coming soon

The Ringing of the Bards #2 is under construction and there's still room for a few more poems; if you want to squeeze into the clown car just send your submissions to kaacheson @ yahoo.co.uk (but make it snappy folks!!)

above photo taken from the Oceania Ragnarok Online community area

on pilot eye

it's been a long while since i posted anything on piloteye, but am dedicating my poetic-self to it today. i have plans for accepting submissions for this project, but not yet. i have to develop some poetics statement first, let people know what the project actually is, but in the meantime, have a look at what's bubbling.

everlasting silhouette

from the rhythm

she fills the hall with
width and all the height
of an aroma near ready

trespassing the lips
the socks through fits
and stripes and you wonder

her hip to swift hip
right gazelling the gave
to have ungiven in

it ends before you
________before you want it

am pretending to be a poet today

treble the mold of a bagel
with your beak

i only write about real life situations

voyage

seashore tribes fed their fires
the masts of shipwrecked clippers
and the skins of their enemies

one

i drove in the opposite direction--
towards the falls, the river with budding rocks--
away from the school. already 20 minutes late leaving
in a van with no doors.

i parked between douglas firs, then sat
watching the rapids settle.

two

we merged on a mountain
with high speed cruisers
from the harbor beyond the crest

three

the fire bleed comfort
as we digressed on the designs
of beer bottle labels
and the young wrestler's signature move.

he fell to the floor
the blue veins of exposure
puncturing through his skin

he died there, by the fire
due to win his first fight
on my birthday.

four

after you'd gone
and i'd cursed your negligence

a father who doesn't know
his own child's name

i realized that the list of dates
you'd written and kept

were all the days
you'd changed his diaper.






[and this, ladies and gentlemen, is proof enough of how un-prepared i am for parenthood. my dreams keep babies in boxes with lists.]

word verification

it's maddenning, those blue ones, the blue squiggley ones...

can anybody tell me what that says? 'cause what i wrote was wrong according to the almighty blog-masters of wonderment.

hotel keys

chronicles of a hotel receptionist: part 1

boy: the basketball game machine... i put a quarter in it and it didn't go.
she: okay, here is another quarter, see if that works. if not, then don't play that game.

25 minutes later

boy: the game with the claw, i put in the dollar and it won't go in and the machine won't make the dollar into quarters any more, can i have some quarters.
she: (hands him 4 quarters and takes the wrinkled dollar bill)

10 minutes later

boy: umm. do you have a ping pong ball?
she: there are two orange ones on the rack near the table, with the paddles
boy: thank you

1 hour later

boy: the soda machine ate my dollar
she: machines get hungry sometimes too you know
boy (looks at she funny) (waits) can i have a dollar?
she: are you going to share you drink with the machine?
boy: no
she: (sighs) here's a dollar.

2 minutes later

boy: it ate it again
she: i told you, it's hungry
boy: it's a soda machine
she: and?
boy: can i have a dollar? again?
she: (hands him another dollar)

p.s. true story, however, it was not the same boy each time, and i didn't time them to know how many minutes between them there was.

weakening

those 9 minutes of snooze
when he holds me
tight like a childhood toy

the soft undersides of his feet
listlessly peeking out
of the dull blue duvet of our bed

and

the gentle stink of his breath
as i kiss him goodbye
just before leaving each morning

relentlessly he succeeds
in breaching my 6am lull



my heart stays in bed with him on sundays





[a bit... well, let's call it a works in progress. it's made up of a few bits i like, but am not sure they work so well together.]

ringing in the first week:

our mayor billy has brought the carnival back to life!

i, my dearest of dear friends ashraf, my fellow wet poetess yasmin, my new best friend shirley and several others are featured in this weeks carnival. how exciting, no?

two points: 1) i am hosting next week's carnival and it's due to be a real hoot, so please, email me (kaacheson[at]yahoo.co.uk) a link or two from your blog so that i can include you and 2) more hosts are needed, so please, email billy and let him know which week you'd like to host! (idleblogs[at]yahoo.com)

the link below will take you to this week's carnival. the reason it looks like it does, is because max is still learning how to type.

