Tag: College

~*~The Blue Elephant~*~ and ~*~Taily Pole~*~

I guess I should have looked ahead on my syllabus before my free writing 😂😂. My two prompts were to be made into formal or “traditional” poems, one being a sonnet (like Shakespeare) and the other being a villanelle, pantoum, or a third option that I don’t remember. A sonnet about a stuffed elephant or Taily Pole?? 

Whatchu talkin’ about, Willis?

Since I’m currently obsessed with Dylan Thomas’ Do Not Go Gentle Into That Good Night, specifically listening to him reading it (which is awesome), and it is a villanelle, I chose to create a Taily Pole poem in that form. The elephant poem was to be a sonnet by default. I think one of the most known Shakespeare sonnets is the one that Roger Rabbit reads while jumping on the bed in Who Framed Roger Rabbit? about counting the ways he loves Jessica Rabbit. (The ADHD force is strong today 😒.) 

Now, I don’t like checking my grades because of severe anxiety, so I don’t know if these were graded yet. If I’m awaiting feedback, I keep my eyes averted and just read the feedback without looking at the grade. Unfortunately, my week 1 paper for literary theory received an F(!) since I missed some points on the rubric, but my awesome professor allowed me to redo and resubmit. The resubmission got an A. That was pretty devastating for me, but I am so glad he gave me a second chance and gave me the feedback I needed to fix it up. Anyway, on to my poems! Click/tap on the poetic form below for the definition of each. 

Sonnet

From Google AI: A 14-line poem with a fixed structure and rhyme scheme.  Sonnets are often written in iambic pentameter, which means each line has 10 syllables in five pairs.  The emphasis is on the second syllable in each pair.  Sonnets are usually divided into two parts – an eight-line section (the octet) and a six-line section (the sestet).  The Shakespearean sonnet rhyme scheme is ABAB CDCD EFEF GG.

~*~Ode to a Blue Elephant~*~

Oh, dear blue elephant of childhood days

A blind witness of our sibling fights

We marched you back and forth in moonlit haze

No words, no punches, just a game of spite



You had no name, no charm, no specialness

Your stuffing crinkled like a florist’s foam

But then bedtime came, and you were the best

And so through the darkness we each did roam



You came to us from fair or Father’s hand

We cared not for you but only the rise

It gave us when we snatched you from the land

Of dreams and sleep and made each other cry

But when my brother left, the game was done

The elephant was lost; so was the fun
Villanelle

From Google AI: A villanelle is a 19-line poem with a strict structure.  It has five three-line stanzas, called tercets, followed by one four-line stanza, called a quatrain.  Villanelles use a specific rhyme scheme, ABA for the tercets and ABAA for the quatrain.  They also have two repeating end rhymes and two refrains.  The first and third lines of the first tercet are repeated alternately at the end of each subsequent stanza.

~*~Taily Pole~*~



Please, tell us the tale of the Taily Pole

As we sit ‘round the fire to combat the breeze

Your soft, intense voice makes the story whole



We beg you for story time, and you play your role

Reluctant storyteller, yet you give in to our pleas

Please, tell us the tale of the Taily Pole



You’re covered in blankets draped like a stole

As the cool wind blows through the trees

Your soft, intense voice makes the story whole



We giggle and shiver, feeling both hot and cold

Waiting patiently with elbows on knees

Please, tell us the tale of the Taily Pole



You lean in and shout, we shriek and roll

Laughing at our temporary unease

Your soft, intense voice makes the story whole



Years later, your memory still warms my soul

As the great-grandkids gather at my uncle’s feet

Please, tell us the tale of the Taily Pole

Your soft, intense voice makes the story whole
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Elephant Blue, Dilly Dilly

I have a poetry workshop this semester and have finished this week’s work. We were to do a couple of writing exercises that will be the base for poems. I’ve not attended a poetry workshop before so I don’t know how this works. I took workshops for statistics class, which was great and super helpful, but not something that dealt with creativity. I had to choose a couple of prompts from the required reading and free write, which is another thing I’m not experienced in, most likely because of AuDHD hindrances. 

