black skies to come
Want it heavy and thick like this pain
Well you took up and left
You were never my rest
You were my weathervane

So I go about my mornings leaving cold cups of coffee
I'm never hungry I'm starving I'm so full
It's been grey for two weeks but everything is still frozen
And I just want to be through

Maybe you're not enough
I want these hard skies to come
Want it black when you come back and say it
And it will pierce through my heart
Like a bolt in the dark
You're my weathervane

You'll hollow out and turn east
And I will finally face what I keep

So let's bring it on
I want these dark clouds to come
Want the sky to sob itself to sleep
When we all wake up clean you will know what I mean...

Want to try and see if I can get our Marquee graphics feature (<M<) to display the poem in both positions, as if spinning--i.e.
"growing onions smell
around flying crows
in tangled sparrows
wildly spinning cock", as in the layout below, alternatiing with all S's reversed, so the second display starts:
"smell onions growing
crows flying around
sparrows tangles in
cock spinning wildly", and on down.
If I post something goofy while trying to see if I can use "Marquee" or not, please excuse me.

Six-Hinged Weather-Vane Semi-Cento

                                    growing onions smell
                                    around flying crows
                                    in tangled sparrows
                                    wildly spinning cock
                here to clean
           dry spider plants
               and round the
 first raindrops splashing
                                    del blanco oso
                                    auroras de tembloroso
                                    y gnomos, brisas,
                                    maestro, chopo, verdad
                still you must
               wax and wane
               as winds blow
     moons and sea-tides
                                   dreams lean and
                                   become day one
                                   layers dry like
                                   shadows chasing me
             clouds to come
              eyes turned to
           finally face what
                   up and left


smell onions growing       *growing onions smell
crows flying around                       around flying crows
sparrows tangled in      in tangled sparrows
cock spinning wildly      wildly spinning cock

*here to clean         clean to here
dry spider plants      plants spider dry
and round the         the round and
first raindrops splashing   splashing raindrops first

oso blanco del         *del blanco oso
tembloroso de auroras      auroras de tembloroso
brisas, gnomos y      y gnomos, brisas,
verdad, chopo, maestro   maestro, chopo, verdad

*still you must         must you still
wax and wane         wane and wax
as winds blow         blow winds as
moons and sea-tides      sea-tides and moons

and lean dreams      *dreams lean and
one day become      become day one
like dry layers         layers dry like
me chasing shadows      shadows chasing me

*clouds to come                   come to clouds
eyes turned to                           to turned eyes
finally face what      what face finally
up and left                                 left and up


Cento Sources (full texts in Journalese, "Things in the pipeline," p. 5):
Alan Safarik "Weather Vane" (un-hinged "growing...")
Maureen Boyle "Weather Vane" (hinged "here...")
Federico García Lorca "Veleta" (un-hinged "del...")
Evaleen Stein "The Weather-Vane" (hinged "still...")
Salvatore Amico M. Buttaci "The Weather Vane" (un-hinged "dreams...")
Nicky Mehta "Weather Vane" (hinged "cloud...")

Six-Hinged Spinning-Weather-Vane Semi-Cento    Six-Hinged Spinning-Weather-Vane Semi-Cento

                                    growing onions smell                  smell onions growing
                                    around flying crows                      crows flying around
                                    in tangled sparrows                      sparrows tangled in
                                    wildly spinning cock                      cock spinning wildly
                here to clean                                                                                 clean to hear
           dry spider plants                                                                                 plants spider dry
               and round the                                                                                 the round and
first raindrops splashing                                                                                 splashing raindrops first
                                    del blanco oso                                      oso blanco del
                                    auroras de tembloroso             tembloroso de auroras
                                    y gnomos, brisas,                             brisas, gnomos, y
                                    maestro, chopo, verdad          verdad, chopo, maestro
                still you must                                                                                 must you still
               wax and wane                                                                                wane and wax
               as winds blow                                                                                 blow winds as
     moons and sea-tides                                                                                 sea-tides and moons
                                   dreams lean and                                 and lean dreams
                                   become day one                                  one day become
                                   layers dry like                                         like dry layers
                                   shadows chasing me                     me chasing shadows
             clouds to come                                                                                  come to clouds
              eyes turned to                                                                                  to turned eyes
           finally face what                                                                                  what face finally
                   up and left                                                                                  left and up


