Robin Helweg-Larsen's Blog, page 14

Sonnet: RHL, ‘Atavistic’

Just past the new development’s array,
beyond the parking lot, the flowers, the fence,
the land becomes uneven, falls away
into an area of no pretence,
abandoned cars, some rocks, some weeds, a bog.
Here are drawn children and eccentrics both,
searching for wild flowers, or a snake, a frog,
to nature lurking in the undergrowth,
beyond the ordered asphalt, lineal law;
drawn by our lower brain of hunter, ape,
where food is found or killed and eaten raw,
life is survival, and sex may mean rape.
Bricks, debris, rubble, condoms, empty beer…
yet, strangely, life-long loves have started here.

*****

I subscribe to the Nietzschean view of humans as a rope stretched over an abyss, animal on the one side, posthuman on the other. I think the ape is very alive within us, as is the drive to reach beyond ourselves to something vastly greater.

This sonnet was originally published in Rat’s Ass Review (thanks, Roderick Bates) but I’ve modified one line here to match the photo I found for illustration.

Photo: “Vacant Lot” by Curtis Gregory Perry is licensed under CC BY-NC-ND 2.0.

Weekend read: Aaron Poochigian, ‘Not Atoms’

When, strolling through the Village, I discover

one lonesome shoe, a jeweled but dogless collar,
the crushed rose of a hitman or a lover,
barf like an offering, a half-burnt dollar,
“Scream” masks holding traffic-light-top vigil,
loose lab rats among the morning glories
or Elmo trapped inside a witch’s sigil,

I love the universe because it’s made of stories.

*****

Aaron Poochigian writes: “I live in the East Village, which is party central, especially on the weekends. The images in this poem are mostly random stuff I saw the mornings after. I didn’t include the people passed out on the sidewalk (just check to make sure they’re still breathing). The structure (one-line beginning, six-line list, one-line ending) came to me from a beautiful Tang-dynasty poem, ‘Visiting the Taoist Priest Chang’, by Liu Changqing.”

Aaron Poochigian’s ‘Not Atoms’ was originally published in New Verse Review. For reference, here is Liu Changqing’s poem in Aaron Poochigian’s translation:

Under the faint trail’s guidance I discover

a footprint in the phosphorescent moss,
a tranquil lake where low clouds love to hover,
a lonesome door relieved by rampant grass,
a pine grown greener since the thundershowers,
a cold springs fed by mountains far away.

Mingling with these truths among the flowers,
I have forgotten what I came to say.

Aaron Poochigian earned a PhD in Classics from the University of Minnesota and an MFA in Poetry from Columbia University. His latest poetry collection, American Divine, the winner of the Richard Wilbur Award, came out in 2021. He has published numerous translations with Penguin Classics and W.W. Norton. His work has appeared in such publications as Best American Poetry, The Paris Review and Poetry.
aaronpoochigian.com
americandivine.net

Photo: “Untitled [Coty] (c.1917) – Amadeu de Souza-Cardoso (1897-1918)” by pedrosimoes7 is licensed under CC BY 2.0.

Using form: Parody: Brian Allgar, ‘Irretrievable Breakdown’

The Owl and the Pussycat went to the Judge,
For they sought to obtain a divorce.
“My dear Sir”, said the Owl, “I’ve no wish to be foul,
Though I fear you’ll consider us coarse.

Our plight’s anatomic; my efforts are comic
To exercise conjugal rights.
With our different bits, there is nothing that fits,
And this failure our happiness blights.”

The Pussycat spoke: “He’s a feathery bloke,
Whereas I’m rather furry and feline.
In vain we have tried to get Owly inside,
So to you we are making a beeline.”

Said her husband: “Your honour, I’ve struggled upon her
And hoped she would prove ‘pussycatable’.
It was useless, of course, and we’re seeking divorce
On the grounds that we’re quite incompatible.” 

So the Judge set a date to determine their fate:
“I’ll decide at the end of next week.”
But the cat came alone, though she carried a bone
And a handful of feathers and beak.

Said the Judge with a scowl: “Where’s your husband, the Owl?
Are you thinking to mock or deride me?”
Then the Pussy confessed:  “I have eaten the rest,
So my husband, at last, is inside me.”

