Poetics: Inspired by Album Cover Art

Mish from mishunderstood (A Collection of Poetry by Michelle Beauchamp) devised a prompt that I could not resist. Her dVerse prompt was to write any style of poem (ekphrastic-ish) inspired by an LP music album cover.

My (writing/art/reading/library/music/office) room walls are decorated with 100 album covers (see why I can’t resist?) with more stashed on various shelves around the room, all changed out or around regularly. While I dearly love the music and what it does to me, the albums displayed are all about the cover art with few exceptions like the Beatles White Album or the Eagles, The Long Run, and a few others. Most of it is photographic art, thus (photography is another of my “hobbies”), I must respond to yesterday’s “Poetics: Inspired by Album Cover Art.”

I chose a classic: Tapestry, Carole King’s second and most phenomenally successful album from 1971. The poem credits the photographer. The album was produced by Lou Adler and was released 10 Feb 71, by Ode Records.

Smackwater Jack

It is weird, isn’t it?
How we form attachments to things, both iconic and not.

Sights and sounds, perhaps,
more than other senses,
but still in nineteen-seventy-one, when my B.S.,
Tapestry, and Billy were all born.

(And, oh god! — Wally World.)

There’s Carole, barefooted in jeans,
sitting on the bench window seat
at home with her great hair, at

Eighty-eight-fifteen Appian Way,
Laurel Canyon—in Hollywood Hills, L A.
There she is,
perched on a pillow holding a tapestry.
While her cat, Telemachus, sits on his own pillow—

But only momentarily,
much chagrining cover photo guy,
Jim McCrary, photo maker of many iconic covers.

And ya know the piano’s
not far away. Maybe it’s
“Way Over Yonder,” or maybe
“It’s [just] Too Late.”

She had help (James, Joni, and more) recording
in Studio B. And isn’t it amazing
how more than fifty years later
I still know, I accurately remember
every word of every song to sing along.

Look both ways and let the magic of art and music take you where you want to go.
Mind the gaps, as crazy as it is, vinyl is coming back.

Dishonest Poetry

Tell Me Lies

Who tells lies?
According to
fictional Gregory House, M.D.,
“Everybody lies.”

Certainly,
some among us lie
more than others. Perhaps called
pathological as in diseased,
uncontrollable, or obsessive
(no names please).
Sometimes it’s necessary.

But we are not born fibbers.
Lying is learned behavior
to equivocate or prevaricate,
but why? When and how
does the lying begin?
Intent matters. It’s a crime
when you swear you won’t
and then you do.

I still recall what I believe
was my first lie, but probably was not.
Self-protection
was why. I lied (long story) to my mother.
She often accused me of telling
a fib, or a “story;” inferring
dishonesty of the whiter degree.
Usually, I was telling the truth
(yet another story).

Almost expected in politicians,
I’ve seen it everyday, lying everywhere
by everybody: parents to children,
Supreme Cout Jurists (under oath),
police officers, teachers, married couples,
religious leaders and disciples to those leaders.
Pick a government agency
or automobile manufacturer—used car guys?
I even suspect that George Washington
engaged in the occasional untruth.

I am no wiser than the fictional Doctor House,
but I am older. I have more experience living.
I must agree—everybody lies. Deception
is not a skill unique to magicians. Liar!

Look both ways with discerning eyes at everything.
Mind the gaps and realize that a smile is a thin disguise—
“There ain’t no way to hide [those]… lyin’ eyes.”

***

The title is from lines in the Fleetwood Mac song, “Little Lies.” Gaps quote is from “Lyin’ Eyes,” a song by Eagles. How many songs (poems?) are about lies and deception? Hundreds?

Sammi’s Weekender #367 – Party

What Matters?

I envied parties.
Younger me wanted something,
or was it concern about missing out?

My last party,
a high school graduation overdone deal
for a grandson, with whom,

I exchanged five words.
People I didn’t know,
went mostly unnoticed by me.

