Tag: Challenge

To the Snake, Anon

~ qbit ~ 30 Comments

My reply to Jilly’s reply to the Denise Levertov poem, “To the Snake“. Full text in-line below.

 

To the Snake, Anon

Eat thine own tail, Ouroboros!
As I must eat my tale
and know we began only to end infinity,
leaving just our stories forever
twined, wrapped, twisted
as the caduceus we made in the forest,
our bower of staff and wings.

Would you shed me so easily?
Do you not taste of your venom?
Your lie forks your tongue
that such pleasure was not love,
the brush of our skin immortal.

My garden flowered with too much joy;
I cannot regret now
what I will bear alone.

 

The Snake’s Keening
by Jilly

Bright Girl, when you plucked me from
the grass and round your neck I hung
felt your seering warmth
and whispered in your ear the secrets
of a serpent’s curse
the weight of sin and shame I bare
wounded in your ears —

Bright Girl — I swore to my scaled children that certainly
you were sinless! But truly
I had no hope of ever passing your heel, only desire
and be held by you, for that thrill,
which bereft
of guilt, as the grass closed
behind me, and you with that dark
assurance in your eyes,
I shall never share.

 

To the Snake
by Denise Levertov

Green Snake, when I hung you round my neck
and stroked your cold, pulsing throat
as you hissed to me, glinting
arrowy gold scales, and I felt
the weight of you on my shoulders,
and the whispering silver of your dryness
sounded close at my ears —

Green Snake–I swore to my companions that certainly
you were harmless! But truly
I had no certainty, and no hope, only desiring
to hold you, for that joy,
which left
a long wake of pleasure, as the leaves moved
and you faded into the pattern
of grass and shadows, and I returned
smiling and haunted, to a dark morning.

Renga Challenge – We Were Wanton

~ qbit ~ 4 Comments

“Human teeth contain a kind of poison, for they dim the brightness of a mirror when bared in front of it and also kill the fledglings of pigeons.” – Pliny The Elder, “Natural History” 79 CE

So feckless to smile at birds along the river,
Of course we knew that we were wanton

[Your couplet…]

[Repeat 5x]

 

 

Administration, Thoughts, Plots, Plans &tc:

Proposed as a Renga of unstructured couplets for two people, but certainly fun if folks want to do one with more people, although then we’d probably want 20 couplets instead of 10.

I’m hoping that by keeping each writer to two lines, our push/pull on each other stays strong, but leaves enough room to develop a new idea, pivot, etc.

PLEASE SIGN UP IN THE COMMENTS BELOW, and we will work out logistics and kick off the working versions in another post.

Group Renga for Jilly’s November Casting Bricks Challenge

More background and thoughts on Regna: here.

Renga Challenge – Swan Dive

~ qbit ~ 23 Comments

Our swan meets Nikki Papandreou,
The Greek Olympic diver

[Your couplet…]

[Repeat 5x]

 

Administration, Thoughts, Plots, Plans &tc:

Proposed as a Renga of unstructured couplets for two people, but certainly fun if folks want to do one with more people, although then we’d probably want 20 couplets instead of 10.

I’m hoping that by keeping each writer to two lines, our push/pull on each other stays strong, but leaves enough room to develop a new idea, pivot, etc.

PLEASE SIGN UP IN THE COMMENTS BELOW, and we will work out logistics and kick off the working versions in another post.

Group Renga for Jilly’s October Casting Bricks Challenge

More background and thoughts on Regna: here.

Renga Challenge – Raccoon Bones

~ qbit ~ 19 Comments

Raccoon bones
Litter the rocks

[Your couplet…]

[Repeat 5x]

 

Administration, Thoughts, Plots, Plans &tc:

OK, I think this is a Renga of unstructured couplets for two people, but certainly fun if folks want to do one with more people, although then we’d probably want 20 couplets instead of 10.

I’m hoping that by keeping each writer to two lines, our push/pull on each other stays strong, but leaves enough room to develop a new idea, pivot, etc.

PLEASE SIGN UP IN THE COMMENTS BELOW, and we will work out logistics and kick off the working version in another post.

This is another attempt at a group Renga, part of Jilly’s September Casting Bricks Challenge.

More background and thoughts on Regna: here.

 

 

Renga – Jumpstart

~ qbit ~ Leave a comment

“28 Days of Unreason, Day 29…”
– Jilly & Co.

Frog and hare on edge,
Foxtail sways, old pond’s shadows –
Jump or not to jump?

[You’re Next! – 7 Syllables]
[7 – syllables]

[Repeat 5/7/5  7/7]

 

Administration, Thoughts, Plots, Plans &tc:

OK, this is my attempt at a group Renga, part of Jilly’s September Casting Bricks Challenge.  Some background and basics on how I think this might work are here.

The “theme” or prompt is the quote on top.

This collaboration is 2+ person Renga in a lightly traditional 5/7/5, 7/7 (repeat) format.  Target of  12 stanzas. By lightly, I mean no need to stick with the specifications for Renga that go down to the line level (although nobody would stop you).  Feel free to use nature as a springboard (or not), use season words if so inspired. Let’s go for the most interesting, completed poem more than worry about anything else until we get better at it.  Down the road we can try for tighter rules, fewer rules, or no rules, or all in combination at once!

Jilly, Charley, Madaket and I will do a test run of the above challenge to shake out how this will all work using blogging tools.  But if people are interested, sign up in the comments below and either we can kick off the same theme/starter lines in a new Renga with others, or we can start something new, or invent your own. I suspect that it will take a bit of coordination and planning between the authors to kick one of these off, so let’s use the comments to sort all that out, then launch the actual collaboration post.

Here is the basic theory of operation: writers will copy their next stanza in the comments.  Probably best to include the line you are pivoting from.  Then the “owner” of the post will move them up to the top, so there is a nicely formatted version when done.

If anybody has other ideas or experience with all of this, please don’t be shy.  We have no idea what we are doing, which is really great. Uncertainty at its best.