Voila!

As promised, following yesterday's Blogland detour through some French poetry, I have endeavoured to give literal translations; I've left the words, as much as possible, in the order in which they were written, rather than re-arranging to the accepted, English syntax. In this way, I hoped to give a better correlation between the original, and my version.

Literal translation of Pastel by Theophile Gautier

I love to see you in your oval frames,
yellowing portraits of beauties from an earlier age,
holding in your hands, roses - a little pale -
as befits flowers a hundred years old.

The winter wind, in touching your cheeks,
has made your carnations and lillies* die.
You have nothing left but spots **of mud
and on the sidewalk*** you languish, all sullied.

It is past, the gentle reign of courtesans.
La Parabere, along with La Pompadour,
would only find rebellious subjects, now,
and in their tombs Love is buried also.

You, meanwhile, ancient portraits one forgets,
you sniff your bouquets of flowers with no scent,
and smile with melancholy
at the memory of your gallant conquests.

*1) i.e. made your pink and white complexions 'die' - in the sense of expire, or fade.
** 2) hints at the idea of beauty spots?or maybe fly-blown, as a describing a mirror's black specks?
***3) on the quais, or walkways of bridges which span the river, maybe even riverbanks?



Literal translation of Chinoiserie.

It is not you, no madame, that I love.
Nor you either, Juliette, nor you
Ophelie, nor Beatrix; not even
Laure the Blonde, with her great, sweet/gentle eyes.

The one I love at present, is in China.
She lives with her old parents
in a tower of fine porcelain
by the Yellow River, where there are cormorants.

She has eyes tip-tilted towards the temples:
a foot small enough to hold in the hand:
a skin more translucent than the parchment of a lamp:
the nails long, and painted bright red.

Through her lattice she inclines her head,
which the swallow in flight comes to touch,
and each evening, as adroitly as a poet,
she sings of weeping willow and peach blossoms.

This poem was inspired by the painting on a Willow Patterned, fine porcelain plate - or so I was lead to believe, so the words 'in China' have a double meaning.

I hope this gives you a flavour of the actual French language, a feel of its lyrical flow. It would take a greater poet/linguist than I to write a grammatical English poem which could catch even a fraction of the nuances of the original. You see, I had to resort to a French word in that last sentence anyway, as I could think of none better!

Thursday With Théophile

...Gautier, that is. I thought today, especially for the curious amongst you, I'd let you see one of those favourite, French poems that I mentioned yesterday. Here it is.

Pastel

J'aime à vous voir en vos cadres ovales,
Portraits jaunis des belles du vieux temps,
Tenant en main des roses un peu pâles,
Comme il convient à des fleurs de cent ans.

Le vent d'hiver, en vous touchant la joue,
A fait mourir vos oeillets et vos lis,
Vous n'avez plus que des mouches de boue
Et sur les quais vous gisez tout salis.

Il est passé, le doux règne des belles;
La Parabère avec la Pompadour
Ne trouveraient que des sujets rebelles,
Et sous leur tombe est enterré l'amour.

Vous, cependant, vieux portraits qu'on oublie,
Vous respirez vos bouquets sans parfums,
Et souriez avec mélancolie
Au souvenir de vos galants défunts.

While I'm at it, I've decided I may as well post another of Gautier's poems that I love. If nothing else, it may make a few of you use your grey cells in a new way, as you endeavour to translate. Nowhere does Blogger say we have to stick to the English language, what, what, what?!


Chinoiserie

Ce n'est pas vous, non, madame, que j'aime,
Ni vous non plus, Juliette, ni vous,
Ophélia, ni Béatrix, ni même
Laure la blonde, avec ses grands yeux doux.

Celle que j'aime à présent, est en Chine;
Elle demeure avec ses vieux parents,
Dans une tour de porcelain fine,
Au fleuve Jaune, où sont les cormorans.

Elle a des yeux retroussés vers les tempes,
Un pied petit à tenir dans la main,
Le teint plus clair que le cuivre des lampes,
Les ongles longs et rougis de carmin.

Par son treillis elle passe sa tête,
Que l'hirondelle en volant vient toucher,
Et, chaque soir, aussi bien qu'un poëte,
Chante le saule et la fleur du pêcher.

I promise to tell the stories of both the poems, eventually, once I've let them confound you for starters. Who knows, there may be talented, multi-lingual Bloggers who won't be able to wait to leave a comment and translate the lot today!

Wednesday With Weaver

Wow! (Thought I may as well keep the 'W's' well in evidence, as a starter.) Thanks to the Weaver of Grass, I rashly agreed to join in today's challenge to write about INSPIRATION. Hmmm. Yesterday, I dutifully typed and printed a hypothetical post, ready for transcribing to Blogger. (I still can't get anything to copy and paste successfully into napple notes - no inspiration there, then....)

But now, in the early hours of Wednesday (5.30am), and in the cold light of day, the two pages of A4, on which I quoted one German and one French poem among other things, lost their charm. All, that is, except for the last paragraph, which seemed to be the most relevant, and I quote:-

I simply love words. The older I get, the more I read, the more words have etched themselves into my conscious, or unconscious, mind. Now Blogger has given me the perfect arena for letting them spill out. But I wouldn't class Blogger.com as inspiring - though many of it's Blogaddicts are! For which I thank you all...

When all is said and done, inspiration can come from absolutely anywhere, anything. As long as one keeps an open mind and a sharp lookout for anything which triggers the flashing , Eureka! sign in the brain, inspiration will always be available. Now, stop reading this and go and find some.

