Friday, April 28, 2006

Iroke Ifa

posted by Leslie LaChance at 4/28/2006

Some Yoruba people believe every person is born with a particular destiny, and that destiny is known to the wise god Orunmila if not always to the people themselves. You see, people sometimes get lost from their destiny, forget their trajectory, go another way, get in trouble. When this happens they go see an iyanifa, a divining priestess, mother of secrets. In a ritual to summon Orunmila in order to relearn one's destiny, the iyanifa taps a carved pointed wand, Iroke Ifa, on a tray covered with seeds. The tapping communicates the need for Orunmila to speak and the seeds are cast, counted and arranged into a symbolic numerlogical system linked to Yoruba prophetic verses that, when recounted by the iyanifa, should remind the person of what he or she already knows. So, I saw one of these divining wands, an Iroke Ifa, in a museum. It was made of ivory and carved with a seated voluptuous woman, a bird, a snake. I read the explanation, and thought, hell, I could use one of those, a thing to summon Orunmila to come tell me my destiny in verse. I'd do it every day. Well, I don't have an Iroke Ifa or an iyanifa, but I used them in a poem.

Iroke Ifa

Easy to get lost from destiny --
Water pulls this way, wind that

Lover takes you down a shortcut
same place, strange place

easy to forget Amnesia
when she's kissing you

say someday I want --
someday I will be

easy. Ask Inyanifa
to ask Orunmila

what should be. Iroke Ifa
tap tapping

faith's ivory finger and
the mother of secrets

sound it out. Creation's
a calabash, a gourd in halves

a grinning god will tell you
it's all in there

you'll hear it
when you're trouble-humbled.

Monday, April 24, 2006

Cyber Violets

posted by trancendyce at 4/24/2006


Spring has sprung
the violets are gone
only in memory
will they live on
perhaps immortal
in zeroes and ones.

Sunday, April 23, 2006

izzes

posted by alliecatmar at 4/23/2006


vocal ladies oozing wistful
bubbles fizzle pitpy pop
visual ladies drooling speckle
casual drizzle never stop

Thursday, April 20, 2006

Ahem..... Sum Werds

posted by AnGreeWoofDawg at 4/20/2006


Be kinder than necessary, for everyone you meet is fighting some kind of battle.

This was a sig file I came across this AM.....
Thought it would do nicely here.....
Keep a good thought, all you cool birds fighting.

Geekin' Poetic

Sitting, tearing the heart
out of hard driven metals;
Screw, wrench, star, tools
Heavy platter matter;
Died somewhere in '89
20 gigabits, arraided line.


You wimmin rock mee wee werld.

Wednesday, April 19, 2006

first edits...

posted by trancendyce at 4/19/2006

Twisted:
Vicissitudes of Lila Jolita Devlin
Trick had gifted Lila with a gorgeous black leather whip with a handle of carved shells to use for the performance. She had passed it among her friends and they had all had so much fun playing with it. She had named it Uzumaki Cho after one of her favorite Japanese horror films Uzumaki and her favorite comedian Margaret Cho. Uzumaki means spiral, which had seemed most fitting for a whip. She had seen Cho in stand-up and had dreamed of a version of Uzumaki staring Cho that was so f#cked up and so funny she had awoken laughing about it.

trancendyce interrupts... When I've been writing there is this one place in the text where the period at the end of the sentence keeps disappearing. Is this a haunted period... or what? Creepy to think about, huh?