000000000-0-0-0-0-0-0

Max plays Ghost Recon on the 360

i guess ryan wasn't doing well enough on his own; max had to jump in and help.

i have

.1
i have been accused
of getting us lost

for the coffee's weakness
& the gum stuck firmly
to the soul of that man's shoe

.2
i have been taunted
by missing pages of newspapers

and ridculed for the company
of a fiveandthreequarters year old

.3
i have been mistaken
for a helping hand

for the magic touch
over common sense
& once for someone's lost daughter

flip flop

i am apologetically round at the shoulders



we spent the afternoon
trying out the backseat
of a car with no backseat

hunting for comfort
on cheap folding chairs
around beach-pit fire places




[flip flop, i think, is an awful name for a poem. but, look, i named it that anyway.]

Billy for Mayor of Poets101.com

why billy?

that should be obvious. there are (excuse me, there will be) 300 blogging poets who owe a fist full of gratitude to billy for having been included in one of his three lists of 100 Blogging Poets in 100 Days (Part II) (Part III). Not to mention all of the guest poets he encourages, he is kid-friendly, he is responsible for Poet of the Week, he takes on the administrative role for the poetry blogging carnival and he is without a doubt the most dedicated to keeping the blogging-poet community together as one (via poets101, his lists, and all around charm).

oh yeah!! and the guy writes poetry on top of all that!!!!!


why mayor?

for one, it sounds nice. official and all that. also, it's got a nice ring to it... Billy, Mayor of Poets101

why poets101.com?

it isn't a city, town, borough or municipal corporation*, but it is a playing field for the ever growing community of blogging poets. so many of them (if not all) encouraged and collected by one Billy the Blogging Poet.

and if all those words (city, town, borough...) have one thing in common, it's that they build up around a collection of people, a community. therefore, let Poets101.com be out make believe city, the town hall, the swing set behind the movie theatre, whatever. it's there and it's ours. and i'm taking it upon myself to make billy the mayor the swing set!

*these are the areas for which a legal mayor has governing rights, you see.

why are you doing this?

... hey, what's wrong with me?

what can i do?

that's simple, just vote (pole box at the top left corner of the page). show billy you love him with the simple click of a button! or, if you want to be extra supportive and show billy you reeeaaaallly care, copy this button

and place it anywhere on your blog or website. spread the news, the joy, the love and the laughter of billy. if you haven't already: add a link from your site to his and encourage more blogging poets to get involved in building our little community into something with a little bit more fortitude, a few more strands to hold the fabric together.

ADDITION: Polls closed today after sevral months. 91% of voters have elected Billy the Mayor of Poets101.com!!!!

Bringing Back the Carnival

i will be proudly hosting the Ringing of the Bards begining July 1st (Saturday) through July 7th. This week (begining Saturday the 24th of June), Our Mayor Billy will be hosting. Do send him your submissions (a hyperlink to a poem written within the past two weeks) and get yourself some higher viewing figures.

Dread Central (that is my statement, made)

and might i suggest some reading; scott glassman's Hazard Lights

2 exploding dog poems

one:
while walking past
i heard the cloud say:

we vastly recommend
the squarer of signatures

they promised me rain today
but i'm all dried up

how many squares
would you like to buy?

i thought, at least,
that's what i heard.

one(point)two:
Every day dulled.
Never looking up.
Stuck fast in his rut.
Forgetting the sky's surprises.

But Today
when he risks it all
to lift his head high
he is politely offered
the first color of the rainbow.
by scheherazade

one(point)three:
Oh!
I'm sorry Pandora
I cannot marry you
I am humanosexual.
Though my nimbus is stratus
And your cumulo is serious
There can never be anything
Between the two of us.
by Crunchy Weta

two:
i had an idea today
do you want to hear it?

i think i can trust you.

i thought, perhaps,
if you agree

that we should get
a microwave

and put it backstage...

two(point)two:
touched
with a glance
she felt she knew
the thumping
in his chest
the wordless
emotion
flitting across
his mental screen.
by mike

the poems above are exercises in that i had nothing in mind before actually writing them. the goal was to write a poem based on a photo. being an obvious fan of exploding dog and loving the way this particular set of drawings fits in my blog posts, i went hunting, found two i liked (without words) and let the pictures tell me their stories. the poems are by no means brilliant, but i think the first one is fun, almost cute.

i'll post any poems to these two pictures that people send me or compose in the comments of this post. consider it a little challenge ^_^

milk_way

the cat and i sat
on the linoleum floor
of the kitchen
drinking milk
in our various ways

odd days

written only on

the gulls arched their vocal cords
in poor intonation

crabs scuttled, a lost dog
humbled from one door to the other

and along the way a child begged
for affection & strange conditioners

[if you get this poem, give it back to me;
'cause i lost it after the 4th line.]

