This might be my last contribution to Justine’s Tea Party. I suspect that when the lovely hostess sees my Tetra Pak take on the prompt, I will be kicked out of her party. Or not?
Month: Mar 2015
Poetry 101 Rehab: End
Do you miss the Writing 201: Poetry course by the Daily Post? Then join this blogging challenge, Poetry 101 Rehab, that will provide your poetry fix!
How it works
Each Monday at 01:00 pm UTC I will publish a poetry prompt along with my response to it. You are invited to answer the prompt, twist it or ignore it; write a poem of your own or share a poem by another author.
I would love to hear about your inspiration, your creative process or other poetry related thoughts, but this is no way obligatory. Nothing is obligatory in this challenge, the idea is to get together, talk poetry and have fun!
How You can Join
Anyone can participate, anytime you want. Publish your poetry post and add a link to it to the InLinkz link-up below my post, or share your link in a comment. Use the tag Poetry 101 Rehab, so we can find each other in the Reader.
I will act as your hostess, and I’ll be here for you to reply your comments, read your verses, like and comment. While my blog is the starting point for the challenge, do visit fellow poets in the link-up and chat to them on their blogs!
The Prompt: End
When sweetness turns sour
When kisses start to burn
Sentences lose meaning
Names no more endearing
That’s the end of it
The end
This week’s prompt is the END. I chose to interpret the topic from a negative angle, which is what I do; but you can just as easily approach the keyword from a positive perspective. While I’m writing about the end of a relationship, you can write, for instance, about the end of the winter – yay! What will your take on the keyword END be? Blog about it in a poetry post and share your link below!
From a Backyard to a Bedsit; or, Kidnapping My Cat
Two days after I had moved from a house in the country to a flat in the city, I concluded that it was time to move my cat. The poor little dear had remained in the backyard, not unattended but meowing plaintively as she sensed the universal nervousness surrounding my move. The idea was to return for her specifically once the boxes had been unpacked, because the prospect of me and the cat buried among boxes to start with and stressing out in unison didn’t strike me as particularly enticing.
On impulse – the impulse being me missing my cat and having the boxes all miraculously cleared out already – I got on the train back to the middle of nowhere to pick up my pet from our old place of residence. I was hoping I would be able to kidnap aka catnap her smoothly, planning only to say hello to the grandparents living on the ground floor. The top floor, occupied by my ex-husband and ex-occupied by me, should have been empty, as I expected the man to be out. He indeed had been out, which was confirmed when his car pulled up to the side of the road as I was walking from the train station to the house. I got in, wondering what my mother would say if she saw I disregarded her advice not to get in a car with a stranger.
My former spouse assumed by default that I had come to tidy up the minor havoc that was wreaked on his home as a result of me having moved half the household out. First I inquired where the bloody batteries were that used to be in the drawer and that I needed for my new clock. I received an indifferent shrug in response. That sparked in me the angry courage to announce, Well, okay, so cheers, I’ll just grab the cat and I’m off for the train. The man wasn’t pleased by my proposal to get my reward without getting any work done. He still let me catch my cat though, if not the train.
Before going, I stopped at the grandparents’. I fully expected the grandmother to offer me the usual slivovitz shot after I had spent five years of my life cohabiting with them. I wasn’t offered anything. Fair enough, let me freeze to death, you person, you, by refusing to provide me with internal heating in this frost. Shaking with disappointment and cold, I nearly got the wrong cat, the grandparents’ old blackie instead of my tabby kitty. They are obviously so easy to confuse.
My tabby enjoyed her transport box as little as I enjoyed dragging the sheer weight of her and the luggage all the way to the railway station. Just as I managed to the railroad crossing, the familiar formerly family car slowed down at the side of the road. I’m being stalked by my ex, how romantic, I thought as I crossed the road to meet him, reasoning that I might wish to avoid a public scene. On the other hand, we were just in front of the village pub, whose regulars would surely welcome an impromptu theatrical performance. They might even lose some coins as courtesy to the amateur actors.
The ex addressed me condescendingly: Don’t be stupid.
I said irritably: You mean “stop being stupid”.
He glared and glowered: Stop correcting me!
I retorted angrily: See, that’s why I’m divorcing you. You’re so bloody mean.
He stared in disbelief: Don’t be so bloody oversensitive.
I gave up, got in the car, thinking: You mean “stop being so bloody oversensitive”.
Etc. etc. etc. You get the idea.
Apparently, my divorced husband was willing to give me a lift home and was ready to do so even though I left his house in a post-apocalyptic condition. Possibly, the man is not as mean as I believe; but I’m so bloody oversensitive that I wouldn’t know. Focusing my attention on the cat, I stopped conversing pointlessly with the man and started to converse pointlessly with the cat. She had meanwhile turned into a Schrödinger’s Cat: I couldn’t tell if she was alive or dead because she grew quiet and it grew dark, so I could neither hear nor see anything.
