Bad Poetry: Bones

Prompted by the Poets & Storytellers United. Content warning: bones, decomposition rate of. 

In a damp and fertile land

things don't always go as planned.

Mrs. Johnson finally got

a permit to use a plot

on the farm, as fit she found,

for a family burial ground;

hired men to find, exhume

from a marketable room

in a larger cemetery,

her son's coffin, with his bones.

Of the job they were not wary.

Protestants expect no moans

from a soundly sleeping spirit

looking forward to inherit

mansion in eternal bliss.

But they weren't expecting this:

though they dug up the whole plot,

six by six by six, found not

one board of the coffin there,

nor a skeleton, nor hair,

but one little blackened bone,

moldering fast away, alone

where it must have lain between

where the hands and ribs had been.

Just one finger joint remained!

All the rest Nature had gained.

Rich, fresh, loamy was the soil,

just a hint of black like oil

stained where body had been laid.

For one finger they were paid;

carried to his father's land,

buried as his mother planned.

Bad Poetry: Books with Intriguing Titles

Prompted by Poets & Storytellers United. Fellow poets should know that Google is failing to post comments on Blogger/Blogspot blogs in a desperate bid to clutter my computer with even more cookies, and I won't back down. For now, that means I can't comment on your poems where they're posted. If you really want me to, I'll post comments and links to them here. 

Anyway, some rhymes:

One hundred years of solitude

had left Macondo weird and crude.

Witty, concise, and on the mark is

the prose of G. Garcia-Marquez.

The author always said that he

heard people mutter "Can it be?"

then wrote his book as if it were.

The book created quite a stir.

It's mostly gross-outs, as we've seen,

desde el principio hasta el fin,

yet memory will long retain

the grandfather who tried in vain

to bring with him a little loam

from the old graveyard back at home

so that he guarded bones, each night,

of his ancestors, as was right,

and so preserve some sense that he

was still where he'd been born to be.

Rainforest photo from Audley Travel, by way of Google.

Desde el principio hasta el fin = from the beginning to the end.

This is the beginning of a series. There'll be another book title poem on my Substack in an hour or two.

Bad Poetry with Birds

Earlier in the week Sherry Marr quoted Mary Oliver: "A poem should always have birds in it." She went on to say that finding birds in a poem made her happy. 

https://stardreamingwithsherrybluesky.blogspot.com/2026/07/bird-math.html

So here is a poem for Sherry Marr.

Because the cardinals own the privet hedge,

the wrens own the back porch, and hummingbirds

own where the jewelweed blooms, long as it does

(and it is blooming now), I seldom see

the rest of the Cat Sanctuary's birds:

the little drab ones camouflaged in trees,

beyond the reach of astigmatic eyes

because they seldom perch for long enough

to aim binoculars if I've brought them.

I seldom do. I've never paid that much

attention. But they're threatened by incursions

of English sparrows and pigeons, in the towns.

The worst thing one can do is put out feeders

and birdhouses that the English sparrows claim.

The best is leave them in the tops of trees

untouched, left to grow back to oak and beech

for future generations to enjoy.

Meanwhile song sparrows, Carolina wrens,

nuthatch and chickadee and Tufted Titmouse,

most years an oriole, a water-thrush

some years, and then of course the mockingbirds

who mock those who try to know birds by sound,

flit through the woods still hardening back from years

when farmers clear-cut to the tops of hills

and watched the hilltops shrink beneath their cuts.

Where trees are cut and soil's left to grow

in grass, the robins and killdeer move in.

Bluebirds were common once; now they are rare

though loved. All birds are predators. The big

ones, crows and hawks and owls, will let

you watch them if you choose.  They knew

when people used to shoot them. Now they know

that people want their species to come back.

The great blue heron, rare when I was young,

is now almost a pest. They kill the trees

where they roost; five or ten years all a tree

can stand of herons' sociability.

We used to think they lived alone. They fish

alone. They roost, when they have fished enough,

in great big happy families, noise and smell

louder than cormorants'. They will share a tree

with cormorants, lesser herons, pelicans

at a good healthy distance if the tree

is big enough. The fertilizer burn's

what kills the tree. Next day the herons fish

alone again; the cormorants stand in rows;

the pelican, presumably, tried to think

how it could get back south where it belonged,

while it lived on the river. People of

good will always enjoy the birds, here, though

fanatical birdwatchers congregate

back east, along the flyway. Birds are nice

to know, especially in mosquito season.

(All photos are fair use from Google. All bird species shown coexist peacefully with cats, though some die after every "pesticide" spray poisoning incident. All normally coexist peacefully with humans, too, though orioles sometimes claim a fruit tree as theirs and fly around, crying "Sweet! sweet!", while humans pick the sweet fruit and laugh at the birds for saying something so obvious. Generally, the smaller a bird is, the higher the proportion of mosquitoes is likely to be in its diet.) 

Bad Poetry: Go West, Rain

"Though our traditions served us well,

No longer must we wait

On them," said the young fool in the north.

"Now we have glyphosate.

