All revisionised out

Well, seven poems revised over one frustrating weekend isn't bad going, in my book. Below are links to each of the revisions, now being workshopped on the poetry newsgroups, and also links to their pages on the superbly crafted rikweb.co.uk website where the final versions of these little tykes will end up. Enjoy!

Crime of Passion - rap thread, rikweb page
Gossip - rap thread, rikweb page
In Dark Places - rap thread, rikweb page
Little Arthur - rap thread, rikweb page
Monkey Knows All - rap thread, rikweb page
Slap Stick - rap thread, rikweb page
Woman and Man in Traffic, Imagined - rap thread, rikweb page

(I'm posting the links mainly for my benefit - the usenet splorger has been busy over crimbotide, making it difficult to find relevant threads via the Google newsreader website.)

Little Arthur

This one first found the light of day (as part of the NaPo 06 debacle) as the poem then entitled "Something Maurice Learned from a Book". It's not just the title that has undergone radical change in the past hour or so:

Little Arthur

Now the spore has touched the ant
it must sprout and down its steed:

white threads needle over barding;
sharp tips lance the pauldron gaps.

Once in, it knits itself a new flesh
between the silks of muscle and fat.

A ring of barbs crowns the head
beneath the bascinet, to rule the beast.

Come dawn, an ant clambers the length
of a long stalk to view its domain;

it lifts the belly to salute the crowds
scurrying below, servicing the realm.

When the grail erupts from the armour
spores shower down: Camelot blooms.

Monkey Knows All

This one's been screaming out for revision ever since it was drafted for NaPo 06. It used to go under the snazzy title of "A Man Once Grew a Universe", but this title is much, much better:

Monkey Knows All

Somewhere light-less he shakes a page
from a periodical, licks the husks
of bookworms from penny-a-word ads.

Shelves squeak like storm-drain rats
as knowledge settles in un-indexed heaps:
he scavenges their racks for glue.

He posits an exit from the stacks -
he saw it, once, wood-framed with steps
when he was sniffing for fresh inks.

He is lost|found, scraping his beard
with knuckles, its snail-whorl strands
stitched in place by threads from spines.

Normally, I think gimmicks like 'lost|found' are a waste of time, but it seems to work here - just my opinion, of course ...

NaPo revision: Gossip

... formerly called "John". By the way, that delivery I was waiting for? Never arrived! I was so pissed off with the delivery firm - what sort of outfit sends its drivers out without mobile phones nowadays? - that I had to take my anger out on the carpets with a vacuum cleaner!

Gossip

I heard your news. A quarrel of tits
clamp claws around the sprung twigs
of the sycamore - huffs of warm air
have cracked its buds; so pale,
these new leaves, as they stretch.
The sun plays catch-me with the clouds,
a roil of damp shadows battling
across a pitch of sky. Your news,
it grows like a lump in my chest -
I can probe it like a tongue tip
in the creeping cracks of my teeth.
Why do you break us?' creak the buds
to the wind; 'why do you rip us?'
bluster the clouds. Around the twigs
claws dig in, beaks bicker, wings flap.

Kalieda Encyclopaedia - the answers

Just in case people looked at the questions I posted before Crimbotide and are wondering what the answers were, here's the answers:

1. How much of the planet surface is covered by ocean?
Around 87.5 per cent of the surface of the planet is water, with just 12.5 per cent being land - link to page.

2. What is the current total population of the continent of Cheidrah?
Approximately 11 million, from a pre-Disaster high of just under 54 million - link to page.

3. In which orbit did the ice at the north pole first fail to melt?
The website doesn't give an exact date for this, for various reasons. Currently the best answer available is provided on the 'Lands of the Ambostak Society' webpage: "The Hambosga authorities first grew worried about the impending Disaster in the early 460s, when the northern ice first failed to break up during the summer months, but chose at that time to concentrate on developing new crop strains resistant to the cooler weather. Not until the early 520s did the authorities begin to view the Disaster as a serious threat to the continued existence of all Hambosga Society." - link to page.

4. How much of the total life on the planet is classified as Type Two lifeforms?
Over 95 per cent of all Kaliedan life is Type One life, with less than 5 per cent being Type Two - link to page.