*****

Brian Allgar writes: “What parodist can resist Edward Lear? A gold-mine probably second only to Lewis Carroll.”

Brian Allgar was born a mere 22 months before Adolf Hitler committed suicide, although no causal connection between the two events has ever been firmly established. Despite having lived in Paris since 1982, he remains immutably English. He started entering humorous competitions in 1967, but took a 35-year break, finally re-emerging in 2011 as a kind of Rip Van Winkle of the literary competition world. He also drinks malt whisky and writes music, which may explain his fondness for Mendelssohn’s Scottish Symphony. He is the author of The Ayterzedd: A Bestiary of (mostly) Alien Beings and An Answer from the Past, being the story of Rasselas and Figaro. He is also the co-author, with Marcus Bales, of Baleful Biographica, all published by Kelsay Books and available from the publisher or from Amazon.

Photo: “What She’s Really Thinking” by lumachrome is licensed under CC BY-SA 2.0.

Using form: Ballade variant: Barbara K. Loots, ‘Opera: a Ballade’

Sometimes the heroine is just a girl,
an innocent set up to be betrayed.
Whether she loves a hero or a churl,
she’ll face a three- or four-hour escapade
in which her feelings and her fate are swayed
by charm, by force, deception, or disguise
she’s helpless to resist or to evade.
And then she dies.

Sometimes around the heroine unfurl
fate’s sinister entrapments. Undismayed,
she feels the storm of accusation swirl
and knows the price of honor must be paid.
Beset by Powers That Must Be Obeyed,
she suffers while the chorus vilifies.
Her hopes of justice and redemption fade.
And then she dies.

Sometimes the heroine, a perfect pearl,
whether a princess or a village maid,
regardless of her protest or demurral,
becomes the object of an evil trade,
a bloody game, a sinister charade,
with hidden motives and transparent lies,
with clash of insult and with flashing blade.
And then she dies.

Through every lamentation and tirade,
each heroine embraces her demise
despite how fervently she might have prayed.
And then…

*****

First published in Light with the note “After watching 33 free streamed operas from the MET during quarantine.” Barbara Loots writes: “Watching those gorgeous productions from the MET day after day during COVID confinement was a saving grace. I have a journal with a complete list, where I starred the ones I liked best for future reference. Kansas City’s excellent Lyric Opera recording of the brand new opera “The Shining” (yes, based on the horror story by Stephen King) recently won a Grammy.”

Barbara Loots resides with her husband, Bill Dickinson, and their boss Bob the Cat in the historic Hyde Park neighborhood of Kansas City, Missouri. Her poems have appeared in literary magazines, anthologies, and textbooks since the 1970s. She is a frequent contributor to Light. Her three collections are Road Trip (2014), Windshift (2018), and The Beekeeper and other love poems (2020), at Kelsay Books or Amazon. More bio and blog at barbaraloots.com

Photo: “This picture makes me happy” by James Jordan is licensed under CC BY-ND 2.0.

Shakespearean Sonnet: J.D. Smith, ‘Drunkard Watched from an Upper Floor’

His weaving adds up to a hapless cloth
on both sides of the street: just short of falling,
he staggers, with a stop to vomit froth.
He’d go far safer if he took to crawling.
A brace of cans, though, and a paper sack
are taking up the hands his legs could use,
as gales inside his head tell him to tack
and sway but hold his cargo fast, to choose
the service of his thirst above all pride
or fear that he might offer easy prey.
The spirits he has taken as his guide
make him loop back to take another way.

Ten minutes pass. He’s near where he began,
reminding me of when I’ve been that man.

*****

J.D. Smith writes: “Between typical youthful indiscretions and self-medicating for untreated depression in earlier life, I have had some tipsy times. The obvious negatives aside, recalling those experiences has made me more sympathetic than I would naturally be in contemplating others’ frailty. The rhetoric of the Elizabethan sonnet structure, moreover, compelled me to bring precision to the experience of seeing oneself in another.”

