Poetry Bus : Yard Brush

So this week's Poetry Bus prompt comes from NanU, and the theme is one of Excess. Of Far Too Much. Of Going Over the Edge. I've done something I've never done for the Poetry Bus before ( I think?) - i.e. I've used a poem already written. Reason being, I'm a wee bit 'writ out' right now - after a bit of a purple patch, thankfully - and, in keeping busy outdoors (while the Irish sky deigns to remain conducive to such activity) I remembered something written a few years ago, which seemed to suit this prompt, albeit on somewhat of a tangent. An ode to a loyal implement which has somewhat exceeded its life expectancy, perhaps only due to a lack of excess in its usage? To wit....



Yard Brush

Old friend, I know you longer than my wife.
I brought you from my parent's home - a gift,
for you were on the way out - your acolyte
had deemed you ill-equipped. Yet here you are

your handle slick and sheened by years
of palms that regularly furled to working fists
(though woodworm traffic in your cambered
head suggests a cheese particularly Swiss).

Your nylon bristles, once bright cherry red
and eager as a pup's tumescent tip,
are clogged and grey like ancient natty dreads,
but still upstanding - equal to the chore.

At least to any I might yet inflict.
For that you labour still speaks volumes too;
my yardwork - yes, the sparsity of it -
has kept our union true.


© P Nolan 2008



That's the implement itself, pictured above in all its woodworm-headed holiness. Still in (sparse) use - even earlier today. The reference to 'clogged and grey, like ancient natty dreads' refers to another brush entirely, one my father used when building our family home, which acquired said appearance from sweeping up after mixing cement. But hey, if a poem can't conflate a little......?

Poetry Bus : Pancake Day

So, time to dust off the bus ticket again.

This time the prompter is the one-and-only Peter Goulding, with a selection of prompts over here. I went for the option of writing an homage to Pancake Tuesday (tomorrow, yay!).

The requirement was to write in the voice of a wellknown poet. I felt that the particular mix of religion and sensual pleasure involved might suit a certain Canadian Troubadour - one of the first poets that ever hooked me with his work - AND I thought I might as well go the whole batterin' hog and record the damn thing too. So, as a Fierce Pancake treat(!?!) - Nolan sings;

Happy Pancake Day, fellow passengers :-)

Pancake Day by scalder


Pancake Day
(with sincere apologies to Leonard Cohen)

Epiphany passed
and the time came at last
to shrive our omissions and misdeeds away

We met in the middle
I brought flour and a griddle
what you brought you just couldn't say

the future was fast
riding free in its stirrups
we buried the past
turned gold into syrup
and danced

and we danced
we danced
on pancake day


As twilight grew angry
we pillaged the pantry
hardly seeing each other for smoke

A crackle of light
turned linoleum white
thunder muffled the words that you spoke

the future was meagre
the past tried to smother us
hungry and eager
we battered and buttered
and danced

and we danced
we danced
on pancake day

The sky boomed and rain fell
we cracked open the shells
mixed the yellows down into the whites

The gutters were flowing
The storm it was blowing
Like Lucifer and all of his lipsmacking sprites

I asked would you rather
Azores malassada
but you just lay stroking your legs

I sprinkled mine
with cane sugar and lime
and we gorged in the night till we ran out of time
and eggs

and we danced
we danced
and we danced
on pancake day

we danced
oh we danced
and we danced
on pancake day

with Mardi Gras spent
we woke up in Lent




© P Nolan 2011

Poetry Bus : Tumulus

The Poetry Bus has rolled into town again, this time under the peerless driving of TheManHimself, Mr. TotalFeckinEejit.

A few nice options on the prompt - including some class sepia photos. But I went for the audio prompt - a track from Van Morrison's Veedon Fleece. Which reminded me of the Golden Fleece, which reminded me in turn of Jason & The Argonauts, who were sometimes call Minyans, who, I discovered, were a prehistoric Aegean tribe, who also made use of that familiar feature of the Irish landscape - Tumulus graves. To wit.....


Tumulus


Lying senseless under sun
troubadours emerge at night
to citizens of twilight trading
fading hues of bottled light

I stir, the world beside me wakes
creaks on her scale beneath
the measure of diurnal pitch
each trace a blessing, firing

livid, time initiating space
from no mere spark, instead
an ember coaxed to flare,
two mysteries refracted there;

a song from time beyond recall
a voice built new from broken things


© P Nolan 2011

You can read some more responses to this prompt HERE.

