weeds and words

dandelion flower and clock

April has brought the cuckoo and forced the lilacs into bloom. Now it’s even bringing a few showers. They don’t seem to be doing much to pierce the drought of March, though, as they barely dampen the surface of the ground and then evaporate with wind and the suddenly dazzle of sunshine.

Still, they are enough to have prompted a few more weeds to flourish and the photo has reminded me of an unfinished poem of frustrated love entitled I want. This is the third stanza:

I want daisies on the lawn in clumps
of seven to fit my footstep, a universe
of dandelion globes and the chance
a simple breath can make it
any time I like.

 
Down by the river the other day, it would have been easy enough to put your foot on seven daisies, but I haven’t seen any in my garden and I’m sure summer isn’t really here yet. Perhaps the river bank is as inaccurate a time keeper as dandelion clocks tend to be.

half found

pale lilac coming into flower

First of all a picture of a spray of lilac. Because it’s April and it’s about time there were lilacs.

And now some talk of poetry. Because it’s April and even if I’m not managing a poem a day, I am trying to focus a bit more than I sometimes do.

I posted a ‘found poem’ in Spanish a few days ago (yesterday’s poem) along with an unsatisfactory translation into English. In fact the bus station notice about ‘security recommendations’ that the text was taken from used to be much longer and much more detailed. It had caught my attention in the past and I found an old copy of the complete version in my notebook.

This time I have taken more liberties with the ‘translation’, although none of the ideas in the poem are entirely mine: they all come from the Spanish original.
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poetical preconceptions

Last night, not having very much new to take for discussion at the writers’ group, I took along the poem That certain feeling (included in last week’s post not enough poetry).

It is such an old piece that I didn’t think anyone in the group would have seen it, and although I don’t really expect to go back and re-write it, I thought it might provoke some discussion, particularly as it’s quite unlike the pieces I’ve taken to the meeting in recent months.

It did in fact provoke some interesting comments about line breaks and line length, as well as drawing my attention once more to the subject of narrators.
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thought for the day

Checking the spam comments queue, I came across this:

Q: how many calories in a grapefruit juice? A: Not enough poetry

I can’t say I’ve ever really looked for poetry in fruit juice of any kind and I don’t know how much I’d have expected to find.

Just at the moment, though, I feel there are altogether too many areas of my life in which there is not enough poetry, so I don’t see why grapefruit juice should be any different.

fragmented thoughts on haiku

The other day I tagged yet another post as ‘haiku’. Later, in the comments, I admitted that the description was probably inaccurate, and it occurs to me that any reader who clicks to read other haiku posts on the blog might infer that I don’t actually know what the word means.

There are plenty of factors that may be taken into account when defining a haiku, including number of lines, syllable count, subject, kigo (season word), kireji (cutting word) etc.
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