Live And Learn

That's what it's all about, no matter which area of life you care to mention. Thanks to Gumbo Writer's interview with Harvey Stanbrough this week, I have discovered a great source for more learning. At one point in this interview, if you've not read it, Mr H. kindly offered to send a PDF file to those interested in the art of writing.

As a result of my being bold enough to request a copy in an email, I've had an ongoing, behind the scenes conversation with the gentleman since then. Thanks to a chance remark of his, I had the perfect nudge to write the following lines:-

Oh, To Be An Open Book!

If I were published in a book,
however would I breathe?
While people flipped my pages,
I might get a reprieve;

for as they turned a leaf or two
I'd inhale with all my might.
This hasty chest expansion
might last me through the night.

By counting all my many lines,
they'd maybe guess my age...
I know, if they erased a few,
I'd not be in a rage!

As The Weaver of Grass is currently asking for people to talk about their sources of inspiration, I thought this would tie in very nicely with her idea. I nominate 'The Chance Remark' as an ideal starting point for prose or poem. Why not go and visit her, and find out more about her cunning plan to get everyone writing? She does some exceedingly worthwhile posts herself, on the pen pushing front!

I'd also like to say a big thank you to the people who have become followers over the past few days... though some of you haven't left me a clue as to how I may return the favour. Nevertheless, you have caused Blogger to count to 100 on his less than perfect fingers; I noticed yesterday, you see, that he managed to make the total 101, but this morning, although I spotted yet another new face in the picture parade, he only makes it total 100. Either people are deserting me in disgust, or Blogger still hasn't mastered the art of arithmetic.

So, speak to me, newcomers - you'll find my bark is far worse than my bite...

Short, But Not Necessarily Sweet

A Reflection

The one in the glass is a stranger.
Who could they be? Should I know?
Possibly. There is a danger
the face is nobody but me!

Q's Done It Again

He sent an email, asking 'What am I?' I thought Blogland should tell him, so here's his question in full:-

I hold sprinklings of dust and occasional hair
pulled out in frustration, or computer despair.
I carry remnants of biscuits, a sandwich or three:
splashes of fruit juice, coffee or tea.
My glossy key tops are like footprints in sand;
some letters worn off by repetitive hand.
The eventual demise of my N, O, P, Q
means it's out with the old, and in with the new.

Only polite answers please - remember I am his Mummy, no matter how old he gets! As such, I am allowed to be a lazy moo, and use his brain power, rather than mine, to fill today's blank blogpage. I wasn't born yesterday. Anything for an easy life...

Chip Off The Old Block

Having written the title, I thought I'd better go straight to The Phrase Finder and probe into the origins of such a delightful saying. This is what I found:-

Meaning

A person or thing that derives from the source or parentage.

Origin

There are at least three variants of this phrase. The earliest form is 'chip of the same block', where the block in question may have been stone or wood. It dates back to at least 1621 when it appeared in a sermon by the Bishop of Lincoln, Robert Sanderson:-

"Am I not a child of the same Adam...a chip of the same block, with him?"

This seems to be interchangeable with 'chip of the old block' (See John Milton's An apology against - A modest confutation of the animadversions upon the remonstrant against Smectymnuus.)

N.B. The author of this gem then pointed out he'd included this book title simply for the pleasure of seeing one which was longer than the quoted line he'd taken from it:-

"How well dost thou now appeare to be a Chip of the old block."

He went on to tell us, it remained 'of ' rather then 'off ' until the 19th century, when the earliest reference he could find was in the Ohio newspaper The Athens Messenger, June 1870:

" The children see their parents' double-dealings, see their want of integrity, and learn them to cheat...The child is too often a chip off the old block."

I shall ignore the use of the verb 'learn' as opposed to 'teach', as well as pray it was not my want of integrity my No.1 Son was copying when he sent me the following lines in an email yesterday:-

Ode to a Biro!
by Q

There was a young Biro in plastic
whose life had been simply fantastic.
It was faithful through all,
with its medium-tip ball,
but unfortunately, I've just gone and snapped it!

I trust my own first-born chip didn't leave too great a dent in his Ma-block...The jury is still out on that one.

Jumping On The Bandwagon

I am beginning to feel some of my readers are guilty of this crime. Though come to think of it, what is a bandwagon? And if several readers jumped at once, would it collapse, or merely overturn?

Perhaps I should stop following this unproductive line of thought, and focus on the accepted meaning of the phrase. As I understand it, it's a way of describing a somewhat copycat mindset.
It would seem, after noting my fairly fast following up on their suggestions for poetic subject matter, that several Blogpersons are challenging me to pit my wits against unseen forces of inspiration on a somewhat regular basis.

More than once has Gumbo Writer prompted me in this fashion. Sometimes I can reply 'by return', as it were, but occasionally it takes a while to get my thinking into gear. Such was the case recently, when in an email of hers, she remarked that my phrase 'the larks and owls would never meet' sounded as though it should warrant a poem of its own.

Eventually, the cogs and wheels whirred, and I emailed her the resultant lines - for her eyes only, as you might say. But then I got to thinking, why limit readership? Why not cast it on the waters of Blogland's Inland Sea, securely corked in typical green glass bottle, and let it wash up on some far distant shore as fate, time and tide decreed? (Thinks:- Do inland seas have tides?)

Therefore, thanks to Angie and my clanking cogs, I give you:-

Larks and Owls

The Larks and Owls would never meet,
should each to his own rhythm keep.
Larks, who wake a break of dawn,
long before it's midnight, Y..A..W..N.
But Owls, who choose to lie abed
until the sun its beams have shed,
at dark, revive to full alert;
they're lively, witty, brisk and pert.
Then, night-time Owls come out to play,
while morning Larks all hide away
beneath their duvets, sound asleep,
as Owls their nightly vigil keep.