click on the onion

poet of the week

billy named me poet of the week

this is, of course, an honor. i think though, it might have something to do with my last email to him in which i declared him mayor of the poets101.com community ^_^

thanks again mayor billy, and thanks to roch for making poets101 all better (it was a bit ill for a few days, not aggregating like it ought and that sort) and making the comments feature function!

to become the poet of the week yourself, email me [kaacheson(at)yahoo(dot)co(dot)uk] or billy [idleblogs(at)yahoo(dot)com]

the onion union

the onion union

do check it out. got a friendly email from their (somewhat unofficial) poetry scout this morning. if you're in the mood to submit something to someone, they're currently looking for work to compile their second issue.

CORRECTION: melanie is actually the official scout for the onion union (check out the about the editor page)

second to memory

the resurrection of remember




promise me you'll rain amidst the thunder storms,
beneath the veil of orange
and ash trees; shedding blossoms like wet skin

ponytail jerk*

crisp

the change in positions revealed
our negative ions to the audience
of squirrels and ash tree blossoms

i'm wearing the holes in your socks

& prefer to verb noun phrases
& adjectify each individual flavor

if you pour me into the cream

_•* .
.* *
*• ..
_.*••
__*.
__.•

*my intent in using this word is compound and in need of explanation (in my opinion). today, jerk is most popularly used as a slang term to describe stupid/mean people (typically men). the word also acts as a verb - to jerk around (to manipulate). another definition refers to meat (see: beef jerky). jerk, again, is a term used in marinades (i do believe this is related to the beef jerky kind of jerk). and lastly, the jerk that i mean to utilize here is the same jerk that George Oppen used in his Discrete Series. this jerk is the soda jerk: one who jerks soda out of a soda fountain. George Oppen presented the idea in a provocative and somewhat diminutive fashion; by this time the tradition was teetering out (norman rockwell's america was lost beneath layers of soot and gunk from the booming industrial economy of the country in the 1940's and 50's). today, i intend homage the soda jerker (with an edge of synosism perhaps, but homage nonetheless).

i was inspired to try my hand at *.'sparkli bits'.* by denielle

oh yeah

here is a picture of my cat
that i keep in my purse
at all times, she said.

here is a picture of my car
that i keep in my wallet
at all times, he said.

here is a rubik's cube
that i melted in a toaster
last night, she said.

here is a cheese knife
that i used to carve
a middle finger, he said.

a.m. rescue

bird hung by a white plastic thread
sticky from the gutter

intervened, with our humanity
and aluminum ladders and scissors

it bit and flew, petrified
of all the fingers unfurling feathers


[[this was a compulsory poem; something i didn't want to trust to memory. but memory serves me much better. the poem doesn't do it, isn't good enough. i feel as though, perhaps, i should not have published it. it gives me good reason to discuss though. let's discuss:

poetry as a means of remembering. our memory is connected directly to language, to words. we memorize, we learn what things are called, give them names, remember numbers and dates. i have always felt compelled to write the most emotional moments in my life into poetry. however, as compelled and motivated as i feel, the poem never does justice to the event. this leads me to steer away from the event and use it, instead, as a highlight or resource for the poem's venacular.

does this happen to anyone else? something so awesome that you can't write about it? only around it?

maybe i'm the only one.

on the other hand, i could write prose and prose and prose on the same topic; it just doesn't contain within poetic form. today, we found a bird hung from the second story gutter from a string. it's feathered fellow chirping wildly for help; i just don't think it was expecting a guy in his early 50's with a cig hanging out of his lips to turn up on an aluminum ladder. the bird that could flew away. the other bird had no choice but to be held, carried down and prodded. marty held the bird and i followed the plastic thread to the loop formed around the bird's neck. rita got the scissors and we were able to free the bird (who at that point had already bit marty's finger). the chickadee fled for the cover of a bush.

what a horrifying sight. to see a bird swinging from a string from the top of a building. it was as if it had been hung. that was the traumatizing part for me. the image. and the instant human reaction to personify the birds.

we saved it though. am i'm grateful for that. the poem, however, does nothing to disperse any feeling or even provoke thought. it doesn't even
sound nice.]]