5. Where does 'boucha' come from?
"Not only can people eat the meat and drink the milk produced by the goats as they start the work of soil brewing and cultivation, but they can take the stomach microflora and produce 'boucha' - a sort of living pancake which can be introduced to a wide variety of Type One produce to turn the inedible into life-supporting foods." - link to page.

6. What makes the Zeenore Ark unique?
" ... it is the only aquatic haven discovered anywhere on the continent. Lifeforms include seemingly mythological creatures such as water-algae, reeds, snails, leeches, shrimps and fish - some of which grow to more than half a metre in length" - details given on the same page as the Q5 answer.

7. The Ramane State collapsed in which orbit?
"The collapse of the old Ramane State, in 796, was both rapid and bloodless." - details given on the same page as the Q3 answer, and also on the Land of Ramane webpage.

8. Why is Fenstrhuuwine different from other Ambostak cities?
There's a number of reasons, the main one being the continued existence of the Kumatti culture and language in the city and surrounding settlements - link to page.

9. Where do the Ba'hadim people live?
In the Land of Ba'hade - link to page.

10. On which river will you find the Exile's Rock?
On the Nuulimuu river, at latitude 23.4°N - link to page.

11. The New Bartekol Agreement was signed in which orbit?
Orbit 751. "The New Bartekol Agreement was a formal treaty between the members which reorganised Bartak Society into a series of Lands and established a new, tightly limited administration - initially based in the city of Defe." - link to page.

12. What beverage do people from the city of Krhiste drink at weddings?
"The 'national' alcoholic beverage is said to be fermented goat milk. It tends to be drunk on important occasions - birthdays, pair-bond ceremonies, deaths - though most people, given a choice, will drink imported alcohol before touching the local brew." - link to page.

13. Translate the Gevey phrase 'tuusrhe jarhizhe loifen velizhe'
'The old man's big dog' - you can work it out from the examples on the Gevey modifiers webpage.

14. If someone in the city of Gevile served you 'shnaathuu', what would you be eating?
"You would probably have been born in one of the jaarvagzuush (temple infirmaries) found across the city. Your moeme (mother) would have given birth standing or crouching, assisted by a jwe'he (midwife). Your bizhve (father) would probably not have been present at the birth. Your shnaathuu (placenta) would almost certainly have been cooked and shared between the whole family." - link to page.

15. Who invented Balanced Ákat?
"Balanced Ákat is, in essence, a reformed language which was first developed around a thousand orbits ago by spiritual, ecological and other groups (who called themselves the Nakap) living in the Telik Nations on the continent of Falah. The purpose of the reforms originated in the thinking of the Nakap philosophers, whose aim was to align human thought and action with that of the natural and spiritual (they called it "real") world in which they believed all people lived." - link to page.

16. In Ákat grammar, what are 'the guests at the feast'?
The agent and patient markers on the verb - link to page.

17. How many main calendars are found across the continent of Ewlah?
Lots, but there's four main ones - link to page.

18. Who was Joes the Explorer?
"You will have heard stories of Joes the Explorer? Joes was the captain who lost his way sailing the Northern Oceans, whose life was saved by his discovery of the Fire Isles long after his ship had run out of food and fresh water ..." (from the Istran creation myth story) - link to page.

19. Which team currently leads the Weestruu Cauvizhuu?
As of this moment of posting, following the Round 18 results, Merundeme have 31 points, with Tratintesh at 29 points and Tuusrhesh on 25 points. With four rounds of the season left, it's beginning to look like a two-horse race - link to page.

20. How do òicustiỳtac players pronounce the name of their game?
/jO.i.XUs.ti.jA.t{X/ - link to page.

Revision: Crime of Passion

I'm waiting on a delivery - the perfect time for revising old drafts:

Crime of Passion

He was a rum punter, that one.
Just ambled through the door
one afternoon, trailing hemp
from the neck. 'You need the work,'
he said, 'and I want work doing.'

So we sat chatting for an age,
detailing the case: players
and promises and stuff -
his quick, sad smile a crack
of dust between unshaved cheeks.

'He told me to do it,' he repeated,
as if the jingle of his assertion
could set his story straight.
But the shekels shackled him
to the time and place.

'You need to see the bigger story,'
he told me, standing to move
as the cock struck sundown.
'Anyone can get their hands
nailed to a plank of wood!'