Now, this required reading mentions people not being able to write a poem in 20 or 30 minutes and makes it sound impossible to actually do so, and that made me question its credibility completely. When I have an idea for a poem, I will sit there and write or type it out in a few minutes. I don’t make a chore out of it (I don’t write every day, either, so that might have something to do with it). 

Also, it was published in 1997 and devotes two chapters to getting recognized and getting published, as in subscribing to magazines and using 🐌 mail. I don’t know why there aren’t newer editions, especially since it’s required material for the class. It’s very common for school books to be updated in subsequent editions. 

Anyway, the prompts I chose were the base for Elephant Blue, Dilly Dilly and Taily Pole that I decided to share here 😊. I have to squeeze poems out of these two writings. Talk about a challenge! 

Elephant Blue, Dilly Dilly

There is a stuffed blue elephant that sits in my spare room.  It was a point of contention for years.  There is nothing special about this stuffed animal.  It is the blue of a summer sky.  Its neck no longer supports its head, most likely due to the nighttime chokeholds it’s endured.  The body is neither soft nor coarse, and the stuffing is that weird stuff that just feels wrong and unpleasant, a slightly more malleable version of that green Styrofoam found in the bottom of floral arrangements.  I can feel and hear it rubbing and crinkling every time I pick the toy up.  It sets my teeth on edge.  I wonder why it didn’t when I was a child.  Maybe it did and I ignored it out of spite. 

This unremarkable, cheap blue elephant was at the center of many underwhelming moonlit “fights” between my brother and me.  Wherever the elephant (not even important enough to have earned a name) began its night, it ended up in a different bed in a different room by morning.  No words were spoken.  No punches were thrown.  Simply here today and gone tomorrow.  Our level of tiredness would dictate how many trips the elephant made in a night. 

My brother, two years older and the opposite sex, took great pleasure in annoying me and making me cry.  The elephant, possibly a prize from one of the crappy games at the county fair, possibly given to one of us by our deadbeat dad who still held hero status at our ages, was an easy rise for both of us, two kids who inherited their father’s temper and temperament. 

I’m not sure what importance the elephant held or if it was merely a pawn in a game I could play with my brother without fearing physical repercussions.  It stayed behind with my mom and me when my brother moved in with Dad at 16.  I was happy he was gone for about a week and then I was done with this new game of being an only child and I wanted my Bub back.  The elephant was forgotten about, tucked away in the closet, then in a black trash bag with other stuffed toys.  I had clearly won but I didn’t really care.

The elephant moved with us to a new home, then went with me when I was briefly married.  Upon returning to Mom’s, the toy was tucked away, still in a bag, in a storage unit, and then at my aunt and uncle’s.  Time passed.  Dad died.  Mom died.  I remarried; my brother gave me away to my new husband.  Bub died.  I now had room at Mom’s house for my stuff, so everything from my aunt and uncle’s house was returned to me.

So many memories!  A stuffed clown with buttons and zippers, a homemade Care Bear with an A stitched on its chest, and that glorious Blue Elephant.  He is magnificent; the beautiful blue of a summer sky, floppy and worn in.  Precious memories contained in this priceless stuffed Elephant. 

Taily Pole

I come from a decent-sized family on my mom’s side.  I grew up with the Parents (Grandma and Papaw), the Kids (my mom and her four siblings), the Spouses (except for Mom) and the Grandkids (me and my 8 cousins).  Every weekend, we had almost a complete turnout of the family with the exception of one aunt and uncle who lived four hours away.  This changed as we got older, with cousins getting into dating or school sports, but it stayed true for years.  I’m the second youngest of the Grandkids, so Papaw and Grandma were getting up there in age.

Being the younger of the Grandkids, I loved hearing Papaw tell stories, which was a rare treat.  One story in particular, Taily Pole, was a favorite of everyone, not because of the story itself, but because of how it was told by Papaw.  It was most effective when he told us the story outside.  We frequently had cookouts in the cooler months, complete with marshmallows to roast.  Getting comfortable was a feat; sitting near the fire was way too hot, sitting away from the fire was way too cold.  It never failed that someone would drag blankets out of the house with one being confiscated by those sitting on the ground. 