Instead of burning strips of pine trees

We might easily sell,

We'll kill all other things but pines

That dry and burn so well."

And so they did, that spring. That summer

Miles of pine trees burned;

The smoke lay heavy on the land.

Yet autumn soon returned.

Fools don't learn. That's what makes them fools.

Next year they did the same.

For many miles away, folks choked

On smoke. They were to blame.

"Though glyphosate is killing people,

We can spare some numbers,"

The old fool in the south said. "Onward

The Economy lumbers!

Let more old folk die younger! Let

The young produce more babies!

And have a War, to thin the herd!

And..." you know. Christian? Maybe his

Claim to conversion's real, but his brain's

Not attuned to the Spirit,

And he must be struck down and blinded

So that he can hear it.

Is poison worse if made in China?

So he bloviated.

Who sells you poison's not your friend.

Hunched in his web, he waited

To see more spraying in the north

Bring back the choking pall

Of smoke that drifts from north to south.

Then, well known for his gall,

He blamed the north for fouling air

People breathe in the south,

And, far from help to fight the fire

Before the south's own drought...

Forgive us, Lord, both south and north.

The east has too much rain,

While once again a deadly drought

Has gripped the central plain.

Please waken people in the north,

Convict them of their sins,

And westward blow our surplus rain,

So everybody wins.

(Cut-off point for tired eyes)

For those who've not been paying attention...These are just some popular links from Google. If you dig you can rake up even muckier stories, conspiracy theories, etc. I don't want to bother. This is a legitimate news story the CBC, the BBC, Reuters, etc., have covered, but not publicized well due to their Trusted News Initiative mandate to smother stories about what's wrong with sponsors' profitable products under layers of celebrity gossip and silly quibbles. The big US news outlets have tried to avoid this story altogether. Ignoring it's not going to make it go away.

Canada's spraying glyphosate on the old forests that might be considered among its great treasures:

https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/sudbury/glyphosate-spraying-wildfires-1.7627844

 

Canada's claim on reciprocal help to fight its ensuing wildfires:

https://globalnews.ca/news/11969816/canada-us-wildfire-support/

Trump's un-neighborly and hubristic response to that claim:

https://www.reuters.com/business/environment/trump-says-he-told-carney-that-canada-must-get-wildfires-under-control-2026-07-20/

The Cat Sanctuary is currently in one of those weather patterns, described in old British and Western European folklore, where rain on (local lore disagrees on exactly which day) a certain day in early July indicates that more rain is going to fall on every one of the next forty days. In the US this rain usually occurs as part of thunderstorms. The lights didn't go out yesterday or last night but I unplugged the computers, just in case, four times. One day last week, by chance, rain didn't fall on the Cat Sanctuary itself but we could see it a few miles away. Tennessee had floods the weekend before last. New York City had floods last weekend. We could spare a little of that rain, and how gladly we would, if it were in our power to send a good natural water-bombing to Canada.

But who knows? If Canadians confess and renounce their sins, show a healthy distrust of those in the US and China trying to sell them more of the poison that plays such an obvious role in this sudden explosion of wildfires, maybe God will help us all with a helpful weather pattern. It's worth trying.

This poem was provoked by last weekend's Poets & Storytellers United prompt. Google's blog feed has been malfunctioning recently so I received the link only on Monday night. The poem that came to mind seemed topical enough for a Thursday post here, so here it is. I'll try to post a more cheerful poem to the PSU link-up on Friday, as well as the one on Substack.

Bad Poetry: Moche Shield

This week's Poets & Storytellers United prompt invites reactions to works of art. 

According to the Metropolitan Museum of Art, this artefact was molded of copper, decorated with gold, silver, turquoise, glass beads, and originally with woven fabric, by or for a Moche warrior in Peru in the first century CE. The owl image was made separately and attached in such a way that the head moved a bit and the wings fluttered when the shield moved. If nothing else, the complexity of the shield might have distracted enemies from throwing spears or shooting arrows to trying to steal the work of art. 

On his shield he put a night bird,

And it glittered in the sunshine,

And it shimmered in the moonlight,

And its wings flapped when he moved it,

And its head bobbed as if watching

Any who were watching him move.

Every bead and fold of fabric,

Every curve of onlaid metal

(It was all of precious metal),

Every wink of sun through beady

Night bird eyes over his shoulder,

Spoke to all who saw him walking:

"Here behold a famous warrior,

Much admired by all the Moche.

Who strikes him will fight a hundred

Moche warriors seeking vengeance."

And there were nights when a watchman

Told himself, "This is the Owl Man,

Chief among the Moche warriors,

Come to take our gold and silver.

Better not to see him coming

Better say: I saw a night bird

Shimmering in the summer moonlight

As if made of gold and silver.

Let him take what he came seeking.

None of us need fight the Owl Man."

And there were days when a warrior

Said: "Ho! I will fight the Owl Man!

I'll win honor, I'll win glory,

People bow when I step forward,

Hold my feet when I am seated,

Carry my things when I travel..."

And his spear bounced off the owl shield,

And Owl Man returned it to him

Straight and swift, with the curare 

Sinking where it gashed his shoulder,

And the warrior hurried homeward

Ere its poison could destroy him...

