Pattern Language
She can’t push herself far enough
….. to see. O futile bed clothes:
get up, grind beans, make a pot
The pattern is there, under foot
…..pieces of crumpled fabric, rags
braided into mountain ranges
Proof that beauty is revealed
….. 30,000 feet above and serpentine
threaded rivers are silvered tinctures
She fondles clear water as if it were
….. a bath drawn by a new lover
purses her lips to form a silent chant
These days dreams are turbulent
….. flight paths through thunderstorms
she’d capitulate, but lightning releases
The ions that remind her of days
….. when horses wore elephants’ caparisons
covered with deities rather than armor
Tiny glitches rip like strained seams
….. they doff their surface, expose subcutaneous
tissue of a sapient being framing her day
* * *
Well! This poems uses a strange mix of words. And isn’t that the point? To use words that one wouldn’t have thought of themselves, and let them make the poem?
I used all the original Big Tent Poetry Wordle words: purse, crumple, pattern, futile, doff, caparison, proof, capitulate, fondle, tincture, sapient and glitch. Caparison was the most challenging, I think. I ended up searching for caparison “images” and that enriched the images, in my head at least. J
I started with “pattern” as the general idea, and did some free writing about what that can mean. A nod to A Pattern Language by Christopher Alexander, although this poem doesn’t really reflect the planning ideas in it.
Find other poems here, at Big Tent Poetry!
Related posts:
Deb, you managed to build some wonderful images with the words -as “Tiny glitches rip like strained seams” which is my favorite.
Deb, you made a beautiful poem! What a good poet you are!
You do have some wonderful images in this. I had never seen a Wordle before and didn’t really get the idea of putting the words together in interesting ways in the poem itself–just picked one word that struck me. I guess the point of having a whole week is to go back and work on the poem (duh). Yours really is beautifully done.
what a wonderful poem you’ve made from all those words. i agree with Joyce, you are a great poet. have a great weekend.
WooHoo = this one sings, sings. Offers a gorgeous pattern.
Really well done.
This is fine, Deb. Ozone
Deb
This is superb
get up, grind beans, make a pot
now I want coffee
Pamela
Thank you, everyone!!
I’m still catching up reading everyone else’s. But I appreciate your comments so very much! And will hope to reply personally, soon.
xxoo
Yes, this is very nice indeed, Deb and I especially like the lines:
“serpentine
threaded rivers are silvered tinctures
She fondles clear water as if it were
….. a bath drawn by a new lover”
That last is particularly evocative!
Even before I saw Derrick’s comment, I thought, wow, this image is great: She fondles clear water as if it were….. a bath drawn by a new lover. I had to double the sentiment. Excellent poem.
Deb, you are a master of the wordie.
So many beautiful images. This is
a favorite:
She fondles clear water as if it were
….. a bath drawn by a new lover
purses her lips to form a silent chant
And, thanks for all you do for Big Tent!
This is excellent Deb. You really must enter the wordle competition next time!
Fantastic! I used to think I wasn’t being “original” if I wrote to a prompt, but now I can see that everyone’s responses to a prompt are wonderfully, originally themselves.
You turn a daily routine into an intensely visual experience.
This helps me figure out how to do a “wordle,” which I’ve never done before. I think I see your mind at work, stretching a word around a new situation as if you had a limited, if interesting, vocabulary, just a few precious coins in your pocket. I love the effect.
It’s also interesting to read several of these wordles in a row, to see what the same words are doing in several poems. It’s like seeing new sides of old friends.
What I most love about this delicately limned poem is the sense of a mythically rich world surrounding the poet, emerging from her imagination. What she wakes to with her coffee, like being in a warm house with exotic trees and windows with no glass somewhere in Bangkok, or Ho Chi Min, or high in the mountains of Nepal. Images of a sensual and rich culture emerge all about her. And through the day this rich inner world, a remembrance of a time when everything was animated with spirit, remain like “tiny glitches” “rips” in the fabric of her life.
Your poem, its precise images, their flow, is clear like water.
A brilliant weaving of wordles in “Pattern Language.”
Ah, made it to your poem. I can relate to the inability to push, the futility, the patterns. The “silvered tinctures of rivers immediately shot me 30,000 feet in the air, where I was viewing your world from a jet. Whoosh! Thank heavens I already had my coffee.
Wonderful, Deb — thanks!
this is wonderful: “as if it were ….. a bath drawn by a new lover.”
This is beautiful, such wonderful images.
My favorite visuals (and there are quite a few good ones) were the rags and rivers. Her daydreams are quite amazing too.
Very nice. Love the 1st line and the idea of how hard it can be to see. How we need, sometimes, to be pushed.