Emily Dickinson -- Imitation and Parodies

My students are once again studying American poetry, so I had them imitate one of Emily Dickinson's poems. Here is a selection of a few I thought really stood out. Some are sincere imitations, while others are just plain wacky. Enjoy!

I remember once
where once was us
yes -- we were once
but it twas the past

To dwindle in the past
is where you'll find me last
I can taste your bitter words
enveloped inside myself

the untangible ticking
that time's supposed to heal
But I shall ponder on
to the last of my appeal

-- Tina Vue and Tou Keng Yang


Fart! We will hear it!
You and I -- today!
You may feel the warmth it gave --
I will smell it!

When you are done, please tell me
That I may straight leave!
Haste! lest while you're gagging
I remember forever!

-- Amanda Matney and Brandi Harris


I'll tell the truth because you can't --
There is no need to cry
You're sad too much, let's see a smile
Happiness is good -- Surprise!
You're kind of crazy -- can't be pleased
Try and have a good time
Come on and smile now Emily
The world is really kind.

--Daniel Padula and Trever Miller


Oh -- my -- lord -- Emily
Honestly -- what -- is -- with --
these -- dashes
They -- are -- so -- annoying --
Like -- a -- cup

It's -- like -- those --
business -- names --
Save -- a -- Cent
Rent -- a -- Car
All -- making -- no -- sense
Whatsoever --

You -- would've -- been --
great -- at -- Morse -- Code--
Oh -- m-y -- st-op --
ta-k-ing -- ov-e-r
my -- poe-m yo-u stup--id d-ashes
Cu-r-s--e yo-u Emil ------------------

-- Josh Kincaid

Why is my Blog Site a Target for Spam?

It's been worse over the past couple of weeks. Solicitations for female Viagra, shoes, something in Chinese I can't read, and someone who just says I have a "genial" post. I wonder if anyone else out there is getting the same. Perhaps it's because I have been inactive for a while on my site, and browsers think I wouldn't notice, except for the fact I have my comments moderation function turned on. Any advice on how to be less of a target, anyone?

I Finally Finished My Novel ... Now What? (or So What?)

In the summer of 2005 I began what started as a short story about a boy going to college and working at a pizza delivery store. It was based in part on my experiences as a college student and pizza guy. The story continued to grow roots and branches until I realized I had the makings of something bigger. I continued working on my "novel" off and on in the following years, periodically writing poetry when I didn't have huge chunks of time to devote to prose writing.

I didn't mention this to many people. I mean, it seemed every writer had an unfinished novel they were working on, and they never seemed to have it finished. I didn't want to be one of those writers of the "Great American (Unfinished) Novel." I told my wife about it a few times, who nodded her head and replied, "That's nice," and then dismissed it when I had trouble telling her what the story was about. Who can blame her? I might have read a chapter or two over the years at some SAWC meetings, but other than that I felt I shouldn't talk it up if I didn't have a "finished" completed novel.

This summer, four years after starting it, I can safely say that I have a finished product, tentatively titled The Slow Constellations Wheeled On. Of course, finished is a relative term, as I expect to do some tweaking or overhauling of the story after having a few close writer friends do a critical reading of it. The ending was the hardest part I found. The closer I came to the end the more difficult it seemed to draw most of the loose ends to a close. I felt like I was trying to tie the end strings of a mop head together. When I did finish the last chapter, I printed the 247-page hard copy and read from the beginning, making notes of the character's names, fixing inconsistencies between details in the story, and looking for grammar and usage mistakes. Then I revised the whole thing on the computer.

Now what?

I read an article somewhere, and conversing with a writer friend about her own novel confirmed it, that the one thing I had to have in order to make my novel marketable is a "dust-jacket" summary of what the novel is about, so when someone asks me what my book is about I can have an answer for them. The following is a rough draft of what I think a good description would be. I don't want to be too specific in giving away details, and I don't want to be too vague, but I tried to describe it in a way that people could relate to its thematic elements.

"A coming-of-age story about Randall Spivey, a boy trying to survive the college scene in a small mountain town on his own in the absence of family support, balancing school and his job as a pizza delivery person, wanting to make it on his own yet battling the despair and loneliness that both pulls him to and repels him from his troubled life at home, facing hardships that challenge him emotionally and spiritually and bring him to the edge of the abyss."