Once everyone was nice and cozy, we grandkids would beg Papaw to tell Taily Pole.  No other story was ever requested during these cookouts.  He would do the obligatory hemming and hawing while all of us grandkids pestered him to the point of acquiescence.  Wrapped up in his own blanket and sitting on a patio chair in the mouth of the single-car garage/potato cellar, he would start the story off low and slow. 

The younger ones couldn’t help but giggle in anticipation.  We knew what was coming, yet we didn’t know how soon and how animatedly it would be delivered.  When Papaw got to the end of the story, he bugged his eyes, magnified by his glasses, and leaned forward, shouting, “I ain’t got your taily pole!”  The story always ended the same and there were always a few who squeaked out of shock, which set everyone else off laughing.  I was usually one of the squeakers but also one who wanted to hear it again and again. 

Years after Papaw died, one of my uncles told Taily Pole to the Great-Grandkids.  I smiled with delight and excitement seeing the little heads poking out of blankets, hearing the nervous laughter, watching the kids, eyes and smiles bright, looking around to see if Mom and Dad were listening, watching the flames flicker in my uncle’s glasses as he bugged his eyes, leaned forward, and shouted, “I ain’t got your taily pole!”

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Happy Christmas and a Merry New Year!!!

It’s winter break from school, and I am kind of bummed and then not so much. Next term, I have a poetry workshop (yay!) and literary theory (boo!). I’ve never taken a workshop before and I am a little excited and a lot scared. I don’t want feedback on my poetry! ! 😂😂 The RSD struggle is real and it certainly extends to critiquing, giving and receiving. 

I just finished up a history class and critical approaches to lit and those were no fun. I don’t take any approaches to literature because I find most of the “classics” extremely boring, and I can’t remember what I read anyway due to my severe ADHD. A lot of the time I miss what’s right in front of me and have to have someone point it out. Other times, I pick up on and obsess over the smallest things and I stay so focused on them that I miss everything else going on. I am nothing if not inconsistent 😝. 

Things are going pretty well with Neville. He is still convinced he is starving 24/7 even though we try to tell him he isn’t. I have started to introduce him to my diabetes “kit” that has my glucose tabs in it. When he is a bit older, I’m going to teach him to alert to my scent (sweat or saliva) when I’m hypoglycemic, and he will retrieve my kit and bring it to me so I can take the tabs. That should be fun. 

He is a little confused at the moment because he thinks the kit is his to grab whenever he wants a treat (too smart for his own good) or just to lie down and chew on when he’s bored. Luckily, the case is hard so he hasn’t damaged it. I’m a little foggy on how to get from point A to point B, but everything I’ve read said he should be a bit older before that kind of training, anyway.  

At the moment, I’m sharing my CGM readings with Adam via an app and he comes in and feeds me sugar whenever I’m really low, which is every time I go to bed. I have gastroparesis, aka delayed gastric emptying (I have a smorgasbord of autoimmune disorders), so I stack my insulin since my sugar won’t drop for hours and then it starts working all at once when I lie down/fall asleep. I’ve tried not stacking, but my numbers just keep rising and rising and I go into panic mode. Most of the time I don’t even remember being woken up and given candy or tablets; Adam usually asks me if I remember him giving me this or that while I’m sleeping.

I had a couple of bucks and got myself some Christmas presents 🙄🙄. I was shopping for something for Adam, but the deals were just too good to pass up! I bought Taylor Swift’s Time magazine issue, obvi, (not a deal) but then I found a ring light and 62″ (taller than me) tripod for $10 on Walmart! It’s normally $30, so I snapped that up real quick. It’s not only white light, but 3 levels of white and 12 different colors for some trippy fun. I’ve been wanting to get some decent pictures of the kiddies and pup but either the lighting is stinky or the pictures are out of focus or some other issue. I also want to record Nev’s training to show him off. He’s such a smart little guy and really tries so hard. Plus, he gets the zoomies like the cats (especially Theo) and it’s hilarious because his butt is almost dragging the floor when he gets going. He runs in a sort of horizontal split. I can’t explain it, but hopefully I can catch a video and upload it here! 

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