Okay, so here are the two main faces,  but all I've discovered is why real wind-vanes don't have
text on them. It's too annoying to try to read it! -Tom

the day
that we all riseth white as milk
we will taste liberty

That's astonishing, silent. Harry touched everyone's life, one way or another, huh? Probably took a few $ from you. I wrote this song for my wife's birthday, don't think it has much appeal beyond personal, so I left it here in journal, where I'm so glad you saw it. -Tom

Note from "Since I Died": inspired by Paul Noth cartoon unpaged in New Yorker  1-26-2009 "He just doesn't know what to do with himself since he passed away."
----
note from Gamer
*soroche [so-ro’-chay]
noun, masc.
1. en Perú a la alteración de la percepción sensorial caused by rarefaction of the air at great altitudes. (Ecuador) (m)
2. A friable, shining silver ore. (m)
3. Soroche (Pseudobombax argentinum) is a species of flowering tree found in Argentina, Bolivia, Brazil, and Paraguay, threatened by habitat loss. Traditionally its seeds are used to stuff pillows.

Myrna's Visual Threshold Maxims posted 1-31

Sundering submitted 1-30

Frank Talk submitted FEb. 1

Good one, Tom.

Thank you, Lavonne, for the studio visit and the encouragement. -Tom

Retired submitted Feb. 1

Recognitions submitted 2-9

Rorschach submitted 2-2, retitled "Inkblot"

X VALENTINE submitted 2-11

Degrees of Separation submitted 2-4

Perfect Tom! You gotta put this one in submit!

B.

Regarding Kiss-Off. I think I dated this guy once.  I will admit however that he was an excellent disser. (oops, meant kisser)  ;)

I think he's still single, Sherry. -Tom

I'm certain he should be. :)

           Introjection
I gave in to that spam email
Free Viagara Longer Errection
but the blue pills just bollixed
my own spelling of fffemale.

KILLZONE®2
BLOOD AND GORE
INTENSE VIOLENCE
STRONG LANGUAGE
WAR. PERFECTED.
“5 OUT OF 5 STARS”
“EDITOR’S  CHOICE”

I hope to submit "Haiku" but I'm still playing with and thinking about how to present it in the least annoying but most effective form. Do you think it's a bit much, Brian, as is? I do appreciate your enthusiasm, though. It does move me closer to taking the plunge. -Tom

Mihori, Hana, Gravigami submitted 2-3

The Mongol 482 — Most Prized Pencil in Human History! posted as revision of "Anarchist Ark" on Feb. 3

Hello, thank you for your silent visit. Yes, some of all of our poems are like matryoshka dolls, something inside something inside something. Coincidentally, just a few minutes ago while I was walking home from my little son's school, thinking if a long piece was reading to submit, I was thinking that all my poems could probably be reduced to haiku size. In this case, you have done half the job for me, and I appreciate your sculpturing in, which is like receiving a new poem from you, and a lovely one. -Tom

untitled ("plain white house") submitted 2-4

Of a teacher submitted Feb. 7

Tarjeta de San Valentín submitted 2-12

Valentine (for Maggie) submitted 2-14

True cow or dybbuk? submitted 2-8

Ravin submitted 2-8

moved "Slowly But Shirley" up a page.

Birthday Poem submitted 2-10

Thank you for saying so, silent. Tom

(a Valentine to Milner Place & Sean Thornton) submitted 2-14; inside, title "The Quiet God"

Timing submitted 2-12

Red Coffee Pot submitted 2-12

So much depends on. . .  this is one of thse red wheelbarrow poems.  I like it.

Thanks for visiting, Rick. I ordered a beetle identification book, hardcover, for $.01 on ebay, because I cannot figure out what the beetle was. Glad you enjoyed. Tom

Your recent Zek is certainly in conversation with WCW. Tom

At Least, At Last submitted 2-15

To Know What Is True submitted 2-17

It's not the most popular thing to do -- tell the truth -- but that's been our task since Homer and before.  Good one.