The synopsis needs work, for sure. Eventually I hope to send my novel out to some recognized contests that offer the winner a publishing contract of some sort. I think I have something worthy of being shared with others. I've heard the hardest avenue to take is to send it to an agent. However, I am prepared for a future time when I realize that I will never publish it unless I go "vanity" and publish it myself (in which case it probably won't be published) and just chalk it up to a labor of love.

I'll keep you posted.

My Ipod Shuffle List, Almost Random

Lately I've been over at Facebook and seen where people are posting the next 10 consecutive songs on their Ipod shuffle feature (as a way of sharing their musical tastes?), and thought I would try that out myself. I haven't had my Ipod for a year yet, and am still figuring out how to use it (you should have heard me cuss when I first got it). I have learned that the shuffle feature is not truly random, as it will play songs by the same artist back to back or sometimes three times in a set of 10 songs. So I find myself "fast forwarding" to the next song (do people still say that? I know it's reminiscent of cassettes, and "rewind" is even more so). Here is my list of 25 consecutively different artists from my Ipod . To be honest, I only cut 4 songs out that were repeat artists.

1. Drunken Angel -- Lucinda Williams
2. Rainy Night in Georgia -- Hem (a Brook Benton cover)
3. Temporarily Blind -- Built to Spill
4. Ten Degrees and Getting Colder -- Nanci Griffith (a Gordon Lightfoot cover)
5. West Liberty -- Glossary (the best Southern Garage Rock band no one's ever heard of)
6. Short Life of Trouble -- Carolina Chocolate Drops
7. Whistling in the Dark -- They Might Be Giants
8. High Life -- Counting Crows
9. Psycho Killer -- Talking Heads
10. Happy Birthday -- "Weird Al" Yankovic
11. You Might Think -- The Cars
12. If I Could -- Jack Johnson
13. Again & Again -- The Bird & the Bee
14. Joy of Love -- Victoria Williams
15. Godspeed -- Mortal ( a Christian Industrial Metal Band from the '90s, no kidding)
16. Escape (The Pina Colada Song)-- Rupert Holmes (I know, but it's a guilty pleasure)
17. New Slang -- The Shins
18. Whatever Way the Wind Blows -- Kelly Willis
19. Nobody Gets a Smooth Ride -- The Choir
20. Just How Lonely -- Southern Culture on the Skids
21. Pretend -- King's X (one of the most eclectic heavy metal bands in their day)
22. Oh Molly Dear -- B.F. Shelton (an oldie but a goodie)
23. Past the Mission -- Tori Amos
24. Sandy Land -- The Whites (from "Down From the Mountain" O'Brother Soundtrack)
25. Gin and Juice -- The Gourds (a Snoop Dogg cover, I'd call it the "Hick-Hop" version)

I don't consider myself a music snob, unless it's that modern top 40 corporate mess, but if you are like me you like what you like. One thing I will say about Ipods, I forsee the death of the concept album with this new techology where you purchase only the songs you want. For me, I couldn't listen to Pink Floyd's Dark Side of the Moon or The Beatles Sargeant Pepper's albums without listening to the whole thing. Each song fits with the next one and connects to the one before it in some way. It's kind of like what happened to album artwork. In a way it died with the vinyl record. Most of the time ITunes doesn't have the album artwork of CDs I transfer to my playlists, anyway. I hope, however, that there will always be those dusty music stores you can walk into and dig through record bins or pick out a use CD for 3 bucks while listening to the cashier's album pick of the hour.

If You Can't Duct It....

I embarrassed my wife over family vacation a couple of weeks ago. We took our two kids to Myrtle Beach, and stayed at the Hampton Inn. It wasn't cheap, of course (we'd been paying on it since last year), but it was nice, let me tell you. I was a little dissappointed in the front desk's service, though.

We were fixin' to head out to the beach when the bottom of my sandle came loose and started flapping like a flip-flop every step I took. It was a K-mart special, and I had them for three years, so I wasn't surprised. The kids were tugging at my arm to hurry and get out to the sand when a thought came across my mind, "If only I had a little duct tape."

Like many folks, having a roll of duct tape handy is about as important as a Leatherman tool or a Swiss Army knife. I always keep a roll in my car, and in my desk drawer at the high school where I teach. I go through a roll of it a semester, and its mostly students who need it -- ripped notebook covers, ball caps with the plastic adjuster torn in back, you name it. I won't go into all the creative, and ludicrous, things I've done with duct tape. People have already written books on that.