If he reached home, if he fell down

On the homeward path, the Owl Man

Never asked, but added his spear

To the Owl Man's own equipment

Honored was the mighty Owl Man

Till at last luck turned against him

And he fell down on the war path.

Then they gathered his equipment

And divided up his weapons,

But the owl shield buried with him.

Never would another Moche

Represent himself as Owl Man.

Owl Man's name was long remembered,

Stories told to younger Moche,

Spirit called on as companion;

Even hundreds of years later,

When the Moche sleep forgotten,

Owl shield says to all who see it:

I belonged to a great warrior,

Loved and feared by all my people.

Bad Poetry: Never Too Old to Dream

This week's Poets & Storytellers United prompt invites reflections on a quote, "You are never too old...to dream a new dream."

Lady, Lady, dream again;

Not all dreams need notice men;

Short-lived creatures leave us here

To our own dreams, without fear.

Turn back to the dreams of youth;

Own your strength; proclaim your truth.

Men brought joy and likewise woe.

Easily come, they easily go.

Own your castle on the hill;

Travel wide and travel far;

Toil like an industrial mill;

Idle like a movie star;

Though we feel we're made for love,

Soon we're called to rise above,

Call in dreams that long have flown,

Rise with them, once we're alone. 

Prompted Bad Poetry: Hackell Keith

This little rhyme is, fortunately, fiction--prompted by the Poets & Storytellers United suggestion to write a poem containing the words "blooms," "hammer," and "teeth."

Shed not a tear for Hackell Keith,

Who's somewhere in this slammer

For knocking all his brother's teeth

Out with a ball-peen hammer.

The twelve-year-old deserves these blooms.

For the teen, a life sentence looms.

But if you ask how Hackell thought

Of such a crime, so horrid,

His story is: his brother, brought

To tears and sweat on forehead

By an impacted molar, begged

That his bad, crooked teeth be pegged.

"For if I have no teeth at all,"

The younger brother pleaded,

"Some nice, straight implants then may fall

In the category 'Needed.'"

Hackell considered this, and struck.

So now--he blames it on bad luck--

Though Bobby Keith will get nice teeth,

The public's wrath has fallen

Upon the head of Hackell Keith,

For what the judge is calling

Insurance fraud with ill intent.

Sighs Hackell, "That's not what we meant."

Bad Poetry: Let Them

This reaction to a prompt at DVerse had been growing in my mind for four or five years.

Some people spend their time and money

Watching TV every day;

Buy whatever they see--how funny!

Then they throw the stuff away.

Let them buy things they don't want.

Let them buy things they don't need.

Let them watch until they can't

Even remember how to read;

That's all right; that's okay;

You don't have to listen to what they say.

You don't have to play the games they play.

You are you, and they are they.

Junior's got a brand new toy.

You might think that Junior's lucky.

Ah, but does he shout for joy

Or shout "It's babyish and yucky"?

Let him make his Grandma cry

'Cos what he thought he wanted last week

Was a whim that's passed on by;

Dump it in the lake or creek.

That's all right; that's okay;

You don't have to listen to what they say.

You don't have to play the games they play.

You are you, and they are they.

Additional verses are available to anyone who wants to sing this song. 

Bad Poetry: Dead Tree?

Almost every year I think

"That peach tree's gone to come no more."

I turn my back on it, I blink,

and it's borne peaches by the score.

This herky-jerky winter, mild

days coaxed it into early bloom

the night before a hard freeze. Wild

trees mostly fall to such a doom.

The Feral Peach Tree's blossoms clung

on through the freeze, and bloomed still more

when it had passed. The first fruit hung

before Memorial Day. There's more

where that fruit came from. It's a tree

not seen before, nor seen again.

An evildoer slipped out free

from those who said they'd keep him in,

sprayed poison on the Feral Peach.

The branches that the spray could touch 

look dead now. Dormant, all and each.

Men have been hanged for half as much.

"The peach tree's dead," a visitor said.

Don't count on it. I think, like me,

that tree has vowed to keep its bed

and watch until the night we see

the evildoer on the ground,

by his own poison felled at last,

condemned to lie as he is found

till ninety days and nine have passed.

The tree will drop a rotten peach

to draw ants to where he did fall

and he will lie there and beseech

that someone come out, help to call,

and as he's made air so unpleasant

those who believe we should forgive

this vain, presumptuous, cringing peasant

stay in the houses where they live,

and I will call the notary,

the lawyer, and policemen, too,

to see our common enemy--

he can't repent, but how he'll rue!

And he'll learn, as his victims learned,

that doctors are no use at all

when glyphosate is what has burned

the skin that's doomed to rot and fall.

And I don't doubt the peach tree, too,

in its own way, will laugh to see,

unfailingly, the poison do

more harm to him than it or me.

Optional cut-off point for tired eyes.

The Famous Feral Elberta Peach Tree currently has three high branches, each loaded with more peaches than they look as if they could bear. Once again it's hurt, but I don't think it's dead. It has more life in it than all the other peach trees in the orchard had, together. 