Poetry Bus : Amber

Not being all that bloggerly of late, it's been a while since I posted something in response to a Poetry Bus prompt, but this weeks's prompt by 120 Socks caught the imagination. The combination of photo and word sparked off some kinda scenario and voice, resulting in the following - hope you like it.


Amber

All the missing days went down and met the rest of my life
gliding in that morning on the clearest skies money could buy
I began to cook with foggy disregard for the outcome

by the time my first guest arrived I had already begun to swoon
coming around each time to spit the metallic taste from my mouth
and scrape off the burnt offerings now clouding the kitchen

beginning again beginning again beginning again
like the audio track set to loop in the limited seating area
seemed the best chance of breaking through charred surfaces

with my home now full of people I could only hold my place
as crowds swam around me, those people asking questions
seemed to be in the minority, most were complacent

while some were advocates, extolling the benefits of exiting
or building a mezzanine or turning off the heat
others ate, glared, belched, smiled, kissed, fucked

it was all I could do to stay on my feet and even sleeping upright
I kept one eye open because I knew that if I went down this time
there'd be nobody, possibly even no thing to share when I awoke

so it was ordained.



© P Nolan 2011

Loads more responses to the prompt here.

Poetry Bus : L'esprit d'escalier

Target

in memoriam C.T.G.

If words came as bidden
opened avenues
brushed ego aside
began flinging stuff through

conceits, longheld prejudice
bottles of piss
re-heated revenge
served up with a kiss

self-righteous tirades
unilateral, shrill
a teacup of toxins
from bitter old pills

vomitted eloquence
sparked by a slight
accusation from someone
or something not right

drummed down fusillades
released inner kids
broke down your guard
called out my id

Sent crusaders, stormtroopers
brickbats and bile
with the wink of an eye
and a twinkling smile

Could petulant spatting
still do me some good?
Re-write the outcome?
You betcha. It could.

Glór Session : Poetry Bus vs. Soundings

Went along to The Glór Session last night for the official launch of The Poetry Bus, issue 1. A brilliant evening! There were poets in abundance, most of whom read their poem from the magazine, another piece or two of their own and their choice of poem from the recently reissued, much loved school anthology Soundings. Publishers Gill & Macmillan donated a number of copies for the raffle - and I was lucky enough to take one home - Yay! My old schooldays copy has long since disappeared, so it's a treat to have a chance to revisit the texts in this snapshot of a shared past.

The video above is me doing my bit at Glór, followed by the wonderful Carol Boland doing hers, as well as reading a note from Poetry Bus editor Peadar O'Donoghue who unfortunately couldn't make it along on the night.

I had a great chat with Carol about her involvement in running the Space Inside arts nights in Wicklow town, as well as her foray into publishing, with the Boland Press due to launch its first(?) title on December 1st in the Signal Arts Centre in Bray - so mark your diaries! Great too, to chat with some of the other Poetry Bus poets who read, including Kate Dempsey, Colm Keegan, Niamh Bagnell, Mags Treanor and many more. Hugely inspiring, and the magazine sold like hot, tasty cakes on a wet November night - which bodes well for its future.

The session was run (as always) with great gusto and good humour by the man himself, Stephen James Smyth. Many thanks Stephen, for a great vibe and a great night. There's loads more video of this and past Glór Sessions over here.

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Poetry Bus : Bath time

It's been a while since I've hopped onboard the Poetry Bus. Preoccupied of late. This weeks prompt comes from Jessica Maybury, over yonder, and has to do with bathrooms, water, swimming etc. Great prompt - some of the best thinking gets done in the bath - but I was all at sea for a bit (a soak is a luxury I haven't had for a while) - no Eureka moment. Instead came a short meditation on the room itself (as society?).

Here it be;

Doldrum

Our bathroom's going down the crapper
tiles ungrouted, mildew on the ceiling,
run-off from the bathrim pisses on the bare marine ply floor
each time the shower is used

a topograph of littered towels claim corner territories as their own
contoured lumps, damp and rank
wary of exasperated hunters blundering in
to bundle them at last into the wash

some bright morning, sunlight will see
the hot tap wink and all these grimy spells will break
with towels rebirthed as heroes born aloft, their
clear expressions creasing widely, hugging all, folded, soft

they'll hunker neatly, muffling all doubt,
dispelling damp and disarray, the lack of DIY shrugged off
until, decks cleared, we'll set our faces to the glass
pipe ourselves a welcome, all shipshape once again
from figurehead to ass.

© P Nolan 2010

Don't forget, it's the OFFICIAL LAUNCH of the Poetry Bus, Issue 1 TONIGHT!!! At the Glór Sessions, with readings by Poetry Bus poets - as well as readings from the newly re-issued Soundings. Should be a good one!