Bon Voyage, little green bottle... may you have a safe journey to those distant realms. And if you happen upon it yourself, Oh! Unknown Castaway, please reseal it after reading, and return to the deeps. Who knows where it may land next?

As Phoenix Requested

This is me talking to/about a couple of my pencils, as per comment/ suggestion left on my last post. I should probably explain, I have pencils at all points of the compass, so it was no easy task deciding which I should engage in conversation. I eventually opted to concentrate on the one which had produced the Enigma poem, the most recent of my efforts - until today, that is.

To be totally contrary, though, both of the following were tapped out on the keyboard; no back of envelope (traditional) or pencil (optional) played any part in their composition.

Ode To An Old, Wooden Pencil

Oh, Pencil! How your black and red
draws words and pictures from my head.
The painted stripes are dented, scratched,
but still your black lead stays intact.
You once belonged unto another,
who chewed your end. It made me shudder.
But when I found you, sad, forlorn,
I docked your tail. You were reborn.
Now, detrimental teeth marks gone,
and pristine eraser placed upon
your nether regions, you're renewed -
one cannot tell you had been chewed!

Blue Clutch Wonder

Nought point seven millimetre,
Pentel two oh seven;
a wonder of the modern age,
a pencil straight from heaven.

Turquoise barrel, silver clip,
twelve leads inside his shell;
consistency of breadth is his,
he always serves me well.

His point is ever crisp and sharp,
yet soft and freely flowing,
with leads advancing one by one;
spare refills keep him going.

No sharpener need spoil his head,
and splinter pointed dome,
for on this marvel of design,
his headgear's made of chrome.

Signposts And Curiosity

"Curiouser and curiouser!" So said Alice in Wonderland, one upon a storytime. For those among us who have more than our share of The Elephant Child's ' satiable curtiosity', a signpost can be our down fall, once our trunks have sniffed a whiff of something interesting...

Blogland leaves these tempting pointers in unexpected places, and we can find ourselves wandering in fields of fantasy before we have time to control the dash of the mouse upon which we ride. I was leisurely investigating blogs old and new after I posted my pennyworth (!) on Tuesday this week, when an Aerial Armadillo had me following one such signpost to the Clarity Of Night.

Before I knew it, I was inveigled into grabbing a used envelope, the back of which was imploring my pencil to waggle out a few words on the subject of In Vino Veritas. This was to comply with rules of a competition set up by Jason Evans. The closing date was only a day away, so my pencil needed to move quickly; eventually producing enough drawn out black lead lines to create the following:-

Enigma

Her glass is filled with wine.
He asks "Will you be mine?"
She, bashful, pale and shy,
lifts glass, and drains it dry.

She hears his words, so false,
spin round her, like a valse.
The Devil's Advocate
has left his help too late.

"You will not be in charge
once truth is set at large!
Beware what comes to pass -
In Vino Veritas!"

The enterprising Mr Evans has put an alphabetical list of numbered entries on his blog, with the chance for Blogpersons to vote for their favourite five submissions. With a total of 158 to peruse, this will be no mean task...Whoever manages to read all of them, will deserve a special prize for their tenacity of purpose, no less.

It's About Time

...I stopped revelling in other people's words and and got down to the business of chiseling a few more of my own in the marble halls of Blogland: or impressing them on clay tablets: or painting them on papyrus: or on a cave's rock face.
When you contemplate the variety of methods humans have used, doesn't it just show how great has been Man's urge to put his thoughts down to share with others? Since the beginning of time an underlying ribbon of communication has woven its threads around the world.

And this Time thing. When did it stop being governed by internal, unconscious rhythm, and turn into the rat race of modern quicker- faster- save time mentality? But then the advantages of this speed become obvious.

Imagine a pre-historic Blogland.

Immediately the whole concept of world wide, near instantaneous communication system becomes laughable. I chisel my message, tie it to a four footed messenger, or the back of a turtle, or leg of an eagle and send it on its way...to... Otherland. There's Authorblog, off in Aussie land, for example, who wouldn't stand a kangaroo's chance in hell of ever reading my equivalent Verse and Worse sample. Doesn't bear thinking about, eh?

Awareness of Time starts to look like a necessary evil in our evolutionary march through life...Although I gave up wearing a wristwatch many moons ago, I have to admit to being a trifle obsessive about clocks. I like their tick, tock, background noise, and it took me a long while to accustom myself to the clock radio beside my bed, because of its tock-tickless state.

It was while pondering in this fashion, that I came to write the following:-

Timepieces

Clock in the hall, steady and slow,
measuring ages as they come and go.
A grandfather clocks towering height
guards the pendulum's swing, left, right.

The clock on the mantelpiece studies life,
the daily routines of husband and wife,
of children and friends who clatter around
quite unaware of its rhythmical sound.

Clock in the kitchen - almost ringing;
bubbling saucepans, kettle singing.
Everything timed, no second wasted;
plates of hot food wait to be tasted.

A travelling clock in the spare room waits
for a guest to arrive. In the hands of the fates
its destiny hangs, and the decision
of when it may once again work with precision.

So all these clocks of which I speak,
each with its character, quite unique,
throughout the house are the guardians of time,
who remind us, to waste it would be a crime!

(Then what am I doing writing this, when I should probably be doing something else?)

Late Edition P.S.

It's 7pm here now, and anybody reading thus far after this time ( or its equivalent elsewhere in the world) please do make sure you read the comment Q has left ... I think you might enjoy it as much as I did!