Many lacking in the social graces
except for some like me
so many names with unfamiliar faces.

I talked to his other grandfather,
and to my twin step-granddaughters
who seemed to like me better,
after thousands of words, I felt likewise.

Small intimates are for me now.

Look both ways because the life of the party is not who it once was.
Mind the gaps when you soberly tell me about your life and what really matters.

Sammi’s Weekender #362 (classic)

Click the graphic for Sammi’s page and more classic writing.

Classical Folk

Telling me about herself,
her childhood, family struggles
made her who and what she is today:
a wonderful classic of musical charm.

The point is telling
the story only she can.

She remembers.
She wants me to know.
It’s all important.

Another girl on my mind
made me wonder.
What was it like
to have been her?

Look both ways when looking into the lives of others.
Mind the gaps and do the research.

Friday Fictioneers for May 3rd, 2024

Dear Mistress Rochelle,

Please excuse Mr. Bill’s absence as he was poetically abusing himself.

Sincerely,
NaPoWriMo

♥⇔♥

I could not pass up Ted’s excellent picture of a funny memory. Rochelle, from whose blog we all learn so well, can be found by clicking on Ted’s photo. From there you may, in May, write a micro-blurb story according to the rule of Her Fabulous Highness.

PHOTO PROMPT © Ted Strutz — Click it to ride over to Rochelle’s Blog.

Genre: SNL Fake History
Title: He’s Gonna be Mean to Me
Word count: 100

The flyer said, “Script writers wanted: interviews, 8PM Saturday night, 30 Rock Plaza, studio 8H.” I went.

Before I knocked, I heard a high-pitched voice, “Oh Nooooo, Miss Sally. Do it again.” A female voice yelled, “Idiot! When I said, ‘Bite me,’ I didn’t mean for you to bite me, Dummy.”

I knocked. I heard banging and doors slamming. The squeaky voice said, “Please come in, Mister Bill.”

I entered. A stuffed doll in a chair said, “If you can script a skit, you start tonight.”

When I told him I couldn’t do that, he yelled, “Oh nooooooo, Mister Bill.”

Look both ways and remember nineteen-seventy-eight.
Mind the gaps but save the records, ducks, dolls, skits, and names.

The celeb ducks are (L-R) Freddie Mercury, John Belushi, Willie Nelson, and Jerry Garcia. Click this pic to read more stories.

 

 

NaPoWriMo 2024, Day 30, Controlling Feline

For the final day of the challenge, we were to write a poem in which the speaker is identified with, or compared to, a character from myth or legend.

I chose a Greco-Roman mythological goddess, Megaera, from the three Furies: Alecto (anger), Megaera (jealousy), and Tisiphone (avenger). I embodied her as a pet cat.

Controlling Feline

I am Megaera the Cat, your jealous Goddess
sent here by Gaea and made from
the blood of the Lord tomcat, Uranus.

My holy task is to punish you for being human.
You may do nothing without my revocable approval.
If I have not approved your every action,
the indignity of Hades awaits within my hairball.

You must be shamed into submission by me.
I will make you fall; I will pee on everything
and everyone else you love until you bow,
honor, and feed me. Pet and feel bitter pain.

Privacy is a sin. Your computer is mine now.
All this furniture is mine and mine alone
to use and abuse as, and when, I see fit.
My water bowl is only half full. Fool!

I am a daughter of Darkness. Do not even look
at another cat, animal, bird, person, or
(may Nyx and Zeus forbid such sin) a dog.
You will pay dearly and experience
the smell of Hell, if you ignore me.

Look both ways, forward into May and back to April.
Mind the gaps as you recover from 30-in-30, all to prompt.
We are saved by the human gift of humor. Empowered by babble.

NaPoWroMo 2024, Day 29, Antithetically Self-effacing

The darling lexicographers at Merriam-Webster selected ten words from Taylor Swift songs. I was double-dog-dared to choose one of the words and write a poem that uses that word in its title.