That stubborn sell-out everybody loves to hate, you know, the old man who looks a bit like our late founding member Oogesti but has lately started looking "older" than Oogesti ever did, has put some obstacles in what looked like the clear path of Glyphosate Awareness. This week a local case involving pesticide vapor drift was judged in favor of the poisoner. 

So? I said to the Bad News Bear who drove up to bear this bad news. Is it not said that, when the pretty girls line up on one side of an issue, that side is about to win? All the young, pretty female Congressmen voted the right way on the Farm Bill. Spraying poison should be recognized as a violent crime against persons in another year or two. Meanwhile, even that judge who's about to retire reportedly said "Spraying on someone else's property is a different matter." I don't think my neighborhood is going to have a Bad Neighbor for very many more days. 

About the old man in Washington, I don't know. I hope he does have a soul that is capable of real repentance. I think people should be praying that he has.

As for the peach tree...you probably have to be local to appreciate this. Peach trees do not usually live long, this high up the Blue Ridge. The long hard freeze killed most. The sudden late freeze killed most that had survived that. The poison spraying? Hah. It's bearing fruit. 

Some trees are super-fertile the year before they die, but this one's been super-fertile for ten years in a row already. I think it thinks it's an apple or persimmon tree, something that's supposed to be strong and hardy. It did not get the memo that peach trees are supposed to die if you look at them the wrong way.

I doubt that anybody will get the full, rich flavor of an Elberta peach off the famous tree this year. It wouldn't be fit to eat, this year, anyway. Next year I won't be surprised if that tree is bowed down to the ground with sweet, ripe peaches, as so many times before. It does not rest for years in between crops, as other peach trees do.

Somewhere, one of the pits of one of its fruits will sprout into another tree like it. One, but probably not two. 

Bad Poetry: Men of Action

Prompted by the Poets & Storytellers United, because I've not posted there for a while...

We are men of action;

lies do not become us.

Never say what we are

going to do; let them

fool around and find out. 

The Obligatory Long Poem About a Greek Legend

Who'd be Achilles? Were not all

the women, except Clytemnestra,

more likable? Ill fates befall

them, true, but surely even extra

ill fate awaits the son of Thetis

in the Greek underworld where ill he's

done will beset him, long as it is.

Who'd ever want to play Achilles?

Apprenticed to physician, he

was offered private life, long, happy,

or short life, long in memory.

"Short life with glory," chose our chappie.

But even so, this gay young colt

hid himself in amongst the fillies

when from the battle he did bolt.

Who'd ever want to play Achilles?

As boy who could pass for a girl

Achilles was the chosen lover

who set Patroclus' heart awhirl,

but, during years spent undercover,

crawled under covers with a maid.

They had two children; but the sillies

let her name from the records fade.

Who'd ever want to play Achilles?

When that first war at last had ended,

Achilles must have been quite a sight

as maiden; muscular and splendid,

he'd give a man both fright and fight.

His parents gave him fifty ships

with fifty soldiers each. To kill he's

ready at last; his troops equips--

Who'd ever want to play Achilles?

But long before his ships reach Troy

some of them wash up on the coast.

Town's army come to attack our boy.

Achilles wounds the chief his host

before misunderstanding's smoothed.

Oracle says he'll cure the ill he's

done. He'll not. Odysseus has soothed--

Who'd ever want to play Achilles?

The wound Achilles gave the chief.

Then they sail on. The men soon grumble.

To quiet them, our boy turns thief,

sacks cities where no gang sought rumble,

takes noble Chryseis as sex slave

even though trying to force his will he's

caught with Prince Troilus, none can save.

Who'd ever want to play Achilles?

Some say Chryseis was a queen;

more say a girl with golden hair.

The richest ransom they'd ever seen

her father brings to reclaim her care.

King Agamemnon, born accurst,

surely gives such a girl the willies;

of her abusers, might not be worst.

Who'd ever want to play Achilles?

Briseis, noble though not royal,

spends the nights in Achilles' tent,

though that was not enough to spoil

his lust for Troilus. When he sent

for Chryseis, to return for ransom,

great love for her's claimed by Achilles.

Later he favors Ag, the handsome.

Who'd ever want to play Achilles?

Nevertheless they're only women.

Chryseis for Briseis once traded,

Achilles sulks, his ships' sails trimming,

lust for fair fights (if any) faded.

He loved Briseis more than life!

He orders faithful silly-billies:

Turn back to his own home and wife.

Who'd ever want to play Achilles?

The war is going against the Greeks!

Odysseus sends to Achilles' truelove,

through all these years and months and weeks

while he's been bedding every new "love":

Patroclus, faithful as a dog:

Can anything cure the ill will he's

wallowing in like a bloated hog?

Who'd ever want to play Achilles?

"I'm off to war," Patroclus says.

"We promised we would fight; let's do it."

Achilles clings to his sulking ways.

Patroclus goes to Troy, falls to it.

He's not too old to go out fighting.

Doing what he's come to do--to kill--he's

felled at last, though tough as a Titan.

