Thursday, October 4, 2012

hurry up please it's time

It's National Poetry Day, and I have made a tiny, six-line poem out of all the moon writing I did yesterday and ditched any reference to the moon.  So it goes. 

There used to be a game I played: write a line of something you would call poetry.  People would usually come up with something lyrical, and quite often there would be moon in the line, or a rose.  The next task was to write a line of something that was not poetry, more difficult than it sounds because anything can be poetry, and poetry can be prosaic.  A line such as, I go to Tesco's to buy my petrol does not announce itself as poetry, especially with the inclusion of a well-known supermarket chain.  Substituting one word (I go to Tesco's to buy my dreams) changes everything.  Makes it sound as though it might be poetry, even if it isn't.

"Everyone's on Twitter cos Facebook's shitter" (one I spotted today) gets points because it rhymes.

Hurry up please it's time - from T.S. Eliot's Wasteland.  Even standing alone it's good.


maria jastrzebska said...

great ideas!

Anna MR said...

I go to Him to buy my petrol ?

Reading the Signs said...

Maria, I always liked writing games :)

Do you, Anna? Who He?

Anna MR said...

I tried to see if it would still be a poem if the petrol remained.


Reading the Signs said...

I go to the stars to buy my petrol.

Anna MR said...

Okay - we never doubted it, but this proves beyond any shadow of anything that you are A True Poet.


Reading the Signs said...

- but tell that to the Poetry Police!

not the poetry police said...

Poetry police schmolice.

"No statue was ever erected for a critic."

~ Jean Sibelius