If you haven't dropped by our poetry blog recently why not take a click's trip over there?I've just added (a little late, I'm sorry) a favourite poem of mine: Louis MacNeice's Prayer before Birth in which the horrors of the modern world are seen through the eyes of an unborn child.
Machinist adds a couple of intriguing anagram poems by Kevin McFadden based on OuLiPo principles. (I'm trying to get my head around OuLiPo about which more another time.)
Sharanya has found a haunting poem called When I Cut My Hair by Cherokee poet Rayna Green, and gives a fascinating insight into what happened in Malika Booker's workshop.
On a lighter note, Dreamer Idiot takes the woman's side and gives us a very enjoyable poem about Bloody Men by Wendy Cope:
Bloody men are like bloody buses -DI is, of course, a new man of astounding sensitivity.
You wait for about a year
And as soon as one approaches your stop
Two or three others appear.
And then there's a "prose poem" which I put up last time - The Love Motel by Indonesian poet Lakshmi Pamunjac - to open a debate about whether there really is such a creature (as a "prose poem" I mean: Lakshmi's very real!) Whether it's a poem or a story, never mind, the real issue at stake in this piece is - which is more important, sex or food?
Incidentally something has been bugging me ever since we started the blog. As you know, we take it in turns to choose a poem we love or that interests us and write about it. Well, over the past year I've noticed that the guys (Leon, DI and Machinist) tend to be much more interested in the technical aspects of the poem, the women (myself, Sharanya, Dina, Sham) in how we relate to it and whether it speaks to us emotionally. (Not that both aspects aren't vitally important when discussing a poem, but it's more a question of emphasis.)
I asked Malika when I interviewed her, about whether this reflects her own experiences and she says she thinks it is ... and also that men and women also seem to approach the writing of poetry somewhat differently! Are we two different species even where poetry is concerned?
Now then, would you like to contribute a post to the blog? You don't need to be "an expert", or be able to speak lingua poetica or have an SPM in advanced versification ... just have a poem you love and would like to share with the world.
Contact Dreamer Idiot or myself if you do.
(I nicked the very nice logo from someone else's blog and can't remember the address! Please let me know and I will credit you.)
13 comments:
I took nearly two hours to compose this for a friend who kept bugging me to write poems/love letters for her. What bothered me the most were the techinical aspects in writing it (I'm a guy and a programmer).
Different species? Quite likely.
it's a really good piece, sotong. it convys exactly waht you wanted to say very nicely. i guess it wasn't quite what the girlfriend wanted though.
Heh.. you're probably right about the technical/emotional thing. It's like women want to hear about people and relationships, guys want to hear about action and violence (mental or physical.)
giant sotong, I would say your poem is a good effort. There is a nice control of the lines and stanzas, and the rhyming isn't really 'contrived' as weak poems I have read...
Don't mind though, I am just an ordinary lover of poetry.
and yeah... keep writin. who kwows u might become a major malaysian poet? I think there are one or two very promising poets among our midst (after Cecil rajendra and wong phui nam)
see what i mean? DI is talking about control and rhyming and i'm thinking of the effect on your poor girlfriend!
The one who asked for a poem is not my girlfriend, but we've known each other since our early teens. She does that to poke fun at me.
Until I had a girlfriend (another girl - we broke up over three years ago) I never thought I was capable of anything romantic. There were a few love letters, but no poetry. As demonstrated, my poems look like chunks of program code.
And it was about blogging.
but for a chunk of programming code - very good
have you written a lot?
Hi Sharon: Just got your note about my turn next week, and replied, but email bounced back. You have some 'over quota' error message at your side.
arrrrgggh.
thanks leon, i'm onto it.
This one's my first real poem. I haven't been paying much attention to whatever recreational writing I've done. My job's currently taking a higher emotional toll.
Some of the poems I used to enjoy were way too long for posting - like 's Pied Piper of Hamelin or Tennyson's Charge of the Light Brigade.
hey giant sotong, i like it.
(i like sotongs too... yummy)
speaking of chunks of programming code... hmmm a couple of interesting ones just came to mind. will have to do some digging though
giant sotong - why not write about one of those favourites for the puisy poesy blog - it would be fun for eg to have the charge of the light brigade up there! (i always enjoy that one too!) and if dreamer idiot can post that wendy cope poem, why should anyone fear being a bit lighter!
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