Who'd ever want to play Achilles?

Some say we know good things when they're past.

Word that he's lost Patroclus forever

stirs up Achilles to fight at last.

Cowardly yet still strong and clever,

he kills the river-god who complains

entire troops of slaughtered ghillies

choke river bed and block the plains.

Who'd ever want to play Achilles?

Was he impervious to injuries,

or had he learned a way to heal them?

Though he was trained as healer, he's

portrayed as if he just didn't feel them.

Was it heart, liver, or lung, or heel

the arrow struck at the final kill? He's

never a healer, always a heel.

Who'd ever want to play Achilles?

Dante said he saw him down in Hell,

bound in the Circle of Lust forever.

Shakespeare said he didn't fare so well,

claiming a victory while he never

fought, even in the final battle,

but chose another boy to fill his

bed, and would kill him should he tattle.

Who'd ever want to play Achilles?

Socrates said that between two liars,

Odysseus is Achilles' better

because his knowing the truth inspires

him to unleash lies without fetter--

Say what?--What an odd Greek idea!

Apollodorus gives final thrill: he's

seen Achilles in Hell, bound to Medea!

Who'd ever want to play Achilles?

To be fair, most of the sources Robert Graves consulted did say some good things about Achilles, other than that he fought hard and dirty when he ran out of excuses. But not many, and I've never found them very convincing. Many men and women, on both sides, are portrayed as heroic in the Iliad. Achilles is portrayed as, at the very best, a spoiled brat; more often a monster of selfishness, lust, and violence.

It used to be obligatory for all writers to write things that showed that they'd read ancient Greek literature, if only in translations. A simplified, heavily censored, age-appropriate version of Graves' Greek Myths was given to my classmates and me in grade eight; I found the real book in the school library; it was my first real study of "adult" themes of vengeance and perversion, and, as such, not a favorite book but one that fascinated me. I still don't like ancient Greek literature because of the bizarre moral sense, the misogyny, and the preposterous claim that those savages in ancient Greece were the only people "civilized" enough to be "really human." I have, however, read some of it--beyond Graves.

For those who haven't, the unexplained characters in this poem are:

1. Clytemnestra: Married to King Agamemnon, who led a different army to the same war with Achilles, leaving one of his cousins to guard the palace and her. Clytemnestra might, some think, not have turned against her husband until she heard that he'd sacrificed their daughter Iphigenia as a burnt offering. Then she seduced her husband's cousin, offering to help make him king in Agamemnon's stead. When Agamemnon came home they prepared a nice bath to rest his weary feet, and when he was naked and relaxed they burst in and murdered him. Some say Clytemnestra was excused for this, in ancient Greek thinking, because she had to avenge her daughter.

2. Thetis: She was described as a nymph rather than a goddess, but as having Olympian "blood." Some say it was her refusal to have sex with Zeus or Apollo, while living with a human man as his wife, that kept her from being taken to Mount Olympus herself. The Iliad says she dipped the infant Achilles in the river Styx to give him invulnerability; other sources say it was fire. When Achilles was sulking in his tent and praying for Troy to win the war, he was praying to Thetis.

3. Agamemnon, himself: He hoped, by valor in battle, to atone for some part of the curse on his family that was believed to have been incurred by his father and uncle having had a sort of competition to see who could do more of the things ancient Greeks considered immoral. He was a good soldier who killed his share of Trojans. Some even claim that he might not have raped Chryseis or Briseis, though this is hard to believe. Most enslaved Greek women worked in homes or on farms and were supervised by the lady of the house, but the ones taken in war had no female supervisors or companions and no legitimate housework to do; if not being held for ransom they were sex slaves. Some claim he boasted about owning Chryseis and preferring her to his rightful wife. Everyone agrees that he raped Cassandra. In ancient Greek thinking that wasn't considered to be why he deserved what he got; rather, he deserved what he got simply because he was a son of Atreus. It was Atreus, not Agamemnon, who killed two infant sons of Agamemnon's uncle Thyestes and served them to Thyestes as roast pork. (Eating human flesh, especially of a relative, was believed to incur a lifelong curse; cannibals could atone only by dying.)

4. Troilus: A prince of Troy, but he was killed while visiting a Greek city in the company of Tenes, a son of Apollo. Sources differ only on whether Achilles murdered Troilus before or in the process of raping him. The crime occurred in the temple of Apollo. Where Tenes was at the time is not recorded. In ancient Greek thinking this made Achilles merely an "over-enthusiastic lover" and was never mentioned as a cause of the Trojan War. Some, however, say Achilles then fell in love with Troilus's sister Polyxena, because she looked like him, and demanded Polyxena in marriage after killing (or having his troops kill) their father in battle. Others say he demanded her as a bride for his son. There is some dispute about whether Polyxena participated in the killing of Achilles and then committed suicide, or demanded that the Greeks kill her as a princess rather than taking her home as a slave. Anyway she didn't survive.