I turned him over in the end,
showed him back to his page
in the book. The man was wanting
miracles - a publicist
or a poet: not me.

Slap Stick

This one showcased on the blog under the delightful title Pointless Poetry Exercise #1 - I think it needed no more than a tweak to bring it to fruition:

Slap Stick

Imagine a copse of clown-trees,
she says, with revolving bow ties
for leaves and bright red nose buds.

Do the flowers squirt brass bees
with nectar, I ask. Oh yes,
she agrees: it is a necessary prank;

how else can the shoe seeds form?
They dangle in long pairs from the boughs,
you know, and drop with the first frost

to the hard ground, slapping down
among puff balls and stinkhorns:
who painted your face so sad?

Woman and Man in Traffic, Imagined

Yep, I'm on a bit of a poem revision roll. This one previously went under the title "Pointless Poetry Exercise #5". The current title is not nearly as good, so title suggestions are very much welcome:

Woman and Man in Traffic, Imagined

Meanwhile let's talk
of mittens: their uses
are manifold,

cold oppressors knitting
their threads into nets
to catch new fingers -
hand-wombs.

Watch them reach out,
grasp at a gust, tuck it
in a mouth - stitches
easing gums.

Look past the window
to the road: a mitten,
lost in speed.

Third attempt: In Dark Places

Revise, revise. Revise again:

In Dark Places

Cold in the ice - sparkles on needles
shaken as chips skip from the trunk,
resin-scent curls moulting: a death
of seasons. That axe is treasured.
Old wood slots within the steel that lops
root from bole, warming the hands
that swirl it in arcs through air
as brittle as decorations.

Good will requires flames, a heap
of amber tongues licking goose meat
turned in lines over the stony pit.

We are in dark places, my love.
We can sit knee to hip and wait
beneath our stencilled angels -
but he won't come. He has no trust
in scratch-mark wings or cold hearths.
Still, I treasure these bricks, know:
our darkness has warmth, a comfort
of arms and dry cloth for the wrapping.

This new god of ours, he has a glitter
in his sled and a red coat to sleep on -
Will you dream in his beard tonight?

I bought you a present, wrapped
in scraps as torn as pockets. It is
- a bribe, I suppose, a new axe -
its shiny shape caught my eyes
like decorations dangled from boughs.
You can keep it by the door, if you like,
or hung on the wall where our fire burned
before I bricked it away, for safety.

Isn't he cute?

Well, I think he's cute:



He's a lilac flag handsquid, and you can read all about him on the Kalieda Encyclopaedia Living Kalieda webpages - here, in fact.

Enjoy!

In Dark Places (the redraft thingy)

Seeing as Ms Jane H has been busy offering comments on her victi... er, volunteers' drafts (including Julie, who lacks cowardice), I suppose it's only right that I offer up a revision of that ghastly mess of a poem I posted a few days back.

I don't know if I can offer much in the way of comments on my redrafting process. I don't so much redraft as react to the first draft, which can often produce something radically different - some would say, perhaps, that the redraft is a completely different poem, though I would argue more that what I'm doing when I redraft is trying to rescue the nut of an idea which was in my head when I sat down to write the first draft, but which hadn't had time to ripen into the knot of ideas I wanted to write about.

In this one, for instance, my starting point was the title of the exercise - Dark Places - which triggered some fairly banal stuff alluding to homelessness in the first draft. But I knew as soon as the 15 minutes was up that that was not what I wanted to write a poem about. Within a day of posting the poem, I was convincing myself that I wanted to write about a different sort of darkness, a homely, safe dark place where intrusions such as winter festivals couldn't barge in un-mediated.

So in fact, when I actually sat down to redraft (most of the work takes place in my head - I like to call it the festering stage of the madness), very little of the original poem survived. This is very different to Jane's comment on the revision process: "When revising, we usually prefer to work with what's already there rather than write new material, mainly because of natural human laziness but also because revision uses a different set of skills to those we use when creating, and it's not always easy to swop sides, as it were, half way through."

Is it the same poem, you may both ask? Well, it is to me. But I don't expect people to understand that.

Anyways, less talking and more showing:

In Dark Places

Cold in the valley, ice on needle leaves
packed in puddles. Chips of wood float
like snowflakes mourning the death
of christmas. This axe is treasured:
old wood slots within the steel that lops
root from bole, warms the hands
that wield it - arch it through air
as brittle as decorations.