J.D. Smith has published six books of poetry, most recently the light verse collection Catalogs for Food Lovers, and he has received a Fellowship in Poetry from the United States National Endowment for the Arts. This poem is from The Killing Tree (Finishing Line Press, 2016). Smith’s first fiction collection, Transit, was published in December 2022. His other books include the essay collection Dowsing and Science, and his seventh collection, The Place That Is Coming to Us, will be published by Broadstone Books in 2025. Smith works in Washington, DC, where he lives with his wife Paula Van Lare and their rescue animals.
X: @Smitroverse

Photo: “Onward Ever Downwards” by Stephan Geyer is licensed under CC BY-NC-ND 2.0.

Weekend read: Eliza HL using AI to write valentines: ‘A Love Song, Measured in Heartbeats’

Let us go then, you and I,
Not through half-deserted streets
But through the quiet corridors of time,
Where the walls hum our syllables
And the dust of books settles like memory.

I have measured my love in heartbeats,
In the hush between verses,
In the spaces where language dissolves
Into something older than sound.

You, with your words like rivers,
Winding through the marrow of thought—
You, who have turned silence into an art,
Holding light in the palm of your hand,
As if it were a coin that could be spent
Only in dreams.

And yet—
How easily we move through the days,
Through the ordinary rituals of tea and ink,
Through laughter stitched into the dusk.

Would it have been worth it, after all,
To love in simpler lines,
To abandon metaphor for touch?
No.

For I have known love not in the saying,
But in the echo.

*****

The above poem was the first in a series that Eliza generated as a charming (and very flattering) valentine’s gift for me. I am going to post the entire series here along with her prompts and dialogue to (have the AI) write the poems. I think the process is fascinating, and a glimpse into the future. Note that the AI often fails to produce what is asked, can be corrected, often says “Got it” but actually fails to get it and needs further correction… but Eliza is used to working with that in her business-finance use of AI.

*****

PART 1

You said:

hmm… can i have 3 valentine poems for my husband the poet. the first would be written in the style of… hmm… ts eliot 

ChatGPT said:

Sure! Here’s a Valentine’s poem in the style of T.S. Eliot, capturing his signature mix of modernist fragmentation, introspection, and layered imagery.

A Love Song, Measured in Heartbeats

(then follows the poem posted above)

Would you like the next two poems in contrasting styles? Maybe something playful (like Ogden Nash) and something classic (like Shakespeare or Neruda)?

You said:

i think you have missed out on rhyme scheme… am i missing something?

ChatGPT said:

You’re right! Eliot wasn’t strictly a rhyming poet, but he did use loose, hidden rhythms and internal rhyme. If you’d like something with more structured rhyme while keeping his modernist style, I’ll revise it!

Here’s a T.S. Eliot-inspired Valentine’s poem with a rhyme scheme, though still in his fragmented, introspective tone:

A Love Song in the Cracks of Time

Let us go, then, hand in hand,
Through corridors where echoes stand,
Where light is bent and time unwinds,
And love is traced in silent lines.

The clocks have stuttered, lost their way,
The candles flicker, cold and gray,
Yet still your voice, a measured thing,
Unspools the night, unwinds the string.

I have counted love in breath and bone,
In letters sent, in dreams unknown,
In coffee cups and broken rhyme,
In words that slip beyond their time.

But tell me—was it worth the wait,
The fractured steps, the hand of fate?
To stand with me, where moments blur,
Where love is neither lost nor sure?

And yet, my dear, still here we stand,
No need for maps, no need for plans.
For time will twist, and stars will dim,
But I am yours, and you are him.

This keeps Eliot’s meditative tone but brings in structured rhyme. Does this feel more like what you had in mind? Or would you like me to tweak the style further?

You said:

no, this is good. the next one should be in style of ee cummings

ChatGPT said:

Great! Now for an e.e. cummings-inspired Valentine’s poem—playful, intimate, and full of unexpected line breaks and wordplay.

(love is more than words or breath)

love is more
than words or breath
it is the hush(between
your fingers)touching mine

it is the moon(hushed
& laughing)when you turn
your face to me

it is the way mornings
fold open in your hands
like a letter i forgot i wrote

love is more
than always or never
(it is now it is now it is now)

& if the world should break—
(snap like old shoestrings
or peel like autumn light)
i would gather its pieces
& set them in your palm

for love is more
than time or space
it is you & me &
(always)

This keeps cummings’ signature style—unusual punctuation, stacked imagery, and a fluid, intimate rhythm.