I figureded about five or six wraps around the back of my sandal would last me at least until the end of the day. Come to find out then that I didn't have a single roll in the van. I remembered the little sign posted in the hotel room stating for any necessities their guests might have forgotten to pack -- toothbrush, razor, needle and thread -- to see the receptionist at the front desk. Despite my wife's eye-rolling, I was sure that if they had toothbrushes they surely would have a roll of duct tape behind the counter. "I'm sure that's something that gets asked of them all the time," I assured my wife. She took the kids around the corner to the side lobby to hide.

When I asked the guy at the front desk if he had any duct tape, or even electrical tape (trying to broaden the options) he looked at me like I'd just asked him for a kidney. I should have known better. The guy looked like some model off the cover of GQ magazine. I told him my sandal was falling apart and I just needed about an arm's length worth. "Well, we don't keep that up here," but in a professional tone said, "but I could call our maintenance man on the radio to see if he has any." He pulled out his radio. "Jerry, are you busy right now?" From the radio I heard a crackle and the sound of an electric drill in the background. "What!?" said the guy on the other end. "We have a gentleman at the front desk who is in need of...."

By that point I was embarrassed that the guy behind the counter interrupted the maintenance man from what he was doing just for duct tape, so I told him not to worry about it. "Well, what room are you in. We could send it up to you later." The thought of room service bringing a roll of duct tape on a silver platter crossed my mind, and I told him to forget it -- I was going out with my family to the beach and wouldn't be back for a few hours. I was also more embarrassed that the maintenance man was probably wondering what idiot would go on vacation and not keep a roll of duct tape under his passenger seat, so I just put up with the flip-flopping until the end of the day and then threw the things away.

"You really showed the color of your neck just now, didn't you?" was my wife's reply when I came back empty handed. She had that I-told-you-so look on her face. "This isn't the Clampett Mansion." Just to rib her a little, I replied, "Well, if we stayed at the Sea Mist or some place a little less fancy, I bet they would have had a roll of duct tape behind the counter! Or Motel 6, 'We'll leave the light on for you -- and a roll of duct tape in your bedside drawer.'" It would probably get more use than that Gideon's Bible, not to be blasphemous or anything.

Moral of the story: Buy an economy pack of duct tape and then keep a roll everywhere you might need it, even if you have to sneak it into your wife's van without her noticing.

My wife's moral of the story: Don't ask the front desk clerk at a 4-star hotel for duct tape. You might as well try asking him for a Skoal Bandit or a Slim Jim.

A Poem by R.T. Smith

Directly

"I'll get it directly," she'd say, meaning
soon, meaning, when I can, meaning, not
yet, bet patient, the world don't turn upon
your every need and whim. Or "the dogs
will be back home directly, I reckon,"
"the preacher will be finished," "your daddy
will see you," "supper will be laid out"--
all "directly," which never meant the straight
line bewteen two surveyor's points or
an arrow's flight, but rather, by the curve,
the indirect, the arc of life and breath,
and she was right, and when she passed
or was passing, I could not say which,
in a patchwork quilt, the makeshift room,
the sweet hymn notes sung neighborly
across the hall, she whispered, "Learn to tell
what needs doing quick as a bluesnake
and what will take the slow way, full
of care and mulling, be fair in every
dealing with beasts and people and all
else alive, and surely, my dear, He will
come for you in His good time, the way
He comes for all of us, directly."

from The Oxford American, July/August 2003.

Poem

Collegiate Poetus (Family: Egotistae)

These aspiring writers,
gathered poets,
form like anthills,
busy workers
at political correctness,
carefully carrying granules
of dirt and scraps of metaphor.

They are everywhere,
crawling, darting
from sidewalk cracks
and coffee houses.
They congregate
on college campus malls,
can lift a hundred times
their weight in redundancy.

But be careful
how you wield that
hard, country sensibility
not to disturb their habitat,
their tiny burrows,
colonies of complacency.
Walk lightly when wearing
your thick-soled
brogans of criticism,
for open toes
bruise easily
in Birkenstocks.

A Poem by Gwendolyn Brooks

The Preacher Ruminates Behind the Sermon

I think it must be lonely to be God.
Nobody loves a master. No. Despite
The bright hosannas, bright dear-Lords, and bright
Determined reverence of Sunday eyes.

Picture Jehovah striding through the hall
Of His importance, creatures running out
From servant-corners to acclaim, to shout
Appreciation of His merit's glare.

But who walks with Him? -- dares to take his arm,
To slap Him on the shoulder, tweak His ear,
Buy him a Coca-Cola or a beer,
Pooh-pooh His politics, call Him a fool?