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Poetry Bus : Early Morning

This week's Poetry Bus driver is Chiccoreal with a prompt to write about the first thing that pops into the head on waking up - so here it is;


Again


Light bleeds along the edge of drawn blinds

Monday and the working week is drizzling to focus

beyond the window raindrops spatter sycamores

like silent neighbours popping corn



Summer shrinks away, this week our second child

is starting secondary school

soon the morning schedule won't accommodate

five minute blinks at sullen numerals


I close my eyes again - a temporary flatline - listen

to the rain shower slide away, down over Sallynoggin to the sea

rinsing early morning swimmers towelling down at Sandycove

freshwater back to salt - an opposite of tears.



© P Nolan 2010

(edited 24.8.10)

Poetry Bus : Weirdly Visions

This week's poetry bus prompt issued from NanU The Sciencegirl. Her prompt involved taking note of those nuggets of nonsense, blogger's own verification words - a linguistic mystic in its own right, which brought some great responses. So with a tip of the hat to Lear, Carroll, Milligan et al - here's my bus pass;

Odditty

In the still of morning
a-frabing I will go
along the banks of Sumet
down to the frozen shore

to search amidst the gravel
for gleaming diagoo
with rake and sieve and mopokip
my fortune I will gather

my freedom I will purchase
and return to Icitemo
to sip on silk and beermemp
and never more stir.


© P Nolan 2010



Speaking of Edward Lear, I wasn't aware until recently (University of Wikipedia) that he was also quite the accomplished artist and illustrator. His work as 'ornithological draughtsman' was favourably compared with Audubon, and he even briefly gave drawing lessons to Queen Victoria. Which allows me to segue sinuously to the image above, entitled 'Demon', my own 'demonological' contribution to a group exhibition by IGI members, launching this Thursday at the United Arts Club. I'm not sure if any of the illustrators on show have ever given lessons to royalty, but several (or rather, their art) have definitely appeared on stamps.

Your invitation to attend is hereby decreed.

Poetry Bus : Confusion, she says

So the Poetry bus rolleth on. This week's theme is 'confusion' as decreed by this weeks driver, Niamh Bagnell - with plenty of passengers over on her blog.

I'm confused. A lot. I think. Who knows? Happy July. Innit?

contour

journeys taken
asphalt or otherwise
must abrade certainty

worthwhile destinations
require navigation and detour
often into knot and tangle

slowed along the route
strained along the rise
stopped along the level
skewed along the decline

sputtering into glare
to find the sea

swell and return

audio visual : words, eyes, ears

The image above is one of my illustrations for TFE's upcoming Poetry Bus magazine. Illustrating poetry is HARD! As in, creating some kind of mutually dynamic relationship which is sympathetic to the text, but not stomping all over same with big visually metaphorical boots. I hope poet and guitarist Dominic Rivron likes this take on his poem After The Rain. The first issue of the Poetry Bus is currently in production - launching soon! This illustration also features in a selection of recent work by IGI Members over at the Scamp blog. Great selection and quality as usual.

Other poetry-related news is that podcasts of most of the readings from this year's dlr Poetry Now festival are now online here, along with my own brief overview of the festival. Well worth a listen. The podcasts, that is. Paul Muldoon's keynote address is well worth checking out.

On a related, yet prosey, tip - the upcoming Mountains to The Sea festival (also in Dun Laoghaire) has just announced a new competition for unpublished writers from the area - details here. Their site also features podcasts of most events from last year's festival, including the keynote address by Paul Auster, speaking about Beckett's influence..

So, while the sun hangs around, why not load up the iPod, crack open a deckchair (and suitable libation) and tickle those cochleae!

Enniscorthy 1500 : Scalderverse

Hi there - back again after tramping around in the cyberwilderness for a few weeks. Lots going on - much of it tiresome, some of it beautiful. And now THIS!

I reckoned I should pay some attention to the weird synchronicity that arose during a recent Poetry Bus prompt. As a native of Enniscorthy, I've always been conscious of the amount of writing talent that has emerged from the town and its hinterland. So I had a chat with the good Tom Mooney, editor of local newspaper the Enniscorthy Echo, and Paul O'Reilly, driving force behind Scallta Media, publisher of local writing and music - and this is what we came up with;

Enniscorthy 1500 : Scalderverse : Call for Submissions

Enniscorthy, Co. Wexford is currently celebrating the 1500th anniversary of its foundation in 510AD. As part of the anniversary celebrations, local newspaper the Enniscorthy Echo will feature a weekly poetry column, entitled Scalderverse. (Natives of Enniscorthy town are traditionally known as ‘Scalders’. A punnet of best Wexford strawberries to anybody who can categorically explain why?)