5. Medea: She came in another story, supposed to have happened earlier. On learning that her husband had cheated on her she killed her own babies and served them to her husband as stew. Apollodorus thought she was the sort of partner-for-afterlife Achilles--why not Atreus?--deserved. In ancient Greek thinking what Medea did was wrong, but only to be expected, since most women were neither moral nor intelligent. 

The mother of Achilles' children may have been just one of seven princesses and their slaves, or more than one; her or their names were given as Deidamia, Iphigenia, or Pyrrha. Some say Pyrrha ("redhead") was just a nickname for Deidamia, Iphigenia was an error, and Achilles and Deidamia were married legally, though secretly. Some say Pyrrha was what Achilles was called when disguised as a girl; some say he was called Cercysera or Aissa. Some say that Iphigenia was the mother of the children and Deidamia adopted them when Iphigenia was killed.

The Titans were legendary giants from the past. The ancient Greeks were not exactly midgets--going by skeletal remains, the average height was about 5'6-8" for men, 5'2-3" for women, which put them well ahead of the ancient Egyptians and probably the ancient Israelites--but they wrote as if they all wished they were taller, the way they believed their gods and ancestors were. The "giants" in their legendary past might have been 6' tall, like Greeks who grew up on a modern high-protein diet today. According to Wikipedia one skeleton said to have been a "very tall" man would have been 5'10". 

The river-god's name was Scamander. One of the princes of Troy was called Scamandrus. So who knows.

Finally, although Cassandra is not really part of Achilles' story, she's certainly part of the Iliad. She was said to have red-blonde hair, grey eyes, and a "mannish figure" in youth, though motherhood filled out her figure. In the Iliad she has a juicy part a good actress could interpret in several ways, with plenty of nuance. Why Ellen/Elliot Page didn't want to play her, rather than Achilles...well...playing Cassandra would require acting talent, at least to choose a way to play the role and stick to it. Playing Achilles merely requires a person to act like a spoiled brat, and/or liar, coward, traitor, thief, and pedophile depending on how much time on stage Achilles gets.

And such were the foundations of our civilization...but without the Jewish, indigenous American, and Engllish Quaker foundations as well, our civilization would never have come as far as it has done.

Bad Poetry: Snarky Happy Haiku

Red cardinal and

Tiger Swallowtail, are you

posing for tourists? 

(Because the view from either side of McDonald's is a lovely, enticing view of what people come here for. From one window wall you can see the quaint little town with the quaint little shops, the silly new park where the Friday Market used to be, and the high school and its sports fields. From the other window you can see a little mown grass and a few picnic tables below a steep tree-covered hill. So today I looked out my preferred window and saw the cardinal flying in between two trees, the butterfly flying in between two other trees. Two of our State emblems right there and yes, I think one of the trees happened to be a dogwood, which is another one...)

Napowrimo 30: Writers

The final National Poetry Writing Month challenge was to write a poem that discusses a category of beings or people in a detached, musing way.

Writers say writing is fun. But they're lazy.

They'd rather go out and look at a daisy

Than come in and write what they learned from the flower.

Writers refuse to be paid by the hour.

Most of the time writers aren't even paid.

Don't be a writer. Learn some other trade. 

It's been fun, writing a poem a day, except when it's conflicted with other things, such as that, right now, I need to be finishing the Monthly Fluffball. 

Napowrimo 29: Then & Now

Today's National Poetry Writing Month challenge suggests poems that compare our past and present lives.

This does not follow the rules for the thought flow of a sijo, but since my brain's gone there...

Typewriter clacking all day

cost me housemates, filled my pockets.

Computer softly moaning

"update, replace," drains my pockets.

Could I go back? In a heartbeat.

I've outlived housemates, anyway. 

Napowrimo 28: At Last, Rain

This National Poetry Writing Month challenge invited poems in a form used by Victoria Chang. The original Chang poem has been translated into English. It doesn't quite fit the syllable count for a traditional sijo, but it looks as if, in the original language, it might have been one. 

White rose from Google, which credits all-creatures.org. 

At last, rain deepens the green

coloring ground, bushes, and trees.

White rose bloomed; white violets

are still in bloom; where's white privet?

Has the white honeysuckle choked it?

No, but poison sprays may do.

Napowrimo 28

Today's National Poetry Writing Month Challenge asks readers to imitate a few features from a poem called "There Should Always Be Two": write a poem in which all the stanzas have the same number of lines, which tells the reader how to do a thing. I chose to invent a form I call the Bicouplet.

There should always be two stanzas

(flinging rhyme like little lances)

And each should be two lines long

(chiming like a little gong). 

Napowrimo 26: Climate Change

The National Poetry Writing Month challenge for today was to write a poem about writing poetry. 

I stand by the one I wrote more than seven years ago...

"

Some poetry’s bad, Heaven knows,

Yet all poetry’s different from prose.

Bad Poetry’s bound

To patterns of sound

(Though these may not accord quite with those).

It roams through every dialect on Earth,

Stretches rhythms for all that they’re worth,

Chooses subjects prosaic,

Becomes a mosaic

Of thoughts Good Poems never give birth.