Rick

Rick, thanks for the encouragement on this. Tom

Two Poems Inspired by Rick Stansberger's "Bear" submitted 2-18

I can't wait!

The Casio Muzak Maker submitted 2-22

 Flect submitted 2-20

Condominium submitted 2-24

War Perfected submitted 2-27

Slowly but Shirley submitted 2-26

"My Fierce Pianist" submitted 2-21, put to workshop 2-22, resubmitted 2-23

The TAU Captive Breeding Center submitted 2-23
retitled TAU Theogamy Center

Dear Tom
122 is a fine number
smiles
silent lotus
Thanks for the encouraging word, Silent. 122 is the number of rounds so far in this wrestling match, as well as the number of pages this monster started out as! Tom

This one's lovely.

122 has me interested in the physical facts of their captivity and how they're handling it (and how we're handling them).

Rick

Thank you, Rick. Yes, there is a long way to go with 122...much to add, much to cut....Thanks for visiting with ideas. Tom

3 Poems/13 Praises submitted 3-6, sent to Picks 3-6

;D

So Go submitted 2-25

When Someone submitted March 2
Things in the pipeline
« Reply #136 on: March 02, 2009, 12:45:52 AM » by Tom Riordan
Holly submitted 3-3
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
   Re: Things in the pipeline
« Reply #137 on: March 02, 2009, 02:41:46 PM » by Tom Riordan
Cronk's On the Move submitted right away to neighbor the referenced poems.

The Bulldog submitted 3-4

Rick, I missed this when you posted it, responded to your #125 but not this one. I'm glad you looked at this, I've been on the fence about it and your encouragement will spur me to submit it. Thank you. Tom

Thank you for looking in, Brian. I'll get this out there one of these days. You've helped screw up my courage! Tom

The Coffins of the War Dead submitted 2-28

Jury Review, Intelligent Design (ENT) - Entrant 131 submitted 3-16

Ísland Hvítabjörn Saga posted 3-10

Drink submitted 3-8

Ditty of The Future Queen submitted 3-7

lamp submitted 3-13

Stevie submitted 3-9

Therese Stewart, City and County of San Francisco Petitioner submitted 3-17-09

Telemetry, Kepler(Kepler) 1.000-1.034, 1.035-1.068, 1.069-1.102 submitted 3-11, 3-13

Firstly, I wish I had as many interesting 'things in the pipeline' as you do, Tom.

Secondly, this is a riot- I thought, I laughed, I thought some more and now I'm thinking it's deserving of a post of it's own. Real nice one.

I should check in here more often.

Thanks, Mike. I don't get into Journals either, scared it'll be as fun as the Submit board and I'll have to send my family to live with my parents. But I am delighted to have you as a guest in here, check in as often as you want, can't beat the rates, and there's usually weird stuff in here that really needs somebody to boost my courage to post it! Tom

I just lol'd everywhere.

Tom, I found reading 'telemetry, kepler' extremely uplifting. So many people try and write about big subjects using, well, big language; the almost conversational tone, in this case, works so much better.

James

Very pleased for the encouragement for this. Thanks, James. Tom

Receivership of the Proletariat submitted 3-12

Mike and Me submitted 3-18-09

---------
98 (80)
yes
it
looks
like
my
brother
1Mike’s
foot
1not
1mine
but
don’t
panic
although
nine
months
separated
us
at
birth
1we
have
been
growing
back
together
bit by bit
so
should
2we
die
on
1the
1same
day
1in
2the
2same
way
no
undertaker
will
1be
able
to
say
1who
1is
2who
1if
3the
feet
seem
his
1it’s
me
2if
2mine
2it’s
him
or
vice
versa
3if
2not
fine
there
are
always
4the
arms
2Mike’s
a
mathematician’s
3mine
1half
waiter’s
2half
beautician’s
and
5the
rhyme
since
Mike
was
1what
I
am
as
I’ll
2be
2what
he
2is
2in
time

