Author: carolyncordon

Wife, mother, Poet, Writer, Art Installationist, Stand Up Comedian, Dog Enthusiast. Spending most of my time being creative in a variety of sometimes quirky ways! I have suffered in my life, I have had wonderful things occur in my life. Concentrating on the wonderful things makes it easier for me to live a great life.
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Thinking About the Sun

carolyncordon

I’m running behind a little with the #poemadayfeb challenge. I need to write a poem about the sun, which was yesterday’s prompt, and then check out what the prompt is for today, and write a poem based on that prompt, and of course, put both of my poems up here on this blog, the ‘Sun’ poem first, and then another post for whatever today’s prompt is. Fun, fun, fun.

Not so much fun is the fact that I had already written my poem for yesterday’s prompt, an in depth bit of discussion and then a lengthy poem of quite a few words, that I lost by accidentally hitting the wrong key, and making it just disappear, never to be seen again. So instead, I will write a stripped back poem, possibly encompassing some of the thoughts from the post that disappeared.

And this time I will make sure I don’t make the whole thing disappear. Writing these things on something else and then doing a copy/paste thing is a much safer idea, so I think I’ll finish this off somewhere else. But I’ll be back, don’t you worry about that!

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OK, I’m back, as I said I would be, and I now have a very, very stripped back poem compared to the original one which I carelessly destroyed, never to be seen again …

I think I prefer this poem, or I may be trying to gee myself up so I don’t hate myself for being so silly and destroying all of those words. The other poem had some of my research in it, that I did earlier today, and it had a photo of a mandarin tree, and some things about photosynthesis, and such things. Not this time though, that’s all gone.

imag0584_1_1

Instead, I have this photograph of the moon, I think from the full moon before the previous one. I don’t remember why I took the photo now, but it was there, I was there (outside on the back veranda), and so I did. This photo, as the photo of the now forever lost blog post, is relevant to the poem, which I will post right here! Thanks for visiting, feel free to add to the discussion if you wish too!

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Sun Thoughts

Black sky, pinprick stars

each a sun, eons old

possibly dead, but

visible to us, somehow …

 

Eastern glow, bright ball

rising, sky’s sunrise hues

then that azure sky

Australians love so much.

 

Sun rising, rising

temperature’s rise too,

then sunset colours

and evening comes –

 

black, and the moon,

those stars, and each star

with its planets,

and each planet, its moons –

 

our solar system,

each star’s solar systems,

galaxy upon galaxy

swirling together, moving.

 

All together, making up

the universe, moving,

ageing, dying, as we too,

move, age and will die …

poetry

Turning Japanese

carolyncordon

The poetry prompt for yesterday was a poetic form, the Katauta poem. This is another Japanese poetry form, almost identical to haiku, in that they both are three lined poems with syllable counts of 5/7/5 syllables (or fewer). The difference is that with this poetic form there are two stanzas, with each being written by a different person, with one, with the second being a reply to the first.

 

It is written by a pair of lovers, in the Japanese form, but that didn’t suit my life situation at all – happily married for over thirty years, sooky love stuff well and truly over & done with! I think I know my husband well enough by now, to realise he would not be interested in writing in this particular poetic form. 

Nothing wrong with that, we all so our own thing, and that is fine, so I came up with another way to use this particular form. I like to use my creativity to work my way around issues like this!

 

Instead of the truly Japanese way of doing this poetic form, I have taken McTavish the Cat and Buster the Dog, two creatures who live in the imaginations of a writer friend of mine (cat) and mine (dog).

 

These two creatures will feature in book four of the Buster the Dog series, that began with “Dig It! Gardening Tips for Dogs”, which was followed by “Doggone It! Mindfulness from a Dog’s Point of View”, and, I thought, with “Dog Buddha’s Thoughts”.

 

I had thought these three books said all I and Buster the Dog needed to say, but my friend had other ideas, and so along came McTavish the Cat!

 

So, these two creatures end up living in the same house, after a relationship  break up, and then a new one starting. Buster the Dog, and his ‘owner’ move into McTavish the Cat’s owner’s house, and work out how they can all live together. Buster the Dog and McTavish the Cat, might not normally have joined together to become best friends,  but such is nature of adversity, and ganging up on a common ‘foe’.

The pair, a dog and a cat, have both previously actively avoided getting too close, but when you live in the same household there are far fewer ways to keep away from each other, and they come to realise they have a lot more in common than they had realised.

 

Things, are very tricky at the start,  but they eventually work out their issues with each other, as they continue finding ways to make life hell for their ‘owners’ and eventually building a loving friendship that is beautiful, hence the poem for this day:

 

Your feline grace –

you flow across the room

like no other can …

 

Your canine calm –

you fill the room with peace,

embracing all …

poetry

A New Poetic Form?

carolyncordon

 A Tritern? I’m not sure if the poetic form of today’s poem I wrote today for the #poemadayfeb challenge, has an actual name, but Tritern is my attempt at giving it one, if it doesn’t already have one. It is a poetic form based a little on the Quatern (details for that style below)

Tritern:

9 lines, broken into 3 stanzas of three lines each
Each line has 9 syllables

The first line of the poem is the refrain,

In second stanza the refrain is the second line

In third (final) stanza refrain is final (third) line.

Rhyming or non rhyming as poet wishes.

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This is the Quatern: it has 16 lines broken up into 4 quatrains (or 4-line stanzas).

  1. Each line is comprised of eight syllables.
  2. The first line is the refrain. In the second stanza, the refrain appears in the second line; in the third stanza, the third line; in the fourth stanza, the fourth (and final) line.
  3. There are no rules for rhyming or iambics.