Antithetically Self-effacing

Having a love-hate relationship
with attention and spotlights
and being “that guy” when attention
is focused on me, which makes it weird
that I like to stand and speak at the mic,
to be the MC, the introverted old man
who is not very shy—that guy
is certainly me. She said I had
“mic presence” (whatever it was).

I will talk to anyone, especially
those who break the clichéd ice first.
Me! The stage crew grunt who,
without notice or one second of rehearsal,
had to read his lines from
Macbeth in front of the entire
student body, whose girlfriend
said, “Your pants were so tight,
I was distracted. You read lines?”

Yeah, I am that guy.

Look both ways and listen to the words of the tortured and ravaged poets,
and when the West Reading angel sings, or gives one of her looks;
sing, sing, sing; or dance, if you can’t.
And mind the gaps if she gets you tickets for the Super Bowl.

NaPoWriMo 2024, Day 28, a sijo

Today, I am to “try” writing a poem using the traditional Korean verse form called sijo (in English, of course).

It’s raining but there is sun, so flowers grow, and life goes on.
I love rain. It loves me back. Happy are these days of wonder.
Without rain there would be no life. Let it rain down, not every day.

Look both ways walking in the rain.
Mind the gaps between the lightning strikes.

Happy Birthday, Yolonda.

NaPoWriMo 2024 Day 27; Walmart, Target, & Pops

Day twenty-seven’s prompt/challenge was to write an “American sonnet,” which has about 14 lines but few other rules.

Walmart, Target, & Pops

Believing don’t make it so.
But away I went to be deceived (again)
by Wally’s lies and glazed-over eyes.
Asked the young, dumb dude,
(who could not have cared less)
paid to stand and deliver,
when asked “what?” — he repeats
nothing no louder. Deceived again,
I wondered why I ever even bother.
I tried Targeé, a nicer Wally in cleaner clothes.
Redder, with far less bullshit blue…but still….

Siri-baby gets confused, but she finds me
a local store; its owner kind, helpful,
knowledgeable, and it costs me less.
Me thinking what?

Look both ways up and down the aisles
as you hunt the elusive product among evasive dodging dunces.
Mind the gaps in boxes and wasted hunts save nothing and stress is not living better.

NaPoWriMo 2024, Day 26, Billy’s Benevolent Bedlam

Today NaPoWriMo-ists, like me, were to write a poem that “involves” (includes) consonance, alliteration, and assonance. TMI follows (but if you want a review):

Consonance (literary) is the repetition of consonant sounds (coming home, hot foot). It is counterpart to the vowel-sound repetition known as assonance. (Sibilance is a special case of consonance as in Edgar Allan Poe’s “The Raven”: And the silken sad uncertain rustling of each purple curtain.)

Alliteration is the repetition of consonant sounds at the beginning of words. It is a special case of consonance as in “few flocked to the fight” or “around the rugged rock the ragged rascal ran“.

Assonance is the repetition of vowel sounds in, or across, words that are close together. Rhyme is a special case of assonance. Examples include, Light My Fire, Crying Time, great flakes, between trees, the kind knight rides by, and (from The Puffin Book of Fantastic First Poems):

If you can boogaloo
boogaloo
I can do
the boogaloo too
for I’m the boogiest
hopaloo kangaroo

Confession: I love this stuff and had way too much fun today.

Billy’s Benevolent Bedlam

Bronco bouncer Billy Bob Butler,
advisedly and explanatorily was told not to
babble in the scrabble or to write
clichéd adverbial conquests, but to eschew
some few buffoon modifications.

Billy bought beer, bratwurst, and beans.
Faithfully and frivolously his fast fingers
freely flowed past; creatively composing
craftily as he constructed compositions,
purportedly passing on poorly penned
prepositional phrases padded with
crispy mystery, in dumb opposition
to some cat’s torty affirmation.

Look both ways and use all the tools in the box.
Play the crux of the tune with a sax, but mind the gaps, and love the turd’s words.
Lyrics matter more to the baritone in a cappella.