Good suggestion, Silent. Thank you. In evaluating your idea, I also had an interesting look at rhyme (-setts) on unaccented syllables vs. those on accented syllables (It/Cit-/Pitts-/bit/bit), something I've never really thought about before, so thank you for that too.
And now with "Mass." we have a phantom unaccented rhyme!
Tom
p.s. (later) For some reason, Silent, I can't take the "Mass."! Have to revert. Tom

added 3-13 to Telemetry, Kepler http://www.poetrycircle.com/index.php/topic,11706.0.html

Another Zen Poem? submitted 3-15

The Doña Paz submitted 3-19

Catholic University of Yaoundé submitted 3-23

Rune and Speech submitted 3-25

love [luhv] submitted 3-24

Big Daddy submitted 3-23

 Telemetry, Kepler (Tetrad 2) 2.171-2.204 consolidated at #163

Barnum & Bailey submitted 3-26

for the singular sue submitted 3-26

Telemetry, Kepler (Tetrad 2) submitted 4-1

antipodes submitted 3-27

What Charles Latan May Be Thinking When
He Touts “The Dangerous Truths of Poetry” submitted 3-29 (last " not fitting on title line)

pesach submitted 3-28

Have Sex For Us submitted 3-31

I adore this.

The Daily Racing Form - MOVED TO WORKSHOP FOR FURTHER WORK
7 column inches $477

Good Luck Guaranteed Did you know a good luck charm can refuse luck
to the person carrying it? Your Luck Proven in Advance Our luck charms
choose you! We place your name in our daily Lucky Lottery until one of our
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Your Luck is in the Mail

Silken Thomas submitted 4-2

Free Public Education - Free Yolanda Hill submitted 4-3

Mīm submitted 4-3

More Dangerous Truths of Poetry MOVED TO WORKSHIP FOR FURTHER WORK

As Charles deftly decanted more Dangerous Truths of Poetry
and Chilean busboys scampered hither and thither to retrieve
the fat cats' empty lobster-cocktail boats because the kitchen
had to reuse them for the Sedutto crème de menthe parfaits
après the Poached Filet Mignon with Wild Mushroom Sabayon
et avant  the Armagnac Marquis de Montesquiou Imperial XO,

one young chef de l'industrie  at Table 2 decided it would be
a tour de force  to light a Cohiba Sublimes Edición Limitada,
and all the Commie crybabies' anti-smoking laws be damned,
since “Perhaps the most  dangerous truth of poetry,” Charles
was saying, “is that no rules apply when sailing to Byzantium
Yet we remain on the shore, Dick Wilbur wrote in 'Regatta.'”

Unfortunately the sprinkler system in the ceiling did respond
to all this high-toned poem-quoting smoke and in a moment
Charles wasn't the only one in the ballroom who was all wet.

He pulled a fifty-dollar grin out of his brainside bag of tricks
and as the execs grabbed their flutes of Clos du Mesnil 1996
and scrambled for the French doors to the portico he rallied:
“The second most dangerous truth is Save the champagne!”

Garrulously grousing, everyone gaped back into the ballroom
where a well-drilled corps of waiters dove to reseal the gold
lips of those magnificent magnums. Damp coif drooping a bit,
Charles lifted his own glass to salute his corporate Magwitch:

“O yes!The best laid schemes o' mice an' men gang aft agley!
But thou art blest compar'd wi' me, the present only toucheth
thee! But Och! I backward cast my e'e, On prospects drear!--
the poet said. An' forward, tho' I canna see, I guess an' fear!
Me lads and lassies, do you know what Bobbie Burns meant?
Good fortune is no better earned, than it eventually is spent.”

Cento submitted 4-6-09

Love this Cento, Tom.

By the by, reference the previous entry, Robert Burns insisted on being called Robert, never Robbie, Bobbie, or Rabbie. I'm particularily careful to attend to his wishes, as already my birthdays on the 25th January are invaded by inebriated Scots and squealing bagpipes (a beauteous sound as long as it's in the next glen), and have no wish for them to be further interrupted by his irate ghost.

Cheers

milner

I appreciate your tip about Burns's first name; it makes my glib name-dropper even glibber. You and Robert shall have to...suffer! But you're on record in his defense, so hopefully his ghost will not harry you.
Otherwise, happy you, to have a birthday-mate like Burns. I have Al Pacino, which would have been fine if he had died just after "Glengarry Glen Ross" and just before "Scent of a Woman"!