Perhaps -- who knows? -- He tires of looking down.
Those eyes are never lifted. Never straight.
Perhaps sometimes He tires of being great
In solitude. Without a hand to hold.

from Black Voices: An Anthology of African-American Literature (1968).

People Get Mean When Times Are Lean

Wouldn't it be great to have so much money you don't know what to do with it? Want a bigger cement pond out back? No problem. Someone cons you into buying Central Park in New York? Oops. Unfortunately, most of us can't be that carefree and spend-easy with our money as the Clampetts. We have to be a little more careful with how we use it, except I have been known to pick my teeth with a dollar bill, but only if the corners are really crisp. And, hey, you can't spend a used toothpick.

I've almost stopped going to Blockbuster Video. Before last weekend, it had been months since my wife and I rented a movie. To try to save money, we've decided to just watch the movies we already have. For our kids, we even put all their DVDs in an album so they can browse through their 50+ collection of Spongebob and Scooby Doo. But my wife just had to see Twilight, so we took the whole family to Blockbuster and spent over $25 on rentals for us and the kids. That made me kind of sore, spending that much money on DVDs that we have to give back in a couple of days. When my wife and I finally settled down to watch her movie, it froze up on us about halfway through. Of course when I turned it over to look at the underside, it was loaded with scratches. We live on the other end of town, so I wasn't about to go over there that night to get another copy. I figured I would get my money back on that rental.

The next week after work I took all the movies back and explained the problem with the Twilight DVD. They asked, "Why didn't you call us about the problem?"

I replied, "What do you mean? It was after 11 when we realized the problem."

"Well," she said, rather curtly, "we don't do refunds on scratched rentals. We only do exchanges. But I'll make an exception this time."

I felt a little indignant about it, and thought an exchange wasn't good enough, especially since I've always thought their rentals rather pricey to begin with. But I was glad that I'd be getting my $5 back. At the same time, another customer was cussing a different Blockbuster employee because he wouldn't accept his membership application. He didn't have a copy of his credit card with him, just the number, and he couldn't understand that the employee needed to see a name next to the number on a card, without seeming to accuse the guy of using a stolen number. Then the customer cussed the other guy more when he ripped the application and threw it in the trash can, claiming that someone might steal his credit card number off the unaccepted application. My complaint seemed minuscule.

Directly afterwards, I stopped for gas. When I went in to pre-pay, now standard since people began driving off without paying for their gas in record numbers, there was an old man who handed a couple of already-scratched $10 tickets to the cashier behind the counter. The cashier gave the man a puzzled look and told him that they weren't winners. "What do you mean, no winner?" The man complained. I deducted that the guy might be farsighted. "Fine. Just give me a couple more of the number 47s," he said, handing the cashier a 20. The cashier gave him a dirty look. "And no need to get an attitude about it," said the man. "Y'all are the ones making your money off of these."

I know times are hard for everyone (except for maybe coal companies and liquor stores). I see more and more people lose their tempers or show their rear ends over money, more so than usual. I was raised to always be tight-fisted about money anyway, so I've been guilty of raising a fuss or two at restaurants and return counters when I don't think I'm getting my money's worth, or going back to the grocery store when I've had a 3-dollar item double scanned by mistake. I've also seen a rise in con-artist scams, honest but naive people thinking they can get something for next to nothing from these charlatans. I think it was Mark Twain that said, "The lack of money is the root of all evil."

I don't know if I'm going to loosen my grip anytime soon, but after this week I might think about being a little more considerate when it comes to my money disputes after seeing how other folks have been reacting. Maybe I should take some advice from the writer and cynic Ambrose Bierce and his book The Devil's Dictionary in this definition, "Money -- A blessing that is of no advantage to us excepting when we part with it." In truth, though, I favor one of Jed Clampett's quotes more, "If money were skunk oil a hound dog couldn't smell me."

Mountains Mourn Over Renowned Moonshiner's Death

The distinguished and sometimes notorious moonshiner Marvin “Popcorn” Sutton died a week ago today in Cocke County, Tennessee, at age 61. Like many descendants of Scotch-Irish settlers, he followed in the tradition of making homemade liquor, building a reputation as being one of the south's top makers of white lightning. He also achieved a cult-hero-outlaw status through various documentaries on the moonshine tradition and through an autobiography entitled Me and My Likker.