I Feel Like Dora The Explorer

If this post title leaves you a trifle puzzled, I'm sorry. My smallest granddaughter once initiated me into Dora's cartoon land, and has occasionally waved merchandise under my nose with blatant Dora logos embossed on its various plastic horrors.
You will gather I favour more traditional, less consumer driven toys. However, that's another story.
Although I've never watched the TV programme, from the title, I assume Dora is an intrepid explorer. That's what I've felt like the past couple of days, flitting round Blogland, peeking at various pals latest offerings and reacquainting myself with their goings on.

While visiting one of my longtime favourites at http://weaverofgrass.blogspot.com/, what should I see but a photo of a combine harvester, along with Weaver's delightful Kraken poem. Then, Lo! and Behold! I found http://crystaljigsaw.blogspot.com/ with a green giant of a tractor on the heading banner.

They reminded me of something I wrote back in the days when I trundled up and down the South Coast railway line to work, and often saw combines and tractors busy in the adjacent fields.

Clean Cut

Harvest dust cloud
shrouds barbershop tractor
noisily creating
crew-cut stubble fields.

Heads of ripened corn
stand to attention,
waiting to be cropped.

No blonde tipped stalks
will be left, to weave
magic-movement patterns
under the teasing comb
of a warm summer wind.

Boss Is A Dirty Word

I may have shown who is boss, and enjoyed making Blogland sit on the naughty step for a while, but I now have the feeling I'm being treated to a bit of my own medicine. You see from choice of vocabulary in that phrase, that medical matters are impinging on my consciousness. I think I have been banished to the naughty step belonging to the NHS. I have obviously been remiss for not making more noises to gain their attention before now. Their radar has now registered my presence, and I'm being bombarded by flak from all directions.

This would be a little more encouraging if the gunners got their act together, and concentrated the salvos so they came from a single direction. Sadly, this does not appear to be the case. Our local surgeries have recently undergone major changes - some for better, some for worse, it seems. My GP, who has known my ins-and-outs (!) for more than 35 years, has moved on to more managerial realms. You might think a letter would have been sent, to inform me whose list I would be transferred to, but no. In fact, I only knew of his departure from a friend of mine who had received such a letter.

This did not bode well, once I blipped on the radar screen, as I'm sure you can imagine, and now I'm dodging bullets while trying to establish a rapport with doctors to whom I'm virtually an unknown entity.

My supposedly 'restful holiday' break, has proved to be a whirlwind of to-ing and fro-ing, at the mercy of medics... apart, that is, from a few great days when NZ relations were in my neck of the woods, together with No1 Son, who played chauffeur for them. Son is much improved, I am happy to report, so pills seem to have had the desired effect in his case, at least! Only wish I could say the same about me. But I live in hopes?!

I'd like to say a BIG thank you to all my Blogpals who have left messages during my AWOL act. I make no promises as to frequency of posts for a while, or to regularity of ward rounds among Blogland's lunatic fringes, but will flit like a will o' the wisp as time and inclination dictate. Normal service will be resumed as soon as I begin to feel normal. This could take centuries as, in truth, I have yet to discover how normal feels... I even wonder whether I would recognise it if it bit me on the behind...

Abracadabra

...Or now you see me, now you don't!
I'm relegating Blogland to the naughty step for a couple of weeks, while I ignore its daily screams for attention. Occasionally, one has to show who is boss.

Turning A Blind Eye

Having got my teeth into this subject of animal welfare, I can't let it go just yet.

On the news yesterday, there was a whole family in the UK who have just been prosecuted for keeping over a hundred horses in squalor on their farm in Amersham, even to the point of allowing some of them to die of hunger and thirst in their disgusting stables, then simply leaving them to rot where they fell.

It is unbelievable that neighbours or visitors to the farm didn't call in the RSPCA before things got so bad. How many blinkered human beings looked the other way, instead of making a stand? Even younger members of that family were condoning the atrocious behaviour of their elders by their continued silence. The farmer and his wife had several grown up sons and daughters. They had to have been aware of their father's cruelty, yet they remained silent.

This same silence was being kept by all those people in America, who had to be aware of those poor moneys being treated like human babies ; owners of shops where the doting 'parents' spent a fortune on baby clothes; supermarkets where the check out girls oohed and aahed at the tiny creatures, but made no attempt to call in animal rescue organisations to investigate such abnormal behavior.

Has the world lost all sense of common decency? Hopefully, not Blogland. I urge everyone who reads this post to talk about these animal welfare issues, to bring them to the notice of as many people as possible; to keep a weather eye open for any similar instances of cruelty and to have the courage to make a noise about it, rather than remain silent.

The animals have no choice. They can't speak for themselves. We can speak on their behalf... please do.

Misplaced Affection, Monkey Style.

I've been waiting to blog about this, ever since I watched a documentary a week or so back with a title along the lines of 'My Monkey Baby'. It had to be American, I thought - and it was.
It was hard to believe any country would allow such goings on.

The first story, was of a young couple just setting out to buy their 'baby'. They drove hundreds of miles to pay around four thousand dollars for a tiny, two week old monkey, from a woman who obviously had a thriving business going. Her small, untidy house had an annex with several cages of breeding pairs of monkeys which supplied her with 'stock'. The cages were simple wire enclosures, like crates, and although their inmates were fed and watered, the cruelty of confinement didn't bear thinking about.

The new 'Daddy' had suffered a less than perfect childhood, and never wanted to have a child of his own, so in his early twenties he had a vasectomy. But he soon found he wanted the chance to lavish care and affection on a newborn, and persuaded his partner to go with the 'monkey baby' idea.

Once collected, 'Mummy' secreted the tiny bundle inside her coat, as they checked into a motel for the night. The feeding bottle they were using had a teat designed for a human baby, obviously, and the unfortunate primate had difficulty fitting it into its tiny mouth. It spent the night spread eagled on 'Daddy's' chest, clinging to his T-shirt for dear life.