Thanks for encouragement too with Cento.


 --Tom

"rabbitsfoot" concordances

alph
a6
all3
and4
another2
antimatter
are3
aren't
at
back
bamboozled
be
beat
believe
big
both
but2
buttons
by
can
catch
change
cherries
day
dependent
dice
driver's
each
entirely
feet
find
fine
fits
front
grin
have
her
I'm
in2
keys
life
looking
marriage2
matter
men's
mine
mirror
neither
nine2
nothing
oblivious
occupying
of 3
on4
one6
or
other2
our
perfect
po-po
rabbitsfoot2
Reilly
replaced
reversible
see
she's
shoes
side
size3
skip
socks
space
the8
this
time
to3
totally 3
turn
twirling
unoccupied
us2
we3
when
where
whose
will 2
women's
worn

freq
the8
a6
one6
and4
on4
all3
are3
of 3
size3
totally3
we3
another2
but2
in2
marriage2
nine2
other2
rabbitsfoot2
us2
will 2

"Bloody Mary" moved to workshop 4-26

Dear Tom

if i may....i seriously like this as a poem !

maybe even Things In The Pipline  would make for a good title
yet i am sure you could create many others.

silent lotus

consider it your found poem, silent, though as you suggest, it may be more of a found poem toy, inviting countless variations! when you're famous, maybe i'll get to be in a footnote of the authoritative biography, "Whence All That Silence?" ~ tom

Well, considering that we have books with titles like "The Unpublished Poems of E.E. Cummings," why not? How' ma doing?

well Tom for your journal

 In The Pipeline


i thought you might need this song


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W5D07c0dJuQ (The video's owner prevents external embedding)

at least for the summer at Lavallette

waves of smiles
silent lotus

Always.

--------------

 
I don't know what I'm made of but it can't be light. Light hurts
where it touches me, each little hornet leaping forward, dabbing
me with an electron-volt, and leaping back away with a Hurrah!
How I envy the creatures around me who are are dark and silent
and out of reach of all the luciferous pustules irritating the galaxy
like white-tipped poison ivy blisters—the unmeasured Black Way
the only air they breathe in the manner of God. Let there be light,
He said in the Beginning, and divided the light from the darkness
that He breathed too. What did He think He was doing? What was
the point exactly? One of those cat's-out-of-the-bag experiments,
didnt' think to put an expiration date on the stuff until it was too
late? For light could not return to being simply dark. God knows
He tried. He could transform it into matter—air, water, fire, flesh—
and then transform it into light again. Like Him, it will not weaken
nor die: He sent His only Son, for Christ's sake, see what the boy
could do—and His death managed three dark hours but no more,
and He was never to return. Lucifer, Indelible, along commands
the photons, the electrons, and though God manages to put His
hand out now and then, and rearrange the flowers in the vase,
neither does He dare to add one arrow to the Archfiend's quiver
nor does He have a place to put one should he pluck it! O, He's
sorry, everybody's sorry, but there is simply nothing to be done!




----

after Stewart Grant “Einstein's Observer” & Marc-Andre Germain “(a + bn)/n = x”


somewhere far away
the universe has&nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp;defective defective defective defective defective
already ended&nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; perfect
the report is heading&nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp;defective defective defective defective defective
in our direction&nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp;excessive

the good news is&nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; defective defective defective defective defective
the tidings&nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; excessive
of intelligent life&nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; defective
have not yet&nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp;&nbsp; &nbsp; excessive
reached the apocalypse&nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; defective defective defective

make up your mind fast&nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; excessive
seven minutes of grace&nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; defective defective defective
my eyeballs shrank&nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp;perfect
a few drops of conjunctiva&nbsp; defective
fluid fell&nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp;&nbsp; excessive

and then&nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp;&nbsp; &nbsp;defective defective defective defective defective
vanished



---
see Stewart Grant “Einstein's Observer” www.poetrycircle.com/index.php/topic,13460.0.html & Marc-Andre Germain'“(a + bn)/n = x” www.poetrycircle.com/index.php/topic,13465.0.html