Twisted:
Vicissitudes of Lila Jolita Devlin

At that point Beverly and Kara came up with an unknown, very cute, fashionable and wasted looking guy in tow.
"Hey birthday girl!" Lila said to Beverly as they touched hands.
"This is Jordan, say hello to Lila, Jordan." Beverly said while Kara whispered loudly in Lila's ear, "Isn't he a hottie-hottie?"
"Hello Lila," the very attractive and stylish Jordan said taking her hand and kissing it a bit much for someone he was just meeting. He was grinning like a fiend, "You are so good... mmmh tasty... I really enjoyed your show!"
"It was a group effort, but I'm glad you liked it. Nice to meet you Jordan." Lila answered laughing as she politely pulled her hand away from Jordan. "Kara luv, might I drag a smoke of yours?"
"Why yes you may, Lila darlin," Kara answered fishing a cigarette and a lighter out of her jacket pocket. "I'll even light your fire." Lila took the cigarette brought it to her lips and Kara flicked the flame to the tip while Lila inhaled. Lila had found that waving a lit cigarette around was a rather effect way to get most drunk guys off her. She also liked the way cigarettes were like fire wands. Lila had dreamed of Bettie Davis fencing in Now, Voyager with her long cigarette in its even longer smoke through holder filter thingy. What the hell are those things called anyway? (Seriously, I want to find out. So if anyone knows... please put it in the comments for this post.) The action was thus... Exhale smoke. Davis says something cutting. Thrust and parry in the cloud of smoke. Take a long drag. Feint and thrust. Exhale smoke. Davis says something biting. Parry and feint in the cloud of smoke. Take a long drag, etc. Until finally Davis puts out the lit cigarette by stabbing it through her opponent's heart.

Tuesday, April 18, 2006

Born Into This

posted by Jane Crowe at 4/18/2006

I just saw the film Born into This about legendary barfly poet Charles Bukowski. It was an incredible portrait of this fascinating man. I thought this poem was especially compelling:

THE GENIUS OF THE CROWD By Charles Bukowski

there is enough treachery, hatred violence absurdity in the average
human being to supply any given army on any given day

and the best at murder are those who preach against it
and the best at hate are those who preach love
and the best at war finally are those who preach peace

those who preach god, need god
those who preach peace do not have peace
those who preach peace do not have love

beware the preachers
beware the knowers
beware those who are always reading books
beware those who either detest poverty or are proud of it
beware those quick to praise for they need praise in return
beware those who are quick to censor
they are afraid of what they do not know
beware those who seek constant crowds for they are nothing alone
beware the average man the average woman
beware their love, their love is average
seeks average

but there is genius in their hatred
there is enough genius in their hatred to kill you
to kill anybody not wanting solitude
not understanding solitude
they will attempt to destroy anything that differs from their own
not being able to create art
they will not understand art
they will consider their failure as creators
only as a failure of the world
not being able to love fully
they will believe your love incomplete
and then they will hate you
and their hatred will be perfect

like a shining diamond
like a knife
like a mountain
like a tiger
like hemlock

their finest art

Tuesday, April 11, 2006

posted by alliecatmar at 4/11/2006

Thursday, April 06, 2006

Space Pirate Reclaimation

posted by trancendyce at 4/06/2006

Warning!
Geek-Out Alert!


Geeka Glazer has assumed control.
Get Geeky With It… Get Geeka With It…

GG just loves pirates and is raring to go into
infinite pirate geek-out sub-routines…
However…
since she doesn’t want to activate shut down sequence…
she will start slowly with this…

Pirate Terms
(first term is for Catmus especially)
cat o'nine tails, or just "cat" -- a whip with many lashes, used for flogging. "A taste of the cat" might refer to a full flogging, or just a single blow to "smarten up" a recalcitrant hand. The marks resembled cat scratches. A flogging with the cat was the most common form of punishment aboard a pirate ship.
kiss the gunner's daughter -- to be bent over and/or tied to one of the ship's guns and flogged.
flotsam -- floating remnants of a shipwreck.
jetsam -- objects that have been thrown overboard in order to lighten a ship when it is in trouble
dead reckoning -- is a method of navigation that involves calculating a ship's position by noting the ship's speed, the speed and direction of the wind, ocean currents, and compass directions.
doldrums -- Located between 5 degrees north and 5 degrees south of the equator, the doldrums are a belt of very still air near the equator that stalled sailing ships.
keelhaul -- punishment by dragging under the ship, from one side to the other. The victim of a keelhauling would be half-drowned, or worse, and lacerated by the barnacles that grew beneath the ship.

Well Beyond Walking the Plank
(a pirate poem by trancendyce)
Cat o'nine tails scratches and flails
as you kiss the gunner's daughter
in the suffocating heat.
Days like flotsam...
nights like jetsam
go by with little more
than a mouthful of water
and a hardtack to eat.
The press gang can rot,
for a crimp you are not,
as all are lost,
stranded windless,
aboard doldrum seas
of captivity and crew.
Dead reckoning will never begin
and soon the ship will drift in
ghostly eternal amid the strange tangle
of the circling Sargasso Sea.
Begad! Here there be monsters!