After an hour of me worrying for both of our lives (mine and the cat’s, not so much the driver’s, except for considering that he might not drive safe if he were dead), we arrived at my home. Schrödinger’s Cat was carried upstairs and deschröndingerised by being moved from the dark to the light. The divorced man proceeded to take leave from the cat with such unprecedented affection that I needed to remind him that he doesn’t like pets in general and the cat in particular. Hurt, he insisted I was wrong. Offended, I insisted he was a bit late. Precisely one divorce court session late.
When the master left, it was time for the mistress to open the cage, or let the cat out of the bag. She seemed well settled in her box, as she probably already incurred the Stockholm Syndrome. Suddenly she leaped out, sniffing and surveying with her beady eyes, and then very slowly, waddling like a duck on the unaccustomed hardboard floor, she headed under the table to check out my modem. Satisfied with finding that there is a Wi-Fi connection, she retired in the closet and, indifferent to her changed surroundings, dozed off. What a cat.
Weekly Photo Challenge: Ephemeral
This photo represents the ephemerality of shadow in particular and life in general – notice the shadow of myself with a duck nested in my belly. In response to WordPress Weekly Photo Challenge: Ephemeral.
Eclectic Corner: Splash of Colour
I’m contributing with a splash colour to lovely Justine’s Eclectic Corner – I hope my splash qualifies, as post-editing saturation-wise was prohibited and so I was deprived of my favourite tool!
Spread Beauty Challenge
I was invited for a mission to Mars – more precisely, I was challenged by the blogger behind The Mission to Mars to join in the Spread Beauty Challenge. Here is how it works.
Rules
- Write ten six-word sentences containing the word beauty.
- Share your favourite quote on beauty.
- Nominate other bloggers to do the same.
Sentences
Beauty is me in the dark.
Beauty is me when I’m drunk.
Beauty is me when nobody looks.
Beauty is lost and found property.
Beauty is love, life and liberty.
I realise that I only produced five sentences, but I can’t be bothered bothering you with writing even more nonsense than this. You’re welcome.
Quote
“Beauty is truth, truth beauty, – that is all / Ye know on earth, and all ye need to know.”
These are the closing lines of John Keats’s poem “Ode on a Grecian Urn”. I have no idea what it means, but as an EngLit graduate, I’m obliged to be pretentiously smart.
Nominees
Ramblings of a College Introvert
You: Does the challenge appeal to you? Feel free to take the torch from here! The nomination is open.
Poetry 101 Rehab: Thaw
Do you miss the Writing 201: Poetry course by the Daily Post? Then join this blogging challenge, Poetry 101 Rehab, that will provide your poetry fix!
How it works
Each Monday at 01:00 pm UTC I will publish a poetry prompt along with my response to it. You are invited to answer the prompt, twist it or ignore it; write a poem of your own or share a poem by another author.
I would love to hear about your inspiration, your creative process or other poetry related thoughts, but this is no way obligatory. Nothing is obligatory in this challenge, the idea is to get together, talk poetry and have fun!
How You can Join
Anyone can participate, anytime you want. Publish your poetry post and add a link to it to the InLinkz link-up below my post, or share your link in a comment. Use the tag Poetry 101 Rehab, so we can find each other in the Reader.
I will act as your hostess, and I’ll be here for you to reply your comments, read your verses, like and comment. While my blog is the starting point for the challenge, do visit fellow poets in the link-up and chat to them on their blogs!
The Prompt: Thaw
Cold feet
That won’t get warm
Frozen heart
That will not thaw
Cold
Stiff
Dead
Like a corpse
On the slab
This week’s prompt is fresh and sprightly: THAW. My somewhat gloomy poem elaborates on the keyword in a figurative sense. You can do the same and describe what you associate with the word THAW. Or you can go for a literal meaning and talk about snow melting and spring coming to the northern hemisphere. What will your take on the keyword THAW be? Blog about it in a poetry post and share your link below!
Photo 101 Rehab: Street Life
It’s been a long and hard withdrawal time since my last visit to Lucile’s Photo 101 Rehab. Now I’m back with vengeance and with a street life photo. As always, the photo was shot with Nikon D80 and post-processed in Corel PaintShop with the following major edits:
- correcting the perspective
- enhancing sharpness, clarity and contrast
- applying a strong local tone mapping filter
- desaturating all colours except yellow
- using a dark vignette effect
Place
The cat doesn’t hate her new place.
TJ’s Household Haiku Challenge: Jug
A jug filled with wine
That turns in water and then
Becomes emptiness
This little haiku was written in response to TJ’s Household Haiku Challenge. The photo at the top of the post shows a jug which has no history yet – it is a new water jug that I just unpacked from its box and I’m starting to create its (hi)story.
Mara Eastern 