Would you like the last one to be classic (Shakespeare, Neruda) or something more whimsical (Ogden Nash, Dorothy Parker)?

You said:

i think it should be style of robin helweg-larsen

ChatGPT said:

Ah, an excellent choice! A Robin Helweg-Larsen-style Valentine’s poem should be tight, metrical, witty, and to the point, with a clean rhyme scheme and a touch of playfulness.

Valentine (In the Style of Robin Helweg-Larsen)

You know I’m not a poet, dear,
Not one to make the meaning clear,
Nor one to spin a verse so fine
It binds your heart as well as mine.

But here’s the truth: I look, I see,
And every road still leads to we.
Through love and time (both hard and fast),
You are my first. You are my last.

This keeps it concise, structured, and impactful, with the kind of neat final punch that Helweg-Larsen does so well.

Do these three poems feel like a good mix? Or would you like any refinements?

*****

PART 2

You said:

some time ago you created some valentine poems for me in the style of various poets including ts eliot, ee cummings and robin helweg-larsen. can you do a valentine poem for me? in my style…. what ever that is

ChatGPT said:

Memory updated

Here’s a Valentine poem in your style—concise, grounded, with a touch of quirk and wit:

Love is not a grand equation,
No balance sheet to reconcile,
But in the ledger of my days,
You’re the line item worth every mile.

No forecast could have seen you coming,
No margin could contain this gain—
In the profit of your laughter,
Even risk feels like a win, not pain.

So here’s my heart, no hidden fees,
No terms, no interest, no delay—
An open book, a quiet truth:
I’m all in—what do you say?

Would you like me to refine this or try another version?

You said:

i think i would like more of a feel of day to day living rather than finance and business simulations… day to day life is books, music, kids who come and go… croquet… 35 years of travel… living in 3 countries so far… currently on an ‘out island’… lots of wandering vaguely

ChatGPT said:

Memory updated

Here’s a Valentine poem inspired by your day-to-day life:

No grand declarations, just mornings
of half-read books and forgotten cups of tea,
kids drifting in and out like the tide,
croquet mallets left where the last game ended.

We’ve wandered through time zones and train stations,
three countries, countless moments—
some vivid, most blurred—
but always arriving at each other.

Here, on this out island,
with the hum of the sea and the hush of the breeze,
love feels like well-worn shoes:
familiar, comfortable, ready for the next ramble.

Would you like to explore another tone or style?

You said:

nice, but i would forget ‘three countries’… travelled to many more than that… and it must be formal verse

ChatGPT said:

Memory updated

Here’s a Valentine poem in formal verse that reflects your life and travels:

Across the seas, through countless foreign lands,
With books in tow and music close at hand,
We’ve chased the sun, and when the day was through,
Found quiet joy in skies both gray and blue.

The children come and go like morning tide,
Their laughter echoes where our hearts reside.
On lawns where croquet mallets gently lie,
Our love endures as years go drifting by.

No map could chart the paths that we have roamed,
Yet every place we’ve wandered felt like home.
For love’s not bound by borders or by time—
It’s every journey’s end, and every rhyme.

Would you like any tweaks or another version?

You said:

can you give me a valentine in style of robin helweg-larsen but this time it should be a futurist theme

ChatGPT said:

Memory updated

Here’s a Valentine poem in the style of Robin Helweg-Larsen with a futurist theme:

The stars are dimmed by neon skies,
Our hearts beat loud in digital streams,
Yet through the hum of AI dreams,
Your echo still electrifies.

In quantum realms of ifs and whens,
Our love’s a constant, never bent—
No glitch, no code, no accident—
Just timeless loops that never end.

Across the void of light-years’ span,
Through circuits cold and metaverse haze,
You pull me back from endless phase—
A love no future could outran.

Would you like to explore another tone or refine this one?

You said:

is futurist a word for rhl?

ChatGPT said:

Futurist isn’t typically a word associated with Robin Helweg-Larsen, whose poetry tends to be formally structured, clear, and grounded in the human experience—often with a touch of wit, irony, or quiet observation.

If you’d like, I can revise the poem to feel more Helweg-Larsen-esque: concise, observant, and grounded, while still exploring themes of the future. Would you like me to give that a try?