This weekly column will feature a poem by a local writer - or which references some aspect of the town itself - in each issue of the Echo from mid-June to end of November 2010. A pamphlet of these poems may also be produced at the end of the year.

While a number of established poets have been invited to partake, it is intended that the majority of poems will be sourced by open submission from emerging writers from the town and its surroundings. Unpublished poems reflecting contemporary life in Enniscorthy are particularly welcome.

Poets from further afield are also welcome to submit poems which specifically reference some aspect of Enniscorthy or its surroundings.

Scalderverse will be curated - and occasionally illustrated - by Padhraig Nolan in association with Scallta Media and the Enniscorthy Echo.

NOTE : There is a production limitation of 40 lines of verse, including stanza breaks, for each poem. A maximum of three poems, with a short biographical note, should be emailed for consideration to scalderverse[at_symbol]gmail.com before July 15th.

***

We kicked off with the first Scalderverse column this week, featuring - with the kind permission of The Ollamh Himself - Heaney's Requiem for the Croppies. An auspicious start! And we have new poems to come from Eamonn Wall and Anthony Cronin, amongst others.

It's fantastic to have some serious established names featuring - but the exciting thing for me is seeing what might come from poets whose names I'm not familiar with. I'm particularly keen to see work which speaks about contemporary life in the town and its environs - so if any of you out there have something that fits the bill - please do submit!

Poetry Bus : Theatricks

This weeks driver of The Poetry Bus is Nevada-based writer, librarian and blogger Terresa Wellborn (great name). Hi Terresa! Her prompt was this remarkably theatrical photo by Keith Carter shown above.

I found it a tough enough prompt to start with, but the resulting piece took its own angle on things;



Noon

Saturday in May and summer arrives
the back garden a suntrap baited
with newspapers, birdsong and beer

In the cavecool kitchen I remain
a shuffling pale caucasian caveman
slicing through an orange block

of what we buy as cheese, four cut
slices snugly fit to blunted squares
of white bread licked with mayonnaise

I hover on the doorstep of kissing sun
blossom breeze, turn instead to monochromes
of costume, tragedy, reveal

the flipside of this page - another world
asleep, where now a person stirs
blinks awake, listens to the night



© P Nolan 2010

Worth noting too that fellow Poetry Busser and Connecticut-based blogger, Jeanne Iris Lakatos, is in Dublin at the mo and (I'm pretty sure) is appearing at The Glór Session downstairs in The International TONITE! (Can anybody confirm this?) Hope to make it along to this.

** Update : Jeanne's flight was delayed - it seems unlikely she'll be arriving in time for Glór tonight after all. Jeanne, drop me a line when you arrive? **

Poetry Bus : Sign O' The Lino

This week, TFE's Poetry Bus is in the safe hands of the good Barbara Smith - and her prompt involved responding to the line;

'I got down on my knees and smelled the brand new linoleum,' from a story by Edna O'Brien, with emphasis on responding with longer lines.

Which I did - like this;

Trackstopper

I got down on my knees and smelled the new linoleum
and blessed the modern age that threw this dreamtime down

unrolled a pristine plane across my gritty concrete cage
clapped into place a slippery playground, this stage

across which - newly confident - I'd glide, a dancer born
my encores blowing faded floral curtains wide

a technicolor faun cavorting in my den until
I'd curl to snooze - a faded star becalmed again

alas, at other times my knees would squeak and drag as if
arrested by some drogue, a limpet smacked in place

I'd stick - just like that - scabbed knees turned to roots, topple
face down, cheek pooled cool to ground - looking back I'm glad it wasn't jute

The Poetry Bus : Scalderville Request Stop

World Wide Weird. One of the other poets mentioned a bizarre coincidence in terms of the image this project threw up for them.

Now I've just had mine. Shvvvvvr. I went with the number 12. The 12th square linked me into the image archive of the Musée McCord in Montreal. The McCord Museum is a public research and teaching museum dedicated to the preservation, study, diffusion and appreciation of Canadian history. Now here's the spooky part.