The next couple were retired. It was the woman's second marriage, after the death of her original husband. They both spoke of 'our daughter' and fed the unfortunate creature, as far as I could see, with a diet of cakes, sugary snacks and lollipops. 'She doesn't like bananas', insisted 'Mama'.
Their wills made provision for the animal to be cared for after their demise - but with the diet they were giving it, I'd imagine it would never reach the 50 year life span it might have attained in the wild.

The third was a 'single parent'. Her own grown up children were no longer in contact with her, so her monkey baby was company, as well as surrogate daughter, now she was a widow. At least she
fed it a reasonable diet, but did spend a fortune on ridiculous, frilly garments she made it wear, changing them several times a day, as though it were a doll, a plaything. Which of course, to her it was.

The last couple had several monkeys, and they had the freedom of the house to wander in, with a large caged area to which they were banished occasionally for 'bad behavior'. They were only subjected to wearing garments when out in public, although nappies were used indoors - until the wearer decided they had enough, and removed the offending article...

With so many children in the world, crying out for love and attention, this misguided 'caring' leaves me speechless...

It's Different

What is? Why, the competition that has been going on over at Angie Ledbetter's Gumbo Writer.
She posted several photos, and had people write 50 words about the one they chose. But then, once the answers were in place, she added a different twist. We were asked to use any of those words from the various answers, to construct a new poem of sorts. I thought this an intriguing exercise, and if you fancy a bit of fun, go read the 50 word answers, and make your own collage from their contents.
Thought I'd let you read my copy and paste job today, to see if you think it makes sense...

Life of Disaster

Far below the spreading sunlight it waits,
the curves are most painful, scrape and burn.
She's waiting, looking out the window
beyond blankets of dirt and canopied leaves -
the disaster my life has become.

Mesmerised by the stillness, I forget
the sunlight filtered through the trees.
Couldn't help but think about grandma,
drowned in memories, saying 'Hurry!'

(You can find Angie at http://angie-ledbetter.blogspot.com)

I'm A Coward

Not the usual kind, I don't think. I faced with equanimity the Doc in her lair this morning; nothing dire showed up as a result of last week's scan, but I am now being propelled into a round of blood tests, gynaecological specialist appointments, and pill popping prescriptions, all of which I can accept with my usual un-flappable sang-froid (apt choice of words, in the circumstances! Think about it , ladies).

No, I'm a coward when it comes to Taxi Drivers. For many years, it has intrigued me how the price between A and B varies, not only between drivers working for the same firm, but also according to whether you are travelling from A to B, or B to A.

Does the road shrink and grow? Are the car tyres of different circumferences and the journey counted in revolutions to calculate price? Either of these theories could explain the discrepancy, but are each as unlikely as the other.

For the five minute ride from my house to the Health Centre, I was charged £2.80 this morning - a pretty average amount, though I have occasionally had a driver charge £2.70 for the same trip in the past few weeks.

The taxi firm I use has been part of the Havant scene since I moved here in 1964, and many of them are so used to me, they tell me where I live...

So the drill goes like this; I ring and book (usually a day in advance) when a Doc's appointment is coming up, and when it's over, and I leave the surgery clasping my bag of goodies to my chest, I give them a call from my mobile, and pretty soon, my chariot awaits - although, come to think of it, in those circumstances I do the 'awaiting' for the chariot. Be that as it may.

Because today, I emerged with a raincoat over one arm, a bulbous bag of goodies, a sheaf of forms and papers plus a hardback book purchased from the surgery which sells second hand ones in aid of a local hospice, using a mobile would have necessitated an extra special balancing act.

I chose the easy option, and used the phone in the vestibule which connects directly to another local cab company - no dialing, no money required. My overloaded left arm could continue balancing with no danger of an avalanche, while my right hand unhooked receiver and placed call. Fine.

Rival cab ( I think of them in this way, as my usual firm have been around longer) duly arrives and whisks me back to my front door. "That's £2.70, love, thank you" says he, as I try to make an elegant an exit as possible. He then begins waffling on about 'not asking passengers he picks up from the Health Centre whether they are Old Age Pensioners, or Disabled, as both options entitle them to reduced fares'. He, apparently, assumes obvious wrinklies will come under one or the other heading, and charges accordingly. OK - that's fine by me, and £2.70 is definitely better than OK. I give him £3.00. He makes absolutely no attempt to give me 30p change.

Coward that I am, I say nothing...

I certainly didn't say 'keep the change', and am left feeling cheated by him, and annoyed at myself. I now feel browbeaten, all over a measly 30p. Does this make me a miser? Or him a bully?

Catching Up

Today has turned out to be just the day for doing that, so forgive me for disappearing until tomorrow...

It's An Age Thing

I was astonished at the number of heartwarming comments that materialised after my Thursday post - So was No.1 Son. I have to share with you all part of the message he sent me yesterday afternoon. You must understand, as I know he reads my every word (and yours too, commenters) I'd sent him an email saying I hope he didn't mind my writing about our current state of less than tranquil being. This was his cracking rejoinder:-

And no I don't mind about the post yesterday (Thursday). Reading through the comments I have to laugh because they make it sound so much worse than things really are. The anti-D's are meant to just to take the edge off things.

Lovely bunch you have found there though, I'm grateful for all the prayers.