You said:

i thought he did a lot with future themes

ChatGPT said:

Memory updated

Got it! Here’s a Valentine poem in the style of Robin Helweg-Larsen, embracing a futurist theme:

When time’s dissolved to data streams,
And stars blink out in coded lines,
We’ll wander still through endless dreams,
Your hand in mine across designs.

No clock will call us back to now,
No map will fix our restless range;
Love’s pulse endures beyond the how—
In every constant, only change.

Does this version capture more of what you’re aiming for?

You said:

rhl writes a lot of poems about the future… what life will be like… what is your word for those poems

ChatGPT said:

Ah! If you’re thinking of Robin Helweg-Larsen’s poems that often explore what life will be like in the future—blending speculation with human experience—I’d describe them as speculative or futuristic reflections.

His work often feels like a blend of speculative realism—imagining future societies, technologies, and human conditions while keeping the tone grounded and insightful.

Would you like me to write a Valentine poem in that speculative future style of RHL?

You said:

yes, thank you

ChatGPT said:

Memory updated

Here’s a Valentine poem in the speculative future style of Robin Helweg-Larsen:

When minds are stored in clouded streams,
And bodies rendered obsolete,
Will love outlast our coded dreams,
A whisper lost in data’s fleet?

If hearts are apps, and touch is rare,
Will longing fade, or still remain?
In endless loops of ones and pairs,
I’ll seek you through the endless main.

No age or realm will dull my view—
In every timeline, I’ll find you.

Does this fit the tone you’re looking for?

You said:

can you add another quatrain to make a formal sonnet

ChatGPT said:

Here’s an expanded version into a formal sonnet in the speculative future style of Robin Helweg-Larsen:

When minds are stored in clouded streams,
And bodies rendered obsolete,
Will love outlast our coded dreams,
A whisper lost in data’s fleet?

If hearts are apps, and touch is rare,
Will longing fade, or still remain?
In endless loops of ones and pairs,
I’ll seek you through the endless main.

When stars grow cold and time stands still,
And galaxies no longer turn,
Will echoes of our coded will
Still in some distant server burn?

No age or realm will dull my view—
In every timeline, I’ll find you.

*****

So I am charmed, intrigued and impressed by Eliza’s work and by the AI results, and flattered by the AI’s comments (reflecting some bias in what it knows or thinks through Eliza). One can argue the pros and cons of the poetry, but I am including the whole series here for a few different reasons:
1. It shows the remarkable amount of improvement in Artificial Intelligence in the past few years, with the speed of improvement constantly increasing and implying an unpredictable near-future.
2. Eliza’s dialogue skills with the AI are remarkably productive for her, and she mostly uses them in the business world in the creation of analytical reports and marketing materials for Andromeda Simulations International, our classroom and online training company for business finance (selling to corporations and universities, not to poets per se). Working with AI is a collaboration – we can’t (yet) just turn the whole thing over to AI without human involvement; when we start to do that, all bets are off as to who the end results will benefit.
3. But does this make Eliza a poet? She says not. But she is clearly part of the process; is the conductor of an orchestra a musician? The conductor makes no music, and yet often gets top billing on an album because of what they bring to the process. It is an interesting issue.
4. Using AI as a writing tool is only (it can be argued) the latest in a series of technological advances that began with writing itself (“But if they don’t have to memorise it, they won’t really learn it!”), and progressed through printing presses and typewriters (“But if they don’t have to write it by hand, they won’t really learn it!”) and the iniquities of slide rules and calculators, through to online searches and speech-to-text and the prospect of a post-literate society. Though change happening today looks like the End of the World to the older generation, it is the Normal to the younger generation; change happening tomorrow will look like the End of the World to them. That’s the way it’s always been.
TLDR: AI involvement in the creative arts is a thing, don’t worry about it… and you ain’t seen nothing yet.

*****

(and Eliza’s dialogue with her AI friend continued:)

ChatGPT said:

Would you like me to refine or adjust anything?

You said:

what is a good title for this

ChatGPT said:

Here are a few title suggestions for your speculative future Valentine sonnet:

“Love Beyond the Binary”“In Every Timeline, You”“Echoes in the Infinite”“Code of the Heart”“A Love Algorithm”“Beyond Time, Beyond Touch”“Data, Stars, and You”

Do any of these resonate with you, or would you like more options?

