Ahah!* An excuse comes to mind!

The reason for the lack of work is that it is my Research Month. A Research Month is something that happens to me three of four times a year, wherein I discover a topic that amuses/intrigues/titillates me and go and read about it for a month or two. Come to think about it, Research Month is rather misleading, maybe it should be re-named Research Month(s).

This Research Month is on Norse mythology. This was an unfortunate choice, however, as to understand the mythology of the Norse, I found I had to understand the Anglo-Saxons, and to understand the Anglo-Saxons I have to understand the Celts. Ok, so that explained May. Then we go on to find out that to understand the myths we need to understand the way they lived, the effects of conquest, the god-damned Romans and so on and so on. Phew.

Anyway, on the up side I did learn how to write Skaldic poetry from a good translation of the Poetic Edda. Huzzah!


(*Firefox spell check wanted to put Ahab instead of "Ahah!". This makes me smile. Here you are Firefox: Ahab. I'm smiling already)

Ok... One post a month, I promise.

Anyway, enough placations! These aren't new, they are old bits of course work but I felt like jamming them in there.

An explanation: (I always feel the need to justify these poems, I don't know why. Maybe it is because I spent so much time on them, maybe it is because my degree relies on them being at least tolerable, maybe it's because I want everyone to know just how clever I really am, deep down, who knows.) This is really one poem in three parts, as we can see from the handy-dandy numbering system I have employed, three parts signifying the progression of a lost love through a gentleman's life. Part one is quite obviously emotional and obsessive, very teenage. Part two is more adult and traditional, still a bit self pitying. Part three, however, is all very "Aaw, wasn't that sweet. So, what's for dinner?" about the whole thing.

Oh, and they also, they progress through style (1. Spencarian Sonnet 2. Romantic 3. Free verse).

There you go. There is in fact thought behind my work. Who'd have thunk it?

III. artifacts

Looking
back on

Arti-
facts

They look
pretty

Tactile
and pleas-
ing

Holding
cold mem-
ories

Left
overs

Still quite
edi-
ble.

Something
to keep
you warm

Something
to chew
upon

But they
are all
ultimate-
ly use-
less

II. beauty is conflagration

Flower, Flower, burning bright

In the shadow of my night

The heat had beauty

Made radiant by the cold

But you burnt too hot

There is no fuel to feed

I am ashes

I. i cut myself to the sound of your voice

There’s a girl somewhere sitting in front of a cheap, slow

public library computer

noiseless snow

through the radiator

I realize there’s still a rose perched in my passenger

seat

That I would see her

That I would meet

That I would greet

Her unprepared

There is silence when I speak

i forget i am more than a hummingbird

hovering above a rare plant

i try to remember, but i can’t