Just one thing, last time I checked I was 38 not 39 !!! So be sure to tell sweetmango - should you decide to email her - if she's into distance healing she might miss me by a year!!! :-)

I hadn't realised that I'd managed to age him by a whole year in the comment I'd added to the post myself. How shocking was that? A mum not getting offspring's age correct? Although I have a more than sneaking suspicion it may have been due to my erratic typing, rather than senility, but hey, I get my share of senior moments. However, in my defence, he is as much in his thirty ninth year as I am in my sixty ninth - so I was close...

Rhymeswithplague-Brague managed to come up with what I took to be a mis-quote following my spic-and-span ponderings this week. He mentioned 'bubble and squirt', which I took to be bubble-and-squeak.

Of course this sent me on a Google-hunt. I know UK tradition has it that the dish Bubble-and-squeak uses a medley of vegetables left over from the Sunday roast, but there were lots of other interesting tidbits I uncovered.

Firstly, its fame is apparently mostly confined to England, with only an occasional passing reference in American literature or media. The dish appears not to have spread to the British Empire countries either, possibly due to hotter climate, or simply different taste buds!

A1770 book by one Thomas Bridges, intriguingly entitled 'A burlesque Translation Of Homer' mentioned

We therefore cooked him up a dish of lean bull-beef, with cabbage fry's...
Bubble, they call this dish, with squeak.

The writer pointed out this work would be more at home among the Simpsons, than the Iliad and said, unsurprisingly, that a Fracis Grose was a collaborator in writing it. There was also a book published by them in 1785 - Dictionary of the Vulgar Tongue- which indicated how the dish got its name.

Bubble and Squeak, beef and cabbage fried together. It is so called from its bubbling and squeaking whilst over the fire.

Eventually, probably due to meat shortage after WWII, only vegetables were used, as the Good Housekeeping - Home Encyclopedia of 1951 pointed out.

In rhyming slang, Bubble and Squeak can mean Greek - no doubt a throw back to the first reference found. In 1968 Leila Berg in her book Risinghill:death of a comprehensive school, wrote:-

"Why do they call Greek children Bubbles? said Mr Colinides to me... Later, it dawned on me it was short for bubble-and-squeak rhyming slang.

Rhymeswithplague-Brague has a lot to answer for...

Spick And Span

Having been up since what seems like the crack of dawn this morning, I got to blogging relatively early, so began by seeing who'd popped up on the Blogger Buzz 'recently posted' list. And there was Bernie from On My Own, telling us all about a 'free' cleaning day carried out by what seemed like two cleaning angels. What a thing to win!

Come to think of it, a couple of those would be a welcome round here. I could ask a small one to fly up into the corners of every room on a cobweb/spider hunt, and get them to flick their wings over the top of any dusty cupboards they met on the way.

Another, heftier, taller entity might like to tackle the outside jobs, hovering mid air to trim over-enthusiastic green and growing things with a shiny (golden, perhaps?) pair of secateurs he/she just happened to have amongst their folds of cloudy raiment. That would be after manhandling (would that apply to an angel?) a few pairs of curtains down and into the washing machine...

I wish!

It's easy to see why the words 'spick and span' presented themselves to me as a suitable title for today. But then, naturally I had to hunt out their origins, as much as one may winkle out the truth of such things. This is what I found:-

The noun spick has various meanings, or rather it had various meanings, as it is now rarely used outside of spick and span. These include: a side of bacon, a floret of lavender, a nail or spike, a thatching spar.

Likewise span has, or did have, several meanings, including: the distance from the tip of the thumb to the tip of the little finger, a measure of butter, a fetter or chain, a chip of wood (as the Norse word spann-nyr).

Is there no end to the useless information I inflict on the Blogland collective mind?
Hopefully not.

If a poem should present itself on any of the aforementioned points before the sun is over the yardarm, or the roof top, I'll be back to share it...

Sorry it's a bit late...and not a lot...

Cleaners come and cleaners go,
but where they've been
we always know.

No speck of dust; house spick and span
thanks to elbow grease
and large dust-pan !

Contrasts

Light/dark, fast/slow, thick/thin, up/down, high/low, happy/sad; wherever you look, contrasts are part of life. I found out this morning, after getting ' normal ' results to all the blood tests No.1 Son has just undergone, his doctor has come to the conclusion that he is depressed.

I know in Blogland many people could hold their hands up to be counted among this band of less than happy campers, so I'm sure they will sympathise with him, too. Anyone who feels like joining with me in sending him some uplifting, healing energies, will be greatly appreciated, for I'm sure these have a power all their own.

Any hints or tips as to what a Mum can do in these circumstances, where 'popping in' to see him is not an option, I'd love to hear, especially from anyone with first hand experience. He has always been such a stalwart for others when they've been going through rough patches, that he deserves to have someone fight in his corner for a change!

Any gentlemen reading this post, may wish to retire at this point, before I make them blush.

In the good old tradition of buses (and problematical things!) never coming singly, I've come under the watchful eye of the medical world, too. Although I've pointed out to many health care bods on more than one occasion, that for me 50= menopause was a joke, a non-event. It never happened. Now they are sitting up and taking notice. I've been for blood tests and pelvic scan, and am booked in to see the doc next Monday at the wonderful time of 7.45am for results. As if this wasn't enough, yesterday comes the routine NHS letter about a follow up to the colonoscopy I had last July, when they removed a tiny polyp. Looks like everybody wants a piece of me at the same time.

I hope you will understand why I opted to write a bit of 'life in the raw' today, instead of resorting to ostrich mode, sticking head in sand and composing another laughable episode of poetic diarrhoea. Not that pelvic examinations aren't laughable, eh, ladies?!

Words

I'm often amazed and enchanted by the words that crop up among comments left by folks passing through my Blogland estate. The winner by far, yesterday, was lakeviewer of sixtyfivewhatnow fame, with her glorious offering 'polemic'. Doesn't it roll off the tongue in the most delightful fashion? How I wish I could instantly craft it into a poem! Might take me some time to achieve that, so will hold it in the back of my mind for future reference, perhaps.