But unlike the romantic notions of moonshining as a hardscrabble, yet noble way of survival in the Appalachians, and part of our cultural heritage, it unfortunately is still illegal (Uncle Sam wants his taxes). Already on probation for a July 2007 state charge triggered by a still explosion, and having prior convictions for moonshining and felony assault with a deadly weapon, a raid on Sutton's property last year turned up three 1,000-gallon stills, more than 800 gallons of moonshine, ingredients to make sour mash, and of course guns. Most of the moonshine he kept in a shed and a junk school bus on his property.

This time the sentencing, an 18-month term in federal prison followed by three years on supervised release, was too much for him. His wife found him in his beloved Ford Fairlane parked out in his barn, engine running, apparently dead of carbon monoxide poisoning. No one really knows why, but perhaps he thought prison would be the death of him, and decided to leave this world on his own terms.

This blog post is by no means a proper eulogy for the man whom thousands knew as a gentle soul. Others I'm sure pay a greater tribute and are much more vocal and outraged by his death. I just wanted to light my candle for him as well. To many he was the romantic notion of the moonshiner, like Uncle Jesse on The Dukes of Hazzard, "never meaning no harm," "making his way the only way he knows how." It is disheartening to me, however, that something couldn't have been done to prevent the loss of such an iconic figure. He will be sorely missed by many, and hopefully never forgotton.


source: J.J. Stambaugh, "Moonshiner 'Popcorn' Sutton May Have Committed Suicide, in Knoxnews.com, March 16, 2009.

In Imitation of Emily Dickinson -- More Parodies

It is that time again when I begin my poetry unit with my students. To help them overcome their fear or disdain in reading poetry, I have them start by reading Emily Dickinson, perhaps not someone's first choice. We discuss her life as a recluse and her unique style of rhythm, capitalization, and punctuation. Then I have them pick one of her poems to do an imitation/parody. When I explain that a parody is like a "Weird Al" Yankovic song -- in a sense you are imitating the rhythm and rhyme of the poem but coming up with your own words -- they warmed up to the activity. Here are just a few examples of my students' work:

Much Sadness is divinest pain --
To an Emo eye --
Much Pain -- the starkest of Darkness --
'Tis not the Majority --
In this, as all will never prevail --
Ascent to darkness -- and you will be sane --
Demure -- you're straightaway to a painful pathway --
And handled with a pitiful sadness chain.

----- by Thoua Chue and Wa Xiong


Tell a lie, but tell it good.
Success is in successful lies,
not bright for our firm delight.
A truth lies superb surprise,
as thunder to the children's nightmare
with dreams of lies.
The lie must blind gradually
or every man be able to see.

----- by Matt Timmons and Elizabeth Burleson


This is our letter to the class.
We never heard a worse song
than Mr. Hampton's sing-a-long.
For this, we hopefully won't get bashed.

Every week he hands out tests
in his gray little sweater vest.
He tried to sing us Gilligan's Island.
It's pretty sad because we think
he tried his best.

----- by Megan Morehead, Luis Diego, and Alex Wells

I included this last poem to show I'm not above a good-humored joke at my expense. As an illustration of how Emily Dickinson used almost exactly the same tight rhythm and meter in her poetry, I demonstrated how you could almost take any poem of hers and sing it to either the tune of Gilligan's Island or The Yellow Rose of Texas. Try it sometime for yourself. It works!

SAWC Reading in Portsmouth, Ohio

The Southern Appalachian Writers Cooperative (SAWC) will be hosting a reading on March 28th at Ye Olde Lantern, located at 601 Second Street in Portsmouth, Ohio.

The reading takes place during the Appalachian Studies Association (ASA) conference weekend at Shawnee State University. Ye Olde Lantern is the local place for poetry readings, and is located a short walk from the campus center.

The reading will start at 7pm and be a combination of poetry/prose and music. Though I'm not sure of the lineup yet, I anticipate a large group to read and play, seeing that many people will be there already for the ASA conference, and that we have the place reserved until 11pm. I myself plan to attend, and am looking forward to not just reading some poetry but seeing the sights along the Ohio River town. I might even drive a little further north and visit the serpent mound outside of Peebles. Houston (my wife) gave me the "all-clear" to launch on this adventure, provided I change all poop diapers and wash the dishes between now and then!

Update Tues. March 24th -- The SAWC lineup for Ye Olde Lantern is as follows, and in no particular order whatsoever:

Hilda Downer
Don Boklage
Mike Henson
Dana Wildsmith
Sherry Stanforth
Jim Webb
Frankie Finley
Pauletta Hansel
Eddy Pendarvis
and me, of course!