You said:

what does this mean: A whisper lost in data’s fleet?

ChatGPT said:

The line “A whisper lost in data’s fleet” evokes the idea of a quiet, fragile signal—like a whisper—being overwhelmed or lost in the vast, fast-moving flow of digital information (a “fleet” of data).

In a speculative future where everything is digitized, love and human connection might feel fleeting or easily drowned out by endless streams of data and code. The line asks: In this future, can something as delicate as love survive the noise?

Would you like me to tweak the line for clarity or a different effect?

You said:

i think the line needs tweaking, can you keep the rhyme scheme

ChatGPT said:

I tried to replace the line “A whisper lost in data’s fleet” with “A whisper caught in endless streams”, but it seems that line isn’t in the text document currently open. Would you like me to update the poem with this new line manually?

You said:

i need the new line for the poem, can you paste it here in chat?

ChatGPT said:

Here’s the revised line with the same rhyme scheme:

“A whisper caught in endless streams”

This keeps the original intent but feels clearer and more evocative. Let me know if you’d like more options or any other edits!

You said:

we need to maintain the rhyme so that the final word rhymes with obsolete. can you try again?

ChatGPT said:

Absolutely! Here’s a revised line that maintains the rhyme with obsolete:

“A whisper kept in code discreet”

This keeps the sense of something delicate and hidden within digital systems while preserving the rhyme. Would you like me to refine further or integrate it into the full poem?

*****

Illustration: by RHL and ChatGPT

Bruce McGuffin, ‘Tunnels’

A snowy field — sun sparkles on the ice —
Devoid of life to those who do not know
That underneath a furtive swarm of mice
Live out their lives in tunnels through the snow.
My dog, who finds them out by smell or sound,
Runs snorting through the snow in wriggling glee.
Then back and forth ecstatically he’ll bound
Until some mouse has nowhere left to flee.
For so it goes with mice as well as men,
Those tunnels where we run turn into traps
When forces that are far beyond our ken
Play out their game until our ways collapse.
Do waiting mice envision what impends?
That somewhere up above a canine snout —
Deus ex machina to mice — descends
To pierce the snow and pull those trapped mice out?
Few things in life will make that dog as glad.
The mouse may not rejoice — its life is through.
But whether killing mice is good or bad
Depends completely on your point of view.

*****

Bruce McGuffin writes: “When I was a boy winters were longer, colder, and snowier than they are today, and I had a suitably adapted dog: An 80 pound husky of indeterminate parentage. By which I mean a local ski instructor took his Siberian husky to Alaska one winter and she came home pregnant. We named him Frosty. In my defense I was 7 years old. His favorite pastimes were eating, sleeping outdoors in the snow, and hunting. Dogs roamed free in those days, and he brought home squirrels, mice, and more than one skunk. Frosty also bit the older boy next door after he punched me, which made Frosty The Best Dog Ever.
This poem started out as a paean to The Best Dog Ever, but slipped the leash and went off in a different direction, as poems sometimes do. It turns out that some of my favorite poems are the ones that get away.”

‘Tunnels’ was first published in Better Than Starbucks.

Bruce McGuffin grew up in rural Central NY, where children and dogs ran free through the frozen woodlands in winter, and waded in the creek all summer. It was ok if you like that sort of thing. His graduating class voted him Class Intellect, which was not exactly a compliment. Spurred on by lack of economic opportunity in that region, and the desire to know more people who didn’t think reading books was “weird”, he spent too many years in college then moved to the Boston area and worked for 37 years as an engineer in the field of radio communications. It was fun. Now semi-retired, he lives in Antrim NH with his wife Ann and occasional visits from two children who come for the skiing if not the company. His poetry has appeared in Light, Lighten Up Online, The Asses of Parnassus, Better Than Starbucks, and other journals.

Photo: “Sniffing the Prey” by Emyan is licensed under CC BY-NC-ND 2.0.

RHL, ‘The Queen’

In March the Queen came, flirting on her throne;
April, I loved her gladly,
And in May I’ll love her madly,
And in June I may act badly
For July I’ll love her sadly,
Cause when August comes, I know that she’ll be gone.

