Tag: dVerse

When I’m among Music and Kindly Books

When I’m among music that holds me late
Dawdling through dance delights
I dream of a firelit inglenook
With candles burning straight
A yellow blaze of lights
Of glowing stars and kindly books

With living pictures in the gloom
A woman’s heart turns back from stone
Liberated in that small cozy room
Heartbeats start again as imagination is seen and sewn

As if I’m alone in garden nights
With elm trees nodding at my thoughts
In my mind’s eye I see these sights
Like inkblots over crowded nightspots

©RedCat

I really should be going to bed. Instead I could not keep myself from writing. For weeks now comparative literature has kept me mired in lyric poetry. From Sapfo to the postmodernist, without having any time to write all that they inspire in me. So this prompt just lit a spark that refused to be ignored.

Poetics at dVerse tonight is called, Dead Poets Society. Our gracious host mentions a BBC Maestro poetry course, written by Carol Ann Duffy. Who she quotes: 

“dead poets speak to us across time through their poems,
and they particularly speak to other poets”,
adding “who often choose to respond across time”.

The task is to read three poems, choose one, and respond to it. My writing itch was tickled by – When I’m among a Blaze of Lights by Siegfried Sassoon 1886 (Matfield, Kent) – 1967 (Heytesbury, Wiltshire)

Sassoon photographed in 1915 by George Charles Beresford found on Wikipedia

Image credits:
Photo by Taylor Wright on Unsplash
Photo by Emil Widlund on Unsplash

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Drowning Bibliophile

This is an unusual feeling for a bibliophile
Usually piles of them make me smile
But now it feels like I’m drowning in books
Astray in a quagmire, kept on tethering hooks

Discombobulated, bewildered and confused
Trying to expound and elucidate ancient literature
Learning to unravel the ineffable mystery
To fathom allegories and tropes of poetry

Oh, the surprises
awaiting those following the path of civilizations sunrises
Oh, the sorrow
when advised to disavow love like Trumbull’s sparrow
Oh, the disgust
when you feel words and language are nothing to trust
Oh, the fear
when you imagine raping Zeus or avenging Furies are near
Oh, the joy
to dream yourself on Lesbos or in Troy

Such is the power of thoughtfully chosen words and rhythmic rhymes
To be read and remembered for all of time

©RedCat

An attempt to capture the elation, confusion and disquiet of myself and several of my classmates embarking on the adventure of Comparative Literature.

Image credits:

Photo by Eugenio Mazzone on Unsplash
Photo by Vasily Ledovsky on Unsplash
Photo by Annie Spratt on Unsplash

Also shared to tonight’s OpenLinkNight #345 at dVerse.

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The Midsummer Queen

The midsummer Queen
Stands proud and strong
Ready to lead the night’s dance
Ready to give her revelers the chance
To realize where their heart belongs

The midsummer sky
Invitingly deep and softly blue
Companion through the unprecedented night
Companion lending souls its light
Teaching the love, every heart is due

The midsummer sky
Lends insight and opens the mind’s eye
Revealing that which was hidden
Revealing no true love is ever forbidden

The midsummer Queen
Pleased with her fey touched children seems
Happy they still come to her
Happy they by her magic are stirred
Vowing to let her guide them to their dreams

©RedCat

It’s that time of year, where magic seems possible, somewhere near. Making heart and soul buzz with creative energy. Making pens fly speedily over paper. Leaving stories in their wake. Demanding to be let out or keep one through the night awake.

Shared to and read live at the second installment of OLN #341 over at dVerse.

Image credits:

Image 1: Picture of my homemade Maypole. By ©RedCat
Image 2: Vivien Leigh as Titania from A Midsummer Night’s Dream, 1937. Photo by J W Debenham.
Image 3: Oberon, Titania and Puck with Fairies Dancing. From William Shakespeare’s A Midsummer Night’s Dream by William Blake. William Blake, Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons.

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Two Lucia Poems – 13 December (Re-post)

Photo by Vidar Nordli-Mathisen on Unsplash

Re-post comment:

As you might have noticed I’m lagging behind on writing Advent Calendar poems so today you get a double re-post of two poems with the the Swedish tradition around Saint Lucia. Both poems are from 2019.

Saint Lucia

(2019 Re-post)

Walters Art Museum [Public domain]

Fair maiden
come to rekindle the light
Hymn signing
sung to heavens delight
Not a word sung
about your saintly fight
As a woman
with your own goal in sight
Condemned by men
to suffering without respite
To write your praises
my hopes reignite

© REDCAT
Claudia Gründer [CC BY-SA 3.0]

All trough childhood and adolescence I where one of those girls that sang like the angels in Lucia processions. In Sweden it’s all about upcoming midwinter and celebrating the returning light. Also the protestant church don’t have saints so the real symbolism of the story of Saint Lucia of Syracuse has gotten lost along the way.

Also posted to OpenLinkNight #256 at dVerse. Which is why this poem is in the dVerse form of a Quadrille – a poem of 44 words, not counting the titel.

Kolforn (Wikimedia) [CC BY-SA 4.0]

Cold Moon

(2019 Re-post)

Preparations for the last full moon abounds
Where we let the Midwinter darkness fall
Then light return with a fair singing maiden
Her clear voice and it’s adoration turns our eyes upon the star
It’s light compelling us to contemplate
the birth-death-rebirth of the fisher king
Yearly reminder to shed the old and start anew

© REDCAT
Image Source

Where I grew up. A several hundreds year old small, pre-steam industrial-mining-farm-wood-lakes town. Folklore still ran deep even in the 1980s.