Good will requires flames, a heap
of tongues licking goose meat: bones
turned in lines over the hearth.

We are in dark places, my love.
We can sit and wait a while
beneath the stencilled angels,
but he cannot come: he has
no liking for walls or chimneys.
I treasure these bricks, know;
this darkness has warmth, a comfort
of arms and dry cloth for the wrapping.

My brother choked on sixpence once.
Twisting it in silver foil didn't stop
the tarnish milling many faces.

I bought you a present, as torn
as pockets poked for loose scraps. It is
- a bribe, I suppose. A new axe -
its shiny shape caught my eyes
like decorations dangled from boughs.
You can keep it by the door, if you like,
or the wall where the fire once burned
before I bricked it away, for safety.

Well, it needs much more work still. But this version feels more right, more accurate in its purpose. This version is ready to be displayed in a critting environment - and thus to the poetry newsgroups it shall be posted. I'll supply a link to that thread in due course, so you can savour the mauling.

The Kalieda Encyclopaedia

After that nasty fifteen minute encounter with 'poetry', something much more interesting and upbeat. I am very proud to announce that the Kalieda Encyclopaedia is once again up-and-running.

And to get you both in the mood to explore the Bumper Book of Kalieda Facts, here's some fun questions:

1. How much of the planet surface is covered by ocean?
2. What is the current total population of the continent of Cheidrah?
3. In which orbit did the ice at the north pole first fail to melt?
4. How much of the total life on the planet is classified as Type Two lifeforms?
5. Where does 'boucha' come from?
6. What makes the Zeenore Ark unique?
7. The Ramane State collapsed in which orbit?
8. Why is Fenstrhuuwine different from other Ambostak cities?
9. Where do the Ba'hadim people live?
10. On which river will you find the Exile's Rock?
11. The New Bartekol Agreement was signed in which orbit?
12. What beverage do people from the city of Krhiste drink at weddings?
13. Translate the Gevey phrase 'tuusrhe jarhizhe loifen velizhe'
14. If someone in the city of Gevile served you 'shnaathuu', what would you be eating?
15. Who invented Balanced Ákat?
16. In Ákat grammar, what are 'the guests at the feast'?
17. How many main calendars are found across the continent of Ewlah?
18. Who was Joes the Explorer?
19. Which team currently leads the Weestruu Cauvizhuu?
20. How do òicustiỳtac players pronounce the name of their game?

There will be extra helpings of ice cream to folks who manage to answer more than four questions correctly. Seven correct answers will get you an extra shiny Gold Star. More than ten and I'll know you've been cheating.

Most importantly, of course: have fun!

On Dark Places

That award winning poet and novelist Jane Holland is doing a sort of online poetry workshop-come-challenge thingy. It is entirely Robs's fault for tempting me to attempt this madcap exercise, which makes a change as normally it is Julie who gets me to do the stupid stuff.

I don't think I'll post what comes below to Ms Jane - it was written in less than fifteen minutes and is thus by definition vile writing - but I will try to have a go at revising it sometime in the next 7 days (house guests permitting) to see if a few words might prove to be salvageable ...

On Dark Places

Cold in the tunnel, cold
and dark like the death of christmas
blown away by the wind in a fit
of brittle chill. I can sit
and wait a while for you here
beneath the stencilled angels
but my feet are wet, as torn
as pockets poked for loose scraps.

Do rats smell of piss, or tramps
of rats? I smell of rich food
gone ripe, I smell the fumes
of their passing. I am no hedge-whore!
It is the sky that leaks, the gutter
that calls for you; I write you
my name on walls with crayon fingers,
red words: I'm still here, still here.

The ultimate accolade?

While Julie and Nic were busy considering the necessity of publishing their poems, I've received news that those very nice people over at the Shit Creek Review have rejected my submissions for their forthcoming tome on traveling.

This is a proud achievement. I can now say that even the Shit Creek Review rejected my work!

I'm certain that the forthcoming issue will be a grand affair, and I congratulate all those poor folk who have had to suffer the indignity of having their work accepted. To them, I can only say: try harder next time.

Oh yes, the work that helped me gain this ultimate accolade? Two poems called Commuting and Traveller, and my short story published on this here very blog - Ice Cream in Havana. Enjoy!