I can hear one or two eyebrows being raised, though. Polemic? Is that related to pandemic?
For any wrinkled foreheads out there, here is the delightful offering found on Google:-

"...a polemic text on a topic is often written specifically to dispute or refute a position or theory that is widely viewed to be beyond reproach..."

Don't you just love that 'in a nut shell' explanation? I can think of no greater fun than disputing just about any theory you care to mention. After all, bandying words about theories, gets everyone's grey cells up and running- if only round in circles. What exercise! And occasionally, you may even find another person's opinion brings you to a full stop, as you ponder its validity.
Of such stuff is learning made.

Pouty Lips, of Pouty Baby's Nonsense, had a eureka moment with the word 'lilt' it seems. It's all very well talking about the rhythm of words, but until the mind grasps what that really means, and where it comes from, the words remain no more than words. Pouty admits to reading some of my stuff out loud, and I love her for grasping the fact that it's exactly the way poetry should be experienced, rhyming or not.

I think I will simply send you away today, admonishing you to read out loud for a bit - doesn't really matter what - while you savour the usually un-noticed lilt of the words, letting each one roll of the tongue in delight.

I look forward to hearing any experiences this may have brought forth by tomorrow...

2.15 pm PS - had to add this:-

Pip, Polemic, Pacify,
Frugal, Frumpish, Fortify.
Astral, Ankh, Antimony,
Artful, Angst, Agrimony.

Words are fun, they've got potential
especially when experimental
combinations come to mind -
try some out, see what you find!

Prose Or Poem?

I see Star asked a similar question in her comment on yesterday's post. Must admit, it's one I've often asked myself, and it will probably be interesting to see what answers any of you, my readers, come up with as a result of such a question.

I've already mentioned a correspondence, poetry-writing course I've been working my way through. Among its notes, it advises one to try writing the words down as in an ordinary sentence. If this works, it's probably prose; if not, it's probably a poem. That's the only advice I've ever encountered on the subject. I tend to think, like beauty, it's in the eye of the beholder.

I did say, I was trying to write a 'word picture' with yesterday's lines. They did not simply flow from the pen. I spent quite some time endeavouring to pare down the number of words I used to a bare minimum; to use ones that would give the sharpest image of what I was trying to convey: no unnecessary 'the, and, a,' etc, added at every tiff and turn but serving no real purpose by their inclusion. Although there is no set rhythm, I did bear in mind the lilt of the words I wrote, not something I'm conscious of when setting out to write prose.

In complete contrast, here's a bit of fun that came to be on Sunday afternoon, complete with obligatory rhyme!

Who'd Be A Zookeeper?

Mister McCorkerdale
worked at the zoo.
He loved all the animals -
'cept one - or two.

The first, a white cockatoo
had a strange habit.
He'd hop around Corky's cap,
just like a rabbit.

He'd bounce and he'd jump
while squawking out loud
'Wothcher, old Corky!'
to delight the crowd

who'd paid just to see
this unusual sight.
They'd loudly applaud him
with all of their might.

The second was Ellie,
a young, playful Jumbo,
who thought of McCorkerdale
as a right dumbo.

She'd fill her long trunk
from a pail full of water,
then squirt it at Corky
when she shouldn't aughter!

Today Already?

Obviously, I must have got waterlogged yesterday, if it's taken me 24 hours to drip dry! Howsomedever, as my Bro likes to say every so often ( his vocabulary is extremely large and no doubt used to impress his old Sis) here I am in tomorrow, today, already...Get the picture?

Despite any good intentions I had of returning to blogland to further amaze you with more tales of the unexpected, Sunday had other ideas. It lured me after lunch, to catch up on a few poetry related TV programmes I'd recorded during the week, and they started the cogs and wheels whirring in my mind.

Although I've not lived in Portsmouth since 1964, the picture of some of its more tightly packed areas has changed but little over the years. Houses in the small side roads face directly onto the pavements, and the only sign of change tends to be in the gradual increase of double glazing and UPVC front doors over the intervening years.

I decided to try and write a word picture about them. Here goes...

City Streets

Terraced houses
huddle row by row,
perspective diminishing
to grey pavements'
vanishing point.

Two up, two down,
kitchen added out back,
bathroom tacked on
as an afterthought,
following demolition
of outmoded privies
in minute gardens.

Parts of the old city
time and bombs forgot,
where life continues
despite hardship.

Cars line narrow streets,
parked on side roads
never designed to hold
these effigies of wealth.

Disclaimer

After reading comments left as a result of yesterday's ditty, I've been unable to decide whether or not some people have gone away thinking that I have an extremely odd bunch of relatives...Maybe so, but I would assure everyone, those in the poem were entirely fictitious!

Will now go away to ponder the unintentional effects of my words on blogland, while I wash my hair. Once drip-dried, I shall no doubt be back to overload you with a few more...

Family Favourites?

Visiting

When I visit Auntie Kate,
she takes the biscuits from my plate.

When I visit Grandpa Jones,
he jokes that he might grind my bones!

When I visit Auntie Flo,
she holds my hand and won't let go.

When I visit Cousin Dot,
she says' You'd fit my stewing- pot!'

When I visit Brother James,
he teases me and calls me names.

But if I visit Uncle Jack,
he says 'Be off! And don't come back!'