“The tradition of Lussevaka – to stay awake through the Lussinatt to guard oneself and the household against evil, has found a modern form through throwing parties until daybreak. ”
– Wikipedia

As a teenager and young adult, no real adult found a problem with us staying out late at discos and parties. As long as some of us (nearly, girls only) also showed up in the early morning hours, clear eyed and sweet voiced to carry lights in our hair or hands singing hymns to Lucia and Light re-born.

So, I grew up with Lucia vigil. It’s a tradition dating back to when Lucia occurred on midwinter, the origin might be somewhere in the pre-christian era, but it is known from the 15th and 16th century. Meaning before Sweden switched to the Gregorian calendar in 1753.

As Midwinter is the opposite point of the year from Midsummer the veil between the worlds where thin, and you kept vigil to keep harmful spirits away and to celebrate and greet the light of a new year in form of a fair singing maiden with light in her hair.

Written for Kerry’s prompt on Real Toads ~ Art FLASH! / 55 in December.
55 words without the title.
Read my first contribution to this double feature prompt here.

Photo by Anne Nygård on Unsplash
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Surrender Sky-clad to the Moon – 6 December (2020 Re-post)

To melt and be like a running brook that sings its melody to the night

On Love – Kahlil Gibran

Surrender sky-clad to the Moon
Heal, love, rest, grow, bathed in her glow
Soul singing her clear silver tune
Surrender sky-clad to the Moon
Accept the Goddess given boon
Love that will never cease to flow
Surrender sky-clad to the Moon
Heal, love, rest, grow, bathed in her glow

©RedCat

Re-post comment:

I have friends who actually go bathing outside all year round. Which makes me cold by just thinking about it. So does imagining dancing sky-clad to the moon in this freezing cold. So with a shiver and a laugh. This is tonight’s advent calendar post. :-)

Kahlil Gibran is a favorite of mine, so the Epigraph was easy to choose. The Triolet is a 8 line Octave form I tried before. As in Sit, waiting, longing, only you and Make Art – Triolet inspired by Neil Gaiman and Chris Riddell.

Image credits:

First image: Photo by samer daboul from Pexels
Second image: Photo by Fabian Reitmeier from Pexels
Third image: Photo by Joel & Jasmin Førestbird on Unsplash

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Demon From The Depths Of Hell – A Sonnet

To a demon risen from the depths of hell
I would like to compare thee
But no words really lend themselves to tell
What you did and how it affected me

How you left me wounded, scarred and branded
Tell how you stole my energy and life
Though you pass as human undetected
You smothered all my passion, strength and drive

You can live freely and never be condemned
Never have to stand accused of abuse
As many monsters you will be forgotten
Whereas I am seen as weird and twisted

As a perpetrator you will remain unknown
Until the day I as a poet become known

©RedCat

I wrote the first version of this sonnet in Swedish as part of an assignment for one of my creative writing classes about a week ago. Then I decided it was worth trying to translate it. The original has a strict rhyme scheme and lines alternating between hendecasyllable and pentameter. The translation however does not, as I decided the content was more important than the form or rhyming. So there are some rhyming lines and some unrhymed. The lines vary between seven and twelve syllables.

Still I’m happy with finally translating a text from one of my classes and proud of this version and its content. Tonight I will read it on Open Link LIVE – November Edition at dVerse.

Image credits:

First image: Photo by Matthew Ball on Unsplash
Second image: Photo by Patrick Hendry on Unsplash
Third image: Photo by Jr Korpa on Unsplash

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Giant hogweed (2019 Re-post)

Taller than grown men
silent reminder
of human folly

One look at you
one whiff of scent
declares intent

This land your domain
roots spread foundation
seeds spread your vanguard

To combat your growth
we must don armour
One touch might burn us

Arm ourselves for
axes will fell your
sturdy stems like trunks

Poisonous sap flow
burns skin in sunlight
blisters and blackens

Down but dangerous
still lying in wait
Second growth or seeds

Wait for guerrilla
warfare without end
Generations feud

We teach our children
to heed the danger
to combat your spread

Write history books
declaring lack of
knowledge led us here

Still we change Nature
before learning of
her intricate ways

©REDCAT

Re-post comment:

I’ve been struggling all day with writing a song.
Keeping every line between five to eight syllables long.
So this poem came to mind for tonight’s
Wandering the Archives Wednesday.

The Return Of The Giant Hogweed by Genesis

Written for Kim’s prompt at dVerse ~ Poetics: Sylvia and Ted. Where we’re asked to write about growing, multiplying, invasive species. As well as try to emulate style of one of the poets.

I decided upon the challenge to keep my line short, with five syllables in each like Sylvia Plath’s Mushroom. It took some editing, but eventually I got there. But boy, do my inner saboteurs have a field day every time I decide to say I actually can do something that connects with writing. Just as they did when I decided to make a new translation of one of Edith Södergran’s poems.
Even though I actually have paid bills working as a freelance translator.

As yesterday’s Haibun challenge showed me how much harder I have with counting syllables in English than my native Swedish. This time I put most words trough a syllable counter I found online.

Wikipedia informed me that this weed too have at least one song to it’s honor.

Image Credits:

First image: Wiki Commons

Second image: By Ronnie Robertson, CC BY-SA 2.0 https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/2.0, via Wikimedia Commons

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Your Touch Lingers – A Quadrille

In the cool moonlight
The warmth of your touch
In my mind
Lingers

The memory of your kiss
Makes my lips
Tingle

Remembering how our bodies moved
And our passion
Intermingled

All through the night
Until both were too exhausted to lift
A finger

© RedCat

It’s a beautiful full moon tonight!

Written for tonight’s Quarille prompt, Let’s Linger, over at dVerse.

Read other Quadrilles by me here.

Image credits:

First image: Photo by Brandon Morgan on Unsplash

Second image: Photo by Constantin Popp on Unsplash

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