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OK, now onto my poem for the 20th of February 2019, based on/inspired by, thinking about people who are good people, but have been beaten down by life. They will brush themselves down, get up and give it another try, because they want to be the kind of person they would like and respect.
Life’s journey can be a difficult one, a marathon of rough terrain, but crossing the winning line in front of others is a fail, if you cross the line in a helicopter.

 

The theme is ‘Last’

 

Who are the Losers?

 

Coming last, losing, beaten by all,

humiliated, defeated, but

isn’t just trying, better than not?

 

If you won’t try, you shouldn’t mock those

coming last. Losing, beaten by all,

but winners ‘cos they gave it their best.

 

Life isn’t fair, and many will cheat,

& cheaters all fail at being good –

coming last, losing, beaten by all!

poetry

Not Sure About This Poem

carolyncordon

So cleanse is the poetry prompt for this, the 19th day of February. I don’t have time to actually write my poem yet, too many other things to do this morning, but I know that prompt will be wandering around the back of my mind, as I’m busy doing other things. The brain is an amazing thing, and we should all take care of it, as much as we can. Yeah, we should, but often don’t …

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Sometimes a poem may not always go the way you were expecting it to go, and you have the choice, follow the poem, or stick with your original thoughts. Today’s poem was quite like that, and now I have a mish-mash of thoughts, the general idea of cleansing our lives through good works, but then the addition of some quite different thoughts, which, though still on the theme of ‘good’, maybe don’t really fit together. I began in one direction, and then turned in another one …

I don’t feel as objective as I need to be to sort this one out to my absolute satisfaction. It may be the problems I have today are part of the whole poem a day thing, where there isn’t enough time for more considered thought. It isn’t a terrible poem, and I am happy enough to post it here, knowing I can always edit it further before the poem ever goes to print, rather than simply being displayed on this blog …

Every piece of writing can be a work in progress, even after the first print run, after all. I’m more or less happy that I have used metaphor in this poem, and stuck with it rather than mixing the metaphor. So I guess this poem could be labelled as a metaphor poem, and for that I thank John Malone, for all he has shown me over the years we’ve been friends.

Any ‘metaphorical’ failings in this poem my own, certainly no fault of John, who is a fine writer of metaphor in his poetry!

 

 

Dining Well for a Good Life

Thinking on past filth dumped on me by life

the wrongs, the jibes, nasty ‘jokes’, strife,

blame laid where none should’ve been given –

claims of my laziness, that were ego-driven …

 

The stories I tell of my life, are my own –

the truth is in what I’ve said, and I’ve shown –

I prefer to do good, whenever I can,

& wish all felt the same, child, woman & man.

 

But all of us have our own ways to go –

it’s up to each one, the results that will show.

I can’t say how each person should be

and the way I go, that may only suit me.

 

But it works for me, so I’ll go on the way I do.

My main meal of life – a good & creative stew –

starting with lemon water to cleanse my palate

then political dishes that suit my ballot –

 

an entree filled with environmental assistance,

next course a salad of ‘Green’-leaning persistence,

main course, that stew of help, for the needy,

& dessert to end, a small one, & don’t be greedy!

 

The ‘meals’ forced on us when we were younger,

ones that sickened us, not feeding our hunger –

we know more now, eat more of what is nutritious,

desserts too, just a little, and life is delicious!

poetry

Tanka & Other Japanese Forms

carolyncordon

I was pleased today, to see that the poetry prompt for the #poemadayfeb event was the Tanka form of poetry. I have spent many years trying to perfect the writing of Haiku, and the similar style of Tanka, and am still trying to perfect them.

I suspect this will continue for the rest of my life, knowing that managing to write one good one, certainly does not mean you’ve ‘got it’! In my life, I think I’ve written a mere handful of fine Haiku, and I’m not sure I’ve every written a Tanka I would call fine …

But today, I am going to do my best at writing a good Tanka, because I’d like the poems I put up here to be all good poems, of various forms, and following the various given prompts for February 2019. A Tanka has a syllable count of 5/7/5/7/7 syllables, or fewer, and a Haiku has a syllable count of 5/7/5 syllables, or fewer. There is a lot more to these poetic forms, but that would be for another blog post …

This has been a wonderful month for me, I feel my poetry is really getting to a higher level, to some extent, and I am ever so grateful to Kathy Parker, Paul Kohn, and Laura Greaves for putting these words together for poets to use as prompts. The more I write poetry, the better I feel I am getting, and the more inspired I am feeling about my writing in general.

Yesterday I wrote my #poemadayfeb poem, and another poem, and the text for a picture book too, all in one inspired day. I don’t know if that picture book will ever become an actual book, but I like it, it’s a sweet little story about friendship, and I’m wishing I could draw well enough, to finish it off!

I’m going to have a bit of a go at doing illustrations for this picture book, just to see how it would look, and whether it might work. That’s a task for me, after I finish this blog post, by posting the Tanka I have now finished writing. It is based on what I heard this morning, and what I remember from other times. I’ve written it down here, and fiddled with it for about ten minutes, still not completely happy, but happier than I was, so it will have to do.

That’s the thing with writing, there’s still something else you might do to make it better, but editing has to stop somewhere if others are going to read your work, and having written that, here it is:

Tanka for the 18th of February, 2019
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Gentle breeze blowing,

wind chimes, and sparrow song,

bring peaceful moments,

before my husband brings home

a cacophony of sound …