What Bad Poetry never will do

Is claim, “I’m so much wiser than you,

If you say I’m not great,

Yourself you denigrate”—

Bad Poetry’s honest and true.

It will freely admit that it’s Bad.

Grandiosity it’s never had.

If it chance to beguile

You into a slight smile,

It may open your mind just a tad.

" 

(Copyright Ⓒ Priscilla King, 2018. Used by permission 😊 )

But the point is to write a new poem each day, so I found an alternative list that invited poems about "loneliness and other impossible situations," "a situation that seems impossible but that you could solve if you wanted to." 

There are situations that are difficult to solve satisfactorily, that could be solved quickly in a way that would probably create worse problems than the original situation. 

Voting for a candidate you don't like personally who's not likely to be of much use on any of the issues that matter to you, who was running against a candidate you don't like personally who's not likely to be of much use on any of the issues that matter to you and who also wants to join other people's war. 

(That's bad enough, so let the majority of Americans who've been in this plight since 2024 consider: being appointed to office by a candidate nobody likes personally, who's not letting you do what your constituent base want you to do, who disagrees with you on several political issues and is probably trying to get you to resign, while you have a personal agenda that requires you to stay where you are.)

Staying with a job that doesn't pay well, but that you enjoy, instead of switching to a job that you'd hate, that wouldn't pay well either, and that you probably wouldn't keep because the reason why the job's open is that the company has hired and fired thirty-eight people for the job already and it's still April.

I live where I want to live. I do many of the things I've always wanted to do. I've not been able to do some other things I've always wanted to do because I am, as my home is, under attack. I have, as my whole neighborhood has, a personal enemy--a land coveter who doesn't even have the fortitude to make offers that would be turned down, who sneaks around trying to ruin people's enjoyment of good land in what used to be a Christian community. After the cat poisoning episode a young man, allegedly a son from what may have been an earlier marriage in another State, was supposed to be watching this Bad Neighbor. Supposedly he's been staying on the other side of the hill and doing nothing worse than spraying poison into the air--not to "protect crops" (he's not planted a crop, nor claimed ownership of a cow, for years) but to make as many neighbors feel as unpleasant as possible. Actually, of course, he slowed down for a season and then resumed the harassment, I think because at this point in his life it's become what he does, who he is...he has to know he's not going to get any more real estate in this neighborhood. And at least he's lost the ability to shoot small animals and leave them in the road. But nasty people never get too old to spread the kind of crazy talk that fascinates people who don't have enough in the way of lives. Rodents don't travel in groups of half a dozen mixed mice and rats of different species, to invade a house that doesn't offer them even water, without some human help; and dumping rodents into basements has been one of this Bad Neighbor's favorite pranks for at least thirty years. And the Cat Sanctuary had rodents in mixed half-dozens this winter; I caught two of different species in one trap, one night. Giving the Bad Neighbor what he wants might solve the problem of being harassed by him, but would certainly create enough other problems that are even worse that it's not a "solution" some of us can even consider.

And then there are public problems, everybody's problems, some of which are soluble if people would just deal with the solutions...

Climate change. It's primarily local. We need leadership,

Of course we do, but not the kind for which globalists clamor.

Leadership by example, we need. Taking the power trip

Out of government, let the elected wield trowel, shovel, hammer.

Let them walk to work every day; let them meet with the electorate

In the road. Let the pavement break up and the roads go to grass.

Cars are good, for the frail and pathetic whose stiff old bones hesitate

To walk on the ground. For the vigorous, let the fad pass.

Let the telecommute be the norm for white-collar employment.

Let the walk to the market become the place where people meet.

Let it be de rigueur, socially, to walk and show enjoyment

Of the flowers and butterflies we notice while on our feet.

It's a hard sell, I know, but it would cool down, without a fight,

Even cities where people cling to their cars as to a right.

Napowrimo 25: Mist

The National Poetry Writing Month Challenge for the 25th of April asks for poems that " use at least three metaphors for a single thing, include an exclamation, ruminate on the definition of a word, and come back in the closing line to the image or idea with which you opened the poem".

I had to sleep on it.

The mist that hangs above the long-dry land:

Sail of a ship still anchored out at sea,

Bridegroom who reaches out to shake bride's hand

Retiring to his room on wedding night,

Green fruit that never ripens on a tree.

Alas that green land reaches such a plight!

The mist still hangs above the long-dry land.

Bad Poetry: Desserts

This post combines the prompt at Napowrimo.net ("something magical and strange that happens at night, and could be a dream, but feels lifelike") and the one at Poets & Storytellers United ("something about desserts, or just desserts"). The dream is one I really had. The rest of the story also happened, but later.

In a dream I held out a plate to take

A slice of the very most fanciful cake

Ever. Little beads of sugar ran round and round,

Colored or gilt. The top was a mound

Of icing and candies. "Vanilla?" I said,

Taking a bite. "Why--it's just cold cornbread!"

I went to the kitchen, and there I made

A salad of fresh fruit in circles arrayed:

Green grapes and tangerine, strawberry slices,

June apple, banana, and raspberries; spices

Not needed, just a few squeezes of lemon

And sprinkle of sugar to please all the women

Expected for luncheon. And please them it did.