Norther II

i haven't had a chance to read all of the second installment of Norther, but judging from what i have settled my eyes upon, it promises to please the senses.



perhaps a proper review is in order, as i neglected to follow through on my last offer to review the first issue of the magazine. in the mean time, get your own copy of Norther: email rob or hardy. it's instant, free, and quality.

previous norther entry on somethingkaty.

the sleeping woman

the sleeping woman I

the humble din of bedside glamour
never reaching its epoch

finer trophies struggle
past her sleeping form

while she, modern in her position
sleeps soundly

dreaming their nightmares
for them



the sleeping woman II

he sits, waiting and watching
her figure rise and fall;
her left nipple sailing on each breath
like a buoy
over vast oceans of supple flesh.

collected at the knee
he admires the form she keeps;
modern and rigorous.
each crevasse a cavern
embodied by lust and by need.

his need. he can't remember
her name or which hotel
they'd stumbled into.

the only memory he retained
was that of an animal
knowing her and remembering how,
but his mind foregoes the why;
and listens intently
to the air as it parts her pursed lips.

the sleeping woman III

stranger creatures have been taken
to the reaches of stranger worlds;

to brink on ages and grape’d
by seductions of stranger intention.

but a stranger he, until last night;
the man that took her all.

ring ring

new phones don't ring
they buzz-squeal
___and dance

get me one of these
new flippin
____phones

my ear is doing
__all the rininging
these days

buy a phone by phone
for six easy payments

of your dignity
and a digit every cycle

BE IN MY NETWORK


[could be that i'm in a rare mood; happily birding]

wet poems

have just joined a collective of poetesses on wet poems. there's a feature on poetisphere as well as on billy's list. go have a peek.

the what of thing (and all the some)

(somewhat) about distance

a poem by scott glassman

hello fish

"it's like plugging in a toaster"
-voice over on an electric lawn mower ad

1.
on a freshly stained deck
rain fell and swarmed in

quarter sized puddles
with pupils of pollen

2.
we watched as the birds shook
the rain from their beaks

and searched the muddy grass
for those more unfortunate than ourselves

3.
wrapped in a king's blanket we're attentive
to the bubble of the fish tank just audible

over the pelting of rain drops
and squawking of wet crows on the lawn

yuichan

i just had a conversation with Yuichan, the Socratic Zen Conversationalist.

ask her what her favorite color is, then ask her why. she'll be your friend.

found her via T.J.'s portfolio of websites he's designed and developed. am impressed, without a doubt. mr morgan, j00 got skillz.

tarmac

the scent of one thousand dead catipillars
torment their ungrateful black wings.

it's saturday morning and we should be sleeping
to the sound of rain on the pavement

outside our treacherous window
that overlooks the future of lawnmowers.

the equalizers demand chaos for company
or the hum of an air conditioner in june,

but we are damned to wrestle with serenity
and the small orange shadow chasing it's tail.

saturday morning rain

you put too much sugar in my tea
as a matter of seduction

the holes in our socks went unnoticed
for the remainder of the course

by then, your fur against mine,
we'd turned the clocks back by an hour

the saturday morning rain
pelting the picture window

all in time with the ticking and sighs
or your phone started to ring

This is a test post from Word 2007

es, that is in the future, but sometimes the future is now, and I’m showing Katy some of the great features Word 2007 is going to bring, including, unsurprisingly, the ability to write your blog posts directly in word, and upload them in one or two quick clicks.

the we could

we could think horrible thoughts together
tucked under the covers of a stranger's bed

touching parts in the dark, underestimating
the lure of breaking points and bending rules

our tangled feet in adjective rigmaroles
for all the world to wake up to on sunday

through stained glass window pains
in arch ways worthy of divinations and rituals

spear-wielding cherubs in new formula pampers
ring our wrists in a game they call 'rose garden'

and your right ear starts bleeding
from two of my eight teeth marks

yasmin rising

a siren of a poetess
emerges from the depths

beyond the mighty ocean
of men and boys

stirring above them
and their clever poetics

we have been discovered
now we discover her

ryan had a dream and...

...in the dream, another black and white cat was messing with Max and you chased him outside into the garden. You thought you saw another cat hiding in the bushes and pulled it out and it was a baby bear, and you got really scared because mommy bears get you when you mess with the baby bear, and there was this old lady and this child hid under a blanket afraid of the baby bear too, so you led them off home.

katy: can i put your dream on my blog?

ryan: Of course you may.

i only wish i could take responsibility for this little masterpiece. i suppose, at least, i was inspiration ^_^