Maureen Thorson’s NaPoWriMo prompt: James Schuyler's poem "Faurés Second Piano Quartet" (which can be read in today's NaPoWriMo post) "imagine[s] music in the context of a place, but more along the lines of a soundtrack laid on top of the location. . . . try writing a poem that similarly imposes a particular song on a place. Describe the interaction between the place and the music using references to a plant and, if possible, incorporate a quotation – bonus points for using a piece of everyday, overheard language."
Robert Lee Brewer’s Poem-a-Day suggestion: “For today's prompt, write a 'something fantastic' poem.”
Mashing up today's two prompts with a shadorma (a Spanish six-line poetic form with these syllable counts per line: 3/5/3/3/7/5). I've pared down the NaPoWriMo prompts . . . no overheard quote, no plant — though there is a planet, one letter off. So, no bonus points for me today, but read the story right below the poem, which is related to bonus points!
Astronaut on Mars
—a shadorma
Rose pink sky,
David Bowie’s glam
“Life on Mars”
is playing
in my space helmet, lovely
glorious blue sunset.
—Draft by Vince Gotera [Do not copy or quote . . . thanks.]
There's a neat personal story that goes with this topic. When I was in college about 50 years ago, I took a very cool gen ed course called "Cosmic Evolution," which turned out to be about astronomy. (I took quite a few astronomy courses after that one, effectively switching to an astronomy major without officially doing so). Anyway, in the final for that first course, there was a bonus points question that went something like this: "If you are on a planet with a red sky, what color would the sunset be?" I didn't get those bonus points but some decades later, out of nowhere, that question came back to me, and I figured out the answer almost immediately . . . the sunset would be blue. And then I found out a few years afterwards, that that was the case on Mars. Isn't that an incredible — uh, fantastic — photo above?
About remembering the question so many years later . . . was I working on answering that question all that time? I remember it bothered me that I couldn't answer it back then. Obviously, the knowledge to answer it was already available to us, since the question was appended to the exam. During the course, we would have learned what we needed to know to answer it. Memory is weird and amazing!
Here's Alan's poem today . . . a pretty fantastic one!
Just a Rose Will Do
The folks who’d bought the old home place
gave me a call to ask if I
would come and get the rose bush. I knew
which one they meant, the one that grew
against the porch’s far post, curled
and just a little loose, the corner
where the swing was hung. I’d swing
and watch the bees at work, the smell
of rose so thick my mouth would taste
like Mammaw’s fancy soap, the thorns
and stingers at their work, and I
was safe and watching, curious
and quiet, swinging rhythm easing
me to sleep, and Pawpaw singing
about beautiful gardens and death
as I remember old men’s songs,
as I would see him take a strip
of cloth and bundle stems the grew
to touch the porch swing chains, to brush
a grown man’s sleeve, fedora brim,
ear. I filled a wheelbarrow twice
with stems I had to cut away.
It was a climber, all right. My wrists
got scratched, my glasses got yanked off
twice. I heard my Pawpaw’s voice,
how just a rose would do, and dug
more of a hole than I’d meant
just to rock the roots gently loose,
and still they filled a galvanized tub—
surely these were new growth, not
the same as what I knew, but I
was not the same as what I was,
so I could bring it to my home,
its bed already dug, manured
and in a sunny spot, the fence
just posts and rails for yards each side.
—Draft by Thomas Alan Holmes [Do not copy or quote . . . thanks.]
Friends, won’t you comment, please? Love to know what you’re thinking. Thanks!
Ingat, everyone. ヅ |
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1 comment:
That’s a fantastic fact all right! Love the Bowie reference too.
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