I am fond of puns, like most of my family, and so tend to title my chapbooks with names like "Classical Illusions" (poems based on things I learned from the Ancient Greeks). Here's a poem from that chapbook"
To
Ixion
I
thought I was satisfied
to
watch you whirl upon a wheel
stretched
immortally in Tartarus
for
loving me....
(So
many times I heard them say
you
were proud when they loved you
and
in disdain you looked past.)
But
here, now, seeing you so racked
despairing
of release
I
wish I had done differently....
(Indeed,
I might have been magnanimous
had
I not loved you.)
Ixion, if you cast your mind back, was the fellow bold enough to profess his love for Hera, Zeus' consort. She took an exception to his interest, apparently, and so he was condemned to be stuck on a wheel in the place where the absolute worst things happened to those who offended the gods.
 |
| Fun with Stencils |
This next one was inspired by my long-time love of Odysseus, begun when I was ten and my Aunt Quail read me Padriac Colum's The Children's Homer: The Adventures of Odysseus and the Tale of Troy, a wonderful children's book illustrated by Willy Pogany.
If
I had to choose
for
the love of Odysseus
either
to be mysterious Circe
or
faithful Penelope
weighing
a year of magic
in
the balance against
a
daily dream unraveled nightly
for
twenty years
even
knowing he must go
eventually
to his own hearth
being
bound to Penelope
I
would cast my lot
for
Circe. One magic year
spent
in the company of such a man
surely
equals twenty spent
without
him.
 |
| More Fun with Stencils |
One day, for lack of anything better to do, I consulted my word finder, letting it flop open where it would. and, with my eyes closed. I poked my finger on a word. This was the result:
Song for
Sendak
When the
fuzzy creatures come
to the
circle bound in blue
they
link their lanky, hairy arms
they
sway from side to side
Pileous
and round they are
and
crinite are their legs
they
dance a hispidulous reel
in the
circle bound in blue
Their
teeth are long and glistening
their
eyes are always green
and in
between their dances
they
juggle orbs of joy
Their
hirsute heads thrown back in song
their
music howls against the moon
and
crashes stiff and bounces back
exactly
to the stars
If you will
listen closely
when the
fuzzy creatures come
you'll
hear the shattered strains of song
fall
slowly in the night
And if
you're very careful
and
concentrate your thoughts
you'll
see them heel-and-toe-and-heel
in the
circle bound in blue
The word, of course, was "hair."
 |
| Yet More Stencil Fun |
The poems and the art are copyrighted 2014 by Anne Lou Robkin.
That's all for now, Nan