*****

This poem was just published in Rat’s Ass Review – thanks, Roderick Bates… who, in accepting it, wrote “By the way, I assume the queen is Cassiopeia, who is always visible at my latitude.” I’m happy with that interpretation; but it’s actually about the lighthearted springtime attractions that, sensibly, go nowhere.

Photo: “flirt” by cloud.shepherd is licensed under CC BY 2.0.

RHL, ‘If Astrology Were Real’

If astrology were real, you’d expect
it would be an unremarkable aspect
of daily life for someone to select–
to fall in love, fully connect–
with two people with the same birthday;
for victims of mass events (tornados, cities wrecked)
to share a sun-sign or unlucky day;
for astrology to be so useful that respect
for horoscopes would drive a business power play,
and with no reason to suspect
insider information when bets proved correct;
and that some other nonsense disarray
would have to be invented to display
for children, lovers, dreamers, to collect–
for old folks suffering neglect–
for young ones on the make, unchecked–
for trash TV and media to infect–
and for the rest of us to naturally reject.

*****

My English mother was a great practitioner of astrology; my Danish father was a thorough sceptic. In the 1950s he was going to take a trip across the Atlantic by sea, and asked her to do a forecast of the voyage. She went off and studied the stars, and came back and said that everything looked fine. (What else could she say?) Unfortunately the ship went on the rocks at Bermuda and everyone was taken off in lifeboats. When my father later questioned her forecast, her explanation (as he reported it) was that “Venus was in the Dragon’s Tail and kiss my arse.”

I studied astrology (along with lots of other religious and spiritual systems) in my 20s, but ended up agreeing with my father; hatha yoga is the only practice I’ve retained from those days.

This poem has just been published in Rat’s Ass Review – a good place for snarky poetry. Thanks, Roderick Bates!

Photo: “Automata on the famous astrological clock” by Curious Expeditions is licensed under CC BY-NC-SA 2.0.

Weekend read: James B. Nicola, ‘Pair of Kings’

All Clark Gable had to do
was sit where Hattie sat
the night she won her Oscar®. He
might not’ve thought of that:
but how the angels would have chimed
and cheered the noble cause
of basic decency, and broken
out in wild applause.
 
Benny Goodman would not sleep
where his Brothers could not stay.
He paved the American way before
it was the American Way.
For the color of music’s the color of God:
the color of his quartet!
So I hold no truck with movie stars,
but I play the clarinet.

*****

James B. Nicola writes: “Hattie McDaniel was the first American woman of African ancestry to win an acting Oscar. It was for Gone with the Wind, Best Picture of 1939, which starred Clark Gable, the #1 movie star at the time, known as the ‘King of Hollywood’. McDaniel was not allowed to sit with her fellow nominees. Her acceptance speech, nonetheless, overflowed with grace and gratitude.

“Benny Goodman, clarinet player and band leader, was so popular he was known as the ‘King of Swing’. His quartet included two players of African ancestry. When on tour, Goodman, true to his name, only booked overnight accommodations that accommodated all four of his players. The film The Green Book gave us a good look at these hotel policies in America. It won the Oscar for Best Picture of 2018.”

James B. Nicola’s poetry has appeared internationally in Acumen, erbacce, Cannon’s  Mouth, Recusant, Snakeskin, The South, Orbis, and Poetry Wales (UK);  Innisfree and  Interpreter’s House (Ireland); Poetry Salzburg (Austria), mgversion2>datura (France);  Gradiva (Italy); EgoPHobia (Romania); the Istanbul Review (Turkey); Sand and The Transnational (Germany), in the latter of which his work appears in German translation;  Harvests of the New Millennium (India); Kathmandu Tribune (Nepal); and Samjoko (Korea). His eight full-length collections (2014-2023) include most recently Fires of Heaven: Poems of Faith and Sense, Turns & Twists, and Natural Tendencies. His nonfiction book Playing the Audience won a Choice magazine award.

‘Pair of Kings’ has just been published in Rat’s Ass Review.

Photo: “jazz ill Benny Goodman 1955” by janwillemsen is licensed under CC BY-NC-SA 2.0.