Friday Fun Poem

A cloud
floats gently by;
fluffy, shape-shifting forms
encouraging dreams which end in
R """"""D
a"""""" r
i """"" o
n"" p
s

I've been trying in vain to make blogger accept the words 'rain drops' as if they were written vertically, with both of them sloping left to right. It worked well until I clicked 'post', then the auto gremlins took over, and the whole effect was ruined. Now I need you to use your imagination, to remove the """"""" in each line, and slope the word 'drops' as my mind envisaged, to run parallel to 'rain'. It would have been effective if I'd managed to persuade blogger to be flexible...

The form started life as a cinquain - five lines, with syllables for them being 2,4,6,8,2 - but my imagination wanted to play with the way the last line was printed and things went haywire....So much for creativity!

Puzzles

Yes, I know the whole of life can be a bit of a puzzle, but that's only if you stop and think about it for too long. If you just get on with living it, you don't have time to be puzzled, I reckon. But I'm really thinking more about those time consuming jig-saws or crossword puzzles - or sudoku, if you are of a mathematical bent. It's often a touch of the 'Marmite Syndrome' - love or hate - that describes a person's attitude to them. I've found, rather than a lukewarm, take-'em-or-leave-'em attitude, a lot of people tip towards one extreme or the other. Either their eyes light up, a pen flies into their hands and the Daily Crossword is under siege in a flash, or they sigh, frown and quickly find a reason to be somewhere else at the very mention of the word puzzle.

If it's jigsaws under scrutiny, the 'for 'em' brigade will get the table cleared and the pieces spread around almost before the crumbs of the last meal have been swept away. The corners (or simply edges, as there are many fiendishly shaped jig-saws around these days) are quickly located and the hunt for matching textures or colours on the squiggly shaped cardboard pieces absorbs their mind completely from that moment on. Concentration rules. Woe betide any swift movement on the part of passers by that manages to waft a delicate piece to the floor...

This grumpy reaction is particularly noticeable if a group of mixed age is endeavouring to achieve a team effort. The smallest, youngest or least dexterous is likely to be ostracised at a very early stage of the proceedings.

I am a sucker for punishment. Not enough for me to enjoy these ready made puzzles which originated in another's mind. No, I revel in the opportunity of self inflicted word puzzles which occur when I try to follow a traditional, poetic rhyme scheme.

I know these days, a lot of poetry tends to be free form, non-rhyming, and there is no doubt many beautiful thoughts and feelings are expressed within its freedom. But the discipline imposed by following a specific form holds this same element of 'puzzle' within my mind. The grey cells need to scurry and search to make language do my bidding. The thrill of the hunt with a finished poem as the only quarry.

Yesterday found me chasing over many hurdles. You've seen the first race result ( thank you RWP for giving me a retrospective boost over one or two jumps). Next on the race card came the Triolet Stakes. The prize would be awarded to the following rhyme scheme:-

A B a A a b A B

Eight lines, with the first, fourth and seventh and the second and eighth repeated verbatim. Not quite as easy as you may think - if you still want the whole thing to make sense! At least there are no restrictions to line length or metre in a Triolet. Here's what I ended up with:-

Concentration

As I try to pen a line
to start the juices flowing,
I hope to capture all in rhyme,
as I try to pen a line -
and fondly hope it won't decline
but keep the verses growing,
as I try to pen a line
to start the juices flowing.

Attics Of The Mind

Our unusually warm weather over the last few days has guaranteed that my thinking processes plummeted to virtual zero. Inspiration suffered under an 82º blanket. By about half past seven in the evening, once the sun moved off the patio doors, I could at least contemplate a quick whizz around Blogland. And what did I find? Many people posting old, faded photographs, many others talking of packing /unpacking boxes, storing parts of their lives, not always quite certain why. Others were telling stories of earlier times, as though they had already unpacked a 'virtual reality' box from the recesses of their minds and were looking at events the same way one might flick through a photograph album.

For some, I think the recollections were almost a way of saying goodbye to the past and looking forward to the future, while with others it made me feel they were holding on to parts of their lives best forgotten. With all these ideas gleaned from minds all over the globe, I thought I might try writing something this morning, while the temperature was a little more conducive to creativity.

It's not often I approach writing in a logical way. I usually get an idea that makes me grab the nearest pen or pencil and scribble frantically, in an almost indecipherable scrawl, to get a string of words down because I like the sound of them, or because I can see where they might lead. But if, like today, I only have a vague idea, then uppermost in my mind it's the rhyme and metre I decide upon first. OK, I would go for iambic pentameter in sonnet form, I thought. Next, I still needed one line to start me off... 'a photograph from childhood, long ago' had a swing to it...
Then the rhyme scheme takes over, and already I'm hunting for a word that will fit with 'ago', and jot down a selection at the side of the page.

Because of the almost nostalgic and and sometimes regretful tone of some of those Blogland posts I'd read, I wanted to capture that mood in the poem that was under construction. This is where the attic of my mind began unloading it's own dusty boxes, as I searched for words or feelings that would combine into a cohesive whole. Half an hour with the pencil got me as far as eight lines, and I transferred to the computer, where it's easier to move things around quickly. At that point, the beginning was 'A photograph...', but seeing the onscreen version, I wanted more lines before this point. It wasn't long before I had decided what they should be, so here it is folks, open to criticism. At least you will know how it came into being...

Voyage Of Discovery

Another box; a dusty treasure trove
of keepsakes hoarded over many years:
a trinket: letter: token of old love
forgotten, washed away by gentle tears:
a photograph from childhood, long ago,
where memory's encapsulated shades
of black and white, now faded, serve to show
in frozen movement, youthful escapades
among imagined fantasies galore.
Oh, then we could be masters of our fate,
before we knew what life may hold in store,
before we realised, it's soon too late
to captain yet another ship. We sail
against prevailing wind to no avail.