It pleased my palate, too. Only one dear old kid

Wanted no fruit but cookies just out of a box.

This was good; it left just enough. Fruit salad rocks.

None of it was left over. I thought I could eat

The whole thing by myself, but I'm glad, now, they beat

Me to that salad's finish. Some food treats are best

Enjoyed when there's just enough for all the rest

And those six perfect bites give delight that's unique,

Not compared with the leftovers eaten all week.

That way memories of the best dessert you ever made

Stay piquant and perfect, and never do fade.

Photo from Google, where it's credited to Natasha's Kitchen. Google has dozens of photos of fruit salads that aren't mine...enough to inspire any cook, whatever may be in the kitchen. Any good fresh unsprayed fruits, alone or together, are likely to become a great, memorable summer dessert.

Napowrimo 23: Cardinals Return to Privet Hedge

Finally catching up with a National Poetry Writing Month Challenge prompt on the intended day...Today's prompt dared poets to write a villanelle that ends with a question.

(Photo from Google, which credits Gardening Know How: male and female cardinal in privet bush. Cardinals' sex roles are less strongly stereotyped than some birds'. Males are much more colorful and conspicuous, but females show some color when they want to. Males are much noisier, but both sexes sing, often in duets. They mate for life, and both parents rear the young.)

Cardinalis virginiensis, the Cardinal bird, lived in Virginia before privet (Ligustrum spp.) was introduced. But the birds became year-round residents rather than summer visitors as privet hedges became common. They are unmistakably attracted to privet berries, which most species, including humans, can't eat. Many cardinals still winter in Central America, where they eat other berries (and compete with farmers), but the birds continue to bring "cheer" and be "pretty birdies" in North America where their territory includes a privet bush that holds on to its berries until spring, or until cardinals eat them, whichever comes first. Privet does not actually spread much, nor is it difficult to control its spread from seeds and roots in your yard. What makes privet so invasive is that cardinals and a few other native birds and mice drop its seeds wherever they fly...and, where privet has spread, cardinals have followed. At one time naturalists actually used Richmondena as a name for the birds because Richmond was as far north as they would go. Now these fruit-loving, weather-tolerant birds live in New Brunswick.

Some people hate privet. They have no reason to hate it; the bushes are hardy enough to choke out some other plants but, if you'd rather have the other plants, all you have to do is cut the privet sprouts down close to the ground; the root may die right then and there, or it may oblige you by sending out another rhizome and sprouting somewhere else, and if that still doesn't suit you, you can cut those sprouts too. It's easy. Privet sprouts are slim little things you can cut with garden shears.  Privet trimmings are good for toasting marshmallows over a fire; they're too sappy to ignite while a marshmallow is toasting and thin enough to dry out and burn well after the marshmallow is cooked.

Some troll even expressed a wish that Mark Gelbart would breathe deeply of privet blossoms and choke on allergic reactions. This is just pathetic. Nobody's allergic to privet blossoms. They release an intense, sweet, delicious odor for a few evenings in May and do no harm whatsoever. People who have allergy reactions in May need to investigate the "pesticides" being sprayed on nearby gardens. Lots of people have allergy-type reactions to glyphosate. Almost everybody has some respiratory system reaction to dicamba. Some other "pesticides" are known to trigger really violent coughing and sneezing fits. But a person who sneezes while passing a privet hedge is a person whose allergies, probably to chemicals, have been aggravated to the point of being "allergic to" every kind of dust and pollen on Earth; such a person should try to find a place to stay indoors and recover.

Sadly, perhaps, privet has a lifespan. Although it does not attract insect predators and the few American animals who can eat it actually propagate it, privet is vulnerable to infection by fungi and nematodes. In a hundred years or so a stand of privet is likely to die out naturally. Cardinals and other songbirds will probably keep the species alive, but not in the same place...however useful privet may be in the places where it's been planted, to control soil erosion and build up soil that can support native plants.

I love my privet hedges because, during the fifty-one weeks of each year when privet is not bearing sweet-smelling white flowers, it "blooms" with cardinals. How can anyone not love a bird that bobs around the windows, in the dead of winter, singing "Cheer! Cheer! Cheer!" Brave flying flowers, that I could gallant it like you and be as little vain...

Brave birds who nest among privet's blossoms white,

Do you spread north because of heat's increase?

Do you count humans as a boon or blight?

When winter reminds us of our life's twilight

Your calls of "cheer" and "pretty birdy" please,

Brave birds who nest among privet's blossoms white.

Other birds, including chickens, like a bite 

Of privet berries dropped among plants and trees.

To you, are humans' chickens boon or blight?

I love the scent of privet's blossoms white

Mixed in with violets, roses, poplar trees,

Brave birds who spread the privet's blossoms white.

In summers when heat beats as if for spite

But no more than it's done for centuries,

We humans ask: have we been boon or blight

To this green planet where we seek the Light

For so few days before our sure demise.

Brave birds who nest among privet's blossoms white,

Do you count humans as a boon or blight?