Tuesday, April 02, 2013

#(#*%^# Haiku, and also Poems 20, 21, 22, and 23 and they are sexy!

Did you  hear that the New York Times is celebrating April as Poetry Month by starting a haiku Tumblr?

No, I won't link to it because #(@&# haiku and #(#&$ Tumblr, too.

Here's some sexy poems:



Hot Actress: Evangeline Lilly
Arts & Sciences

  by Philip Appleman


"Everyone carries around in the back of
his mind the wreck of a thing he calls
his education." —Stephen Leacock

SOLID GEOMETRY Here's a nice thought we can save: The luckiest thing about sex Is: you happen to be so concave In the very same place I'm convex. BOTANY Your thighs always blossomed like orchids, You had rose hips when we danced, But the question that always baffled me was: How can I get into those plants? ECONOMICS Diversification's a virtue, And as one of its multiple facets, when we're merging, it really won't hurt you To share your disposable assets. GEOGRAPHY Russian you would be deplorable, But your Lapland is simply Andorrable So my Hungary fantasy understands Why I can't keep my hands off your Netherlands. LIT. SURVEY Alexander composed like the Pope, Swift was of course never tardy, And my Longfellow's Wildest hope Is to find you right next to my Hardy. PHYSICS If E is how eager I am for you, And m is your marvelous body, And c means the caring I plan for you, Then E = Magna Cum Laude. MUSIC APPRECIATION You're my favorite tune, my symphony, So please do me this favor: Don't ever change, not even a hemi- Demi-semiquaver. ART APPRECIATION King Arthur, betrayed by Sir Lancelot, Blamed the poets who'd praised him, and spake: "That knight's nights are in the Queen's pantsalot, So from now on your art's for Art's sake." ABSTRACT EXPRESSIONISM I couldn’t do Goyas or Grecos, And my Rembrandts had zero panache, But after I junked all my brushes, My canvases made quite a splash. PHILOSOPHY 1. Blaise Pascal Pascal, reflecting tearfully On our wars for the Holy Pigeon, Said, "Alas, we do evil most cheerfully When we do it for religion." 2. René Descartes The unruly dactyls and anapests Were thumping their wild dithyrambic When Descartes with a scowl very sternly stressed: "I think, therefore iambic!" 3. Thomas Hobbes Better at thinking than loving, He deserved his wife's retort: On their wedding night, she told him, "Tom, That was nasty, brutish – and short!"

*****************************************************************

That's actually how it's written! Just like that: a paragraph.  And yet it rhymes! And it's not a stupid haiku which stupid everyone stupidly thinks they can write.

5-7-5, about nature, BINGO! It's a poem.  I hate to be like the Neil DeGrasse Tyson of poetry -- Tyson regularly and systematically attempts to take people's enjoyment of science away from them in order to prove how smart (and unlikable) he is -- but haiku is worse than free verse.

Seriously.

I would rather get mugged by a bunch of poetry slam beatniks than read a single haiku.

Here's another sexy poem:


Hot Actor: Christopher Meloni
The Elephant is Slow to Mate

  by D. H. Lawrence
The elephant, the huge old beast,
     is slow to mate;
he finds a female, they show no haste
     they wait

for the sympathy in their vast shy hearts
     slowly, slowly to rouse
as they loiter along the river-beds
     and drink and browse

and dash in panic through the brake
     of forest with the herd,
and sleep in massive silence, and wake
     together, without a word.

So slowly the great hot elephant hearts
     grow full of desire,
and the great beasts mate in secret at last,
     hiding their fire.

Oldest they are and the wisest of beasts
     so they know at last
how to wait for the loneliest of feasts
     for the full repast.

They do not snatch, they do not tear;
     their massive blood
moves as the moon-tides, near, more near
     till they touch in flood.

****************************************************************

And Tumblr? Everything on Tumblr is such a one-note joke that by now, simply saying "Tumblr" means that the joke has gotten old.

Try it:

"I put on Tumblr...nevermind, I'm already bored with it."

Here's a third sexy poem:


Couple Sharing a Peach

  by Molly Peacock
Hot Actress: Kelly Carlson

It's not the first time
we've bitten into a peach.
But now at the same time
it splits--half for each.
Our "then" is inside its "now,"
its halved pit unfleshed--

what was refreshed.
Two happinesses unfold
from one joy, folioed.
In a hotel room
our moment lies
with its ode inside,
a red tinge,
with a hinge.

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So DO NOT celebrate April is Poetry month with some crappy haiku about jerks.  Read REAL poems.  I've already posted 23 of them.  There's more everywhere.  Read something that takes some effort and actually attempts to convey a thought -- a thought more complex than "I can string together 17 syllables that sound profound."

Here's the fourth sexy poem:




The Hug

by Thom Gunn

Hot Actor: Ryan Reynolds
It was your birthday, we had drunk and dined
    Half of the night with our old friend
        Who'd showed us in the end
    To a bed I reached in one drunk stride.
        Already I lay snug,
And drowsy with the wine dozed on one side.

I dozed, I slept. My sleep broke on a hug,
        Suddenly, from behind,
In which the full lengths of our bodies pressed:
        Your instep to my heel,
    My shoulder-blades against your chest.
    It was not sex, but I could feel
    The whole strength of your body set,
           Or braced, to mine,
        And locking me to you
    As if we were still twenty-two
    When our grand passion had not yet
        Become familial.
    My quick sleep had deleted all
    Of intervening time and place.
        I only knew
The stay of your secure firm dry embrace.

3 comments:

PT Dilloway said...

I'm celebrating poetry month by not reading or writing any poems.

I never did get around to trying to write a haiku for my avatar, Butler Blue 2, on his retirement. I'll try one now:

O Butler Blue 2
Happy Retirement to you
From Grumpy Bulldog

So yes that's how easy haikus are. Probably pisses off all those old samurai who used to put real thought into theirs to see their artform become a total joke.

Michael Offutt, Phantom Reader said...

@Patrick: Haikus are not a total joke. There was a lot of contemplation and drinking of sake involved while men discussed the meanings behind words. It was used to be social.

Briane said...

Social or not, Michael, the form has gotten so debased that it has less meaning than a limerick. At least those take some skill. Most people nowadays don't know a haiku from a senryu.

PT: I assume your decision to force me to read a haiku after my rant is to keep up your grumpy persona. But getting sentimental over a bulldog belies the impression you hope to make.