I counted down the page to image number 12, which turned out to be the photo of the august gentleman you see above. The caption describes him as "Mr. Whitney(?), Enniscorthy, Ireland, about 1885." An Irishman! What a coincidence, eh? Not major though - except that Enniscorthy is also my hometown, where I was born and raised. WTF? The universe is definitely trying to tell me something. Very 'Artists Way' indeed :-o

Enniscorthy is a beautiful place, culturally and historically rich, yet there's sadness too. The local landscape is dominated by Vinegar Hill, where the 1798 rebels were finally defeated, blasted back against the bare rock, as commemorated in Seamus Heaney's poem Requiem for The Croppies.

For a small enough town, it has produced a great many writers, including Anthony Cronin, Colm Toibin, Eamon Wall and - a more recent addition - Peter Murphy, whose novel John The Revelator, garnered noteworthy reviews and heavyweight fans.

Anyway, enough metaphysical tourism - how to deal with such a familiar subject in this particular context?


Around 1885

There was river traffic still
though the forest had long been cleared

In Deadwood they were mining seams
at home the gold was barley, harvested and brewed

Rabbits scattered - just as now - bared on stubble
cropped by hand, the season still the same

By the gate, Whitney saw a final coney jink to cover
opened his eyes to Montreal snow


© P Nolan 2010


And now, a warm Scalder welcome to my fellow Poetry Bus passengers. Tayto anyone?

Karen is thinking thrashy.

Rachel Fox Mad Max, the opera?

Dominic Rivron is having a Kiwi moment.

Enchanted Oak is laying down supplies.

Sandra Leigh is getting minty fresh.

Niamh B with a touch of Poe.

Titus the Dog is feeling a little 'ruff', yet experiencing the Poetry Bus twilight zone.

The Watercats are seeing Goblins.

Argent is time travelling.

The Bug is sizzling.

Jeanne Iris is setting sail.

Uiscebot is getting frisky.

Poetikat razzes the moneymen.

NanU is catching toads.

Swiss considers British algae.

Crazyfieldmouse is parched.

Pure Fiction is exorcising.

Great stuff and thanks to all!

The Poetry Bus conductor is hanging out the back with an outstretched hand for tardy travellers - make a dash for it!

* ADDENDUM * Here's a response to the prompt from my non-blogging friend, poet Chris Allen;













Not unlike the Trees at Dyrehaven

Tomorrow in this place the sun will shine,
The choirs of old will be recalled in the acoustic arch,
The beauty of nature reign supreme
And the holly trees squat and summer green,
Their thorns a little rounder - berries gone,
November passions fallen – their reds fired to earth.
This formal wheel - its turn in turn will take.

And I cannot imagine the face that I might have
There in the moment to carry the tides of existence,
To turn into the wind of shapes and matters
This final record of the watch.

Tomorrow as you rise above the valley
Move beyond the canopy and linger
Fluid and abiding like a river returning

The berries I saw fall here last October,
A velvet vein of wine in the still of winter
Sweetened and distilled by time and distance
A moment alive in the breath of it all to trace
Elements as periodic as a glimpse of the eternal
In which a man might make his soul a shelter.

If everything is thrown before the heavens,
Exposed to every weather in acceptance,
Home, is a memory sustained
By forces which are more than we can name
Of moments felt and entered in the heart -
A place existing always where you are.

© C Allen 2010

The Poetry Bus : All Aboard!

So the Poetry Bus has been rattling away along its circuitous route for a while now, and.. Parp! Parp! Good Lord, here it comes, hurtling with a distinct lack of decorum down Scaldervillage's main street, mit ye merrye olde buschauffeur ag gáire amach as an fuinneog. Let the dust settle, stock up on Tayto and Red Lemonade and step onboard to partake in this week's trip.

So, first things first. Before going any (ahem) furthur, please pick a number between 1 and 14.

Ok? Got it? Certain? Right, onwards.

The following link will bring you to a web page. To the right - just below the main image on that page - you'll see a group of 14 small squares. Each of these is a (randomly generated) link to a particular archive of photos. Click on the square that corresponds with your chosen number. Count down to the image in that particular collection that matches your chosen number. Let that image (or whichever tickles) be your prompt. Write.

Here's the link.

These photo archives are part of a larger project called The Commons on Flickr. Be Careful! You could quite easily spend the rest of your day (and then some) browsing the visual riches therein.

Don't do that (now). Instead, write! Then post your poem on your blog and comment here to let me know when your work is online. I'll post again on Monday.

Note : In general, the photos in The Commons are intended to be used for personal, educational or research purposes, so there are usually "no known copyright restrictions" - allowing you to reproduce them on your blog if you wish. But please respect any restrictions that may apply to any individual image, if so stated beneath the image.

Have Fun!